BTW, I count six players in our lineup tonight who would clear waivers: Ryan, Stempniak, Rask, DiGiuseppe, Nordstrom and Darling. In year four of a five-year rebuild plan, I can't think of many things more humiliating than that. Five of our 12 forwards wouldn't make any other team in the league. Think about that.
While that does indeed suck, in 12/13, shortly before RF took over, we had way more than that: Here's the list of guys that played at least 30 / 48 games that season: Corvo, Dwyer, Harrison, Gleason, McBain, Sanginetti, Bowman, Westgarth, LaRose, Brent, Wallace (28 games). On top of that, we had Semin (bought out 2 years later), Jokinen (did pass through waivers that 12/13 season), Ruutu (lucky to get rid of him by retaining salary), Gleason (bought out the following season by Toronto), Tlusty (not a regular NHLr 2 years later).
The vast majority of that team was out of the NHL a year or two later. The ONLY guys from that team 5 years ago still in the NHL today? Staal, Staal, Skinner, Faulk, Riley Nash, and Cam Ward.