Dallas Stars News: Pittsburgh Penguins Trade Jamie Oleksiak To Stars

The Dallas Stars made another move in the trade market on Monday afternoon, reacquiring defenseman Jamie Oleksiak from the Pittsburgh Penguins. In return, they sent the Penguins their old 2019 fourth-round pick. As a result, it’s almost as if the initial trade never happened.

On Dec. 19, 2017, the Dallas Stars made a move that seemed inevitable. The Stars traded defenseman Jamie Oleksiak to the Pittsburgh Penguins in exchange for a conditional 2019 fourth-round pick.

The move was more numbers-based than anything for Dallas. As they entered the 2017-18 season, the Stars had an overstocking of defensemen on their NHL roster and spent the first two months struggling to keep their blue line balanced. Some players were used in a variety of fashions while others were left relatively unused and confined to the press box on most game nights.

Waiving Patrik Nemeth a few days before opening night and seeing him claimed by the Colorado Avalanche was the first step. But Oleksiak was the move that seemingly solved the problem.

Oleksiak, now 26, had been in and out of the Stars lineup since the 2013 lockout-shortened season. He provided a handful of positives to a consistently shifting Dallas blue line, but never found a way to solidify his starting spot. That came as a disappointment, especially considering Oleksiak was a first-round pick by the Stars in the 2011 NHL Draft.

More from Blackout Dallas

So, while shipping him off for a pick wasn’t easy, it was something that the Dallas Stars needed to do.

But here we are 405 days later, and Jamie Oleksiak is a Star once again. On Monday afternoon, the Stars announced that they had reacquired the defenseman in exchange for the same pick that Pittsburgh had sent to Dallas in December. So, in one theory, it’s as if the trade never happened. The Stars never got the chance to spend the draft pick and Oleksiak spent one year of his career up north.

But, on the other hand, this trade does come with certain aftereffects. For one, Oleksiak is a more developed starter now. He started in 47 games for the Penguins last year, earned a three-year extension (he’ll make an AAV of $2,137,500 through the 2020-21 season), and has played in 36 contests with Pittsburgh this year. In those contests, he scored four goals and tallied 11 points along with a +5 rating. In his time with Dallas, he never posted a rating above zero in a given season.

Oleksiak is a big body, as Stars fans probably remember. At 6’7, 255 lb., he’s known as an aggressive, defensive defenseman that racks up hits and blocked shots and can also play the role of enforcer.

This move directly correlates with filling the void that has been left by the absence of Marc Methot (knee) and Stephen Johns (post-traumatic headaches). Both are big-bodied defenders that use their weight to their advantage, but neither have been able to consistently impact the Dallas blue line this season. Johns has yet to skate in a regular season game and has no definitive timetable for a return and Marc Methot just had season-ending surgery to repair a cartilage defect in his left knee. The surgery cuts his season short at nine games and a -3 rating.