Good for you. I don't buy that they are on the up and up just because they may grab a player who makes them better. The team in general is full of holes, and we are still waiting for the youngsters currently in the NHL to fill those holes. So far Larkin is the only one close.
Seeing this discussion go back and forth, my guess would be this is a disagreement on perspective. You are sitting here in the here and now and saying "look at all the holes, any addition to the team can't fill all the holes and making it to the playoffs would not be representative of the state of the team at this moment" and the counter is looking at it from the perspective of "if we are making pick ups that make the team better and we are slotting in our new players along with the continued improvement of the current (young) roster players, then we are finding ourselves pressing to make the playoffs, regardless of how far we can get." Both are potentially valid scenarios.
If we fall into a trap year where Abdelkader becomes a 40-45 point guy and Nyquist finds a new gear to score 30 and Nielsen regains his offensive ability to the point where Holland makes the decision to hold the course at the deadline instead of selling, then we are looking at probably the former scenario. One year where we are playing way above the expectations would just throw a hurdle in the middle of acquiring better prospects, via deadline deals and the draft.
If we have a year where we see Larkin put up 70+ points, and Mantha score 30+ goals, and Rasmussen acclimates himself to the pro game quickly, and Hronek can break in effectively and we find our way into the playoffs, we are going in a completely different direction, and we are 100% on the upswing looking for those select pieces, a Tavares, a Doughty, a Karlsson, that one big name to fill a hole, along with our draft pick from this year, to push us closer to contending.
All that being said, I think anyone sitting here and not hoping for the latter scenario is batshit crazy.