I would give up the NTC/NMC clauses very quickly to keep the AAV lower. To me, Josi can be a lifer. I don't envision WANTING to trade him at any point. And if it ever does get to a scenario where both sides would like a change, those things can be waived. He's one of the rare players where I just don't worry about that though. He'd be like Rinne. We aren't saddled with a lot of those clauses on our payroll. If anybody could get one, it's Josi.
And for the first time in forever, we're actually up against the cap. We have a good lineup. We should still be in a contention window for several years. Every $$$ save on the cap is worth something to help make our team better. Also, when an 8-year deal ends, it's not like Josi is going to be just 32. He'll be 38. There has to be some dropoff and I think it's reasonable that we don't want a high AAV on him in those final years. We'll still want him on the team. But we're probably in trouble if he's still one of our top players at that time.
So give him some bonus money up front that he can invest and make some nice ROI on in the meantime, give him whatever he wants on NTC/NMC clauses, and drag that AAV as low as possible... that's what's going to help us WIN.
8x$8M, full NMC. Load it $10-10-8-8-8-8-6-6 or something like that, with bonuses piled up in those first few years. That's still a pretty sweet deal, I'd say. If he didn't want to accept that, I would be comfortable letting things play out through the season and towards July 1, 2020. It's a good enough offer that I'd feel like we made our best play at retaining him, and I'd offer the same thing to like Pietrangelo or whoever on July 1st. We don't seem to have a lot of trouble attracting talent, do we?