1st of all I don't take your post as a shot or an attempt to start an argument, I take it for genuine trying to understand what I'm getting at. Now that that is out of the way.
If you were to take the 1st 8 years of Hossa salary and work out the average you 6.55M which is roughly 1.4 more than what it stands at now. If you take the 1st 8 years of Keith's contract it works out to about 7.25 which is roughly 1.75 less than what it stands at now. That makes roughly 3.15M of cap circumvention. Add a 1M or so of your own and you got yourself a player.
Getting Panarin for free, and let's not understate that, a free top 10. That's what keeps the Hawks competitive. Do they use analytics? I'm sure they do. Is it the main reason for their success, I beg to differ.
It allows them to have a player like Hjalmarsson on their second pairing instaed of having to opt for someone like McQuaid or Miller like we have to do.
