With fans so naturally optimistic, I appreciate Sheng's dose of realism.
Depends on the lottery but I imagine a lot of the offseason targets are going to be up front. Goaltending looks like it'll be Vanecek and Blackwood and there's a lot of blue liners still under contract. If we don't get Celebrini, we can afford to be patient for another season to tick down some contracts remaining but if there is pressure on Grier to compete, he may open up as many spots as he can and fill it with external acquisitions due to the amount of cap space we have to spend.
At this point there's absolutely no reason to tick down some of the contracts remaining, especially if Logan is done. Even if he's not I'd rather just keep him around. Vlasic's only got two years left and I imagine trying to trade either one would require a retention spot we don't have to spare.
The reason to do so is to maintain cap flexibility until we have found someone to build around or collect enough young players to build a deep team. The reality is that our blue line is terrible and it is not an easy fix that can be done in one or two offseasons. I would still prefer to keep Vlasic until his contract expires unless we have a reason to push him into a buyout. Ferraro is useful to the team until someone is willing to give us a 1st round pick. Rutta is probably tradeable. The rest can be buried if necessary. The issue is where are we bringing in defensemen from. I have a very pessimistic view of what it would take for us to sign anyone of worth in free agency. There aren't a lot of appealing offensive defensemen available in the free agent market. Trading for one seems counterproductive for us given what we'd likely be asked to give up. I think they can go for big splashes up front without much worry but if we don't get Celebrini, we should avoid investing in anyone for more than three years.
This is when you start using some of your picks and kids for other picks and kids like a David Jiricek. We have tons of cap flexibility now so getting rid of someone like Logan solely for the purpose of needing his cap space is unnecessary. If Thompson and Shakir can step in and be competent next year I'll be much more comfortable going forward. I would make a pitch for Chyrchryn in Ottawa or, on a lower tier try to get someone from a cash-strapped team who's got a year left. Someone older, like Ekblad. Monitor is someone else I'd be willing to overpay for on a 3-4 year deal.
I don't mind making pitches for free agents this offseason. The issue is that the quality of free agents this offseason seems low to me on the backend. Chychrun seems unlikely for us if he's already giving up on Ottawa for competitive reasons. I would like Ekblad too but that also seems unlikely for various reasons. He's got an NMC that turns into a 12 team NTC. I don't see how he would accept a trade to us. We don't really have anything to offer and I'm sure someone will take the chance on him in his final year if he and the team want to part ways. Montour is one I'd probably agree with you on if he's willing to do 3-4 years here but I will still have concerns with him. I don't trust that he'd be able to produce here like he has in Florida. I'm sure we'll do something on the backend but I'm also in no huge rush to do so if we don't land Celebrini.
I wouldn't give anything longer than 3 years and preferably go 2. The reason is we can't really overpay for anyone on a one-year "promise of a TDL move to a contender" because of the lack of retention spots. That's what I hate about the EK and Hertl deals. How much did we really get out of retaining a combined 3 million for the next 5-6 years in contrast to what we could have gained year in year out whether through retaining on our own pieces or just retaining as a third party on rentals.
The rentals you're describing would be highly unlikely to net us 1st round picks.
That's one, very simplistic way of looking at it. I would say in both cases it was the player and the retention that netted us the first round picks and in the case of EK, it was the player, the retention and taking back 15 million dollars in salary that got us the pick.
Hertl at 6.75 million until 2030 is still a bad contract. Edstrom and an unprotected fist was an offer way too good to pass up.
Yes, the deals required the players, and I absolutely agree that Grier acted out of fear he'd never get anything close to the value he got again.
He’s turning 30 with an injury history.
That's fair, we're just on different sides with the Hertl trade.
We'll free one retention slot after next season so I think we can overpay on anything with two or more years attached to it. The issue is if all we're going to get out of that are more of the Nico Sturms or Kyle Burroughs types of replacement level players then it's not going to get us much. It seems much harder to get players in that middle six forward or 2nd pairing defenseman level without giving them 4 or more years. At that point, you're basically trying to compete with them.
Patently false. The flat cap era is over. Something like the Monahan trade to Montreal (team gets a 1st to take a 1 year cap dump) will probably never happen again.
Completely agree. It's now very clear towards what end I should be hoping for which is a loss every game. This is a not amazing feeling, but it's way better than the middling nonsense of years past.
We are far too far away for Celebrini to matter materially to our record - we will remain one of the worst teams in the league next year unless a buncy of prospects all hit their maximum ceiling at the same time.
I think having that retention spot in two years will make it significantly easier to move a viable middle six piece for a bounty (whomever that is) on the last year of a deal. We'd def get more from those types than a Nico Sturm for cheap which wont require retention.
A direction is nice, but as we've seen from teams like Anaheim, just having good prospects doesn't mean all that much. It may, but nothing is guaranteed except our misery during the down times.
As we've seen with what teams do now to skirt around cap issues, it's not over. Teams will copy the Vegas template of overpaying for retention.
