Greg Wyshynski, senior writer: As incredible as it might have seemed a year ago, Erik Karlsson's departure from the Senators is starting to seem like an inevitability.
He loves the city. He loves the franchise. But the toxicity of the team's current state might be too much for the 27-year-old defenseman to overcome, from the team's downshift into a rebuild to the abject mismanagement of owner Eugene Melnyk. How does one accept a max contract offer while his team is slashing payroll everywhere from on the ice to in the front office to around the arena?