Every NHL team has a few trades they would love to have back, and the Ottawa Senators are no different. Looking back, the organization made two trades that saw them trade away talented young forwards far too early and watched them become stars somewhere else.
With that, let’s look at the two deals that didn’t age well for the Senators.
Pavol Demitra to the St. Louis Blues in 1996
If there is one trade Senators fans still shake their heads over, it's Pavol Demitra. Ottawa dealt the 21-year-old to the St. Louis Blues in November of 1996 for Swedish defenceman Christer Olsson after Demitra struggled to find a regular spot in the lineup. The problem was the Senators never really gave him enough time to figure things out.
Demitra wasted no time becoming one of the Blues' top offensive players, putting up three 30-goal seasons and finishing with 493 points in 494 games for the franchise. He eventually played more than 800 NHL games with stints with the Los Angeles Kings, Minnesota Wild and the Vancouver Cancuks and recorded 768 career points.
Meanwhile, Olsson appeared in just 25 games for Ottawa and record five points before heading back to Europe. It is one of those trades that looks worse every time you go back and revisit it.
Martin Havlat to the Chicago Blackhawks in 2006
The Martin Havlat trade is another one that is tough to defend. Especially when the return was Tom Preissing, Josh Hennessy, Michal Barinka, and a second-round pick (Patrick Wiercioch).
Coming off a season where he scored 13 points in 10 playoff games, Havlat was due for a new contract. Instead of working something out, Ottawa sent him and Bryan Smolinski to Chicago as part of a three-team trade that included the San Jose Sharks.
Preissing, who was the key piece of the return, gave the Senators a solid season during their run to the 2007 Stanley Cup Final. However, he only played one season and recorded 38 points. He went on to play a total of 326 games and scored 126 points.Â
Havlat, meanwhile, continued producing exactly the way many expected. He put up 161 points in 172 games with the Blackhawks and became an important piece of a young team that was on the rise. He went on to play for the Wild, Sharks, New Jersey Devils and Blues. Over his career, he had 594 points in 790 games.
It isn’t hard to figure out that the Senators made a terrible mistake parting with Havlat.Â
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