The 2025 Playoff Sober Report: Dallas' blueline should the source of all your debates.

What should be the talking point of the summer.

Pete DeBoer. Jake Oettinger. Jason Robertson. Neil Graham. Darnell Nurse. Forest for the trees. All of it.

I’ve been wanting to write this for awhile, for a lot of reasons. How many? What about 1,873? That’s how many shots on net Dallas allowed at even-strength. That ranked 22nd in the NHL, by the way. How about 175 reasons? That’s how many EV goals Dallas was expected to allow based on the shot quality opponents generated on them. That rank, by the way, was 21st. Barely above the New York Islanders and Buffalo Sabres. Yes, that sadness pile in a failure bowl that is the Buffalo Sabres.

You might say something about Miro Heiskanen being injured. Sure. Except the rate of expected goals Dallas allowed in the postseason (per 60) at EV ranked below the Montreal Canadians. I probably don’t need to tell you whether that was good or bad. That’s my big gripe about the extracurriculars, for a lot of reasons. So you’re gonna trade Robertson, one of your best defensive forwards, for what? If it’s anything other than a major blueline fix, then the results could be disastrous. How does this not set up Graham for failure if he only has two puck movers to connect with a depleted forward core? Will getting revenge on Nurse offset the amount of blood this team sheds on the defensive side of things? None of these things connect with Dallas’ big flaw since the loss of Chris Tanev.

So I’m glad we had our fun, and got the Real Housewives drama out of our system. Because right now, fixing the blueline is as serious as a LeeAnne Locken grudge.