Like playground bullies circling daring each other to throw the first punch, the NHL Entry Draft on Sunday turned out to be a lot more hype than wheeling and dealing. There was one blockbuster trade early in the first round that offered promise, but it proved to be the only jaw dropper of the day.

As expected the draft presented some interesting dynamics as we saw Seth Jones fall to fourth and the Nashville Predators. The first goaltender of the day wasn’t taken until the Montreal Canadiens selected Zach Fucale with the 36th pick overall. In case you happened to wonder where Saku Salminen and Hampus Melen ended up, I’m guessing you weren’t, that would be at 184 (Tampa Bay) and 199 (Detroit) respectively.

The biggest news of the day came from the host New Jersey Devils. No, I don’t mean NHL 14 cover legend Martin Brodeur drafting his son, Anthony with the Devils’ final pick in round seven. New Jersey had the ninth pick of the opening round when it was announced that the Devils had traded their pick to the Vancouver Canucks for goaltender Cory Schneider.

Jaws collectively dropped across the NHL landscape as the Canucks had decided to solve their goaltending albatross/controversy by sending their starting goaltender to the Devils for the ninth pick in the 2013 draft. After giving Schneider the nod over Roberto Luongo at the start of the season, Canucks GM Mike Gillis dealt his 27-year old starter to the other side of North America.

Luongo, 34, who had done almost everything but void his own contract to get out of Vancouver, is now the starter. This trade makes sense to Gillis and Gillis alone. After playing coy to everyone, preaching patience to all, Gillis looks like he crapped the bed on this one. Luongo has a terrible contract and is seven years older than Schneider. After being given the starting job, Schneider was superb for the Canucks. Today, he was essentially traded for Bo Horvat whom the Canucks selected with their ninth pick.

There were a handful of other deals as Chicago purged some payroll, sending Stanley Cup hero David Bolland to Toronto and Michael Frolik to Winnipeg, each for draft picks. Tyler Kennedy was sent from Pittsburgh to San Jose for draft picks prior to the draft. Cal Clutterbuck and Nino Niederreiter swapped zip codes as the New York Islanders and Minnesota Wild gave each player a change of scenery.

So after dropping a blockbuster early into the draft, the trade winds fell relatively silent. Perhaps the audacious, one-sided nature of the Vancouver-New Jersey deal gave some general managers pause before they pulled the trigger on their own deals. Whatever the case may be, the 2013 NHL Draft came and went with fairly little fanfare. Expect the real fireworks later this week when free agency opens up.