Stars open to trading veteran winger

The Stars are open to the possibility of dealing winger Mason Marchment, reports David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period. It’s a more palatable avenue to clear cap space this summer than moving star left-winger Jason Robertson, who Dallas has at least considered including in talks in the weeks since their elimination in the Western Conference Final.

Marchment, who turns 30 in a week, is coming off one of the better seasons of his career. He scored 22-25–47 with a +15 rating over 62 appearances in 2024-25. While he missed significant time due to a facial fracture and subsequent surgery, that was his best goal-scoring work on a per-game basis for his career at 0.35 and his second-best season in the points department at 0.76.

The left-shot winger has averaged 21 goals and 51 points per 82 games over his six-year NHL career. Injuries are a legitimate concern, having only hit the 80-game mark once, but he’s one of the more consistently effective middle-six wingers in the league when healthy, both offensively and physically. Checking in at 6’5″ and 212 lbs, he’s a willing fighter and frequent hitter while also serving as one of the more efficient per-minute point producers of the last few years.

His possession impacts leave a little more to be desired. His raw numbers look fine, but become more concerning when put in context, considering he’s spent the majority of his NHL career with a pair of strong 5-on-5 teams in Florida and Dallas. They’re not huge drawbacks – he’s averaged a -0.2 relative CF% at even strength over his career while receiving semi-favorable offensive zone deployment – but his reputation defensively likely outweighs reality a little bit.

Nonetheless, his $4.5MM cap hit provides great value to the Stars. That’s almost never a deal a championship-contending club would be looking to move, but as detailed at length, the Stars simply don’t have a path toward cap compliance next season without making a salary dump. They have under $5MM in projected space with seven roster spots to fill, meaning they’d essentially have to sign only league-minimum players this summer while letting all of their pending free agents walk.

Salary cap considerations are essentially the sole motivator behind considering moving Marchment, a pending UFA starting July 1, and Robertson, a pending RFA starting July 1. They each have one year left on their contracts and would normally have their resources devoted toward extension discussions in a few weeks, but without a chance of recouping any cost-effective assets in a deal involving overpaid defenders Mathew Dumba and Ilya Lyubushkin, it appears general manager Jim Nill is looking to part ways with a player with higher trade value to try and land a cheap contributor as part of the return.

Marchment would obviously have a much lower return and asking price than Robertson, a first-line fixture who’s posted 80 points in back-to-back seasons following his 109-point breakout in 2022-23. Parting ways with the former would also have a much less transformative impact on their forward group next season. Still, if they get the right deal for the latter, it may make sense. Extending Robertson, who will presumably cost at least his $9.3MM qualifying offer per season to re-sign on a multi-year deal, would give Dallas seven players making over $8MM per season in the summer of 2026, when they need to work out a new deal for star defenseman Thomas Harley.