The mental gymnastics in this post is impressive. The trade looked very good at the time, in retrospect not so much. Let's break down the trade.
Trade Date: September 13th, 2018
Ottawa trades:
- Erik Karlsson - signed to a 8 x 11.5 mil contract. still a top pairing defenseman but declined the past 2 years due to injuries. Question mark moving forward but the contract isn't looking good.
- Francis Perron - irrelevant
San Jose trades:
- Chris Tierney - #3C, could fetch a 2nd/3rd + C prospect
- Rudolf Balcers - Claimed back San Jose, B/C prospect
- Dylan DeMelo - Traded for a 3rd
- Josh Norris - B prospect. potential to be a top 6 center, but also a question mark
- 2020 1st (3rd OV, Tim Stutzle) - A prospect, about as close to a lock of being a top 6 forward as there is with a decent chance of being a #1C.
Your argument is that without EK behind Burns you'd have Tim Heed. If you did not do the trade, you would have had $11.5 mil in cap space + all your other assets to obtain another offensive defenseman, while still keeping your 2020 pick which turned out to be Stutzle.
In retrospect, the trade was the difference between San Jose going through a re-tooling phase as opposed to a complete rebuild hampered by some very expensive contracts.