It still makes no sense to me. I understand the Nash trade was made before the lockout, and I realize that most - if not all - hockey experts/analysts did not expect the drastic cap shrinking we saw coming out of the lockout, so that changed the cap structure considerably, but, ignoring what I think about Gaborik, I just fail to see the logic of wanting to basically take Columbus' "core", add it to Lundqvist, Callahan, and Stepan, and roll for the future.
Change is a part of sports, that's fine, but the players now "central" to our near and long-term success are not better than they were at 1 PM yesterday. I loved the trade for Clowe, and I still do.
The other thing is, I think most agree, even myself as a Gaborik fan, that this team is a flawed core, a bad fit, be it coach, skill sets, whatever. The problem there is, if the Clowe move is to "shake it up" the Gaborik move is to make it so we can keep it together, without even seeing how it all worked. If Clowe works and we need to re-sign him and extend Stepan, McDonagh, and Hagelin (though, it's arguable with out depth on the blue line, an offer sheet for McDongah might not have been the worst thing in the world to come our way, but that's a different discussion), then there are pieces to trade and/or amnesty. Richards, Girardi, Staal, Gaborik. Buyouts, LTIR, trades. All could create the space necessary to sign the RFAs.
Or, looking at it another way, would this trade still be on the table at the draft? If the answer is yes - and I think it is - then we did ourselves a disservice given our stated goal of winning a cup and the talent that, at least on paper, made that goal plausible.
Nash was a childhood hero for me, but adding three players that I'm fond of really makes me want to cheer for the Rags. Can't wait to be in the East next year.
Let's not add another group.
