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But I’m starting to think if moving down and grabbing a top defenceman isn’t the single best move, it’s as strong a bet as drafting Tkachuk.

Where do No. 1 puck-moving d-men come from?

Edmonton needs a top defenceman, that crucial ingredient in almost all Stanley Cup-winning teams. Pittsburgh has Kris Letang. Chicago’s Cup winners had Duncan Keith. Boston had Zdeno Chara. Los Angeles had Drew Doughty. Detroit had Nicklas Lidstrom. Anaheim had Chris Pronger and Scott Niedermayer.

If you’re lucky, you can acquire that top d-man in a trade. If we look at the Top 30 puck-moving d-men in the NHL from 2014-16, we see that players like Brent Burns, Dustin Byfuglien, Keith Yandle, Nick Leddy, Alex Goligoski, Johnny Boychuk and Dougie Hamilton were all acquired in trades.

A few others — Ryan Suter, Jake Muzzin, Roman Josi and Mark Giordano — were signed on as free agents.

The largest number — Ryan McDonagh, Erik Karlsson, Oscar Klefbom, John Klingberg, T.J. Brodie, Tyson Barrie, P.K. Subban, Shea Weber, Justin Faulk, Duncan Keith, John Carlson, Andrei Markov — were taken with mid-to-low first round or lower round picks. So teams can get a good player with sharp scouting and draft day luck.

The only top puck-movers originally acquired with a Top 10 pick were Drew Doughty, Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Alex Pietrangelo, Suter, Hamilton and Aaron Ekblad, six out of the top 30. That’s not a huge number.

Edmonton took a shot on Darnell Nurse with the seventh overall pick in 2013, and while Nurse looks like he might well become a dynamic, aggressive and useful NHL d-man, he’s not on track to being a top puck mover. The key point, however, is thatNurse was never on track to be such a player.