TOO BAD THE GM CAN'T TRADE HIMSELF...

That Larry Mavety, he sure can bang the dent out of a fender.

The difference between the moves the Kingston Frontenacs GM-for-life has made of late and real progress is akin to the difference between being an auto wrecker and building a custom car. All Mavety is really doing is salvage work from the damage done by his own poor drafts.

It's just not possible in the OHL to trade your way from the outhouse to the penthouse; you do it through drafting. Fire Larry Mavety posted some numbers on this last night: Would you believe that the Frontenacs have only one of their past four first-round picks still on the roster, while their division rivals in Belleville, Oshawa and Ottawa each have at least three still in their lineups?

There's nothing bad about moving defenceman Ben Shutron and goalie Jason Guy to Kitchener and London, respectively. It got the Frontenacs a younger defenceman (Corbin Crawford, picked up in an earlier deal) and a rookie goalie, Mavric Parks, who's from the Ottawa area.

Getting Parks is great. He has two more years in the OHL after this season, so that makes it less likely Mavety will blow another high draft choice on a goalie (see Daryl Borden in 2005). The Frontenacs are getting a good one; of course, that's what people who cover the league said about Guy last season, and Borden the year before.

The big picture is that the Frontenacs will be lost until they have a management structure that leads to better drafting and development. They don't have that, which means they're doomed to stay in the bottom half of the conference standings.

Related:
Frontenacs trade Shutron, Guy (Doug Graham, Kingston Whig-Standard)
Mason a Ranger (Jeff Hicks, Kitchener-Waterloo Record)