The cap isnt going up

. . . especially to $85.5 million.

Zach Parise is still a useful player and can win you an occasional game or two, whereas Andrew Ladd can't, and he and Tyler Johnson have no-trade clauses which they are highly unlikely to waive, and Tampa Bay is looking to reduce their cap, so exchanging one 5 million dollar player for another doesn't achieve that, and Bailey is better than Johnson in any event (in my opinion). So each of those trades is going to leave one team unhappy even if they were possible.

I agree parise is still a useful player and the trade made sense before the deadline - the trade was more about getting rid of Ladd than acquiring parise. The cap won’t go up and it’s likely there will be a compliance buyout, so there’s no point in trading for Parise unless the wild retain 50% salary (which they won’t do). Isles have to sign barzal , pulock, and toews this summer and pelech (5+ mill) , beauvillier (4+ ) and sorokin (who knows) next summer.

Cizikas and a $1.5M cap rise should take care of Pelech, but it will require finally getting rid of the Boychuk and Hickey contracts to make the rest of it work.

agreed. I don’t think it will be a problem, they’ll figure it out. Finally the younger guys will push the vets out.

It's too bad the Islanders have $15 million tied up in Boychuk, Clutterbuck, Komarov and Hickey (in addition to Ladd).

I think Ladd CBO + hickey (with 3rd rd pick) this summer

Koivula + pick to Seattle to take 1 year of boychuk + komarov buyout next summer

NYR bought out shattenkirk to sign panarin + trouba for 1 year of cap relief (it saved them around 6 mill this season but next next season the cap hit is back to 6 mill)

Isles have options but Lou might have to get creative

I based the cap on this article, thought I was being reasonable on the low end, lol

https://www.nhl.com/news/nhl-salary-cap-projections-for-next-season/c-315855100