Trading Brassard simply because he will have a NMC/NTC after putting up his best season to date, sets a presedence for other players that request similiar terms: The club will not show loyalty. In essence it makes these types of contracts worthless for players who sign contracts with a NMT/NTC as a term. Not a great bargaining chip
Brassards contract isnt a problem because Brassard is performing.
It sets a precedence on 2 counts: 1 what you describe, and 2, what I'm sayin --- the team comes first; a club cannot allow loyalty to a single player to superimpose over the good of the team.
At some other time, I think it would be good to make a separate thread going forward about NMNTCs. IMO they should not be given out, or at most be the rare exception to the rule. Tooooooo maaaannnnnnnyyyy people want to play here, and I don't begrudge them $$ for their labor, but other aspects of a deal can be a killer.
You should get paid what your services command, approx., +/- slightly due to various factors and then, if traded, we give you a trading bonus. That is a more manageable solution than too many NMNTCs.
Bern, you've spoken both about not letting contracts control the club, and salaries control the club. At any point the team has the option of trading players during the trade window to alleviate just this type of situation. The contracts will never "control" the club as you so fear, it only dictates the squad you can have in any given trade window.
respectfully your statement which I highlighted is in error as to the core of the issue/problem.
Yes,
At any point the team has the option of trading players during the trade window to alleviate just this type of situation
yes, we can trade players, but that does not mean we can trade THE very players that are causing the cap bottleneck.
You simply dont trade away integral pieces to a stanley cup contending team that is in "win now" mode. You genuinely just dont
The ? is not if you gave up integral pieces --- and btw, Brass, Girardi, and Zuc, while all valuable, arguably not more integral than other names I could use --- rather, the ? is what have you wound up with.
Replacing Brass w/Shiefle, even at an expensive cost, could be well worth it.
Indeed in the scenario of that last trade, we would up with Wheeler, on a big line w/Kreider + Hayes, as well.
The ? of whether or not it was too much, or the least that had to be surrendered is one thing, but given the above, I find it hard to argue that "integral pieces" were not replaced with even more valuable ones.