The fact that Tlusty took a 1 year deal tells me that he wants to get paid. No doubt Carolina, after a sub-par year, offered him a longer team, lesser value deal.
He's most likely gone, unless he performs good enough that the bias achieved from watching him, night in and night out, which is greater in Tlusty's case as he does so many small, unnoticeable things extremely well, to push him over the edge that RF may want to keep him at the price he wants, but not enough to make other teams want to pay for him.
That threshold is unknown, but I think it ranges between very small and non-existent.
I'm loathe to loose another top-sixer, and I'm still a Tlusty fanboy, so I hope they retain him.
There are a few questions that Ron Francis needs to address;
--How far are the Hurricanes' from contention?
--Is this contention a consistent "one-and-done", or actual Stanley Cup contention (if you believe that anything can happen in the playoffs, this is irrelevant)?
--Can the Hurricanes' get there and remain there before Staal, Semin and Sekera start to decline?
The last is important, because while I believe, and it is reasonable to do so, that the Hurricanes are not far from the playoffs (though this can be extended to many teams in the League), the more burning question is if the Hurricanes' can get there before Semin and Staal begin to decline.
I think the 'Canes have a 5 year window before Semin and Staal pass from "useful overpaid vets" to "borderline useless". Realistically, if the Hurricanes' can get the pieces they need, they can compete and have a window for 3 years before they need to replace E. Staal and Semin's production.
A big cog in this is Marc Staal. If he goes to FA, there will be rumors that he is headed to Carolina in the offseason. Whether those are true or not don't matter at the deadline; it means that Carolina could realistically acquire him because they are the only players willing to pay the full price to New York. In short, they could add another top-4 defenseman, long term, for pieces that don't have an impact on the roster right now.