I'm not trying to be critical of Stan outside of a box. The guy is phenomenal. He mentioned he had to trade our 2 top D prospects to make the moves of Saad and Sharp.
In my opinion this off-season has been another work of genius already, with minor details of Versteeg/Bickell to tie the bow. He did something unfathomable, which is to lose Saad and Sharp as well as 2 FA loan centers,
yet I think he may be bringing back a better team in 2015 than started the season in 2014 depending on a bunch of young players (Panarin, Dano, Teuvo, Garbutt, Kruger, Morin, McNeil, Danault, Hartman, Nordstrom, Comiskey, Pokka, Forsling, Haggerty, Hob Goblin) to step up and become even better hockey players than they were in 2014/15 and fill out nicely around our amazing core.
He also solidified 2C for 4-5 years, and together with Teuvo our core is nearly as strong today as it was last year even if none of the mentioned players make it to a winning playoff hockey level.
I think I am the only one that loved the signing of Runblaad. I see some offensive handling things in him besides the shot and a big tough body.
Daley makes up for Oduya and it will be really interesting to see how he fairs as a blackhawk. Daley has been asked to do much more in the past for Dallas than he needs to now, and his offensive skill is going to be a nice boost to our forwards.
If I had to guess, Stan was grooming the 2 big young defenders to replace Seabrook, but Q/Stan have decided there isn't any replacing Seabs. He is untouchable and can go nowhere. Or at least I hope that is what it means. Given that, he decided to jettison his enforcer defender replacements with less offensive skill upside in favor of our Blackhawk system defenders with offensive skill. Seabs/Hammer/Keith provide the defensive stability and are better suited paired with a Daley Runblaad than adding more penalty minutes in the box that Johns gives you.
I'm slightly concerned we have empowered Dallas too greatly, and will have to handle them ourselves now, seeing a nightmare at every turn of events. Niemi/Sharp/Johns/Oduya
Niemi alone may have made Dallas formidable. Now we are going to have an irritated young bruiser taking shots at our forwards, and Sharp finding his legs every time he plays us. You don't need to be Cassandra to know these events will happen.
