In his post draft media availability, Yzerman alluded to possibly signing 2 forwards and 2 or 3 dmen on the UFA market, aside from obviously needing a goalie. He also made it pretty clear he wants to keep young guys and prospects playing outside the NHL, other than Zadina and Hronek.
I'm wondering if he's looking at how much cap space he has and how the flat cap is going to affect other teams and sees an opportunity to improve the team in the short term with a mix of a couple of decent signings and a couple bargain reclamation projects but without really derailing the rebuild much if at all.
-The only real risk is that the team moves to later in the first round, but they'll still have 6 picks in the first 3 rounds in the 2021 draft, and would still have a good handful of guys they can float as rentals at the TDL to get more.
-Can't really get into cap trouble since they've got around $24M coming off the books after next season (NOT including Zetterberg), and unless Mantha and/or Bertuzzi only get 1 year bridge deals, Hronek will be the only guy that really needs a decent raise.
-Won't be blocking young guys from NHL roster spots, since it sounds like Yzerman doesn't want a ton of them starting in the NHL season, but they still at least 4 forwards and 3 dmen slated to leave next summer and could also potentially lose a roster player to Seattle which opens another spot for young guys that Yzerman thinks are ready.
But, I guess we'll see what happens. I'm interested to see what Yzerman does.
The only thing I'm really averse to is signing a goalie for longterm and big money, which I guess only really encompasses Markstrom. I've seen the 5+ x $5M+ goalie signed well into his 30's movie before and it stank. I'd much rather go with a cheaper shorter term band-aid for now.