Speculation: 2018-19 Roster Discussion Part I

[Pinkfloyd]

You have to, or you have Trotz walking away after winning the Cup.

Trotz walked away because the Caps didn't want him.

 

[Herschel]

Couple comments:

Salaries - DW is betting on the salary cap growing significantly over the next few seasons and it is really not a bad bet. It is already getting a nice bump for next season. Seattle will cause an additional bump when they come into the league. You could also see an increase in the Canadian dollar which is massive for NHL revenues, however this is the least likely but it is just as unlikely to see a significant drop.

With the cap going up, those "bad" contracts become ok contracts assuming those players are still capable of playing at the NHL level. Example - if Vlasic's play has regressed and this is what he is for the next 3-4 seasons there is no one who can tell me he isn't still a top 4D. Sure he might not be able to carry a pairing solo or be hard matched in shutdown role but he is still a legitimate 15-18 minutes D, which is worth 7M

Vlasic's play... I don't think his play has regressed as much as many posters but is more the combination of having weaker less experienced wingers and facing the new breed of faster NHL players. There are several times where he makes the standard smart play for it only to turn into a foot race because his teammates aren't anticipating it. He is also losing or tying footraces that he used to win because the average forward is significantly faster than they were even 2-3 seasons ago.

I also think there is something else going on with his play that has nothing to do with ability or regression. After much consideration here are my ideas

1) Coaching issue - there may be some friction between him and Zettler. This could be part of the reason for the coaching changes. Much has been made of the impact Boughner departure had on Burns but really outside of maybe Dillon every D has been worse since he left.

2) Trade List - with the pick up of Karlsson I suspect DW asked for Vlasic's trade list, which any good GM needs to do. This could have rubbed Vlasic the wrong way and has impacted his play in a negative way.

3) Disinterest - Vlasic might also be just "saving" it for the playoffs. While less likely, he does strike me as the kind of player who has done enough in the regular season and no longer really cares about it.

I had considered an injury but based on his playing time I just don't see that as likely.

DW's Team Meeting - I suspect this was more of we believe we have the answers in this room AND once we see this roster rising to its potential, ownership is committed to adding a piece or two for a deep playoff run. This message would have the impact of backing the PDB, a wake up call to the team and a warning to players that moves will be made so if you want to be here show me you can help us win.

 

[Alaskanice]

Couple comments:

Salaries - DW is betting on the salary cap growing significantly over the next few seasons and it is really not a bad bet. It is already getting a nice bump for next season. Seattle will cause an additional bump when they come into the league. You could also see an increase in the Canadian dollar which is massive for NHL revenues, however this is the least likely but it is just as unlikely to see a significant drop.

With the cap going up, those "bad" contracts become ok contracts assuming those players are still capable of playing at the NHL level. Example - if Vlasic's play has regressed and this is what he is for the next 3-4 seasons there is no one who can tell me he isn't still a top 4D. Sure he might not be able to carry a pairing solo or be hard matched in shutdown role but he is still a legitimate 15-18 minutes D, which is worth 7M

Vlasic's play... I don't think his play has regressed as much as many posters but is more the combination of having weaker less experienced wingers and facing the new breed of faster NHL players. There are several times where he makes the standard smart play for it only to turn into a foot race because his teammates aren't anticipating it. He is also losing or tying footraces that he used to win because the average forward is significantly faster than they were even 2-3 seasons ago.

I also think there is something else going on with his play that has nothing to do with ability or regression. After much consideration here are my ideas

1) Coaching issue - there may be some friction between him and Zettler. This could be part of the reason for the coaching changes. Much has been made of the impact Boughner departure had on Burns but really outside of maybe Dillon every D has been worse since he left.

2) Trade List - with the pick up of Karlsson I suspect DW asked for Vlasic's trade list, which any good GM needs to do. This could have rubbed Vlasic the wrong way and has impacted his play in a negative way.

3) Disinterest - Vlasic might also be just "saving" it for the playoffs. While less likely, he does strike me as the kind of player who has done enough in the regular season and no longer really cares about it.

I had considered an injury but based on his playing time I just don't see that as likely.

DW's Team Meeting - I suspect this was more of we believe we have the answers in this room AND once we see this roster rising to its potential, ownership is committed to adding a piece or two for a deep playoff run. This message would have the impact of backing the PDB, a wake up call to the team and a warning to players that moves will be made so if you want to be here show me you can help us win.

I wholeheartedly agree with your points. Mainly the one regarding DW.
I think there is a lot of limited thinking when some state the need to get rid of him long with the coach or whomever played a bad game or signed a long contract.
I believe that DW started signing long contracts, not because he turned into a blithering idiot, because he knows all the analytics, the health and the financial situations.
This is how we ended up with Jones, Kane and Karlsson in trades. He has so much information and so many conversations that we do not. This is how we ended up nearly signing Tavares.
None of this was by accident. DW has a sneaky plan that impresses me. He find ways to do things that don’t seem possible. He’s set us up several times for legitimate runs at the Stanley Cup.
We have a great one here in DW. My opinion.

 

[Lebanezer]

Spott still running the power play.

 

[Used As A Shield]

Spott still running the power play.

Running or Ruining?

 

[SactoShark]

Trotz walked away because the Caps didn't want him.

 

[TomasHertlsRooster]

Yes and they literally didn’t bother to make a better offer.

 

[Barrie22]

so 1.5 million a year for 2 years or 4 million a year for 5 years. hmmm i wonder what i would take.

 

[SactoShark]

Yes and they literally didn’t bother to make a better offer.

Okay i see PF's point now. I've just never seen anything in the media spin it like that.

 

[TomasHertlsRooster]

Okay i see PF's point now. I've just never seen anything in the media spin it like that.

Trotz wanted to return.

“I do want to be back, there are some things that we have to work out. I’ve talked to [GM Brian MacLellan]. If we can get them worked out, then there’s no question.”

Those “things” were almost certainly along the lines of paying him at least half of his market value. He signed for $4M in Long Island and Washington didn’t even offer him $2M.

Whether or not Washington did that because their owner wanted to save money, or because the GM didn’t want him back, it’s an issue that wouldn’t have been present on a team whose GM wanted to bring the coach back and whose owner was Hasso Plattner.

Also, remember that Trotz is widely regarded as one of the best coaches in the game, and he had just won a Stanley Cup. DeBoer, meanwhile, is widely regarded as a mediocre coach. A guy like Trotz is going to see much more demand and higher offers if he becomes a free agent than a guy like DeBoer will.

It was just incredibly stupid of Doug Wilson to re-sign PDB if true.

 

[TomasHertlsRooster]

I'm not sure how you consider last season an indictment of PDB's coaching. I thought he did wonders with a team that couldn't score and lost their #1 center. No way would DW ever say cup or bust for a coach. He's not that dumb. There is too much luck involved with injuries that comes into play.

This a horse that has long since died from the beating but the only one of the contracts that isn't reasonable is Vlassics... maybe Jones a little too but didn't he sign it after backstopping the team to a finals run? Not unreasonable to think he had a brighter future and he was a year away from UFA status so they were going to pay a higher price than if he were an RFA. Reality is you have to compare all those contracts to what comparable UFA's got. Sure they could let these players walk but then what? You're not replacing them with UFAs since history has shown that it's tough for the Sharks to attract the best UFAs. They also would have had to trade those players in season to get any compensation. That would have gutted the team but probably not enough to finish with a top 3 draft pick. There is also literally no case to be made that you could have signed them for less. Whatever they got in SJ they would have gotten on the open market. Maybe even more. Tavares got $11mil. Couture might have gotten as much as $9mil on the open market. It's a function of an increased cap. As bad as some of us think he's played this season he is still almost a point a game, a 30+ goal scorer who played on team Canada and a legit con smyth candidate during the Sharks finals run. Dude was getting paid.

DeBoer did some things well last season but ultimately, he made way too many blatant errors that raised red flags. DeMelo over Heed was bad, Melker Karlsson over Barclays Goodrow/Jannik Hansen was bad, Kane on the Pavelski-Donskoi line over Meier was bad, and the system change was bad and clearly made them a worse team. It’s fair to say that he didn’t deserve to be fired last season but he definitely didn’t deserve to get a contract extension one year advance.

The same goes for guys like Vlasic, Jones, and Couture who were signed a year early. Maybe their play didn’t automatically suggest that they deserved to be traded, but they had all shown signs of decline before they signed their contracts, and they definitely didn’t deserve to be re-signed 364 days before they needed to be. And it’s concerning that Doug Wilson wasn’t able to look at basic statistics based on the effectiveness of coaches after a certain number of years as coach and players at a certain age, put that information together with what he saw from these guys, and decide “I need to sign them 364 days before they might leave.” It’s a very concerning trend.

Just because these players might have been paid this on the open market doesn’t mean that they were good contracts. If you think that’s a strong base to build an argument on, just look at what the open market paid guys in 2016. Kane only made marginally more than his closest UFA comparables in Okposo, Ladd, Eriksson, and Lucic did in 2016, and the increase in cap more or less offsets the difference in salary...okay, so Kane’s contract is comparable to those 4. The problem is that those contracts sucked! The kind of GMs that signed those guys to “market value” are the kind that fail.

Between the 4 teams that signed those players, 12 seasons have been played since they were signed, and only one of those teams made the playoffs in one of those seasons. Sure, I can throw eat bananas and throw shit at people and compare myself to a monkey, but does that make it a good idea? Shouldn’t I be striving to be better than a monkey? And shouldn’t DW strive to be better than 4 dumbass monkeys in Peter Chiarelli, Tim Murray, Jim Benning, and Garth Snow (the 4 GMs who signed those players)? Two of those guys have been fired already and the other two are considered the two worst GMs in the NHL. Forgive me for not forgiving DW’s decision making on the basis of it being comparable to the decisions made by those 4 buffoons.

Jones’ contract was signed after a regular season where his .912 SV% ranked 21st among 30 NHL goaltenders who played at least 41 games. It was not signed after his strong regular season and playoff run of 2015-2016. It was signed after a below average regular season performance and it made him the 12th highest paid goalie in the NHL IIRC.

And I don’t agree with the idea that DW would have had to trade them either. If he just let go of all of Kane, Vlasic, and Jones, we would be in pretty much the same exact spot right now and we would have $19.75M in cap space along with our 2019 1st round pick.

It’s also really not that hard for the Sharks to attract UFAs. The main reason the Sharks have historically missed out on UFAs is because Doug Wilson has historically been very conservative with the salary cap. Had Doug Wilson been throwing 7X7s at Kanes, 7X8s at Vlasics, 5.75X6s at Jones, we would not talk about how the Sharks historically have trouble signing UFAs. We would more likely talk about how UFAs come here way too often and we would try to build a wall around San Jose to try and keep them out. :laugh.

 

[Doctor Soraluce]

DeBoer did some things well last season but ultimately, he made way too many blatant errors that raised red flags. DeMelo over Heed was bad, Melker Karlsson over Barclays Goodrow/Jannik Hansen was bad, Kane on the Pavelski-Donskoi line over Meier was bad, and the system change was bad and clearly made them a worse team. It’s fair to say that he didn’t deserve to be fired last season but he definitely didn’t deserve to get a contract extension one year advance.

The same goes for guys like Vlasic, Jones, and Couture who were signed a year early. Maybe their play didn’t automatically suggest that they deserved to be traded, but they had all shown signs of decline before they signed their contracts, and they definitely didn’t deserve to be re-signed 364 days before they needed to be. And it’s concerning that Doug Wilson wasn’t able to look at basic statistics based on the effectiveness of coaches after a certain number of years as coach and players at a certain age, put that information together with what he saw from these guys, and decide “I need to sign them 364 days before they might leave.” It’s a very concerning trend.

Just because these players might have been paid this on the open market doesn’t mean that they were good contracts. If you think that’s a strong base to build an argument on, just look at what the open market paid guys in 2016. Kane only made marginally more than his closest UFA comparables in Okposo, Ladd, Eriksson, and Lucic did in 2016, and the increase in cap more or less offsets the difference in salary...okay, so Kane’s contract is comparable to those 4. The problem is that those contracts sucked! The kind of GMs that signed those guys to “market value” are the kind that fail.

Between the 4 teams that signed those players, 12 seasons have been played since they were signed, and only one of those teams made the playoffs in one of those seasons. Sure, I can throw eat bananas and throw **** at people and compare myself to a monkey, but does that make it a good idea? Shouldn’t I be striving to be better than a monkey? And shouldn’t DW strive to be better than 4 dumbass monkeys in Peter Chiarelli, Tim Murray, Jim Benning, and Garth Snow (the 4 GMs who signed those players)? Two of those guys have been fired already and the other two are considered the two worst GMs in the NHL. Forgive me for not forgiving DW’s decision making on the basis of it being comparable to the decisions made by those 4 buffoons.

Jones’ contract was signed after a regular season where his .912 SV% ranked 21st among 30 NHL goaltenders who played at least 41 games. It was not signed after his strong regular season and playoff run of 2015-2016. It was signed after a below average regular season performance and it made him the 12th highest paid goalie in the NHL IIRC.

And I don’t agree with the idea that DW would have had to trade them either. If he just let go of all of Kane, Vlasic, and Jones, we would be in pretty much the same exact spot right now and we would have $19.75M in cap space along with our 2019 1st round pick.

It’s also really not that hard for the Sharks to attract UFAs. The main reason the Sharks have historically missed out on UFAs is because Doug Wilson has historically been very conservative with the salary cap. Had Doug Wilson been throwing 7X7s at Kanes, 7X8s at Vlasics, 5.75X6s at Jones, we would not talk about how the Sharks historically have trouble signing UFAs. We would more likely talk about how UFAs come here way too often and we would try to build a wall around San Jose to try and keep them out. :laugh.

Kane deserved to be up with Pavs and Donkey. He was the more dynamic player. Until he got hurt he scored at a rate the Meier wasn't even close to touching.

It's standard in the NHL for teams to re-sign their UFAs at the one year prior mark. What are the ages of your Kane comparable? Seems like a couple were older. What was the cap percentage of those contracts for the year they signed? Were they under the current CBA? Seems like you're doing apples to oranges again...

No GM that wants to keep his job is letting that many prime of career assets walk with no compensation. That would be franchise suicide. C'mon man your argument lacks logic.

History is against your assertion in regards to UFA signings and SJ. (niedermeyer, Tavares, Stamkos, etc, etc etc...)

 

[Juxtaposer]

Wild that Evander Kane is on a 20 goal, 47 point pace after that hot start. I cannot believe we’re paying that guy $7M for the next seven years and giving up a first round pick for the honor of doing so. Just ridiculous. If we miss the playoffs this season, we’ll have essentially given up a lottery pick for that contract.

 

[Negatively Positive]

DW never gave out any long term contracts to durable players like Thornton and Marleau but he gave them to injury prone inferior players. One of the things I liked about DW was that he never signed any super long deals that could hamstring the team in the long term but those days are over.

 

[Dicdonya]

Wild that Evander Kane is on a 20 goal, 47 point pace after that hot start. I cannot believe we’re paying that guy $7M for the next seven years and giving up a first round pick for the honor of doing so. Just ridiculous. If we miss the playoffs this season, we’ll have essentially given up a lottery pick for that contract.

Almost seems like some posters owe you a bit of an apology for jumping the gun early in year poking fun at you for your stance on the Kane contract. Wouldn't hold my breath though, and there is also the possibility Kane goes on another tear at some point to earn his contract. Lately though, its not looking too good.

 

[LA Shark]

I didn't hate the Kane contract when it was signed, didn't love it either. Thought it was obviously too long and would have preferred like a 6x6 deal. Starting look like it's going to be a terrible contract however.

 

[TomasHertlsRooster]

Kane deserved to be up with Pavs and Donkey. He was the more dynamic player. Until he got hurt he scored at a rate the Meier wasn't even close to touching.

It's standard in the NHL for teams to re-sign their UFAs at the one year prior mark. What are the ages of your Kane comparable? Seems like a couple were older. What was the cap percentage of those contracts for the year they signed? Were they under the current CBA? Seems like you're doing apples to oranges again...

No GM that wants to keep his job is letting that many prime of career assets walk with no compensation. That would be franchise suicide. C'mon man your argument lacks logic.

History is against your assertion in regards to UFA signings and SJ. (niedermeyer, Tavares, Stamkos, etc, etc etc...)

Kane didn’t deserve to be up with Pavelski and Donskoi after his suspension. It was clear in game 2 of that series that Meier was the much better fit on that line with Pavelski and Donskoi and every single metric says that over the entire course of last season (RS+PO), Meier was better on that line than Kane. Kane was obviously hurt and playing terribly; he really should not have been stapled to that line.

I’m actually not comparing apples to oranges. I’m doing what CapFriendly’s “comparable contract” calculator does on its default settings, which takes age into consideration and places ten times as much emphasis on % of cap hit as it does on face value AAV. Where the top 4 most comparable contracts are Okposo, JVR, Lucic, and Bobby Ryan. All horrible contracts signed by GMs that have either been fired or are considered some of the worst in the NHL.

And if you really want to compare (rotten) apples to apples, let’s go a step further. I adjusted the calculator’s settings to put 20% emphasis on 5 categories: age, Cap hit % of cap ceiling, contract length, games played, and points. After doing that, here are Kane’s top-6 comparables:

Nathan Horton
Kyle Okposo
Milan Lucic
Bobby Ryan
Kyle Turris
Dustin Brown

Yuck. Kyle Turris’ contract might end up being decent. The rest of those are names you can probably find if you check HF’s latest “worst contracts in the league.” thread.

None of those guys are “prime of career assets” on day one of their contract. On average, NHL skaters peak in WAR between age 22-25. (Excluding Jones because these metrics don’t include WAR for goalies who peak later) The average age of Couture/Kane/Vlasic during the first game of their contracts is 29.33, where WAR is over 0.25 less than peak years. The average of those 3, on opening night, over the entirety of their contracts is 32.78, where WAR is over 0.75 less than it is in peak years. I also disagree with your premise that a GM shouldn’t let prime of career assets walk just for the sake of not doing so, but none of those guys are “prime of career assets”, both in terms of simply their age compared to peak age of NHL players, and their actual performance. None of them were coming off career years when they signed their new deals.

The results of 2 elite superstars who hit UFA and considered San Jose as one of their destinations doesn’t really say that history isn’t on my side. You’re looking at just two examples there. Meanwhile, I can say that in 2015, when Doug Wilson wanted to help his team through UFA, he signed Joel Ward and Paul Martin to fair contracts. Joel Ward and Paul Martin are much closer to Kane and Vlasic than Kane and Vlasic are to Tavares and Niedermayer. DW could probably improve on those guys through UFA and for less money at that.

 

[BaileyMacTavish]

Yeah I'm gonna eat crow for that Kane contract. Woof it's bad. Disn't think it was great, but disn't hate it. Now I do. *sigh*

 

[TomasHertlsRooster]

Almost seems like some posters owe you a bit of an apology for jumping the gun early in year poking fun at you for your stance on the Kane contract. Wouldn't hold my breath though, and there is also the possibility Kane goes on another tear at some point to earn his contract. Lately though, its not looking too good.

It’s always funny when people try to play “I told you so!” Based on a minuscule sample size. Nobody said Kane couldn’t score 4 goals in 4 games, we said he wouldn’t score enough in the 574 games he is signed for to be worth his contract.

Wild that Evander Kane is on a 20 goal, 47 point pace after that hot start. I cannot believe we’re paying that guy $7M for the next seven years and giving up a first round pick for the honor of doing so. Just ridiculous. If we miss the playoffs this season, we’ll have essentially given up a lottery pick for that contract.

It’s okay, he’s on pace for 44 minor penalties! He’s scaring other teams and bringing toughness and intangibles. We need a tough player like him and we have a good penalty kill. With our penalty kill of 85.5%, if he takes 44 minor penalties this season, that should only lead to ~6-7 goals against. Totally not a big deal.

DW never gave out any long term contracts to durable players like Thornton and Marleau but he gave them to injury prone inferior players. One of the things I liked about DW was that he never signed any super long deals that could hamstring the team in the long term but those days are over.

If I had a time machine, the first thing that I would do is go back in time and stop whatever caused him to change his philosophy on long term contracts.

 

[Dicdonya]

It’s always funny when people try to play “I told you so!” Based on a minuscule sample size. Nobody said Kane couldn’t score 4 goals in 4 games, we said he wouldn’t score enough in the 574 games he is signed for to be worth his contract.

Yeah, I am agnostic on the Kane contract still, verdict is still out IMO. However maybe wait until the first of seven years is over before trying to say someone was right/wrong about the contract would be advisable.

 

[Agent Zub]

kane contract is sorta bad but at least he cares. vlasic on the other hand seems to have checked out

 

[Juxtaposer]

Almost seems like some posters owe you a bit of an apology for jumping the gun early in year poking fun at you for your stance on the Kane contract. Wouldn't hold my breath though, and there is also the possibility Kane goes on another tear at some point to earn his contract. Lately though, its not looking too good.

No one needs to apologize. This isn’t 2009, I can handle some people making asses of themselves now.

But yeah. I think we’re seeing the player Kane really is now.

 

[Sysreq]

I’m not worried about the long-term contracts. This league has shown time and again, that you can get out of such deals should it be required. We will get compliance buyouts in the new CBA, and we will be able to trade to Seattle in the next expansion draft. Doug is playing the long game here. Long term contracts have proven to be very beneficial to the organizations, to secure strong players at a below market rate. That is why everyone has gone towards them.

 

[Pinkfloyd]

Wild that Evander Kane is on a 20 goal, 47 point pace after that hot start. I cannot believe we’re paying that guy $7M for the next seven years and giving up a first round pick for the honor of doing so. Just ridiculous. If we miss the playoffs this season, we’ll have essentially given up a lottery pick for that contract.

I'm pretty sure if we miss the playoffs, that lottery pick goes to Ottawa not Buffalo. And we were giving up a 2nd to rent Kane so I'm not terribly upset even knowing that I felt it was too much to upgrade on a pick one round to keep a solid top six guy for a while. I think they'll probably pay Seattle to take Kane. It'll look bad but it's not going to be as bad as people think, imo.

 

[tiburon12]

If I had a time machine, the first thing that I would do is go back in time and stop whatever caused him to change his philosophy on long term contracts.

I don't think it was him who changed his mind though. Yes, he did change strategy with giving long term deals, but i think that's because his contemporaries started doing that first. Good agents, who, remember, work for the player, not the team, will use that to their advantage.

Let's look at Burns for a moment. Burns signed his deal in November of 2016, a year he went on to win the Norris. He was on a tear up to that point and was playing outstanding hockey. He had also just been a force on a team that lost in the cup Final months earlier. One has to think that Burns' agent saw him as a contender to win the Norris, saw Hedman sign for 8 x 7.875 months earlier, and saw Stamkos threaten to walk months earlier. DW saw all of that too. A good agent would come equipped to those negotiations and say "look, the market is set at 8 x 7.875, and my client (Burns) is currently playing better than that player. Give us something similar or we will walk and someone else will."

Seems to me like DW got caught up in a "Sink or Swim" situation with long contracts - if he wasnt going to give them, other GMs would. I think it's pretty clear he made the correct decision with Burns for that contract, but it's likely his hand was forced regarding the term.

Vlasic and Jones, I think he missed on those, unfortunately, but to be fair, no one really saw Vlasic declining this rapidly. With Jones, we are lucky that our team is good enough to make the playoffs even if he plays poorly, so at the very least, we can judge Jones on playoffs. Good goalies are also not in abundance, so consider who would be his replacement had we not signed him. Certainly not Dell over a full season.

My point is not to absolve DW of any responsibility on some contracts that don't look great (Kane in particular), but i think it is very unfair to blame him for changing his approach to long term deals. Let's also not forget 3 years was too long for Marleau, and that continues to be the right call (Marleau's deal is killing the Leafs next year).

Yeah, I am agnostic on the Kane contract still, verdict is still out IMO. However maybe wait until the first of seven years is over before trying to say someone was right/wrong about the contract would be advisable.

It's still too early to judge + the team is collectively playing like trash. To use poor team play to indict Kane is also not fair. Having said that, he needs to score more, and it's not like he is playing particularly well (like, say, Pavs).