$3.1M for Kapanen is an overpayment. He's good, but he doesn't even have 50 career points yet. People need to chill on his value. Realistically he gets between $2.5-3M on a 2 or 3 year bridge deal so you can lower the cap a bit there.
Johnsson isn't going anywhere. If anyone gets moved it'll be a RW cause that's where the depth is. Johnsson is one of the few options they have at LW and he's young and cheap, he'll stay.
Brown probably gets a prospect back that will be close to playing a 4th line role, he's not really a cap dump.
Zaitsev probably moved and 1 or 2 right handed dman brought in for depth

I've been saying this exact thing about Kappy, people think he's been playing top 6 mins for the last 3 years. He'll get a 2-3 yrs @ 2.5m (give or take 200k). AJ also isn't going anywhere, that would make no sense. Leafs are in cap squeeze ONLY next year because of Patty, Brown and Z.

You are suggesting Kapanen gets 2.5-3 million and calling 3.1 mil an over pay?

If I'm Kapanen and the Leafs are offering me under 3 for a few years im looking hard at offer sheets. If I'm other teams I'm strongly considering offersheetinf the guy. 4 million for 4 years will get you him through his prime. If trying to replicate at a UFA you'll pay that for a 2nd-3rd line winger at about 29-33. In other words past his prime. It'll cost you a second. The Leafs can't match.

I would try to give him a one year bridge and resign him next year when Marleau's contracts is off the books

Smh. No, I said $3.1M for a 1 year deal is an overpayment. He hasn't shown that he can consistently play at the level he's been playing at, he tends to be a very streaky player. As I said, he also doesn't even have 50 career points.

A very real and logical comparison is Connor Brown's contract. Both were up and down from the AHL before finally making the team full time in their last year of their ELC. Brown had 89GP with 21G and 22A for 0.48PPG. As of right now, Kapanen has 108GP with 23G and 18A for 0.38PPG. Both are responsible defensively and see a lot of PK time and some but not a whole lot of PP time. Brown signed a 3year/$6.3M deal, so $2.1M per season which was a cap hit percentage of 2.8% at the time of the signing. So Kapanen at 2.8% of the projected $83M is $2.324M per year. Brown was about 23 years old when he signed, Kapanen is 22 right now. So a 2-3 year deal for Kapanen would end when he was 25, making both players still RFA's at the end of their deals. So if you wanna make a case for Kapanen that's where your reference points come in. I'd argue that Kapanen has more offensive upside to his game yes with hia superior speed, but that's just potential. He has to prove it. So you could add a bit more to the $2.324M comparison for that.

My educated prediction based on comparisons, Kapanen signs with Toronto for roughly $2.8M for 3 years. None of those years by out UFA years so it won't come at an obscene cost.

So yes, $3.1M for 1 year is an overpayment when they can get him cheaper for longer. & no team is going to offer him $4M for 4 seasons because that's atrocious. If they do, it's only to put Toronto in a tight spot and not because they think it's worth it. Kapanen is a secondary player on any team. He's not the type you build around so you don't commit to him long term right now. You bridge deal him to see if he can consistently improve to what he has been playing like.