Edited Jan. 7, 2023 at 4:53 p.m.
Quoting: draft_em_sign_em_trade_em
How ?
Do you not know how cap space works? Or how it accrues over the course of a season?
Provided a team doesn't have players on LTIR or go over the cap limit, and stay under that limit. A team's cap can and will accrue. Consider it a form of interest and bonus for effective cap management.
For example, a team with roughly $3.4M in cap space at the start of the season that doesn't have any players go on LTIR and stay under the cap, that team would have roughly $15M in accumulated cap space that can be put to use acquiring players at the TDL.
This is how teams can afford to take on a players full cap hit without retention and actively fit them onto the roster while staying under the cap ceiling.
The purpose of retaining on players is more or less to lower a players AAV, nothing more.
The Wild currently have $6.4M in cap space as it stands. By the deadline, this number will have accrued to $14.8M.
If you go to every teams page, it will show the various info on each teams cap situations. And will have differing amounts for current, deadline, and LTIR cap space used or available.
Case and point, here's Minnesota's.
https://www.capfriendly.com/teams/wild