why should they be sitting at the top of the west though? they weren't really close to the top last year, and they didn't improve in the offseason. i made a post talking about this in the offseason when everybody in the media was talking about how the hawks were poised to be elite again this season because off all the "toughness" and "fire" that they got, when in reality we lost campbell and then added a bunch of crappy tough guys and called it "depth". the only talent/skill guy they got was andrew brunette, but it seems like he's just too slow to keep up. the campbell trade was still good, but it's like they didn't even make an attempt to make up for it. it's hard to say what they should have done differently because the free agent pool was weak this past offseason and guys were getting overpaid, but i felt at the time (and now) like they needed to do something else if they were going to move campbell. when campbell went out with the broken collarbone on the ovechkin hit towards the end of the cup season our defense went to [expletive] also. they almost lost to nashville and it wasn't until he came back mid-playoffs that they starting looking like they could actually win the cup. the organization is still in great shape long-term, but it's annoying that it looks like we're going to waste another year of young toews-kane on their cap friendly contracts.