Detroit Red Wings trade for Kailer Yamamoto and Klim Kostin

The Detroit Red Wings got busy on draft day. While they have continued to make their picks as the draft went on, the team was also fielding calls from opposing teams. When it comes to the Red Wings second rounders, there was a brief pause in their stretch of three back-to-back-to-back picks; it was not a trade of draft picks but rather players.

An old friend of the Detroit Red Wings and former General Manager (GM) Ken Holland, phoned Steve Yzerman and his crew. The Oilers and Red Wings were ultimately able to strike up a deal, or at least lay the groundwork for it.

The Detroit Red Wings have acquired forwards Kailer Yamamoto and Klim Kostin from the Edmonton Oilers in exchange for future considerations.

It sounds like Kostin and Yamamoto will be able to jump into the Red Wings organization and bring some immediate impact to the organization. There are plenty of reasons to be excited about this deal, even without fully knowing the return.

Detroit Red Wings trade for Kailer Yamamoto and Klim Kostin.

Yamamoto has been an underutilized part of the Oilers’ offense. He showed lots to like while playing on the top line with Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl but was buried in the bottom six as of late. The 24-year-old is a former first-round pick, and the Red Wings will look to get some value out of him.

Yamamoto played in 58 games with ten goals and 15 assists for 25 total points for the Oilers last season. His career best is 20 goals, and 21 assists for 41 total points over 81 games. So there’s reason to be interested in Yamamoto.

He’s under contract for the 2023-24 season with a $3.1 million cap hit before he becomes an arbitration-eligible restricted free agent. It will allow the Red Wings to see if he can pan out and be part of the team Yzerman is building.

The other player who was part of this contract was Klim Kostin. The 24-year-old forward is a restricted free agent this off-season who is arbitration-eligible. The Red Wings seem to believe they can bring in Kostin as a depth addition in the bottom six.

The Red Wings have to be excited about this deal, being able to bring in two forwards. After all, the free-agent market is thin this year, so finding a trade like this might actually pan out well. Kostin was just brought in from St. Louis before the 2021-22 season.

In 57 games, Kostin scored 11 goals and ten assists for 21 total points for the Oilers. Now it’s super early to see how this will pan out. However, the Red Wings faithful should be interested to see how this pans out for the team.