Still mourning Stamkos? Here are departures that really cost Tampa Bay

TAMPA — For the most part, the argument has been all passion and no logic.

Steven Stamkos is gone? What have the Lightning done? Where is the loyalty?

Tampa Bay will never be the same!

Or will it?

While this may feel like a seismic shift in our hockey landscape, history says the departure of an iconic player or coach does not lead to catastrophe. It has, at times, been a necessary turn toward resurgence.

One year after Marty St. Louis was traded, the Lightning were in the Stanley Cup Final. Three years after Evan Longoria was traded, the Rays were in the World Series. One year after Tony Dungy was fired, the Bucs won a Super Bowl.

These are not just random instances. Teams do not haphazardly cast megastars aside. It’s often cast as an economic decision, but it usually involves a player on the backside of a career. Or a team that needs to reinvent itself.

Sure, there is a void when a Vinny Lecavalier is traded, but you forget the Lightning were 18-26-4 and coach Guy Boucher was fired that season. Yes, it was shocking when John Lynch and Warren Sapp were cut loose, but they were in their 30s and the Bucs had just finished 7-9.

So it is with the Lightning today. After successive first-round exits in the playoffs, general manager Julien BriseBois wanted to act quickly before the window of opportunity with Nikita Kucherov/Victor Hedman/Andrei Vasilevskiy/Brayden Point closed. Stamkos is still a highly productive offensive player, particularly on the power play, but the Lightning needed to invest in a forward with a stronger defensive game.

And just like that, we have a new era of Lightning hockey.

Will this end up being a mistake? That’s certainly possible. But I would argue the time was right for the Lightning to make a bold move before their slow decline turned into an out-of-control freefall.

Around here, the real franchise-killers have not been the release of fan favorites but rather moves that generated less outrage. Smaller decisions that led to missed opportunities and a lifetime of regret.

Putting aside Stamkos, Lecavalier, St. Louis, Derrick Brooks, Lynch, Sapp and Longoria, here are five departures that should have been mourned.

Josh Hamilton

The No. 1 pick in the 1999 draft, his career in Tampa Bay was derailed by injuries and drug problems. He went nearly four full seasons without playing any organized baseball before finally getting his life together and appearing in 15 games with a Rays rookie league team in 2006.

Gambling that no team would take him in the Rule 5 draft — which meant he had to spend the entire 2007 season in the majors — the Rays left Hamilton unprotected in the offseason. It was a foolhardy risk and a horrible misreading of what other teams were thinking. Several GMs later expressed interest in Hamilton, and the Reds ended up getting him via a trade with the Cubs. Two years later, he made the first of five consecutive All-Star teams.

From 2008-12, Hamilton hit .305 and averaged 36 home runs and 126 RBIs per 162 games. Think about that. In those five seasons, the Rays averaged 92 wins a year and won the 2008 American League pennant. Would they have won a World Series with Hamilton in the middle of the order?

Who did the Rays protect on the 40-man roster instead of Hamilton? Jon Switzer, who went 0-2 with an 8.05 ERA for the Rays in 2007. Mitch Talbot, who was 0-0 with an 11.17 ERA in 2008. Damon Hollins, who never played another day in the big leagues.

Rich McKay

Brooks, Sapp, Lynch. Ronde Barber, Mike Alstott, Warrick Dunn. Some of the biggest names in Bucs history were drafted while McKay was general manager. It was his front office who assembled the roster that would eventually win the 2002 Super Bowl.

However, a power struggle with Jon Gruden led to McKay’s departure late in the 2003 season. Gruden brought in Bruce Allen as his handpicked GM, and the Bucs embarked on a decade-long stroll through irrelevance. Allen spent 13 seasons as a GM/president in Tampa Bay and Washington, and his teams never won a single playoff game.

In the 10 years before McKay took over as GM, the Bucs were 43-116. In the 10 years after he left, they were 66-94. In between, with McKay at the helm, the Bucs went 86-74 with five playoff appearances and a Super Bowl.

Ryan McDonagh

Plenty of players have left the Lightning for salary-cap reasons the past few years, but none had the impact of McDonagh.

The Lightning misread how important he was to their roster when they traded him in 2022, which explains why they reacquired him seven weeks ago. He doesn’t score a lot, so he’s never been a serious Norris contender, but McDonagh is one of the top shutdown defenders of the past 20 years.

Of the players whose NHL careers began after 2000, McDonagh’s plus-246 rating is fourth in the league.

The Lightning were 58-31 in the postseason with McDonagh. They are 3-8 since he left.

Charlie Morton

With the money they saved by dealing Longoria to the Giants, the Rays signed Morton to one of the richest free-agent deals in franchise history. Two years later, they were in the World Series. However, the Rays failed to pick up Morton’s option in 2021, and it might have cost them another shot at the Series.

Tampa Bay won 100 games without Morton in 2021, but their starting pitching was seriously weakened by injuries and trades. By the time they got to the playoffs, they were running on fumes and were eliminated in the division round by Boston.

Morton, meanwhile, has gone 42-29 with a 3.79 ERA for the Braves.

Bruce Arians

This one is not as clear-cut, but still worth mourning.

The official story is that Arians opted to retire — suddenly and surprisingly — after the Bucs lost in the 2021 NFC Championship Game. The suspicion is that Tom Brady pushed him out the door. The Bucs have gone on to make the playoffs in back-to-back seasons with Todd Bowles as head coach, but the real loss was in Arians’ offensive acumen.

Maybe it had more to do with Tampa Bay’s offensive line suffering injuries and defections in 2022, but the Bucs went from averaging 30.1 points a game with Arians running the offense in 2021 to 18.4 points without him. As a result, Brady’s final NFL season ended with an 8-9 record.