What I Would Have Done pt 2

Team: 2020-21 St. Louis Blues

Initial Creation Date: Aug. 22, 2020

Published: Aug. 22, 2020

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

A continuation of this team: https://www.capfriendly.com/armchair-gm/team/1861059

I'll be more brief this time.

- Not extending Faulk allows us to extend Dunn and Pietrangelo without trading positive value players like Bozak.

- If Pietrangelo doesn't re-sign, you still have Faulk you can extend. If he has the same year he just had, it'll probably be much cheaper and for less term, which is good for both him and the Blues. Could also pursue Barrie, Brodie, DeMelo, Rutta in FA (all defensemen who are better than Faulk, hot take).

- Giving Dunn a little more money gets us the extra year, which rides him and Gardiner through together with the same term.

- At this point, if Fabbri didn't perform over the season given a few months in the top nine, we can trade him regardless of value to fulfill his trade request. I'm sure Detroit would still be interested. This makes room for Kyrou and moves Schenn over to the wing full-time.

- I don't really care if we trade Allen or Binnington, but to make the cap work one had to go. I chose to keep Binnington since he won the cup but as I said before, if Binnington wants a pay increase after this contract, I'm not re-signing him. Don't pay for saves folks.

- I also choose to trade Barbashev to make the cap work. Sundqvist can take the 4C job. I like Barbashev as a player and a team guy and I don't mind his contract right now but he'd want a pay increase next year and we shouldn't give it to him due to his underlying numbers. So a trade it is.

- I don't love Bortuzzo being an everyday player so hopefully Gunnarsson or Mikkola can play the right occasionally.

Next year Steen, Gunnarsson, Bozak fall off and we lose someone (Sanford, Blais, or Gardiner) in the expansion draft. This gives us the ability to re-sign Thomas and Kyrou with ease, while building in bottom six roster spot for Kostin. If there's money left over and he won't break the bank, we can re-sign Schwartz too, so long as it doesn't jeapordize us re-signing Parayko. The final part comes next.