Bishop was nowhere near top form when he was dealt. He as already having an off year.
Bishop was a stud here right away too and played under a much worse defense, Vasi has kinda been spoiled his entire career playing while Tampa was peaking. Tampas defense has finally become average instead top 5-10 like he usually gets. Vasi isnt in any worse a position than most goalies, and most of them were never really had it as great as he did most of his career.
No, 100% disagree. The previous year he was .926 SV % and .939 SV% in the postseason. He was dealt because of his cap hit and because he couldn't stay healthy, not because of his play. We wanted the cap space and to cement Vasy into the #1 spot who appeared to have a better long term outlook. His "poor" SV% his final year here was because he was pushed into a 1b role from the start and had to deal with the distraction of trade rumors.
The very next season Bishop went to Dallas and completely turned that team around, Dallas went from 27th in goals allowed to 5th with the same clusterf*** group of defensemen, the only thing that changed was the goalie. The following season he had the best SV% in the league and finished second in Vezina voting. IDK, I think that's pretty damn good if he was "nowhere near top form".
Anyways that's not even my point, the point is he went to LA and looked awful in that system and was a key reason LA missed the postseason, Budaj looked awful here despite having helped LA to a wild card spot at the time of the trade by flopping around like a fish.