Three NHL Trade Deadline Sellers That Should Bounce Back Next Season

NHL trade deadline season highlighted a few teams punting on their seasons.

The Florida Panthers, Toronto Maple Leafs, Winnipeg Jets, Washington Capitals and others hope that potentially missing the playoffs this season will be a one-off, and they can be great teams again next season.

This season, the Boston Bruins are proof that retooling and making your roster younger while preparing for the future can be effective.

Last season, the Bruins traded away pieces, such as Brad Marchand, Brandon Carlo and Charlie Coyle.

Despite missing the playoffs that year and losing some key players in trades, they were able to execute a quick turnaround in one year. Now, they're back in the playoff mix, hanging on to the final wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference.

Here are three teams that seem to be out of this year's playoff race, but certainly could be back next season with a few tweaks and a fresh campaign.

The Florida Panthers really don't need to change much next season. Based on the few notable moves they made ahead of the trade deadline, GM Bill Zito understands that.

While all teams deal with injuries each season, the Panthers lost arguably two of their most important skaters for a chunk of this season. Left winger Matthew Tkachuk made his season debut for Florida on Jan. 19, missing the first half of the year recovering from surgery for a sports hernia and torn adductor muscle.

Not to mention, captain Aleksander Barkov is missing the entire campaign after suffering a torn ACL and MCL in his right knee during training camp. With the new playoff cap, Zito was unable to replace those players, expecting Tkachuk to eventually return and hoping Barkov would come back for the post-season.

However, it looks like they won't even get that far, thanks to the poor start the team had this year.

When the team is healthier next season, all signs should point to the back-to-back Stanley Cup champions getting into the playoffs again.

It was a surprise to see the reigning Presidents' Trophy winners, the Winnipeg Jets, fall so far just one year later.

They went from finishing as the best team in the NHL during the 2024-25 regular season to being one of the league's worst teams. Before Monday's games, the Jets sat in 27th and are five points out of the playoffs. There is still a sliver of hope to make the post-season this year with a weak Western Conference, but the chances are slim.

GM Kevin Cheveldayoff traded away defensemen Luke Schenn and Logan Stanley to the Buffalo Sabres. The departure of those two blueliners suggests the Jets are ready to focus on bouncing back next season.

They still have an elite core of Kyle Connor, Mark Scheifele, Josh Morrissey and Connor Hellebuyck, and they'll take another crack at it next year.

Also, look out for Cole Perfetti. If he can be healthy and get back to performing the way he did last year, Winnipeg will be back.

They won't require many more retooling moves, but a tweak or two will get them to where they need to be.

This has been an extremely disappointing season for the Toronto Maple Leafs, to say the least. They went from being Atlantic Division champions last year to being a selling team at this year's trade deadline.

This hasn't been the scene in Toronto for almost a decade. The Leafs have made the post-season for the last nine years, ever since captain Auston Matthews was drafted in 2016.

The loss of Mitch Marner doesn't seem to help, and there's a chance that this will be Craig Berube's last season as the team's coach. The Maple Leafs haven't even won a game since returning from the Olympic break.

While they're on a rapid downward spiral, they still have the likes of Auston Matthews and William Nylander in their primes. Veteran John Tavares and young star Matthew Knies continue to do well.

They also have a pair of solid goaltenders in Joseph Woll and Anthony Stolarz, along with 24-year-old Dennis Hildeby in the system.

Even the coach of Toronto's division rival, Tampa Bay Lightning bench boss Jon Cooper, believes the team will be back in contention next season.

"They have a fabulous core still there of players," Cooper told reporters over the weekend. "It's a team that is probably in a situation it has been in for a while and probably won't be again next year. If they don't make (the playoffs), this is probably going to be a one-off for them because they got a good group."

The state of the Maple Leafs certainly won't fix itself, and GM Brad Treliving will have to pull this roster from out of the mud. But there is a world where Toronto gets back into the post-season next year and beyond.

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