Two Year Clean Up

Created by: A_K

Team: 2025-26 St. Louis Blues

Initial Creation Date: Sep. 7, 2023

Published: Sep. 8, 2023

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

Legend

Left Handed

Original Team

Waivers Exempt

Right Handed

Position

Trade Clause

Max Perf. Bonus

Expiry Status

Term Remaining

McDavid, Connor

$12,500,000 ( Performance Bonus

$250,000)

NMC

UFA - 5

Description

If Armstrong is serious about fixing the defense, maybe he can take advantage of buyouts and free agents courtesy of the projected cap increase.

Per the Athletic:
2024-25: $87.7 million
2025-26: $92.1 million

Next offseason they could sign Hanifin and buy out Krug. The following season they could sign Chychrun and buy out Leddy. Essentially, each move is giving up on a 33 yr old in lieu of a 27 yr old for their age 27-33 seasons. It's not the best way to build a team (dead cap and bloated FAs), but these guys would take a lot of weight off of Parayko and Faulk as they get older. Personally I have high hopes for Buchinger but I don't know if any LHD in the Blues system will be capable of anything more than a no.4 so FA might be their best hope. With that said they should definitely keep drafting and developing.

FWIW the cap hit % of those deals for Hanifin and Chychrun is 8.6% based on a 92.1m cap, slightly above the 8% of Parayko/Faulk/Krug when they signed at 6.5m.

Free Agent Signings

RESERVE LIST	YEARS	CAP HIT
Snuggerud, Jimmy	2	$950,000
Stenberg, Otto	3	$950,000
Robertsson, Simon	2	$950,000
Lindstein, Theo	3	$950,000

RFA	YEARS	CAP HIT
Hofer, Joel	2	$1,500,000
Toropchenko, Alexey	2	$1,500,000
Neighbours, Jake	2	$1,500,000
Alexandrov, Nikita	1	$1,000,000
Tucker, Tyler	1	$900,000

UFA	YEARS	CAP HIT
Buchnevich, Pavel	6	$8,125,000
Chychrun, Jakob	7	$8,000,000
Hanifin, Noah	6	$8,000,000

Trades

STL

2025 3rd round pick (BOS)

BOS

Hayes, Kevin ($1,785,714 retained)

Buyouts

Torey Krug: $2,083,333
Nick Leddy: $2,000,000

Retained Salary Transactions

Kevin Hayes: $1,785,714 (50%)

Draft	Round 1	Round 2	Round 3	Round 4	Round 5	Round 6	Round 7
2024
2025
2026

ROSTER

LONG-TERM OUTLOOK

EMBED

TEXT-EMBED

ROSTER SIZE	SALARY CAP	CAP HIT	OVERAGES	BONUSES	CAP SPACE
23	$92,100,000	$89,897,380	$0	$1,562,500	$2,202,620

Left Wing	Centre	Right Wing
Buchnevich, Pavel $8,125,000$8,125,000 LW, RW, C UFA	Thomas, Robert $8,125,000$8,125,000 C, RW NTC UFA - 6	Snuggerud, Jimmy $950,000$950,000 RW, C RFA
Bolduc, Zachary $863,333$863,333 ($425,000$425K) LW RFA - 1	Dvorsky, Dalibor $950,000$950,000 ($1,000,000$1M) C RFA - 1	Kyrou, Jordan $8,125,000$8,125,000 RW NTC UFA - 6
Neighbours, Jake $1,500,000$1,500,000 LW, RW RFA	Schenn, Brayden $6,500,000$6,500,000 C, LW M-NTC UFA - 3	Saad, Brandon $4,500,000$4,500,000 LW, RW M-NTC UFA - 1
Alexandrov, Nikita $1,000,000$1,000,000 C RFA	Dean, Zach $852,500$852,500 C RFA - 1	Toropchenko, Alexey $1,500,000$1,500,000 LW, RW RFA

Left Defense	Right Defense	Goaltender
Hanifin, Noah $8,000,000$8,000,000 LD UFA - 7	Parayko, Colton $6,500,000$6,500,000 RD NTC UFA - 5	Binnington, Jordan $6,000,000$6,000,000 G M-NTC UFA - 2
Chychrun, Jakob $8,000,000$8,000,000 LD/RD UFA	Faulk, Justin $6,500,000$6,500,000 RD M-NTC UFA - 2	Hofer, Joel $1,500,000$1,500,000 G RFA
Lindstein, Theo $950,000$950,000 LD RFA - 2	Buchinger, Michael $870,000$870,000 ($80,000$80K) LD RFA - 1

Scratches	Injured Reserve (IR)	Long Term IR (LTIR)
Robertsson, Simon $950,000$950,000 RW RFA - 2
Tucker, Tyler $900,000$900,000 LD/RD RFA
Lööf, Leo $867,500$867,500 ($57,500$58K) LD RFA - 1

Top Comments

Sep. 8, 2023 at 9:45 a.m.

Hammerwise

Joined: Aug. 2018

Posts: 6,335

Likes: 2,234

I was thinking of this earlier, what if pre season Travis Sanheim from PHI starts to look good, rebounding from a bad 22-23.

PHI needs a top 4 RD and doesn;t want to get old. So What about a Parayko and Vrana (expiring UFA) for Sanheim (with a bit of retention - 1.5 or 1.75) and Laughton KIND of deal? Sanheim is 2 yrs younger than Parayko and signed similar long term but with retention to 4.75mil, and he'd be a cheaper option than Chychrun at 2LD and Laughton would be a big two way upgrade on Vrana?

Sep. 8, 2023 at 9:50 a.m.

A_K

Lets Go Blues

Joined: Jun. 2016

Posts: 6,777

Likes: 4,333

Quoting: Hammerwise

Personally I've never been sold on Sanheim. He has some skill but isn't reliable. The retention would at least get a foot in the door I guess. But trading away Parayko won't solve anything for the Blues; they can get much more out of him by surrounding him with better players and easing his role.

Hammerwise and mokumboi liked this.

Sep. 8, 2023 at 9:55 a.m.

Hammerwise

Joined: Aug. 2018

Posts: 6,335

Likes: 2,234

Quoting: A_K

Yes it would be totally reliant on Sanheim being the 2019 or 2020 or 2021 version and not last years. Hes younger and with some retention that goes a ways towards bridging the gap between them, but thats more than made up by the laughton for vrana swap, in my opinion.

Sep. 8, 2023 at 11:19 a.m.

mokumboi

Joined: Apr. 2019

Posts: 29,326

Likes: 11,373

Splurging on Hanifin AND Chych is not what the defense needs. Maybe one of them, not both.

Sep. 8, 2023 at 11:47 a.m.

A_K

Lets Go Blues

Joined: Jun. 2016

Posts: 6,777

Likes: 4,333

Quoting: mokumboi

Splurging on Hanifin AND Chych is not what the defense needs. Maybe one of them, not both.

I'd definitely be good with either/or... thought it was interesting that the cap would allow for both. And that's with buyouts when - if NTCs were waived - retained salary trades could make it even cheaper overall.

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