Other teams are trying to improve by acquiring players from other teams, which in turn weakens those teams.
Tampa isn't any better than last year.
Florida lost several players.
Buffalo didn't make any significant moves.
It's unclear what Detroit accomplished.
We've added forward depth, a top-four right defenseman, rounded out our defense for a more balanced look, and brought in a Vezina winner. It's hard to say we haven't improved.
Many were excited and got used to the big names we acquired over the past two years, such as DeBrincat, Chychrun, and Korpisalo, believing that these moves made us a playoff team. In reality, the team needed better support players who complemented what we already had.
The same people who predicted playoffs and lauded the big moves by Dorion are now upset that we didn't give up huge assets for big names that only added more offense and poor defense. Those same moves that have put this organization behind years in terms of assets and cap structure.
Tampa is still much better than we are.
Boston is still much better than we are.
Florida is much much better than we are.
Toronto is still much better than we are.
Detroit is about on par with us, but they were ahead of us in the standings and it's hard to believe they'll regress with all that youth.
Buffalo sucks forever.
Habs are rebuilding but doing it the right way.
Look, Perron is cool but he's not an offensive star anymore, and Amadio is a fourth liner on a good team who had his numbers inflated being with Vegas. Jensen is an aging, slowing dman who might look decent but is he really that much better than Chychrun at this point? Barely.
And once again I'm forced to bring up all the question marks in Norris, Pinto, Chabot and the new HC. None of them are close to sure things.
Ullmark is the big addition and might get us out of the bottom 10 on his own.
I predict we finish somewhere around 18th and 23rd in the league unless a miracle happens.
The bolded is 3 pieces of the core though. They are question marks, but lets be honest, if those guys aren't in the lineup and contributing, it's hard to argue the team isn't going to have trouble. They will. That's just the position they're in with 16+ mil + Pinto's upcoming salary locked in to those guys.
Won't ever deny how Dorion f***ed the team over with so many big contracts, but does this mean we should just accept futility for the next 2-3 years?