In terms of 'building a future roster' and anticipating where we are with the prospect cabinet, the big issue looming on the horizon is familiar to us as NYR fans- We have a lot of good middle-6 and 2nd-3rd pair prospects in the pipeline, but no real top pairing or 1st line hopefuls save Chytil.
So we could feasibly be in a situation again where we have lots of good players like Dubi, Cally, Stepan, Staal, Anisimov, ect that fill out the roster with depth, but are in need of trading for other team's disgruntled stars or reaching out in free agency to get 'true' starpower.
Most of the teams that have been the most successful have drafter their first liners and top pairing dmen. Pittsburgh drafted Letang, Crosby, Malkin. They brought in Kessel and Hornqvist as complements. Chicago drafted Kane, Keith, Toews, Schmaltz. LA drafted Doughty and Kopitar. There are not many examples of cup winning teams in recent years who havent had a substantial portion of their top starpower and core being developed from within.
So the question for NYR is how do they get ahold of the much coveted 'blue chippers,' who can handle the true bulk of the load while the rest of the roster becomes well above average role players, instead of having to force role players into star roles like we've done previously with Staal, Dubinsky, ect. We've done well so far but this team really needs to score big with a Tarasenko or an Erik Karlsson type steal in the mid-to-late first round. Either that or win the lottery.