People knew Barrie was getting misused in Toronto. Everyone but Mike Babcock knew what Barrie was--a horrendous defender, but can pay dividends as a rover defenseman with skilled forwards. It should be a shock to no one he's scoring at a career high rate this season.
Hall? He's showing you what he is today. He did in NJ, he did in AZ and he's doing it in BUF. He's a high-risk forward, requires primary minutes with elite linemates and gives you middling results. Why is that intriguing?
Kahun has really been a huge let down at 2 LW position -- on pace for 25 points (pro rated to a full 82 game season) is unacceptable production for being a winger on the freaking reigning Hart/Art Ross trophy winner.
It's not a huge pressing need because Leon still gets his points, but it is a bottleneck for the team, you shouldn't have such crap production next to a center that good.
So if Hall can turn that 25 points into even a 60 point pace and is cool with a 1 year deal ... that's an upgrade for us all day.
If Jesse continues to develop decent chemistry with McDavid too, maybe you can actually deploy 3 line depth
Holloway + McDavid + Poolparty
Hall + Draisaitl + Kassian
RNH + Yamamoto + Benson (?)
Next year for example, that would make things very hard on other teams match up wise.
IF Hall is willing to do the Barrie thing and take a 1 year deal, I'd rather spend that money on one Hall instead of getting two Kahun + Chiasson types. It's not need no.1 on the priority list but if we can cash in continually on these 1 year players that want a bounce back year here, we may as well. We've suffered many years having problems getting UFAs, we might as well cash in now that we some appeal for guys who want to increase their value.