Porter Stoutheart
We Got Wood
- Jun 14, 2017
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The other argument sometimes made about us accepting Weber's contract relates to the compliance buyouts. Several teams did buy out players with these types of contracts as one of their two league-allowed salary cap compliance buyouts. Brad Richards, Christian Ehrhoff, Ilya Bryzgalov, Vincent Lecavalier, Daniel Briere... there were several examples of back-diving contracts that teams did choose to extricate themselves from, with no cap hit remaining, and therefore no eventual recapture penalty applying. In theory, it is argued, the Predators could have done this too, once the new CBA was ratified. The counter to this, however, is that Weber's contract was just at its very beginning, and $110M with 14 years to run is an awful lot to buy out for a franchise that wasn't particularly stable at the time and coming out of a lockout. There are just so many arguments that Poile has at his disposal, and it seems like he has every assurance from the NHL front office that they are valid and will be taken into consideration. They don't need to chase down the details or publicize that right now of course, not until such time as Weber's retirement day arrives. The new CBA may arrive first. Lots could happen. But I don't think Poile made any of his decisions about the Weber contract lightly, not from matching the Philly offersheet, to foregoing the compliance buyout, to trading him. He will have had his ducks in order every step of the way.
