Team: 2020-21 Tampa Bay Lightning

Initial Creation Date: Oct. 23, 2020

Published: Oct. 24, 2020

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

This is my attempt at what I think Tampa could do to keep the band together.

Paquette, Coburn and one of Johnson, Gourde, Palat and Killorn got to go for Tampa to squeeze under the cap. I chose Killorn because he has a modifed NMC whereas the other three have NTC.

I chose Minnesota for Paquette because I think he fits what Guerin would be looking for and he seems to be trying to bring in additional centers to move around in his lineup (Bonino, Bjustad, Johanson).

Coburn to Anaheim, simple camp dump and bring back a fringe NHLer in Carrick on a minimum deal. Coburn fills the void left by Gudbranson in Anaheim and much cheaper for them.

I can see Nashville making a play for Killorn after losing Smith and Granlund. The return is worth less than what Killorn's value is IMO, but I think Tampa is going to have to accept a lesser return to move the cap out, similar to what Vegas did with Nate Schmidt.

Now for the signings...unless Tampa can find a way to move out another contract in Johnson, Palat or Gourde, the money just isn't there for the RFAs. Gave Cirelli 1.5, in similar fashion to how San Jose gave Labanc the one year, 1 mil deal last season. Then the rest of the cap is split between Cernak and Sergachev, where I gave the extra dough to Cernak for signing on for 2 years versus 1. I don't think Tampa will want to go through this again next year so I think they'll try to sign one of the three core RFAs to a multi year deal, which I think Cernak is the easiest target.

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