He's unreliable. His offensive production should be seen as a bonus. We can't always look at it from the "but he's better than [x]" standpoint. He costs more, he wanted more term, there's a reason he left. He's not a core guy that you can build around. A luxury that wouldn't have made any difference to last years team.
He's definitely not a core guy and I doubt anybody would claim that he is. He probably wouldn't have made a difference to last year's team, but not that many players make a difference all by themselves. You can also improve a team by making a couple of small smart moves that add up like what the rags did when they signed him for 2 years. Got great value out of that. Who exactly are you comparing him to when you say that he costs more and wanted more term? His AAV is marginally higher than Komarov's and his term is better.
That's simply not true. Komarov was the better PKer last year with a cheaper contract this year.
Grabner's marginally more expensive than Komarov and when it comes to ~3M bottom sixers I consider term to be more important than AAV, they can fall off a cliff any time after 30 especially when they're as physical as Komarov. By what measure exactly was Komarov the significantly better PKer?
Over the last two seasons Komarov was on the ice for 367 minutes on the PK, and gave up 17 goals. Grabner was on the ice for 292 minutes, and gave up 21 goals.
I'm not sure that a three year deal at 3.35 is better than four at 3, especially considering that Leo is the better player.
I don't know where you're getting those stats from, I see 341 minutes with 30GA for Komarov and 283 minutes and 20 GA for Grabner on 5v4 PK. We could include all PK situations, but that wouldn't make it better for Komarov. Regardless, pure goals against are probably a pretty shoddy indicator of an individual player's ability unless you're suggesting they run the PK all by themselves (and play goalie too).