Speculation: 2022 Off-Season | Dethroned: What next? - Part 2

[DMB06]

Would anyone be interested in having a season long competition where we submit final stat predictions for each of our guys prior to the season and have a final winner at the end? I always like doing things like that, it's fun seeing how close you can get and tracking each player as the season plays out.

I was thinking of something very simple, such as guessing goals, assists, and +/-. For every point you are away, you lose one point. Everyone's point total will be negative at the end of the season, winner is the person closest to zero.

For example I predict Hedman has 16 goals, 58 assists, and +/- of +22 and he ends the season with 19 goals, 42 assists, and a +11. I would lose 3 points for goals, 16 pts for assists, and 11 points for +/-, for a total of -30.

We can do it just for fun or give the winner something small. I think a lot of gamers frequent this site so it could be something like a gifted Steam game or something.

Anyway, just figured I'd ask. If enough people want to play I think it would be pretty fun.

 

[Stammertime91]

Would anyone be interested in having a season long competition where we submit final stat predictions for each of our guys prior to the season and have a final winner at the end? I always like doing things like that, it's fun seeing how close you can get and tracking each player as the season plays out.

I was thinking of something very simple, such as guessing goals, assists, and +/-. For every point you are away, you lose one point. Everyone's point total will be negative at the end of the season, winner is the person closest to zero.

For example I predict Hedman has 16 goals, 58 assists, and +/- of +22 and he ends the season with 19 goals, 42 assists, and a +11. I would lose 3 points for goals, 16 pts for assists, and 11 points for +/-, for a total of -30.

We can do it just for fun or give the winner something small. I think a lot of gamers frequent this site so it could be something like a gifted Steam game or something.

Anyway, just figured I'd ask. If enough people want to play I think it would be pretty fun.

There's so much math in this post I farted an 8 out of my ass.




But sure, I'll participate.

 

[DaBolts]

There's so much math in this post I farted an 8 out of my ass.




But sure, I'll participate.

I'll pass until I see the medical report for our team.

In January 2023.

 

[Todd1a]

Ondrej Palat liked not winning the Stanley Cup this year so much, he's signed up for 5 years of it.

 

[Volodya Krutov]

Hedman was playing on top pairing then. Sergachev hasn't really done that to this point (for significant time). Not saying he can't but he hasn't yet. I get it takes longer for defenseman to fully mature and maybe Sergachev has more been about opportunity since Hedman and McDonagh were the top 2 in front of him. But the defense Sergachev has been a part of since being acquired has been quite a deal better than any defensive unit during Hedman's development.

I just don’t get the rush to signing him this summer. They had months to do that before they had to worry about an arbitrator getting involved and would have had an opportunity to see him carry out the extra responsibilities.

That's not how it works in Tampa. Hedman, McD an Sergachev were the obvious 3 top guys on defense, playing all +20 minutes in all situations (McD didn't get pp time tho). Saying Sergachev was sheltered is nonsense, the kid constantly had to be lead his pairing with the weakest dmen on this team, Bogo, Foote and all.

He did fine and finished the playoffs very strong. Is he worth that contract ? Not from what we have seen so far, but they gave him that money based on their expectations and an expected massive salary cap boom. We all need to chill on this one.

 

[Todd1a]

Damn I would have grabbed him for that price

Strome to caps 1 year deal 3.5 avv

 

[OffBy1]

Here's the problem for the people still missing it:

JB let McD go because he wasn't going to be worth his cap hit for the next 4 years, Fine, no problem.

But then JB overpays Sergachev and Cirelli for 3 of those next 4 years (and beyond).

We should have been able to sign Serge and Cirelli without people scratching their heads at the AAV, because they were restricted free agents, we had the leverage. Maybe we would have missed out on free agents this year with protracted negotiations, but I'd have taken that over these 8 year mistake deals.

I'd seen prognosticators speculating Sergachev would get 7 mil AAV. I haven't seen what the speculation was on Cirelli, but he's never scored 20 goals, never scored 50 points, and is bad on faceoffs. At 6.2 mil, he's too expensive for the third line, doesn't have enough offense for the 2nd line and hasn't worked out on wing at all. So that pretty much locks in the problem of not enough top line center positions for Point, Stamkos and Cirelli. Stamkos is going to be on wing for the rest of his career here, after we saw we he can still do in the center (100+ point season).

In my opinion Cirelli is no way a 6.2 per year guy, even with his 5th place Selke finish. He's a very good third line center. Since it's a long term deal I could have seen 5 mil a year.

Sergachev should have been 7 mil or a little lower even if you have to make it a much shorter deal. Again, they're RFA's so we could have held out. This means for the next 8 years we've got a salary cap 3 mil lower than the rest of the league.

 

[Volodya Krutov]

Here's the problem for the people still missing it:

JB let McD go because he wasn't going to be worth his cap hit for the next 4 years, Fine, no problem.

But then JB overpays Sergachev and Cirelli for 3 of those next 4 years (and beyond).

We should have been able to sign Serge and Cirelli without people scratching their heads at the AAV, because they were restricted free agents, we had the leverage. Maybe we would have missed out on free agents this year with protracted negotiations, but I'd have taken that over these 8 year mistake deals.

I'd seen prognosticators speculating Sergachev would get 7 mil AAV. I haven't seen what the speculation was on Cirelli, but he's never scored 20 goals, never scored 50 points, and is bad on faceoffs. At 6.2 mil, he's too expensive for the third line, doesn't have enough offense for the 2nd line and hasn't worked out on wing at all. So that pretty much locks in the problem of not enough top line center positions for Point, Stamkos and Cirelli. Stamkos is going to be on wing for the rest of his career here, after we saw we he can still do in the center (100+ point season).

In my opinion Cirelli is no way a 6.2 per year guy, even with his 5th place Selke finish. He's a very good third line center. Since it's a long term deal I could have seen 5 mil a year.

Sergachev should have been 7 mil or a little lower even if you have to make it a much shorter deal. Again, they're RFA's so we could have held out. This means for the next 8 years we've got a salary cap 3 mil lower than the rest of the league.

Again, that's not how it works. with a 8 years contract you're buying also UFA years, meaning when the salary cap gets to $92M by 2026, which is expected, neither Sergachev nor Cirelli will benefit from that salary boom. The next time those guys will hit free agency, they'll be past their prime.

 

[ThunderRoad]

That's not how it works in Tampa. Hedman, McD an Sergachev were the obvious 3 top guys on defense, playing all +20 minutes in all situations (McD didn't get pp time tho). Saying Sergachev was sheltered is nonsense, the kid constantly had to be lead his pairing with the weakest dmen on this team, Bogo, Foote and all.

He did fine and finished the playoffs very strong. Is he worth that contract ? Not from what we have seen so far, but they gave him that money based on their expectations and an expected massive salary cap boom. We all need to chill on this one.

The top 3 defenseman still have primary roles, and they weren't simply interchangeable in situations used - the ranking on those 3 has been to this point Hedman, McDonagh, and then Sergachev. We all know what Hedman's main role is, which is more of what Sergachev's game has been modeled like. And McDonagh led the shutdown pairing with Cernak where his contributions were more from defensive side (good at making reads and positioning) - he was Tampa's top shot-blocker, lockdown defender, and main cog of the team’s penalty-kill unit.

Now with McDonagh gone, Sergachev is the replacement for filling that role. He's gotten better defensively but he needs to improve at protecting the puck and reducing turnovers/odd man rushes. He's also going to see way more time shorthanded and increased minutes overall now that the other third D-man that logged 20+ minutes is no longer here. Hedman's ice time is going up too. He hasn't shown himself to be a top pairing defenseman yet. Potential might be there, and now with McDonagh (and 2nd best overall defender the Lightning had) gone, his responsibilities are going up on an every game basis. He's going to need to shutdown the other teams top lines consistently. They paid him as if he has consistently shown this, and he hasn't yet. He hasn't needed to yet, but he will now.

And when is this expected massive salary cap boom supposedly to happen? Everything I've seen suggests it's years down the road, and alot can change during that time. If it happens, hallelujah, and yeah every contract will suddenly look better. Just not so sure it’s just around the corner and thinking it's going to be little 1M or so bumps for awhile (which is better than nothing but doesn't cover the contract extension increases similar to what occurred past couple of years with the stagnant cap and how Tampa ended up in the position they're in the past two off-seasons having to sacrifice depth).

I like Sergachev, but it would have been nice to wait a few months into the season to verify how things are going (with a defense without McD handling the main shutdown defensive duties) before paying him this contract. And then would think unless Foote takes a big step forward (which thought he looked decent against Toronto) or Myers is some revelation, Hedman, Sergachev, and Cernak's ice time getting boosted again with Bogosian out possibly to end of the year, and Cernak (love him and his warrior mentality) is often injured himself so can almost plan that situation will be encountered once again - so even more minutes for Serge and Hedman.

 

[Volodya Krutov]

The top 3 defenseman still have primary roles, and they weren't simply interchangeable in situations used - the ranking on those 3 has been to this point Hedman, McDonagh, and then Sergachev. We all know what Hedman's main role is, which is more of what Sergachev's game has been modeled like. And McDonagh led the shutdown pairing with Cernak where his contributions were more from defensive side (good at making reads and positioning) - he was Tampa's top shot-blocker, lockdown defender, and main cog of the team’s penalty-kill unit.

Now with McDonagh gone, Sergachev is the replacement for filling that role. He's gotten better defensively but he needs to improve at protecting the puck and reducing turnovers/odd man rushes. He's also going to see way more time shorthanded and increased minutes overall now that the other third D-man that logged 20+ minutes is no longer here. Hedman's ice time is going up too. He hasn't shown himself to be a top pairing defenseman yet. Potential might be there, and now with McDonagh (and 2nd best overall defender the Lightning had) gone, his responsibilities are going up on an every game basis. He's going to need to shutdown the other teams top lines consistently. They paid him as if he has consistently shown this, and he hasn't yet. He hasn't needed to yet, but he will now.

And when is this expected massive salary cap boom supposedly to happen? Everything I've seen suggests it's years down the road, and alot can change during that time. If it happens, hallelujah, and yeah every contract will suddenly look better. Just not so sure it’s just around the corner and thinking it's going to be little 1M or so bumps for awhile (which is better than nothing but doesn't cover the contract extension increases similar to what occurred past couple of years with the stagnant cap and how Tampa ended up in the position they're in the past two off-seasons having to sacrifice depth).

I like Sergachev, but it would have been nice to wait a few months into the season to verify how things are going (with a defense without McD handling the main shutdown defensive duties) before paying him this contract. And then would think unless Foote takes a big step forward (which thought he looked decent against Toronto) or Myers is some revelation, Hedman, Sergachev, and Cernak's ice time getting boosted again with Bogosian out possibly to end of the year, and Cernak (love him and his warrior mentality) is often injured himself so can almost plan that situation will be encountered once again - so even more minutes for Serge and Hedman.

You all saying Sergachev needs to replace McD when it'll be Cernak's role in some parts to replace him and a shared burden by both 98 and 77. That's not just about 98.

I already stated Sergachev's minutes are kinda maxed out, probably a bit of more PK time but he's been very good at it so far. He'll get more defensive starts too but playing with Cernak instead of Foote is likely to do him good. Again, he's not worth that contract today but the Cap is expected to increase and you can't sit on your ass as a GM and say "what if it doesn't".

Chill guys, chill.

 

[OffBy1]

Again, that's not how it works. with a 8 years contract you're buying also UFA years, meaning when the salary cap gets to $92M by 2026, which is expected, neither Sergachev nor Cirelli will benefit from that salary boom. The next time those guys will hit free agency, they'll be past their prime.

That's one way of looking at it - they are signing away some of their free agency years. Palat still made out pretty well this free agency; if these guys are as good as these contracts suggest, they should still be sought after at 32-33 years old.

On the other hand you don't know if either Serge or Cirelli is EVER going to be worth 8.5 mil or 6.2 mil at any point in their career. Thus you don't know if they'd ever get that in the free agency market, even in their primes. Neither has shown they are worth near that much thus far.

We have 4 full seasons with Cirelli with a career high at 44 points (bad) while a +79 overall and has never been a minus (good). That's not worth 6.2 for 8 years and he's been steady, not improving year after year.

We've had 5 full seasons of Serge never topping 31 points (so so) and a career +50 with other defensemen like Hedman, McD and Cernak taking the toughest opposing players. Serge's stats have been steady as well, not seeing a year after year improvement, except for in the 2020-2021 season, which didn't continue this year.

This is a long term gamble based on progression I'm not seeing. I could see Serge getting some consistency around his 2020-2021 performance, but with his defense, I still don't know if he's worth north of 7.5. Cirelli, I'm even less optimistic about.

I'd rather give them back some of those free agency years if we got a 4-6 year deals with more reasonable AAVs. You're acting like it's a huge favor to us to commit so much money to them before we know how low/high their ceiling is.

 

[DistantThunderRep]

That's one way of looking at it - they are signing away some of their free agency years. Palat still made out pretty well this free agency; if these guys are as good as these contracts suggest, they should still be sought after at 32-33 years old.

On the other hand you don't know if either Serge or Cirelli is EVER going to be worth 8.5 mil or 6.2 mil at any point in their career. Thus you don't know if they'd ever get that in the free agency market, even in their primes. Neither has shown they are worth near that much thus far.

We have 4 full seasons with Cirelli with a career high at 44 points (bad) while a +79 overall and has never been a minus (good). That's not worth 6.2 for 8 years and he's been steady, not improving year after year.

We've had 5 full seasons of Serge never topping 31 points (so so) and a career +50 with other defensemen like Hedman, McD and Cernak taking the toughest opposing players. Serge's stats have been steady as well, not seeing a year after year improvement, except for in the 2020-2021 season, which didn't continue this year.

This is a long term gamble based on progression I'm not seeing. I could see Serge getting some consistency around his 2020-2021 performance, but with his defense, I still don't know if he's worth north of 7.5. Cirelli, I'm even less optimistic about.

I'd rather give them back some of those free agency years if we got a 4-6 year deals with more reasonable AAVs. You're acting like it's a huge favor to us to commit so much money to them before we know how low/high their ceiling is.

In all fairness Palat would have made way more if it wasn’t for a flat cap for the last few years. That we know isn’t going to happen now. That uncertainty is gone, so we are back to the paying for UFA years. Yeah it’s high now, but it’s only realistically high for maybe the first 2 or 3 years barring Sergachev completely falling off a cliff. Buying those UFA years probably docked on about 1.25-1.5 million AAV a year to cover cap inflation offer the 8 years. It’s not that difficult to realize that.

For example if your current job came at you and said they would increase your pay from 80k a year to 120k a year but you won’t get any raises or bonuses for the next 8 years, you would argue if you’re going to lock on for 8 years, you need to include 8 years of raises in your new salary. That’s what it is.

Serge is probably a 6.7m defenseman right now, at worst case 7.2m. The 8.5 factored in raises he won’t get for 8 years. Does it suck right now? Sure, but it makes sense why the price is what it is. Cirelli is pretty much right on par with that logic. If he finds his offense and can consistently put up 20, it’s a steal. Cernak seems like the one who got shafted the most. Because his contract doesn’t seem to really include cap inflation.

 

[Sky04]

Again, that's not how it works. with a 8 years contract you're buying also UFA years, meaning when the salary cap gets to $92M by 2026, which is expected, neither Sergachev nor Cirelli will benefit from that salary boom. The next time those guys will hit free agency, they'll be past their prime.

8 year contracts also give them guaranteed money which should be offset with a lower AAV, that's like saying he should've gotten 9.5-10M if he took a 4 year contract instead.

IF on the cap boom, it was actually projected for 2027 by the time they pay off the escrow debt that's barring any other issues that come up in the next 5 years until then it's 1M cap increases which means it'll be tight for at least half their contract lengths.

 

[ThunderRoad]

You all saying Sergachev needs to replace McD when it'll be Cernak's role in some parts to replace him and a shared burden by both 98 and 77. That's not just about 98.

I already stated Sergachev's minutes are kinda maxed out, probably a bit of more PK time but he's been very good at it so far. He'll get more defensive starts too but playing with Cernak instead of Foote is likely to do him good. Again, he's not worth that contract today but the Cap is expected to increase and you can't sit on your ass as a GM and say "what if it doesn't".

Chill guys, chill.

GMs couldn't have predicted the pandemic and the resulting flat cap considering how the cap was trending previously. But now GMs should be cautious and wary of the slow cap growth that is likely to continue for the near future and plan accordingly.

Otherwise continue to watch the depth leave the building and that wasn’t how Tampa won the Cups. And the pipeline isn't in a state to start spitting out prospects ready to make a transition to the NHL. As long as Vinik is the owner, it looks as if Tampa will always have approval to spend to the cap. The % of cap space the contract accounts for though becomes even more important as the extensions kick in.

 

[HoseEmDown]

Here's the problem for the people still missing it:

JB let McD go because he wasn't going to be worth his cap hit for the next 4 years, Fine, no problem.

But then JB overpays Sergachev and Cirelli for 3 of those next 4 years (and beyond).

We should have been able to sign Serge and Cirelli without people scratching their heads at the AAV, because they were restricted free agents, we had the leverage. Maybe we would have missed out on free agents this year with protracted negotiations, but I'd have taken that over these 8 year mistake deals.

I'd seen prognosticators speculating Sergachev would get 7 mil AAV. I haven't seen what the speculation was on Cirelli, but he's never scored 20 goals, never scored 50 points, and is bad on faceoffs. At 6.2 mil, he's too expensive for the third line, doesn't have enough offense for the 2nd line and hasn't worked out on wing at all. So that pretty much locks in the problem of not enough top line center positions for Point, Stamkos and Cirelli. Stamkos is going to be on wing for the rest of his career here, after we saw we he can still do in the center (100+ point season).

In my opinion Cirelli is no way a 6.2 per year guy, even with his 5th place Selke finish. He's a very good third line center. Since it's a long term deal I could have seen 5 mil a year.

Sergachev should have been 7 mil or a little lower even if you have to make it a much shorter deal. Again, they're RFA's so we could have held out. This means for the next 8 years we've got a salary cap 3 mil lower than the rest of the league.

We really didn't have much leverage if we waited to sign them. Cirelli had just 1 RFA year left and Sergachev 2. If we hold out to sign them they then have all the leverage. Cirelli could've done what Trouba was gonna do and take his QO then walk as a free agent the next year at 27. Maybe Sergachev only wanted a 3 year deal like Boeser and then he becomes a UFA at 28.

Everyone is saying how Sergachev now will only make 500k less than Makar. Well Colorado didn't really get many cheap years with him. They got him for a 10 playoff game run and 2 regular seasons before his big raise. He also is only signed for 6 years then a UFA. We got 3 ELC years and 3 bridge years with him before 8 years at a high hit for the best part of his career.

There's risks with all these guys not continuing to improve and we really don't get the best deals. But we at least know we have 3 core pieces locked up for what should be thier prime years. We now don't have to worry if any are gonna walk anytime soon.

 

[LTIR Trickery]

Here's the problem for the people still missing it:

JB let McD go because he wasn't going to be worth his cap hit for the next 4 years, Fine, no problem.

But then JB overpays Sergachev and Cirelli for 3 of those next 4 years (and beyond).

We should have been able to sign Serge and Cirelli without people scratching their heads at the AAV, because they were restricted free agents, we had the leverage. Maybe we would have missed out on free agents this year with protracted negotiations, but I'd have taken that over these 8 year mistake deals.

I'd seen prognosticators speculating Sergachev would get 7 mil AAV. I haven't seen what the speculation was on Cirelli, but he's never scored 20 goals, never scored 50 points, and is bad on faceoffs. At 6.2 mil, he's too expensive for the third line, doesn't have enough offense for the 2nd line and hasn't worked out on wing at all. So that pretty much locks in the problem of not enough top line center positions for Point, Stamkos and Cirelli. Stamkos is going to be on wing for the rest of his career here, after we saw we he can still do in the center (100+ point season).

In my opinion Cirelli is no way a 6.2 per year guy, even with his 5th place Selke finish. He's a very good third line center. Since it's a long term deal I could have seen 5 mil a year.

Sergachev should have been 7 mil or a little lower even if you have to make it a much shorter deal. Again, they're RFA's so we could have held out. This means for the next 8 years we've got a salary cap 3 mil lower than the rest of the league.

How do you think negotiations work? We just say "this is what you're paying you, get f***ed" as if the player has no leverage? You also think Sergachev is, what, going to look around and say "I know all of these guys have set the market between 8 and 9 million, but f*** THAT! I will take less!" Sergachev took standard money on max term for... helping you win 2 cups and carry the defensive workload every night.

This might be the worst take yet, and its impressively bad. "This means for the next 8 years we've got a salary cap 3 mil lower than the rest of the league" uhhh thats not how the salary cap works, at all.



"Here's the problem for the people still missing it"

 

[Felonious Python]

How do you think negotiations work? We just say "this is what you're paying you, get f***ed" as if the player has no leverage? You also think Sergachev is, what, going to look around and say "I know all of these guys have set the market between 8 and 9 million, but f*** THAT! I will take less!" Sergachev took standard money on max term for... helping you win 2 cups and carry the defensive workload every night.

This might be the worst take yet, and its impressively bad. "This means for the next 8 years we've got a salary cap 3 mil lower than the rest of the league" uhhh thats not how the salary cap works, at all.



"Here's the problem for the people still missing it"

The way we usually frame contract negotiations is about money vs term. If you get term, the player has a more agreeable AAV. These guys (and Serge in particular) seem to have gotten both without being franchise players.

We also don't know, however, if the projections have the cap going up $20 million once the escrow debt is paid off.

 

[DMB06]

How do you think negotiations work? We just say "this is what you're paying you, get f***ed" as if the player has no leverage? You also think Sergachev is, what, going to look around and say "I know all of these guys have set the market between 8 and 9 million, but f*** THAT! I will take less!" Sergachev took standard money on max term for... helping you win 2 cups and carry the defensive workload every night.

This might be the worst take yet, and its impressively bad. "This means for the next 8 years we've got a salary cap 3 mil lower than the rest of the league" uhhh thats not how the salary cap works, at all.



"Here's the problem for the people still missing it"

Sergachev himself said he needs to elevate his game to earn this contract. Your claim here is that he's already an 8.5m defenseman. Which is it?

 

[Outl4w]

Imagine if we could have got patches for futures and traded Kilhorn...

We really didn't have much leverage if we waited to sign them. Cirelli had just 1 RFA year left and Sergachev 2. If we hold out to sign them they then have all the leverage. Cirelli could've done what Trouba was gonna do and take his QO then walk as a free agent the next year at 27. Maybe Sergachev only wanted a 3 year deal like Boeser and then he becomes a UFA at 28.

Everyone is saying how Sergachev now will only make 500k less than Makar. Well Colorado didn't really get many cheap years with him. They got him for a 10 playoff game run and 2 regular seasons before his big raise. He also is only signed for 6 years then a UFA. We got 3 ELC years and 3 bridge years with him before 8 years at a high hit for the best part of his career.

There's risks with all these guys not continuing to improve and we really don't get the best deals. But we at least know we have 3 core pieces locked up for what should be thier prime years. We now don't have to worry if any are gonna walk anytime soon.

Cirelli has never proven he is a top 6 center. He really needs to improve his offensive game. Sergachev at least has shown flashes of a top line defenseman. I mean his contract is better than Nurse and Jones and he will improve I think.

 

[The Macho King]

The way we usually frame contract negotiations is about money vs term. If you get term, the player has a more agreeable AAV. These guys (and Serge in particular) seem to have gotten both without being franchise players.

We also don't know, however, if the projections have the cap going up $20 million once the escrow debt is paid off.

Eh....... think there's an age bias in this. For 24 year olds, I don't think the calculus is that straightforward. Like if Matthews signed an 8 year contract instead of 5, I think the AAV would have actually been much higher (because of aging curves).

Similarly, Makar's 5 by 9 (which is still a f***ing sweetheart deal) would have been higher with more years tacked on.

 

[RussianGuyovich]

Eh....... think there's an age bias in this. For 24 year olds, I don't think the calculus is that straightforward. Like if Matthews signed an 8 year contract instead of 5, I think the AAV would have actually been much higher (because of aging curves).

Similarly, Makar's 5 by 9 (which is still a f***ing sweetheart deal) would have been higher with more years tacked on.

Seriously. Buying UFA years is not new. Why are people acting like it’s not a metric when working a contract?

 

[The Macho King]

Seriously. Buying UFA years is not new. Why are people acting like it’s not a metric when working a contract?

There's a difference between signing a 28 year old's first UFA contract, where the years push down the AAV, and a 24 year old's last RFA contract, where each year is expected to be prime earning years. When you're extending a contract into 35-40 year old seasons, the player is not expected to be pulling in that much anyway (which is also why these contracts often back dive, although there's a lot that goes into that beyond just aging curves).

Edit: This is me agreeing with you and expanding my point, not directly addressing anything you said for the record.

 

[OffBy1]

How do you think negotiations work? We just say "this is what you're paying you, get f***ed" as if the player has no leverage? You also think Sergachev is, what, going to look around and say "I know all of these guys have set the market between 8 and 9 million, but f*** THAT! I will take less!" Sergachev took standard money on max term for... helping you win 2 cups and carry the defensive workload every night.

This might be the worst take yet, and its impressively bad. "This means for the next 8 years we've got a salary cap 3 mil lower than the rest of the league" uhhh thats not how the salary cap works, at all.

I agree that is a terrible take, but you're the one who came up with it, so pat yourself on the back.

Or course it's a negotiation, but you wouldn't know that from seeing Sergachev emerge with 8.5 mil for 8 years - more than Hedman who he's clearly worse than right now and not by a little. He has a big chasm to bridge to threaten Hedman for the #1 minutes on this team. When Hedman signed that deal, no one was freaking out, you could see he was improving. Sergachev was a third pairing defensemen last year who looked capable of stepping in for McD in spot duty at this late point in McD's career.

As other's have said though, at least Sergachev has shown some "flashes". Cirelli has been steadily unimpressive offensively and bad on faceoffs. I see these two contracts mostly based on "hope" they will grow a lot more.

We didn't have to sign them for both high AAVs and 8 year terms when they haven't shown play that warrants it in 4+ years each. Look at where Hedman and Stamkos were as RFAs when they signed their 8 year deals compared to Serge and Cirelli. They don't have to "fall off a cliff" to make these contracts look bad - they need to improve significantly to make them look good. It looks like a squandering of the money we gained by trading McD.

"uhhh thats not how the salary cap works, at all."
When you overpay (more than their market value) for the players you get, it's same as you having a lower cap than everyone else. That's how math works.

 

[HoseEmDown]

Imagine if we could have got patches for futures and traded Kilhorn...


Cirelli has never proven he is a top 6 center. He really needs to improve his offensive game. Sergachev at least has shown flashes of a top line defenseman. I mean his contract is better than Nurse and Jones and he will improve I think.

Killorn is not the problem. Pacioretty makes 2.5M more than him so would be almost impossible to fit in. Killorn scored just 5 less even strength points than DaBrincat did this past year, he scores well at even strength which is where we need the most production. Kucherov, Stamkos, Hedman and Point are the PP scorers. We wouldn't be getting the most of of Pacioretty paying him 7M to play PP2.

The thing with Cirelli is that you are sacrificing some points for defense. If you get top 5 Selke defense with 45-50 points it's better than 60 points and poor defense. He can eat the heavy minutes and matchups you don't want the 1C doing. I would like to see him consistently over 50 points myself but if he can win a Selke instead you take that.

 

[Bob and 200 others]

No you don’t. No way you do. What do you think stamkos and hedman and whoever else think right now? Right after a finals loss, stamkos said we aren’t done. JBB seems to think we are. This roster will not go far in the playoffs. We could have kept our solid players and worried about our future later, like we have been doing the last few years. Showing our good players the door is something you do when you are rebuilding, not contending for a cup.

As sky mentioned, if I’m stamkos and hedman, I’m pissed off I left money on the table if I’m not going to be on a competitive team anymore.

Oh Jesus Christ get over yourself, you have no idea what those guys are "thinking". And I highly doubt it's anything like bitterness, I'm sure unlike you and others they have some faith in their GM.