Is this going to make him tough to trade to contenders near the cap? We can't retain on bonuses, right? When do those bonuses hit the cap? How does this structure work assuming that he's only hit the first bonus ahead of the playoffs but looks to be a safe bet to hit the second bonus? And do the playoff qualifiers transfer to his new team?
We need HELP mouser!!! Haha
Any retained salary transaction must include both the player salary and bonuses at the same %.
Technically the bonuses count against the cap from day 1. So Vrbata's cap hit is $3.25M at the moment, though the cap tracking sites don't depict it that way. Teams can exceed the salary cap by up to 7.5% due to performance bonuses. Once a bonus becomes unreachable then the team receives a credit to their cap to offset the bonus.
Do the bonuses transfer? Unknown, depends on how the contract is written. Though most likely they do transfer IMO.
Who pays the bonuses? Again, depends on how the contract is written. If for example the contract said Vrbata is to be paid $500k immediately upon playing 30 games then the Coyotes would pay that out. If the contract said Vrbata will be paid $500k at the end of the regular season if he played 30 games, then that payout would be split between the Coyotes and other team if Vrbata were traded with retained salary.
Let's say for example Vrbata is traded with 50% at the TDL before he reaches 20G or 40P. The team that acquires Vrbata would have him at a $1.625M cap hit, pro-rated to roughly $350k in real salary space, for the remainder of the season. If Vrbata didn't reach 20G/40P then that would be removed from the cap hit. If the team didn't make the playoffs or bowed out early then those bonuses would be removed from the cap hit. One quirk with performance bonuses though: if a team is using the LTIR exception to exceed the cap then all earned performance bonuses carry over to the next season.