There's just no way Maroon gets a big cap hit.
Everyone likes to say that Chiarelli overpaid for players, but there are plenty of reasons why those players got deals as high as they did, and I don't mean because Chiarelli is a bad negotiator.
Sekera, Russell, Lucic, Draisaitl, and McDavid all had leverage that Maroon simply does not have.
Sekera/Lucic- UFA mercenaries. People are outraged by the costs of these guys, but if you are bidding up players after July 1st, the costs are always high. We NEEDED to fill out our lineup with these guys to have any chance at playoffs. They filled the gaps in the rebuild.
Russell- He's very underrated, and 4 million is not a lot considering that he plays over 21 minutes a night, 22 in the playoffs. It's not a bad deal if he stays 2nd pairing. What makes it a bad deal is the NTC, because he might not be 2nd pairing for the whole deal. But, with the Sekera injury we didn't have much choice.
Drai/McDavid- core pieces, in arguably the most sought after position in hockey (1C). We had their RFA rights but that doesn't matter a ton when the entire league would gladly overpay to have either player. I know offer sheets aren't used much, but the reason is because GMs always bite the bullet and fork over a little extra to prevent it ever getting to that point.
Maroon- throws his leverage away by giving McDavid credit. It doesn't even matter though, since every GM will assume that he's at least partly inflated by McDavid. He plays the least valuable position in hockey. Jokinen got 1.1 million as a winger. If Chiarelli were a bad negotiator, he'd get double that. The reason is leverage. Wingers are the least valuable players in hockey, and are easy to replace by trade and signing. We have a lot of great wingers on the team already, and we are a team that is obviously being built down the middle.