They didn't have to wait. They could have placed him on LTIR on Tuesday. My understanding about LTIR is that teams have 2 options.
Option 1:
Place player in LTIR the day prior to the season opening. This allows you to exceed to cap on the opening day roster. But the amount you are over becomes a set limit as the injured player is considered to be replaced. For example if yu only go over by $1 million, you cannot exceed $1 million the rest of the year.
Option 2:
Place player on LTIR opening day, or later. This allows the team to exceed the cap by the entire amount of the injured players contract while they are injured.
This is why I think the article is just a giant pile of ********, because it's almost like they are combining the two options. If Smid is placed on LTIR anytime during the season the Flames can exceed the cap by $3.5 million if they need it. It literally makes no sense to sign Grossmann just to get close when he could be demoted tomorrow (well after clearing waivers but you get my point) and replace him with a $4 million player.
The bottom line is the Flames wanted to be under the cap and not us LTIR because if you are under the cap your space later in the year compounds, but when you use LTIR you are over the cap and that space does not compound. Right now we have $8,666 in cap space, that will compound to next to nothing by the deadline. If anything by signing Grossmann the Flames are ****ing themselves out of cap space later in the year because having 583k in cap space right now would amass to close to a million in cap space by the deadline. Why would Treliving be willing to do that just to maximize LTIR use? So I have absolutely zero doubt that this theory is absolutely 100% ********.
It is as simple as Treliving not wanting to use LTIR unless there are more injuries.
According to the article, Option 2 gives you relief equal to the injured player's contract minus the cap space available. That is to say, if a team like Florida used Option 2, they would get no relief at all, because they wouldn't need it.
If true, then you can see the logic, provided they waive Grossman when they put Smid on LTIR.
So, if I have it right, Smid's AAV is $3.5M, and Grossman's contract is about $600K
Scenario A: (not signing Grossman, then putting Smid on LTIR)
They can exceed the cap by about $2.9M, and they have $600K space to start with. They can add $3.5M total.
Scenario B: (signing Grossman, putting Smid on LTIR and waiving Grossman)
They can exceed the cap by about $3.5M, and they have $600K space after waiving Grossman. They can add $4.1M total.
I'm unsure of how much cap space waiving Grossman would open up, if it's the full amount or not, but as long as it is more than zero, you can see the logic.