If Buffalo were interested in Zuccarello, eating the extra cap difference between him and Olofsson should be more than enough.

Columbus doesn’t need another bottom pair RD.

These deals are a tad bit optimistic for Buffalo. I don’t think you’ll find another GM willing to co-operate.

There's a debate on trading Zucc. Basically, a lot of fans think we should move him and free up the cap space, but the belief is that the team wouldn't want to move him in fear of pissing off Kaprizov. Losing his cap hit won't fix fix all our cap issues, but it will sure make things a lot easier.

His last half of the season was also pretty concerning. From the start of our road trip on January 17th until the end of the year (final 40 regular season games), his production and overall play went downhill pretty significantly. There's some worry that this may be a sign of things to come and that his age is catching up with him. Guerin did say he had a groin issue at the end of the year, but it's not clear how long that had been going on. Since it was never brought up that he was banged up or at risk of not playing until the very end of the season, I'd assume it hadn't been very long.