Ryan McDonagh Dealt to Lightning: Trade Winners and Losers

We like to manifest reunions here between players and teams where they either started their careers or had their greatest success. The Tampa Bay Lightning and Nashville Predators helped us scratch that itch on Tuesday.

The Lightning re-acquired defenseman Ryan McDonagh and a 2024 fourth-round pick (via Edmonton) from the Predators for Tampa Bay's 2025 second-round pick and a 2024 seventh-rounder.

McDonagh previously helped lead the Lightning to back-to-back Stanley Cup titles in 2020 and 2021. He's always been a steadying force on the blue line, as the Lightning know well. After all, they're the team that traded him to Nashville in July 2022.

In the past two seasons, McDonagh continued to be a solid player and was vital in helping lead the Predators back to the playoffs this year. But make no mistake: This trade will have a significant impact on what happens with both teams for the upcoming season and beyond.

Who won? Who lost? What else could shake loose? Let's figure all of that out here.

It's always nice to go home, right? For a player, there's nothing more comforting than returning to a team and a city where their career hit the highest of highs. Such is the case with McDonagh going back to Tampa.

For four-and-a-half seasons, McDonagh and Victor Hedman anchored the Lightning blue line and gave them one of the most formidable defensive units in the NHL. McDonagh's aggressiveness with and without the puck and his ability to do a lot of dirty work around the net made him a key player in the Lightning's back-to-back Stanley Cup championships.

What's more comforting is that he returns to the Lightning with a ton of his old teammates still holding it down. From Hedman to Andrei Vasilevskiy to Brayden Point and beyond, fitting into the mix won't be a problem. Even more impressive is how he'll help round out Tampa Bay's top four on defense with Hedman, Mikhail Sergachev and Erik Černák.

Here's to hoping McDonagh hasn't sold his house in the Tampa area to help make moving that much easier.

If you noticed Steven Stamkos' name missing from the reunion list, that was on purpose. Because...just what is going to happen with the Lightning captain?

Stamkos can become an unrestricted free agent on July 1, and alarm bells went up before this season when Stamkos opened training camp sharing that he and the team had yet to start talks about a new contract. Since then, questions about his future in Tampa have loomed, and they continue to do so.

Bringing McDonagh back comes at a cost. His $6.75 million cap hit will be on the books for the next two seasons, and the Lightning were already looking at needing to do some financial gymnastics to figure out a way to get Stamkos back into the fold.

At Tuesday's press conference about the trade, general manager Julien BriseBois sounded calm and cool about the situation:

How are they going to make it happen, though? According to CapFriendly, the Lightning have just over $5 million in cap space. If Stamkos takes a team-friendly hometown deal, it would make BriseBois' life much easier, but this is likely Stamkos' last chance to cash in for a sizable amount.

Stamkos seems happy in Tampa and is the face of the franchise, as he has been for a long time now. But if the Lightning want to bring him back and make other additions, they'll need to make hard decisions elsewhere on their roster, which complicates their offseason even more.

The flipside to the Lightning taking back McDonagh and creating a bigger salary-cap headache for themselves is the Predators have again cleared the books to make a monster move of their own.

If you're thinking about Mitch Marner and the Toronto Maple Leafs, you're not alone.

Every dollar counts in Nashville. Ensuring they can have some freedom to wheel and deal is important. Subtracting McDonagh's $6.75 million cap hit gave the Predators more than $26 million in cap space this summer, according to CapFriendly.

What does Nashville need? Scoring. Filip Forsberg can do a lot, but asking him to do it all is too much.

What do they have a surplus of? Goaltending.

Juuse Saros is a Vezina-caliber netminder with a year left on his contract and staring at becoming an unrestricted free agent next summer. The Predators also have top prospect Yaroslav Askarov ready to take over the NHL as he dominates in the AHL.

If the Preds build a blockbuster trade around Saros and Marner, it could solve a few issues for both teams. Toronto would get a no-doubt No. 1 goalie in Saros, while Nashville would get a star player to wheel with Forsberg and create problems for the rest of the Western Conference. The nearly $6 million in added cap cost for Nashville could be weathered easily, and the Leafs saving that much money to add a top goalie seems ideal.

It makes sense in theory and on paper, but reality has a way of getting in the way of a great fantasy trade idea. But the logic makes sense, especially for Toronto, who is desperate to make a deep run in the playoffs.

After re-adding McDonagh and limiting their salary-cap space to just over $5 million for the offseason, the Lightning are now staring down a difficult offseason.

Stamkos' contract situation will jump to the forefront. Is there any way for the Lightning to bring him back given the limited cap space at their disposal? It seems unlikely, but hockey finances often have fascinating twists and turns.

If they do bring back Stamkos, who would they trade to free up cap space and allow them to make the necessary additions to stay in contention for a Cup?

Would the Lightning consider moving two-way center Anthony Cirelli, who's entering the second year of his eight-year, $50 million ($6.5 million cap hit) extension? His no-trade protections don't kick in for a few more years, and teams in search of high-end depth up the middle (Buffalo? Boston? Carolina? Chicago? Utah?) might clamor for him.

Would Nick Paul and his $3.5 million cap hit along with his gritty play be attractive to other contenders in the league? That seems possible, but if the Lightning are paring down their roster, wouldn't they prefer to keep Paul around?

The Lightning now have some tough decisions to make this summer in the wake of this deal.