Didn't know they had a stud d-man.
And with your analogy, we should be more than fine since we do have a stud goalie. Along with one of the best two-way trio of C in the league.
my formula was a general one, not specific to any one team: any stud goal scorer is < either a stud goalie or stud d-man, ergo, the loss of a stud goal scorer can be handled better by a team that has one of the other 2 variables.
As far as our stud goalie, i've broken it down before but here it is again. Here is what we have seen from Rask:
-Strong regular seasons where he has a full workload, combined with early round playoff exits. (i'm not blaming him for those exits, just bringing it up to illustrate his total season workload history).
-Long, strong, playoff run, but with a lockout shortened regular season.
What we have NOT seen him do yet:
Full regular season workload, AND a long playoff run.
As someone alluded to earlier, the Chara situation makes Rask's job even harder. It isn't just about Chara in a vacuum, but all the ripple effects that flow from it.