Salary Cap: '24-'25 Salary Thread: Crosbicles Volume MMXXV - Poolman and Poolparty?!?

[Empoleon8771]

Just from a numbers check:

1. Buyout Jarry
2. Sign Marner to a 7 year, $15 million AAV deal
3. Re-sign Tomasino ($1.5 million), Hallander ($1.5 million), Glass ($1.5 million), Ponomarev ($1 million) and POJ ($1 million)

Rakell-Crosby-Rust
Bunting-Malkin-Marner
Hallander-Glass-Tomasino
Lizotte-Ponomarev-Acciari
Hayes-Poulin

XXXXX-Karlsson
Pickering-Letang
Graves-POJ
St. Ivany

Nedjelkovic-Bloqmvist

You have $8 million in cap space to fill that top pair LD spot, this lineup is sitting at $87.5 million even with giving Marner an asinine contract and doing nothing else.

 

[SomeDude]

look, Dude, it's 12:17pm on a shitty january day, the cap is going up by approximately 1 billion dollars, you will either get on board with our ALL-IN PLAN or we can ship you off to Philly, BUCKLE UP BUCKO

This brings up a good point. There may be just enough barbiturates floating around that board room for them to order Dubas to spend all the money on a Friday afternoon and immediately regret it Tuesday morning.

 

[SEALBound]

Good lord that's a lot of cap space. Increasing by $9.5 million every off-season

This is also why I find it silly to act like Rakell's contract is detrimental. In 2 years, Rakell caliber players will be making $8 million simply because of how crazy high the cap will be.

The rising cap actually helps us with value for Rakell (and even Bunting and Karlsson for that matter) because, as you point out, taking in a $5mil hit for a top 6 winger becomes a lot easier. It also offers a bit of an advantage because not only can you bring is a top 6 wing on (now) value contract, but you can likely add an additional player. If you were already a cap team, you can add $5mil Rakell and still have $4mil to add a solid higher end bottom 6 guy.

It also makes retaining on Karlsson a bit more palatable if it gets us a slightly higher return.

We are going to see a lot of teams not be cap teams.

This would be smart by a lot of GMs which I why I don't think it will happen. If you're Florida, Vegas, Edmonton and you can get your league top team together and keep $4-5mil in cap space that you can weaponize throughout the year or at the TDL, you could put together a hell of a team.

 

[IcedCapp]

This brings up a good point. There may be just enough barbiturates floating around that board room for them to order Dubas to spend all the money on a Friday afternoon and immediately regret it Tuesday morning.

YEAH, ILLEGAL DRUG USE, NOW WE'RE TALKIN.

see? teamwork makes the dream work

 

[Gurglesons]

This would be smart by a lot of GMs which I why I don't think it will happen. If you're Florida, Vegas, Edmonton and you can get your league top team together and keep $4-5mil in cap space that you can weaponize throughout the year or at the TDL, you could put together a hell of a team.

My point is teams like PIT, WPG, OTT, etc.. smaller market teams will not be cap teams.

 

[Ugene Magic]

Good lord that's a lot of cap space. Increasing by $9.5 million every off-season

This is also why I find it silly to act like Rakell's contract is detrimental. In 2 years, Rakell caliber players will be making $8 million simply because of how crazy high the cap will be.

The cap floor in 27/28 will be like 84.0...

It's getting to the point of why even have a cap at all.

 

[SomeDude]

YEAH, ILLEGAL DRUG USE, NOW WE'RE TALKIN.

see? teamwork makes the dream work

They’re only illegal if you’re poor.

 

[Khelandros]

Why are we trading Rakell?

 

[Randy Butternubs]

I like CapWages in general but do not like their ArmChairGM tool. Suggestions for any other site with a decent team builder?

 

[Empoleon8771]

I like CapWages in general but do not like their ArmChairGM tool. Suggestions for any other site with a decent team builder?

I use puckpedia

 

[IcedCapp]

Why are we trading Rakell?

We aren’t now. Now we’re trading FOR players. Life comes at you fast

 

[SomeDude]

Why are we trading Rakell?

He likely has value and isn’t nailed down to the floor?

 

[Gurglesons]

Why are we trading Rakell?

So we don't get stuck with the contract in a few years when he inevitably falls off.

Same reason San Jose took what many people viewed as "lesser" returns for EK, Burns, and Hertl.

 

[Pancakes]

They should definitely strike while the iron is hot with Rakell if he has value now.

If they sit on him and he goes out and puts up like a 40-50 point season next year instead of the year he's having now then they've just shot themselves in the foot for no reason and not even gotten a playoffs out of it.

But this organization loves to make the same mistakes over and over so they'll probably just keep him

 

[IcedCapp]

They should definitely strike while the iron is hot with Rakell if he has value now.

If they sit on him and he goes out and puts up like a 40-50 point season next year instead of the year he's having now then they've just shot themselves in the foot for no reason and not even gotten a playoffs out of it.

But this organization loves to make the same mistakes over and over so they'll probably just keep him

wrong energy, Pancakes, come on. We're solving world hunger right now, get locked the f*** in and tell us how we're winning 73 games next season. It ain't by trading away Rakell for picks, I'll tell you that damn much

 

[Khelandros]

He likely has value and isn’t nailed down to the floor?

So how far does this get burned down? Are the Pens following the Blackhawks/Montreal/Buffalo model where any good to decent player gets shipped out for unknown draft picks which may or may not pan out and the franchise spends 10 years plus in purgatory trying to dig out of a hole?

You cannot gut a team and hope for a quick rebuild. It doesn't work in todays NHL.

 

[DesertedPenguin]

then again, aren't we about to have a ton of money come off the books? Maybe Dubas looks at all this space and thinks we can buy our way into contention next year.

(i'm basically speaking to myself in post form, don't mind my non-sequiturs)

I've been convinced for a little while that this is at least part of the plan. It may be a two-year process, not one, but the rapidly escalating cap and FSG's pledge to spend to the cap shouldn't be ignored.

Make a couple of splashes in free agency and then augment the roster with younger players from WBS.

 

[Gurglesons]

So how far does this get burned down? Are the Pens following the Blackhawks/Montreal/Buffalo model where any good to decent player gets shipped out for unknown draft picks which may or may not pan out and the franchise spends 10 years plus in purgatory trying to dig out of a hole?

You cannot gut a team and hope for a quick rebuild. It doesn't work in todays NHL.

Rakell is easily replaceable just like Rust at their ages.

I made this argument all summer when Jake was going UFA. If you put someone next to Sid and give him Jake's usage they'll produce.

And look Rakell and Rust are proving it.

 

[DesertedPenguin]

I just don’t see an organization of finance bros that exists only to make money willing to spend upwards of $100 million on a roster when the building has been half empty for a year and a half.

We will spend some money, but I really don’t think we’re gonna make a huge splash. Even if we wanted to, it would take those players willing to sign here when like 20 other teams will also now have the cap space to offer them what they want.

FSG has pledged to spend to the cap. They've said it multiple times.

 

[Mr. T]

I just don’t see an organization of finance bros that exists only to make money willing to spend upwards of $100 million on a roster when the building has been half empty for a year and a half.

What if we put attendance on the block chain?

 

[SEALBound]

Not to spoil this shopping spree talk with something more reasonable and realistic, but in that Sportnet article about the destinations for Pettersson, he listed LA. Seems a bit counter intuitive given their depth but LA has Spence and Clarke as valuable young dmen and they resigned Anderson for a long term deal. I wonder if we could pry Jakub Dvorak from them?

6'5 200lbs and can move quite well. 2nd round pick in 2023. I might do it straight up or have them add a 3rd. I could even do something like Pettersson+DOC for Dvorak+2026 2nd. That would give us 3 2nds in 2026.

They also have Kirill Kirsanov over in the KHL/VHL but I'm not sure what his status is.

 

[SomeDude]

FSG has pledged to spend to the cap. They've said it multiple times.

Yes, a corporation has never lied to anyone or shifted gears for the sake of their profit margins.

 

[Gurglesons]

FSG has pledged to spend to the cap. They've said it multiple times.

FSG leadership also told Sidney Crosby that the Penguins would be a better team this year than last year. Welp!

 

[Pancakes]

wrong energy, Pancakes, come on. We're solving world hunger right now, get locked the f*** in and tell us how we're winning 73 games next season. It ain't by trading away Rakell for picks, I'll tell you that damn much

Sorry I forgot about the master plan for next year of signing Marner, Koivunen coming up and becoming Jake Guentzel 2.0 immediately, Sid putting up 100 points because why not, Malkin getting shoulder work done and coming back next season hammering one timers like he's John Daly on the back 9 hitting drives after his tenth coors lite, Karlsson slap passing his way into another Norris, Letang using whatever drugs they're giving Ovechkin to make him play like he's 19, and Mike Sullivan using his bushido to inspire the entire bottom six to master the hidden art of stick-to-itiveness.

Oh and Rutger McGroarty takes some skating lessons too somewhere in there.

Yyyyyyyeaaah *puts on sunglasses*

 

[SEALBound]

Rakell is easily replaceable just like Rust at their ages.

I made this argument all summer when Jake was going UFA. If you put someone next to Sid and give him Jake's usage they'll produce.

And look Rakell and Rust are proving it.

I think we would struggle to replace Rakell for $5mil or less.

When you're trading Rakell, it comes with the acknowledgement that you are not getting better. I don't see us spending assets to bring in a top 6 and I don't see any realistic FA targets that come in at $5mil to do better. If you wanna say Marner, sure.

If you send him out, you just hope McGroarty is ready to go and can bridge the gap in a way that isn't detrimental to his overall development. OR you sign another Beauvillier and let him have a go at it.