[Cali Panthers Fan]

It's close, but I take the #1 goalie all day any day, then the #1 D-man, then the center.

We have wasted a lot of assets chasing after other team's cast off goalies, and we finally found a solid one in Mike Smith, but he's 35 and probably only has a couple of years left in the tank. Jones would solve a major hole in our lineup that we still don't have a long term solution to. It's fair to say that this team probably has more success in both the regular season and playoffs with Martin Jones over guys like Ramo, Hiller, Ortio, Elliott, Johnson etc. Now that isn't ruling out the goalies we have in the system, but clearly Jones was ready for prime time before anyone else that we've drafted.

We have drafted and developed other defensemen fairly well. That would likely sort itself out, but probably not on the same level as Hamilton. So while Hamilton is better than anyone we've drafted, we have plenty of good to great defense prospects.

We've drafted Monahan, Bennett, Jankowski, and also had Backlund in the system. While Barzal is an upgrade on any of those not named Monahan (although not as good as Backlund is defensively) I still think we have had plenty of solid center prospects. It's a position that's a little easier to draft for as well since most forwards out of junior can usually make the transition to the NHL quickly, so there's less guess work.

Goaltending is always the most important position to address, so Jones for me I guess.