Speculation: Pietrangelo's future (reports: to go to FA)

[DudeWhereIsMakar]

I mean the Blues gotta trade Jake Allen and Tyler Bozak away as a start in order to keep Pietrangelo. They could do a deal that includes Vince Dunn too, I think they might even be able to pull off something huge in order to continue contending.

Upsets me knowing that the Blues might not keep Pietrangelo, did tons and something no Blues player has done before, captain the Blues to a Stanley Cup. Also, he has heart for St. Louis which you cannot put a price on.

 

[Ranksu]

There is 4 people who know situation.
Pietro, his wife, his agent and Army. Rest of us are guessing.

 

[bluesXwinXtheXcup]

I think he's as good as gone.

 

[SIU LAW]

Assuming a flat cap, if the Blues keep both Petro and Dunn, unless they want to deal multiple players/depth, I think the Blues pretty much have to buyout Steen if he doesn’t retire (and only gain a little over two million next year in cap space with a buyout), just to have some cap room for emergencies/etc.

Not doing so would seem to unnecessarily force the Blues to lose more useful depth and assets.

Steen retiring or accepting a trade would go a long way to keeping both defensemen.

 

[SIU LAW]

I just noticed that Cap Friendly is now assuming a cap of 84 for next year instead of the flat cap number that Army recently mentioned. Yikes, things are even more difficult than I realized.

 

[Stupendous Yappi]

I just noticed that Cap Friendly is now assuming a cap of 84 for next year instead of the flat cap number that Army recently mentioned. Yikes, things are even more difficult than I realized.

I don't understand you. That's 2.5M more than a flat cap would be. Are you saying it will be worse for the Blues if the Cap goes up to 84M? (I don't think CapFriendly knows any more than the rest of us, and the rumors of a flat cap are pretty credible, but I doubt a final decision has been made yet.)

 

[SIU LAW]

I don't understand you. That's 2.5M more than a flat cap would be. Are you saying it will be worse for the Blues if the Cap goes up to 84M? (I don't think CapFriendly knows any more than the rest of us, and the rumors of a flat cap are pretty credible, but I doubt a final decision has been made yet.)

My mistake for not being clear. My previous post above about Steen is when I was relying on Cap Friendly as to remaining cap space for next season. After I made that post, I then noticed that Cap Friendly is evidently assuming a cap number that was higher (84) than what Army recently suggested as likely for next season (flat at 81.5). The Blues are in a tougher cap spot than I realized when making my post about Steen.

 

[Ted Hoffman]

My mistake for not being clear. My previous post above about Steen is when I was relying on Cap Friendly as to remaining cap space for next season. After I made that post, I then noticed that Cap Friendly is evidently assuming a cap number that was higher (84) than what Army recently suggested as likely for next season (flat at 81.5). The Blues are in a tougher cap spot than I realized when making my post about Steen.

Right. And that's the thing to consider: even at $84M, this is going to be a pain in the ass to fit.

Maybe Steen can "have a condition where he's allergic to the composite hockey sticks that everyone uses" and can't play any more, and we can LTIR him and open up space that way. Some other kind of bullshit thing a la Hossa, but which gets passed off as being legitimate and buys us cap space and then will "mysteriously" get better after his contract is over (which I fully expect to have happen with Hossa).

 

[Eldon Reid]

Right. And that's the thing to consider: even at $84M, this is going to be a pain in the ass to fit.

Maybe Steen can "have a condition where he's allergic to the composite hockey sticks that everyone uses" and can't play any more, and we can LTIR him and open up space that way. Some other kind of bullshit thing a la Hossa, but which gets passed off as being legitimate and buys us cap space and then will "mysteriously" get better after his contract is over (which I fully expect to have happen with Hossa).

Maybe Blues can pull off the Orpik deal and trade Steen to whoever and they buy him out and he resigns with the Blues.

 

[Eldon Reid]

So looking at the Blues situation from 2 different perspective. One with a flat cap at 81.5 and other we will go with 84 mill as capfriendly has.

As of NOW, the Blues have 14 forwards signed for next season, 5 dmans, & 2 goalies (whether it is Binnington & Allen or Husso)

Fowards have about 51.3 million of the cap
Defense have about 18.4 million of the cap
Goalie have about 8.75 million of the cap.

For a grand total of 78.45 million.

With a flat cap, we are in some deep trouble in trying to sign Pietrangelo.
If cap goes up to 84, we won't have as many hurdles to clear to try to sign him.

So let's look at some very logical moves the Blues can make to reduce their expenditures for now.

Trading Allen for draft pick and bringing up Husso. This move alone saves 3.6 million.
Trading Gunnar for pick and bringing up Mikkola. This move saves about 960k.

Those 2 moves save 4.5 mil and if the cap is at 84 million, we could almost sign both Pietrangelo & Dunn with those savings alone and maybe we could sign both since Dunn has very little control in his decision.

81.5 millon cap would have to involved movement or buyout of Steen or Bozak or trade of Schwartz to open up enough space.

 

[BlueDream]

Why do you say that? In a world where Pietrangelo wants to stay, we have to clear cap.

Isn’t Alex Steen’s contract exactly the one we’d like to most clear (aside from Faulk?) It’s not like he’s a top 6 player anymore.

1. Doesn’t even make financial sense, to start. Buying him out doesn’t make his salary completely disappear. He has 1 year left. Why not just ride that out instead of paying him to not play for us for multiple years? It’s just a narrow minded outlook. It helps our cap for 1 year, after that it hurts us. So in the end it’s not really a net positive at all.

2. He’s still a valuable member of the team. Sure he’s not a top 6 player but he’s still a good bottom 6’er. Top PK’er, versatile, good defensively, always battles hard and the players absolutely rave about his leadership in the room. He’s a well respected Blue and has been for a long time. If you’ve been following the Blues for a while, they usually are pretty classy in the way they operate. Buying out a guy like that after he helped you win a Cup is not their style.

 

[Em etah Eh]

1. Doesn’t even make financial sense, to start. Buying him out doesn’t make his salary completely disappear. He has 1 year left. Why not just ride that out instead of paying him to not play for us for multiple years? It’s just a narrow minded outlook. It helps our cap for 1 year, after that it hurts us. So in the end it’s not really a net positive at all.

2. He’s still a valuable member of the team. Sure he’s not a top 6 player but he’s still a good bottom 6’er. Top PK’er, versatile, good defensively, always battles hard and the players absolutely rave about his leadership in the room. He’s a well respected Blue and has been for a long time. If you’ve been following the Blues for a while, they usually are pretty classy in the way they operate. Buying out a guy like that after he helped you win a Cup is not their style.

The original buyout post by Mook was about compliance buyout and the full 5.75 coming off the books. If there is a compliance buyout (which I’m very doubtful there will be) then Steen’s contract is definitely the first one you buy out.

 

[Falco Lombardi]

1. Doesn’t even make financial sense, to start. Buying him out doesn’t make his salary completely disappear. He has 1 year left. Why not just ride that out instead of paying him to not play for us for multiple years? It’s just a narrow minded outlook. It helps our cap for 1 year, after that it hurts us. So in the end it’s not really a net positive at all.

2. He’s still a valuable member of the team. Sure he’s not a top 6 player but he’s still a good bottom 6’er. Top PK’er, versatile, good defensively, always battles hard and the players absolutely rave about his leadership in the room. He’s a well respected Blue and has been for a long time. If you’ve been following the Blues for a while, they usually are pretty classy in the way they operate. Buying out a guy like that after he helped you win a Cup is not their style.

1. We were discussing potential compliance buyouts which does clear the full thing. At least I thought we were. I don’t think it’s a far fetched idea at all, especially if the cap drops in any way.

2. It’s absolutely not the nicest way to go about it, I would agree. However, keeping Pietrangelo should rank above being nice in the end.

We’ve got roughly 2 mil in cap space at BEST if the cap stays flat (and we don’t know that. It certainly isn’t going up.) Let’s say the magic number is 9. You’ve got to come up with 7 mil in space.

Allen at 4.35 x 1
Bozak at 5 x 1
Steen at 5.75 x 1

I think we all agree those are the three potential targets that are the biggest cap hinderances that are not overly cumbersome to move (Justin Faulk). Of those, Alex Steen, in his current form, is by far the easiest to replace and clears the most money.

So I’m wondering what your plan is to keep Pietrangelo is if it doesn’t involve moving Steen’s contract, especially if the option to make it disappear is there.

 

[Brian39]

Just looking at CapFriendly. It seems that Doug Armstrong has been handing out NTC's like Halloween candy in recent years. We all know about Faulk, but I was interested to find out that Bozak, Perron, Schwartz, and even Gunnarsson, have one. Interestingly, one player that doesn't have an NTC is Jake Allen.

Bozak has a 10 team no-trade list
Perron has a 5 team no-trade list
Gunnar has a 5 team no-trade list

These M-NTCs give the player some control about where they would end up, but they are far from huge barriers to a trade.

 

[Brian39]

I really, really don't understand the idea of moving Dunn in order to make the cap work. He doesn't have arbitration rights and Army has made it crystal clear that he is willing to play hardball with guys who don't have leverage.

Let's assume that the team views him as expendable. If that is the case, the much better option is to tell him "you can sign your qualifying offer or you can sign a 2 year deal at $1.5M AAV."

If you truly need to use a high value asset to move Bozak/Steen/Allen, I think you are much better off using a 1st rounder for that purpose and then keeping Dunn at one of those contracts. Then next summer you trade Dunn for futures. Trading a 24 year old Dunn in the summer of 2021 would return a good value futures asset that would largely offset the loss of the 1st we give up in this hypothetical.

There is massive value to having another year of Dunn at a dirt cheap price in 2020/21. He should be way down the list of assets to move in order to sign Petro because signing him to a 1 or 2 year deal is a contract that provides huge positive value.

 

[Stupendous Yappi]

I really, really don't understand the idea of moving Dunn in order to make the cap work. He doesn't have arbitration rights and Army has made it crystal clear that he is willing to play hardball with guys who don't have leverage.

Let's assume that the team views him as expendable. If that is the case, the much better option is to tell him "you can sign your qualifying offer or you can sign a 2 year deal at $1.5M AAV."

If you truly need to use a high value asset to move Bozak/Steen/Allen, I think you are much better off using a 1st rounder for that purpose and then keeping Dunn at one of those contracts. Then next summer you trade Dunn for futures. Trading a 24 year old Dunn in the summer of 2021 would return a good value futures asset that would largely offset the loss of the 1st we give up in this hypothetical.

There is massive value to having another year of Dunn at a dirt cheap price in 2020/21. He should be way down the list of assets to move in order to sign Petro because signing him to a 1 or 2 year deal is a contract that provides huge positive value.

Do you think another defender will be moved? Gunnarsson maybe?

 

[Stlblue50]

That Faulk trade is looking worse and worse every day. Faulk straight up for Eddy would have been a bad trade. Then you throw in one of our top remaining prospects and I think a pick too!

If that trade didn’t happen then all we would have to do is let Eddy walk and trade Allen.

 

[Celtic Note]

I really, really don't understand the idea of moving Dunn in order to make the cap work. He doesn't have arbitration rights and Army has made it crystal clear that he is willing to play hardball with guys who don't have leverage.

Let's assume that the team views him as expendable. If that is the case, the much better option is to tell him "you can sign your qualifying offer or you can sign a 2 year deal at $1.5M AAV."

If you truly need to use a high value asset to move Bozak/Steen/Allen, I think you are much better off using a 1st rounder for that purpose and then keeping Dunn at one of those contracts. Then next summer you trade Dunn for futures. Trading a 24 year old Dunn in the summer of 2021 would return a good value futures asset that would largely offset the loss of the 1st we give up in this hypothetical.

There is massive value to having another year of Dunn at a dirt cheap price in 2020/21. He should be way down the list of assets to move in order to sign Petro because signing him to a 1 or 2 year deal is a contract that provides huge positive value.

So much this^

I never understood moving Dunn for a whole host of reasons, many of which you cover here.

 

[BlueKnight]

Elliotte Friedman was on Calgary sports radio yesterday,Talking NHL and one of the things was Pietrangelo. Blues are clear they want to re-sign Petro and offering similar to OEL $8.25M - $8.75M x 8 range. But not the $9M Petro's camp wants. I can't remember all of was said That was one part that i remember.

 

[Ranksu]

All these odd moves and Army has forced him to corner. Only way out is make big trades if wanna keep Pietro.

Blues d-core would be better without Faulk. 6.500 mill.$ of dead weight.

 

[Stupendous Yappi]

Elliotte Friedman was on Calgary sports radio yesterday,Talking NHL and one of the things was Pietrangelo. Blues are clear they want to re-sign Petro and offering similar to OEL $8.25M - $8.75M x 8 range. But not the $9M Petro's camp wants. I can't remember all of was said That was one part that i remember.

Current circumstances seem to make Pietro’s camp’s position harder to defend. I don’t think public opinion would be very sympathetic if that’s the difference that leads him to walk. If the Blues stand by that offer even with the lower projected cap, it’s effectively a higher percentage of the team cap number. I’m pretty optimistic they find common ground with this framework.

 

[Brian39]

Do you think another defender will be moved? Gunnarsson maybe?

If we extend Petro, then I think a D gets moved. It makes no sense to go into next season with 7 D men ahead of Mikkola on the depth chart. He has done everything he can to demonstrate he deserves an NHL shot, he turns 24 in a week and we are on the hook for his full $785k if we stash him in the AHL next year. He needs to be on the NHL roster next year and given a chance to sink or swim. Even if you ignore the cap savings he offers, it just makes sense for him to be one of the 7 D men next season. I'd have him bump out Gunnar. Bortz has an edge and style that no one else on our back end has and is therefore a more valuable option as the 6th/7th man than Gunnar is. Gunnar's 1 year at $1.75 should be easy to move, so you would get some cap savings and roll into next year with Petro, Parayko, Faulk, Scandella, Dunn, Mikkola, and Bortz.

If Petro walks, then you don't need to move another D man. Roll into camp assuming Parayko, Faulk, Bortz, Scandella, Dunn, Gunnar, Mikkola will be the 7 D men to make the team and force Perunovich to force a move in camp or go to the AHL.

 

[Brian39]

Current circumstances seem to make Pietro’s camp’s position harder to defend. I don’t think public opinion would be very sympathetic if that’s the difference that leads him to walk. If the Blues stand by that offer even with the lower projected cap, it’s effectively a higher percentage of the team cap number. I’m pretty optimistic they find common ground with this framework.

I'm taking those numbers with a big grain of salt. Those are the numbers Friedman has been talking about hearing for months now. No one has reported that there have been any discussions between Petro and the Blues since the pandemic hit. I think the odds are very, very good that these estimates are obsolete and don't account for any of the potential cap impacts of lost revenue.

 

[Ranksu]

If we extend Petro, then I think a D gets moved. It makes no sense to go into next season with 7 D men ahead of Mikkola on the depth chart. He has done everything he can to demonstrate he deserves an NHL shot, he turns 24 in a week and we are on the hook for his full $785k if we stash him in the AHL next year. He needs to be on the NHL roster next year and given a chance to sink or swim. Even if you ignore the cap savings he offers, it just makes sense for him to be one of the 7 D men next season. I'd have him bump out Gunnar. Bortz has an edge and style that no one else on our back end has and is therefore a more valuable option as the 6th/7th man than Gunnar is. Gunnar's 1 year at $1.75 should be easy to move, so you would get some cap savings and roll into next year with Petro, Parayko, Faulk, Scandella, Dunn, Mikkola, and Bortz.

If Petro walks, then you don't need to move another D man. Roll into camp assuming Parayko, Faulk, Bortz, Scandella, Dunn, Gunnar, Mikkola will be the 7 D men to make the team and force Perunovich to force a move in camp or go to the AHL.

Bolded: Generally we havent talk yet how difficult situation our d-core would go if we don't have Pietro. Scandella should play top2 minutes with Parayko. Faulk play top4 minutes with Dunn? Or you wanna break good chemistry Scandella - Parayko and go with Gunnar who previously played with Pietro and top minutes?

Scandella - Parayko
Dunn - Faulk
Gunnar/Mikkola - Bortuzzo

So it kind of make sense to give Faulk 7-year extension, 'cus he would replace Pietro's some of minutes. Parayko take full load at 5on5 and some PK. Faulk slide in to Pietro's 1st powerplay unite. That is only thing what I'm totally ok with.


We're really blessed to have Pietro and Parayko as a our #1 and #2 RHD.

 

[Celtic Note]

Faulk and Dunn both need to play with guys that can hold down the fort defensively. Pairing them together would be anxiety inducing to watch.