Your statement is highly contextual.
Not winning the lottery changes the dynamic substantially. Absent Laine we're quite likely to have only pulled in Connor as a rookie forward and his development arc would have very likely paralleled Ehlers development with a start on the third line, eventually moving up to the top six should he follow a similar development line. Absent Laine we actually need to have Stafford for our roster as a top six player. Certainly he's an imperfect forward but we didn't exactly have a ton of guys filling the net on a regular basis. Stafford did that and did it reasonably well. He's not the greatest on defense perhaps but there are no guarantees that either Laine or Connor are going to be exceptional in that manner in their rookie seasons either. We might all speculate and hope that they'll bring more to the table than Stafford but it is entirely within the realm of possibility that both are more of a defensive liability than Stafford has been in the past, especially as rookies. Their ceilings both offensively and defensively might be higher but they've proven precisely nothing at this point.
I don't consider the signing of Stafford as neutral or negative. When he was signed there was no indication we'd get an offensive phenom at #2 OA. I consider it a slight overpay to get a shorter term. That term to me is looking just slightly off ideal. Should Laine or Connor (both) have Ehlers-like seasons then Stafford becomes a luxury item that expires at the end of the year. He might have negative tendencies/trends in certain aspects of his game, but now that we have Laine we all seem to think of him (Stafford) as some sort of Devin Setoguchi clone and that's not accurate. However if Laine and/or Connor disappoint to an extent we'll likely be thankful to have a veteran top six presence that can score.
I respectfully disagree that Stafford isn't a winning part of that trade. Initially he was just a rental that was helpful. Last season he was third in goals on a team that badly needed goal scoring. This season it appears he'll be a luxury we don't need. That's a good place to be but outside of winning that second slot in the lottery we're drafting Tkachuk-Keller-Nylander-Sergachev, all of whom are likely headed back to their junior leagues.
Bogosian-Myers is a rub to me. Kane appears the better player overall of the remaining but the headaches and teams disruption are absolutely worth what appears to a 2.25 season acquisition that was needed (Stafford), what looks to be going forward a 3rd line winger (Armia) that exceeds much of what we've played the last five years on the 3rd line and a 1st round pick (Roslovic) that appears to be a very reasonable shot at a middle six player. That's three roster players, two that might be with the Jets for the long run all to off-load a player with "issues" that his teammates didn't like? No, that's a clear win, even though we gave up the best player.
. I don't know how many years we will have to wait to see the stars align like this again.
