I got to agree... I think trading guys like Dumba and Vatanen on the open market (and possibly even retaining salary to make the deal work) would have fetched more than what they ended up with. Same with Strome/Nelson from NYI.
Although I think I get where LV is coming from - just stockpiling draft picks, because they realize they're gonna suck for the near future, so there's no point in getting players who are good now, but will be FA's in 1,2 or 3 years and might not want to re-sign with the terrible Knights.
They already traded away a couple of Dmen selected in the expansion draft too.