Only allowed 3 recently per team

That's 3 salary retentions active at any one time OP.

More of a rebuilding move regardless. I think LA had signaled they want to be competitive.

Many things wrong.

Seattle trading two picks for a guy they could have just taken in the expansion draft???

Kings lose nothing with these deals except AA, and he's not a major loss. He shouldn't have been re-signed in the first place.

Rumour is they wanted both MacDermid and Wagner, cant take both.

They lose cap space which they could use to improve their roster.

They have many rookies lined up for a spot, they don't really have much more space to improve the roster. But if they get more draft picks they could use those to get a top defenseman instead of giving up prospects.

The habs obviously don’t do that.

You still need cap space to add those players.
It also leaves $25M to sign 12 players for next year. It's not unmanageable, but if those contract year players have the kind of success needed to make an impact, that space could quickly reach a premium.
Brown, Petersen, and a few bridge deals, and suddenly you're in cap hell.

I'm just saying it's unwise to use your cap space that way while also trying to contend. Maybe on 1 year deals at the deadline, after you've secured your final roster.

You are correct, but none of those contracts is more than 1 year except Drouin' 2250000 retentions, + they have plenty of cap space freeing up every year for the next 3 years. it's really not an issue for the Kings. Their lineup next year is going to be filled with entry-level contracts anyway.

And Zucker too I guess, but you get it, 4.5 mil for one more year is nothing for the Kings.

You might want to review the long term projection for next year or build a 22/23 team. I think you'll find it's tighter than you believe.

I've done it many times.

20 mil is more than enough to sign Petersen, Kempe, Vilardi, Anderson, Lias, and JAD, unless Vilardi has a stellar season it might take a little more. Then we don't know what the situation with Brown will be, he might retire, but if he signs it will be for cheap. In any way, there's enough space for all this to go through, it's not like this is going to happen, it's only but a theory.