@Behind Enemy Lines
The other thread got locked with this one sprouting up. For the record, I didn't say you had rose colored glasses on. I said "others". I would have just flat out said you had them on if I was going to say that.
Fundamentally, we agree on alot of the same issues this team is plagued with and how Vegas played them. That's done and long over with now. But a GM who is serious about getting this team over the next two humps should not have looked at that series and thought "Bad breaks in the series got us. This roster is plenty good enough" when there were and still are massive, noticeable areas for upgrades even an average fan could see.
As I said previous, I'm not going give Holland any leeway outside of his first season. I believe it was off-season #2 when he had $30 million to play with and the team is no more near being a legitimate cup contender than when he was brought on. Smith, as much as I liked him, was aging. There were several good goalies on the market that year (Grubauer, Ullmark, Andersen) and he re-upped a nearly 40 year old Mike Smith before free agency even opened that offseason in '21 (Smith signed July 22nd, free agency was July 28th).
The Nurse contract, Campbell contract (which I was first in favor of), not trading Ceci and now Brown's deal (the way it's structured to affect next year's cap) and being the only move ge made this offseason, he's carpet bombed the cap just as bad as Chiarelli had and took $25 million of Katz's money in the process.
Detroit fans warned us about his handling of the cap and he didn't learn a thing. Capped out again and the only deals he can make are dollar in dollar out.
At some point, the McDavid-Draisaitl-Nurse-RNH bromance has to be broken up because if they are asked for any input on who to re-sign or bring in, then the inmates are truely running the asylum. I'd trade Nurse for another D-man to start and get out of that caphit for what he brings. He's our Huberdeau. For the record, I'm not advocating trading the top 2 guys, that would be asinine and I'd consider myself trolling at that point.