" No way we can keep all our first picks "

[McYoungGuns]

On the main boards it was brought up in the oilers may move Yak threadlaugh:) that we had to trade one of our first overall picks in order to be competitive , at first I was mad and I let him have it , but then when I was going on and on trying to prove my side:


Lets just say RNH and Yak both take the 6 mill deals that Hall and Eberle both took

thats 24 mill in them

leaving us 40 mill to spend on the 8 other fwds , 6 D and 2 goalies

Hall (6) RNH (6) Yak (6) 18
?(4) ?(4) Ebs (6) 14
?(2) ?(3) ?(2) 7
?(1) ?(1) ? (1) 3

42 mill on fwds (high end ? Yes )

Schultz (5) ? (5) 10
Petry (4) smid (3.5) 7.5 - This is what I'm assuming Petry will sign after next year , 4 years 16 mill
? (2.5) ? (2.5) 5

22.5 on D


4 mill goalie
1 mill back up

5 mill

69.5 mill

as you can see there arnt many names filled in because I didn't want to get the " oh hes not worth this or that " or that there are no rookies on elc listed , this is what I see the high end of our costs and tbh it was cutting it a little close but if the salary does go up then we are looking pretty good and if not ... well... cut costs ?

Well heres the question , Is it possible in your vision of the Oilers for us to keep the big 5 or is it all but imminent that we lose one or two ?

Click to read more...

 

[Tarus]

Quite a few teams spend a majority of their cap on their top 4 - 6 players, so the answer to that old HF cliché is no. You keep your game breaking talent and build an affordable roster around them, the idea being that the stars will provide shelter for lower tier players to be effective in complimentary roles(Bickell/Stalberg in Chicago for example).

The real danger is the bad contracts(like Horcoff), which can back a team into a corner and force them to offload talent. But even then, you dump the lower tier guys who are making too much, not the star players.

Only reason to trade them down the road is if the balance isn't quite right or one of them stagnates in their development. The biggest risk of that is Eberle who got a contract in a career year, but RNH/Yak are potential issues as well if the Oilers continue to enter contract negotiations with their stars with the gameplan of just handing them contracts they can't refuse, instead of actually negotiating a fair contract.

It's a non-issue though, and doesn't even take into account that we could be looking at a 90 - 100 million dollar cap in 5 years.

 

[Broilers]

Cap will increase

Cap will be 75M in 2015-2016 When Yakopov need his extension and cap will keep increasing. We just keep extending our core and Oilers will be successful.

The next year is crucial. We have to start winning we need to have meaningful games till the last week of the regular season.

 

[nexttothemoon]

Honestly... least of our concerns. If RNH/Yak/Schultz all are good enough that they are worthy of 5-6 million salaries... that's a Good Thing.

Sure the team has to be smart with contracts and not throw around huge cap crippling deals to UFA's... but I wouldn't worry about having too much high end expensive talent and this is what it really comes down to.... other fan bases worried about the Oilers accumulating elite talent.

 

[Jimmi McJenkins]

You just Keep them. You get rid of fringe pieces and keep the Elite ones.

 

[McQuixote]

Yes we can afford them. But expect to pay Yakupov considerably more than 6 million per when it comes time to re-up him.

 

[Mc5RingsAndABeer]

I've reposted this several times whenever someone brings that up. I didn't include Schultz in this but that doesn't make too much of a difference

__________________________________________________________

Hall is already locked up for a while at a discount. Eberle's contract could be an overpayment, an underpayment, or even. We will see if he can return to last season's form. Either way, he's locked up for a while as well. Horcoff, Hemsky, Whitney, and Khabibulin represent $18.25m of their cap. They'll most likely all be gone by the time RNH/Yakupov are signed.

As for tying up a lot of money in forwards...Suppose RNH and Yakupov also sign for $6.00m (that's what Hall and Eberle got). That's $24.00m in total. Here's the top 4 forwards caphits for some good teams around the league + Carolina (highest I think) for the 2013-2014 season.

Anaheim: $24.37m (Getzlaf, Perry, Ryan, Cogliano)
Boston: $22.00m (Lucic, Seguin, Bergeron, Krejci)
Carolina: $26.98m (Staal, Semin, Staal, Skinner)
Chicago: $23.78m (Kane, Toews, Sharp, Hossa)
Los Angeles: $21.47m (Kopitar, Richards, Carter, Williams)
Pittsburgh: $26.13m (Crosby, Malkin, Neal, Kunitz)
Vancouver: $21.70m (Sedin, Sedin, Kesler, Burrows)
Washington: $25.24m (Ovechkin, Backstrom, Laich, Erat)

Edmonton: $24.00m ?? (Hall, Eberle, Nugent-Hopkins, Yakupov)

It will be perfectly fine. Remember that Hall deal that was bashed all over HF? That's a huge reason why.

 

[KlimasLoveChild]

Yes we can afford them. But expect to pay Yakupov considerably more than 6 million per when it comes time to re-up him.

So you think he is going to put up fifty goals next season? That sure bodes well for the oilers playoff chances. I think there is next to zero chance he gets more then six except if he puts up stamkos like numbers.

 

[Halibut]

We probably dont want to be able to afford them all in the long run, the only way they remain affordable is if we never become competitive and they fail to perform. If they start to perform as expected, and the team starts competing for cups and hopefully even winning one or two, salaries will rise all around and most likely at least one of them will either have to or want to move. It's probably inevitable but there's a lot of ground between here and there and for at least right now were better off keeping them.

Personally I think the question is irrelevant. Do we have to? Who cares we may want to at some point, give me a better option now and I'll trade any of them but I'm not giving anybody away for peanuts because we cant afford them x years down the road.

 

[joestevens29]

Of course we can. The question will be whether or not we can keep them all and be a stanley cup contender or if we'll have to move one to have a better rounded top 6.

 

[CupofOil]

It's a Garrioch rumor, there's no use in getting worked up about it.

I do think that one of them (likely one of the forwards, Eberle or Yakupov) will have to be moved at some point maybe in a couple of years when they are at peak value and the Oilers are looking to take a step towards Cup contender but now is definitely not the time for that.

 

[Kenadyan]

I think the Oilers can keep all of them as long as they are smart about how they hand out the contracts while allowing the team to remain under the salary cap. That's what teams with good cap managers do.

Don't sign anyone to a stupid contract (think Luongo or Campbell).

Also when you look at Chicago I noticed some listed their top forwards, but they are also able to afford Keith and Seabrooke on defense as well, so it can be done.

 

[nexttothemoon]

It gets "worse" for the Oilers very soon.. .once they draft Barkov/Monahan/Lindholm... they'll have yet another $5-6 million dollar player on their hands in 3 years. Can't wait for that problem.

 

[Draiskull]

It gets "worse" for the Oilers very soon.. .once they draft Barkov/Monahan/Lindholm... they'll have yet another $5-6 million dollar player on their hands in 3 years. Can't wait for that problem.

nooooooooooo ... blow this unsustainable team up and rebuild!!

Stupid notion and way too early to start the 'sky is falling'. We are one Horcoff buyout away from being a below cap floor team..

 

[gqmixmaster]

I would rather have a roster of 18 players all deserving 6M plus than one that could all be signed under the cap.

 

[Draiskull]

Our salary chart is starting to look normal with best players getting paid the best salary.

(Khabi \ Whitney gone and Hall and Ebs off the ELC)

Still some odd ones in the list though but should be gone in a year or two..
(Hemsky \ Smyth \ N.Schultz\ Belanger will free up 12+ M after next season)
(Horcoff 5.5M more for Yakupov the year after)

No reason to trade the star power.

 

[Master Lok]

some ideas in this threads that are simply wrong.

a) Hall is not signed at a discount. Let's see him continue being injury free and productive before we can say that his contract is at a discount. Unless people actually think that Eberle was also signed a at discount according to his performance last year?

b) Why on earth would the Oilers sign RNH and Yakupov and everyone to a six million dollar contract automatically? They have to earn it, and its going to be tough to earn it simply because not everyone will get gametime on the PP, or on the first line etc. I can see that no one will earn more than Taylor Hall's six million dollar as being the cap. And everyone will earn less, since this will be Hall's team.

c) It only makes sense to negotiate with RNH's and Yakupov's agent to sign for less, depending on their performance. RNH and Yakupov has to have huge seasons in order to match up to Hall's six million contract.

d) As many others have said, you do whatever you can do to keep your elite talent, and then you cheapen out of the non-elite talent. If that means you have to buy out Horcoff in his last year (not this year) deal, then you do. If that means you say good bye to anyone who demands too much money (i.e. Mark Fistric $2 million per season for three year demands), then good bye.

If you have to forgo getting Lucic as your second or third line winger, then you do. If you have to put in cheap rookie contracts in your third and fourth lines (hello Anton Lander, Marincin,) then so be it. If that means more seasons of the teams cheapest contract Corey Potter, then that's part of the solution.

 

[AUAIOMRN]

We need to make sure our low end guys get paid like low end guys. Giving out an extra .5M here and there will start to add up.

 

[Mr Forever]

You can afford to have an expensive core if you aren't an active FA market team. We will have to augment the team with players on their ELCs and then move them when their contracts come up, ala Chicago, in order to keep it together.

 

[dem]

If Nuge puts up another season like last year he will be lucky to get half of what Hall got.

Well.. not really. but I could see 3.5-4 mil on a 2 or 3 year deal.

 

[Trafalgar Sadge Law]

We need to make sure our low end guys get paid like low end guys. Giving out an extra .5M here and there will start to add up.

This, no more 5 million for Hemsky, 2.25 million for Smyth type deals.

 

[The Nuge]

You can afford to have an expensive core if you aren't an active FA market team. We will have to augment the team with players on their ELCs and then move them when their contracts come up, ala Chicago, in order to keep it together.

This. It means we need guys like Pitlick and Moroz to pan out, but there's absolutely no reason to panic

 

[oilexport]

smart asset management has never been this teams strength (among a host of other weaknesses). Handing out balloon type contracts due to our past history of players leaving is risky management. Several contracts were awarded due to potential payback (penner, horcoff, gilbert, now the kids) is a gamble which sometimes will not pay off. This method will not work for the make-up of this Team moving forward. Pay people what thier worth on shorter contracts with exceptions of course (Hall). Play a little hardball (just a little) and find the right balence with these contracts.

Carefull with Gagner !! too bad we can't develop our Center position cause Sam's got us by the short hairs now (as I mentioned, host of weaknesses)!

 

[McJadeddog]

If Nuge puts up another season like last year he will be lucky to get half of what Hall got.

Well.. not really. but I could see 3.5-4 mil on a 2 or 3 year deal.

yeah, this is a pretty good point... we all just assume that RNH will put up 65+ points next year and thus get a 6 million/year extension... that could very well not happen though... he could easily sign a 2 or 3 year "bridge" deal, like lots of good young RFA players do... additionally, yakupov could falter somewhat in the next 2 years as well, and sign a similar "bridge contract"

i find it hard to believe that both RNH and yak will sign 6 million/6-8 year deals like hall/eberle did... eventually they both probably will get 6 (or more) on a deal that takes them into UFA years, but i doubt they both sign that contract as their 2nd NHL contract

 

[McBooya42]

We will be able to keep the big 5 and be just fine...