We go back to having a barren top 6 once again on a team that already struggles scoring for the past two seasons. This is still a team with a horrible goal differential that’s nowhere near being an actual contender. Even if they back into the playoffs this year in a horrible division, they’re still nowhere near the caliber of the top teams in the league and will get eviscerated in the postseason.
Take Meier away from that equation while not adding anything back and you’re much closer to being a last place team again than you are a playoff team.
Regardless, it doesn’t matter because you wouldn’t have to pay Meier to dump Jones retained 50% at his current form and a buyout isn’t all that painful on Jones compared to Vlasic. Anywhere Vlasic is willing to waive his NMC for isnt going to have the cap space to inherit $10-$13 million between the two of them so it’s a moot point.
You can’t look at everything through the lens of this season or next season when making these sorts of decisions on trades and contracts. These moves have long term repercussions and the idea of cutting dead weight immediately no matter what is short sighted and is how you get into even deeper organizational trouble because at some point you have to atone for the mistakes you made on these contracts and it all catches up to you. I can go on ad nauseam about this again, but the past few weeks have shown we’re nowhere near the same thought process on the state of the organization and cap economics so it’s not really worth anyone’s time.
The idea that Meier, who has spent significant time on the 3rd line, is the difference between what we have now and a barren top six is not convincing to me. But you know damn well that when I'm suggesting such a thing, it is with the intent of using what is saved.
I agree you wouldn't have to pay Meier to dump 50% retained Jones. You're doing it to not retain on Jones at all. The Sharks, like everyone else in the league, won't retain 50% on anyone with more than one year on the deal. You're looking at 1.5 maybe 2 mil if this sort of number inflates with a cap increase.
As for Vlasic, you repeating it doesn't make the assertion true. They likely will still have to take back a contract because Vlasic even at 5.5 mil is still horrible value. Having to do that plus retain opens up the potential of getting some value back on Meier's part of the deal.
The problem here is that you either unwittingly or intentionally try to pigeonhole these discussions into what you want it to be and argue against that. You are dead set on the rebuild argument even though I've never made any such determination myself and the team is unlikely to go that route. Until you get past your false premises and unwarranted preconceived notions of what you think the team needs to do, you'll continue to misrepresent what I'm saying.