Quoting: BeterChiarelli
I'm fascinated with the Leafs' upcoming cap situation, but I think you've got it all wrong here. For what it's worth, I subscribe to the camp that's proven that Nylander and Marner are statistically equivalent. I'll use $8M as what Nylander should be signed at.
1. I'm like 99.99% sure Marleau has either a handshake deal to be traded back to San Jose for this year of his deal. If the Sharks resign Karlsson, Pavelski, Thornton, Labanc, and Meier to team-friendly deals (and Wilson is probably more than capable of that), I'm anticipating that Toronto can save about 4M on Marleau (they must retain 2.25M to move him).
The entire 4th line will have to be made out of either cheap ELC deals or players making league minimum. There's at least $1M to be freed up on the 4th line. Anyone with an RFA expiry can be moved for late-round picks (or higher should they warrant it) to keep fueling this tea with cheap, effective players. Borgman falls into this camp as well: he's definitely a useful player, but there are players within the Leafs' system that can be just as effective for >$300k cheaper. It all matters when the team is in cap hell. I'll touch on Scherbak later. I'm estimating that there can be about $1.3M found just in those inefficiencies: avoid getting attached to non-core players. The turnover on this roster is going to be violent until the cap raises enough to give this team room to keep players for longer.
Carrick will not be resigned by the Leafs, especially not at $3.5M: If they do resign him, the deal will be at ~$2M. However, I imagine the remainder of that money is split between Jonsson and Kapanen in order to get them on 3 or 4-year deals. No savings there, just better allocation of money.
By not doing that Petry trade at all, any remaining cash needed for a Nylander contract can be found. Without Scherbak coming in, there's another $200k that can be saved as well.
Matthews would be wise to not sign a deal close to what Tavares signed for (which looks like a bad deal after seeing what Seguin got). Draisaitl is a good comparable, but for the optics as Matthews being Toronto's star, a deal closer to Seguin's makes more sense to me. Assume $2M in savings here, Auston will make his money through sponsors. He wants to win, I don't think it silly to think he takes a modest discount.
McElhinney probably won't have much left in the tank by this point. The Leafs would be better off spending more on Sparks. Around $1.5M AT MOST. Liljegren is probably ready to go at this point, and the blueline most likely looks like:
Rielly | Zaitsev
Dermott | Carrick
[] | Liljegren
If Sandin isn't NHL-ready, throw money at a short-term deal for someone who can anchor Liljegren and push him into the top-4 by the deadline.
There's room here to sign everyone. Dubas isn't a madman, and he's not a liar. Wat's holding up the Nylander deal is most likely Marner's camp wanting more despite the two players being statistically equivalent. I'm very jealous of the Leafs.
Well said, and well thought out. I've toyed around with their cap hit next season a lot and here is what I have come up with.
1) you are right, there will be turnover. Gardiner and Hainsey are gone, without a doubt. Replaced by younger cheaper depth players. I do think one of Johnsson or Kapanen could be lost as well if either have a very good season.
2) Marleau will either retire or play out his last year with TO. Eitherway its not the biggest problem. They can still fit it all next year regardless.
3) 8 Million a season is too much for Nylander or Marner, neither are centres so they'll have trouble demanding that much unless they are getting over 90 points a season which neither have done. I think between 7 and 7.5 each is a better deal but I agree that their contracts will be a lot closer. In fact I wouldn't be surprised if they got matching deals.
4) where Toronto needs to keep clear is with the overpriced bad deals so many teams have to deal with. Which I don't see them doing because they just can't afford it. So many teams got into trouble by bridging their stars and then giving them huge 3rd contracts as they left their 20's. Now those teams are aging and have zero cap space because they are playing their older stars huge money they no longer can live up to. (Chicago, LA, Anahiem etc) Toronto is unique because bridge deals are essentially dead (for star players anyways) and they don't have any bad contracts currently (Marleau doesn't really count since he still scores close to 30 goals)