The defense has to be upgraded in a few key ways.
1) Team defense. Hopefully with the addition of Tavares and some internal Marlies promotions and fresh legs, we have a team that brings better back pressure and team defense as a whole. This is more like the incremental improvement of having such a young team.
2) Internal improvement of existing blueliners. Hopefully Rielly has another gear, Zaitsev stabilizes and Dermott takes another leap in his development as a top 4 defenseman. Couple that with regression from Hainsey and you have a net improvement you can count on.
3) Internal promotion: hopefully one or two of Ozhiganov, Holl, Rosen, Borgman surprises as a viable NHL defenseman from the young pro stream of things.
4) Long term development: hopefully some combination of Sandin, Liljegren, Rasanen, Gordeev, Nielsen becomes the next Travis Dermott. Longer term approach but the upside is whomever we get here will likely be on a cheap ELC for a while.
5) UFA Rental/Trade. I'm thinking it could be someone like Tyler Myers or a Justin Faulk. For whatever reason these guys might be available, either contractual or team surplus. We can throw the full weight of trading any combination of Brown, Kapanen, Leivo, Johnsson, Grundstrom, Korshkov, 1st rounder, other prospects for them, or something much more modest, depending on whom the target is. Basically the McDonagh trade.
6) Nuclear option: one of Marner or Nylander, either by cap situation, contract demand or whatever other factor forces us to deal from a position of strength for a stud blueliner, or package of assets that allows us to trade for a superstar defenseman.