I would still take Stamkos as the single best centre in the division right now. Tavares is close, but Stamkos just racks up offensively. Matthews could get there by the end of the season, as he was really solid after he finally recovered from all the injuries, but as of right now Stammer still is in my eyes number 1 (Bergeron is also the fourth guy in this conversation, and Eichel could work his way in of he lives up to his potential). Now, the Leafs are really inly rivalled by Pittsburgh for depth down the middle as a whole, I grant you that.
Tampa already has a true superstar on the blue-line so while adding the best dman in the NHL (when healthy), would be an absurd abundance of riches, unlike the Leafs, I don’t see any holes in key areas for Tampa. They sort of look like those Capitals teams of a few years ago that looked like gods on paper and dominated in the regular season.
Now for an
extended (and healthy) Karlsson, yes, the Leafs should be willing to trade Nylander and the first and maybe even Liljegren as well,
if they can make the contracts work with the cap (this is all pointless if we also can’t afford to sign Marner next season; that along with losing Nylander, our pick and the single best prospect in our system would seriously damage the Leafs ability to contend).
The Lightning indeed do not have the same need for a superstar blue-liner, but still... can you imagine the damage that Hedman and Karlssin could do? Split them up and you have teams facing a Norris caliber defenceman
all game, and stack them together in high leverage situations and just watch as the puck soends minutes at a time in the opponents end... and can you imagine how insane it would be to see both those guys feeding passes to Stamkos and Kucherov?! That would be nuts.
Losing Point would indeed cause some issues at centre depth, but Karlsson is just so good and would have such a positive impact, if Point is the required centrepiece (in addition to a blue-chip future or something for a sugned Karlsson, and the Lighting can work it under the cal, then I think Tampa has to pull the trigger: their window is firmly open now, we don’t know about three or five years from now, but putting Karlsson in this lineup now undoubtedly puts them as very heavy Cup favorites and should really help them finally get over that playoff hump they have had for the last few years (we all know how mych Karlsson can elevate his game in the playoffs; imagine if he had the roster of the Lightning in 2017 instead of the Sens).