Do you honestly think spending $21 million that could be spent to actually improve our team is a good idea?
Well first of all, swapping Cam Ward for Hiller is a wash at worst. At best it gets you a goaltender who's led teams to conference finals and even won a Conn Smythe. It's only a year either way, which is the buffer period Ortio will need to settle into whatever role he earns for himself.
So it really comes down to Raymond + 15th VS Semin + 5th.
Mitch Marner or Ivan Provorov are players who will probably perform right at the start of their contracts for what you're essentially paying Semin.
It'd require a little bit of playing with flexibility or buyouts in the 16-17 season only because of Engelland/Smid/Bollig/Semin all being under contract, but the players we're talking about are the kind of impact players Gaudreau, Brodie, and Monahan have been for us.
Sure, you're getting a pretty good player @ 15 who might make the NHL, might even be a middle 6er or a top 4D. But you'd getting a dynamite-impact player in the top 7 of the draft (i.e. the list I posted earlier in this thread) that when combined with other prospects propels us to contender status within a year. And then you can consider that while Semin is coming off a bad year, he's still one of the better snipers in the whole league, and a big righty-handed RW who's always been a quality possession forward. If Hartley could revive the careers of guys like Marc Savard, he's probably your best bet for reviving Semin.
The thing to really note is that the Hurricanes, for whatever reason, are just an team that really struggles to score - think Kings East. The Flames are the opposite, we get grade A chances out the wazoo especially when Johnny's on the ice. If anyone could turn Semin back into a 30+ goal scorer, it's Gaudreau.
On its own, bad contract for sketchy player.
With top 7 pick (Top 5 in the case of the Hurricanes), just average it out with the expected production of the pick and the production of Semin and split it down the middle.
Guys like Marner and Provorov might have gone first overall in other drafts (these are Patrick Kane or Duncan Kieth type talents).