Wings could be on the rise again as early as next season with careful management of the roster, use of buyouts, and luck in drafting\free agency.
I say, whatever happens with the playoffs and with drafting, we need to A. let Cleary go, and B. buy out CC and Samuelsson. Resign Brunner, Flip, and Howard promote Nyquist\Tatar full-time, and sign a decent top-4 D and top-six F.
Flip-Dats-Semin
Franzen-Zetts-Brunner
Nyquist-Helm-Tatar
Abdelkader-Scrub UFA-Bertuzzi
Eaves
Kronwall-Whitney
Ericsson-Smith
Quincey-Kindl
Howard
That third line would be hell on wheels.
i do not see us signing semin nor perry nor getzlaf(and i dont think those last two make it too free agency)
our two best bets to make it to free agency and possibly sign with detroit are
-streit
-weiss
as they both play for small market not very good teams so may want to test their luck elsewhere nor will they be at the top of the pay scale and thus out of our reach nor generate as much interest as some of the other noteable possible UFA's.
the only current roster player we "may" buyout would be CC
cleary and miller will likely not be brought back
filppula will resign somewhere around 4-4.5$ a season
howard will resign somewhere around 3.5-3.8$ a season
FORWARDS
Gustav Nyquist ($0.788m) / Pavel Datsyuk ($6.700m) / Johan Franzen ($3.955m)
Valtteri Filppula ($4.400m) / Henrik Zetterberg ($6.083m) / Damien Brunner ($1.500m)
Tomas Tatar ($0.840m) / Darren Helm ($2.125m) / Todd Bertuzzi ($2.075m)
Mikael Samuelsson ($3.000m) / Justin Abdelkader ($1.800m) / Jordin Tootoo ($1.900m)
DEFENSEMEN
Niklas Kronwall ($4.750m) / Mark Streit ($4.700m)
Jonathan Ericsson ($3.250m) / Brendan Smith ($0.900m)
Kyle Quincey ($3.775m) / Jakub Kindl ($0.900m)
Kent Huskins ($0.750m) /
GOALTENDERS
Jonas Gustavsson ($1.500m)
Jimmy Howard ($3.800m)
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CAPGEEK.COM TOTALS (follow @capgeek on Twitter)
(these totals are compiled with the bonus cushion)
SALARY CAP: $64,300,000; CAP PAYROLL: $63,723,712; BONUSES: $160,000
CAP SPACE (24-man roster): $736,288
see it dosent really work to see us adding many big pieces this summer unless we trade quincey or franzen(we wont) or we let filppula walk(we wont)