Solid AHL trade. Bitetto is a fringe NHL to good AHL defensemen, which is a position the Rangers have loads of depth at. He is 31 so he is what he is. Merkley right now is a fringe NHL to good AHL forward who is 24. They have an area of need at Hartford at forward. This is a really good trade for Hartford and who knows, maybe he plays a few games in NHL for them, which was probably not going to be the case for Bitetto at this point. Also a reminder on Bitetto that he was signed to a two year deal so we could meet the minimums on available players for the expansion draft so to get anything that might be useful out of that signing is pretty good when it was clear what purpose it served at the time.