The list of questionable moves from general manager Lou Lamoriello got a bit longer Monday when the team placed forward Austin Czarnik on waivers. The Seattle Kraken snatched him a day later.

The truth is the Islanders didn’t really have a choice. The team was able to stash Czarnik on injured reserve for a few games once Kyle Palmieri returned from injury, but couldn’t keep him there. The Islanders had to trim their roster down to 21 players, and Czarnik was lower on the totem pole than Kieffer Bellows, Sebastian Aho and Ross Johnston.

But the fact the Islanders were willing to waive Czarnik — who has two goals and five points in 11 games this season — and not Kyle Palmieri — who only has one goal and seven points this season — is preposterous.

The latter has arguably been the most disappointing player on the team this season. The Islanders gave him a hefty $20 million deal last summer after he scored seven goals in last year’s playoffs. That was despite only scoring two goals and four points in 17 regular season games after the Islanders acquired him at the 2021 trade deadline. Unless he can prove fans wrong in the last 3.5 years of his contract, re-signing him was a mistake.

Czarnik was playing like a younger version of Leo Komarov this season. He was a great penalty killer who head coach Barry Trotz could slot anywhere in his lineup on any given night. That, on top of his minuscule salary cap hit ($750 thousand on an expiring contract) and impressive scoring rate (albeit a small sample size), was more than enough for a struggling Seattle team to take a chance on him.

Any team who would’ve claimed Palmieri off waivers would’ve been undertaking a tremendous risk. It would limit what that team could do at the trade deadline, with that albatross contract weighing it down for over three years. The Islanders could’ve sent Palmieri to Bridgeport, hoped he’d find his game, and brought him back up if he did.

That’s precisely what the Dallas Stars did. They sent goalie Anton Khudobin, who led the team to the Stanley Cup Final in 2020 and had a 12-11-7 record a season ago, to the minors after early-season struggles. Goalies Braden Holtby and Jake Oettinger were playing much better and the team didn’t want to carry around three goalies. Khudobin has a 2-4-0 record with the AHL’s Texas Stars along with a 2.55 GAA and a .903 SV%.

Meanwhile, Oettinger, the 26th overall pick in the 2017 NHL Draft, has rewarded his team’s trust in him. He has an 11-5-0 record with a 2.53 GAA and a .912 SV%. Holtby has been an okay backup too.

The Stars hardly cared about Khudobin’s resume or the no-trade clause on his contract, but rather about the team’s overall performance. They’re four points out of the final wild card spot in the Western Conference. The Islanders could glean some lessons from the Stars so they don’t make this mistake again in what has been a season to forget.

Ben Baruch

Born and raised on Long Island. Isles fan since 2009. Studying journalism at the University of Maryland, College Park.