Nedeljkovic's ceiling is a great starter not a vezina candidate... they don't need him to be better than that. Why lost him AND more for a goalie who's approaching 30 and does not nearly have as long in his career left at his highest level as Nedeljkovic?

Hamilton is not a defensive liability, you need to watch Hamilton if you think he is. He's not an elite DFD don't get that wrong, but he's sure as hell not a liability. He doesn't kill penalties, but he's good with 5v5 defense.

Hakanpaa was a very good 3RD for Carolina, who won their division. So he's a bottom pairing guy on a contender. He's a big guy who throws his weight around, can kill penalties and it good not great defensively. Definition of a 3rd pairing guy. Like a better version of Jan Rutta.

Okay, let's use underlying numbers to measure this, shall we?

Hamilton has an xGA of 1.76/60 (NST) not great, not horrible. Passible when his offense is as good as he is. Trouba had a xGA that was worse than 4 for every 60 minutes he played. Remove your rangers glasses, Hamilton is fine defensively and he's all around better than trouba.

St Louis' D core was great dude. Parayko #1, Pietrangelo #2, Dunn was an above average 2nd pair guy. Edmundson was a trash heap, Bortuzzo and Gunnarson were good 3rd pairing guys, and that doesn't incldue Bouwmeester who stepped up big in the post season despite not playing all too well. With Allen and his bad year, they probably don't make the playoffs, but any mediocre goalie could have gotten that team to the post-season.

I think he's getting at least 8 million, even if Carolina can't ante that amount up.

Who do we all think would be in on Hamilton if he tests the market? Flyers, Oilers and Flames seem like options.

Not sure why Carolina bothers with that Gibson trade. Goaltending hasn't been the problem, especially this year and Ned looks like he's a quality goalie. Haven't really addressed the issue of scoring or made this lineup tougher to play against and are just spending much more on a position that has been really good for them the past 3 years and is continuing to track in the right direction.