I think it's worth discussing who is "yet another offensive player" and who is a genuine upgrade. We do want upgrades, don't we?
What do you mean by "yet another offensive player"? More of what we have?
Anyone who isn't some kind of magic superstar.
See, here's the thing. Folks may say we need goal scorers, but we have many very good quality goal scorers. Folks may say we need playmakers, but we have several really good quality playmakers. Folks may say we need to create chances, but we DO create chances, frequently. Folks may say we need to get more shots on net, but we're doing just fine in that regard. Folks might rant about the coaching staff, but we were playing exactly this same way before and we were getting goals. Folks may point out that we've abandoned "safe is death" - but we're still creating chances, so that hasn't gone away. So what the hell is it?
I honest to G-d defy anybody to point out whatever it is that is keeping this team from scoring other than some empty thought-killing "mumble mumble talent level" statement. By every objective measure and every dispassionate observation they are doing
everything right 5-on-5, with plenty of personnel that have repeatedly demonstrated all the necessary capability and more besides, and yet The Puck Still Will Not Go In consistently.
When you're seemingly doing everything right, what the hell can you add? Nobody has been playing particularly poorly, unless you count Cam's slowdown. We're not stuck with eleventy billion third liners, unless one wants to take the absurd notion that everybody's been "overperforming" for the last three years. We're not making more mistakes than any other NHL team. We have honest to G-d weapons on the blueline. We haven't been crippled by injury - just Anderson is missing. So what the hell else can be done?
We have occasional daydreams about guys like Trocheck and Connor and the like. But what skills do they
add to this team that we don't already have? What will they
do that everybody else we have somehow inexplicably cannot? What is it that makes them the solution to our problems, and why is it suddenly impossible to get that out of the many players we already have?
I want an explanation other than "they're just better somehow", because if we can't identify what it is that's wrong, then we have no hope of making sane trades that will actually
help. Grass-is-greener syndrome does not fix things. I want fixes, not blind rote action. But so far all I've seen is "well, we need guys who can score goals" without any conception of what it is they're supposed to be
doing to make that happen.