Arizona, who are trying to reduce both cap and salary, are going to take on two huge cap dumps AND retain on Ekman-Larsson?!?!?

They don't want to pay their all situation dman $10M a season later, so they're obviously excited to get a bunch of money and cap back while paying him $1.6M for those years to play for someone else. Because they love a first round pick and a prospect who has never broken in to a full time gig THAT much!

No GM in their right mind retains money for SEVEN years. That's just asking to be perpetually middle of the pack, even if it is just 1.25m

Even without the retention, OEL doesn't go for two cap dumps, a 26yo mid-pairing dman, and a 23yo prospect who's ceiling is mid-pair. The 1st doesn't offset the rest of an underwhelming package

Right now, Arizona owes Ekman-Larsson $4 million. Those 4 guys will cost them at least $8 million (depending upon what Stecher signs for), so even assuming that the $1.25 retention can be applied to the signing bonus already paid him, Arizona goes $4 million in the hole on this deal this year. Now let's look at next year. Ekman-Larsson is owed $10.5 million, but since only Sutter is coming off the books, Arizona would be paying at least $8.75 million for these guys. So Arizona is net minus $2.25 million over the first two years of this deal. Of course, we have to add back in the cap hits and salaries of the guys Arizona would have on the roster if not for the incoming quartet in 2020 and trio in 2021, so Arizona would actually come out ahead on the deal, but I can't see this trade saving them more than $3 million over the first two years.