I've never thought toughness was our issue. We had plenty of willing fighters, physical guys, and guys willing to take a puck to the face. I think our issue was size/strength, especially on the backend. I'm interested to see how Gudbranson and Brown does because that could be a real help on the PK and dealing with bigger/stronger forwards. Demelo and Hainsey were fine defensemen but they weren't bruisers and while Borowiecki was willing he simply didn't have the size/strength to do anything but run into people.
Skill-wise, I'm not sure we've improved. Dadanov, Galchnyuk, and Logan Brown are all good PP guys and that was, by far, our biggest weakness last season so I'm hopeful. I think they are a real improvement on the guys they're essentially replacing, Ennis, Namestnikov, and Duclair offensively. I also think Watson is an upgrade skill-wise on the Peca/Sabourin duo we trotted out. What about Pageau though? I mean we've done nothing to replace him except the minutes Batherson is going to play. He might do it offensively, it was only 40 points and Batherson is likely going to get a lot of opportunity, but there is no way we're going to replace Pageau defensively with a rookie like Batherson and expect to improve the position. Another solid center signing could go a long way to filling out the roster. IDK. Maybe they expect Norris/Brown to absolutely kill it.
I think Anderson was done last year but unfortunately, I'm not sold on Murray. If Murray is even a league average goalie night-in night-out that will be an improvement, but I just can't sell myself on expecting it after the season Murray had on a much better team.