Last season, before the Ryan McDonagh trade took place, the Lightning had a hole to fill defensively. Anton Stralman was aging, Jake Dotchin was not a top pair defenseman, and Dan Girardi/Braydon Coburn weren’t quite that good. So they made a bold trade for McDonagh and it made sense.
But this season, the Lightning have a surplus of defensemen, to the point where there’s a rotation for who gets scratched. Plus, Jan Rutta has been a solid 6th or 7th defenseman in his career, but he’s been 8th on the depth chart and spending lots of time down in the AHL with the Syracuse Crunch.