Zadorov JUST re-signed in Calgary...

Hoffman is a cap dump. He will cost assets to get rid of

Can't buy Byron out - the buyout period has passed.

For starters why buyout Byron? He has 1 year left, if unhealthy, due to hip issues, he goes on LTIR, or else he is serviceable and can be dealt with 50% retention at the TDL. Either way you can't buy him out since the period expired, but let's say we still could. Buying him out this year, places more cap restrictions next year, which we don't want. Considering Caufield, Harris will need new contracts next year and you need to save money to resign Slafkovsky and potentially UFAs as well as the 2023 1st round pick. Byron's buyout does not stretch that far out however, you don't want to be spending to the cap every year. You need to be able to get assets for retaining salary, a luxury in this league, something teams use during a rebuild, which is something Habs are not able to do due to terrible cap management.

In order to trade Hoffman he needs a good year, production wise, or else he will cost to be traded. I don't see Habs management doing that especially for left defencemen, which the habs have an abundance of, hence why they traded away Romanov.

I am hoping they can resign Caufield before the season starts to an 8 year deal. Slafkovsky might be forced into the AHL this year, due to cap implications, since they need to sign Dach (hoping a 3 year $2.25m deal). Hopefully we can retain on Drouin, Dadonov and Allen this TDL and get decent returns for the 2023 draft.

Well I'm looking for a team that would switch one of our forward (Hoffman, Dadonov, Drouin, Byron)
In this trade, I thought Zadorov is a bit overpaid considering he played bellow 16min per game in the last 10 games.

So I think Habs management needs to trade a bad forward contract for a bad defenseman contract.
On this case, both player have 2 years left on contact and Calgary has a depth in defense.