Wouldn’t Saad + Shaw not being on the roster have covered Panarin’s cap hit though? Most of it at least.
As in, we don’t trade Saad for Panarin. Re-sign Panarin to an 8 year $10mAAV deal (that I’ll argue would’ve happened If we didn’t trade him) Don’t trade for Shaw. Saad+Shaw = $9.9mAAV.
Having huge chunks of our cap space tied up on LTIR contracts and/or bad contracts for 2-3 year chunks isn’t any better than having $31 million tied up on 3 franchise players.
It’s been absolutely beaten to death but I’m still of the opinion that trading Panarin was the right move, just probably wrong target. Yes you can made Panarin contract work for a year or two but what about a few years down the line when these kids need extensions? Especially with this unexpected flat cap, having 3 forwards north of 10mil AND Seabrooks dead money it would have been impossible to build any kind of depth as those four players are about half your cap and one of them isnt even one of your top 18 skaters. Teams without depth don’t win cups ever. Kubalik would likely have been the first of many cap casualties.
top heavy teams with no depth tend to do well in the regular season to get figured out in the playoffs. I think with Panarin, were a team that doesn’t seriously challenge for the cup but ends up drafting low 20s/high teens. Not a good situation to be in at all. I just don’t see a scenario where signing Panarin at north of 10 mil would be good for the long term health of this team. It just would have created a bit more exciting hockey to watch right now.
I’m pretty sure I said that offseason that I’d like to see Panarin shopped for a young defenseman. Still think that would have been the best move but obviously have no clue if any realistic offers were available
