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Speculation: Amnesty buyout candidates and its implicatons

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4evaBlue

Bottle of Lightning
Jan 9, 2011
4,834
5
I haven't been able to find full details of the amnesty buyout program, so I'll be using some assumptions along the way.

What we do know:
  • Each team will be able to drop two player off their cap, as long as the contract was signed during the 2005 CBA.
  • The team is still responsible for paying that player for the remainder of the contract, it just won't show up on their cap.
  • The amnesty buyout still comes out of the PA's share.
  • The player will be placed on waivers, allowing other teams to submit contract offers to his agent.
  • Should a contract be accepted with a new team, his original team only has to pay the player for the difference between the two contracts (let's call this amnesty portion).

Assumption:
  • The amnesty portion should reduce the cap ceiling for every team across the league. I.E: Let's assume Gomez gets "buried" with his $7.3M contract for the last year of his contract, and no other team offers him a new contract. His cap hit of $7.3M would lower the player's share by $7.3M, and it should result in a cap reduction of $7.3M/30 = $243k for each team. Does this make sense?
  • These buyouts can only occur for a short period during June, 2013, and cannot be "saved" for B. Richards' twilight years.

Implications:
  • Since the team is still on the hook for the player's contract, I don't see this doing much for the poorer teams, unless the player gets another contract to ease the financial sting for the original team. NYI buying out the DiPietro's contract will do nothing for them, as I don't see many teams lining up for his services.
  • There may be a few serviceable players getting waived, for whom the Leafs could submit competing offers within the framework of the new CBA. Luongo, Bryzgalov, Lecavalier, etc
  • Some teams may be forced to use their amnesty buyout to get under the $60M cap for next season. It's the only reason I see for the Habs not wanting to suck up the last year of Gomez's $7.3M caphit.
  • Teams who have the financial backing to pay some of these contracts outside of the cap could potentially trade for some of these bad contracts, and use their amnesty on them, in return for draft picks/other assets

[table="head"]Team|# players signed for '13-'14|'13-'14 cap hit|Notables not signed for '13-'14|Amnesty Candidates
Habs|16|$60.2M|Subban|Gomez (1x$7.3M), Kaberle (1x$4.25M)
Bolts|15|$57.5M||Lecavalier (7x$7.7M), Malone (2x$4.5M)
Flyers|16|$57.4M|Timonen|Pronger (4x$4.9M), Bryzgalov (7x$5.6M), Briere (2x$6.5M)
Bruins|16|$57.3M|Rask, Horton, Ference|--
Hawks|17|$57.2M||Frolik (1x$2.3M), Montador (2x$2.7M)
Canucks|13|$55.4M|Edler|Luongo (8x$5.3M), Ballard (2x$4.2M)
Sharks|14|$54.3M|Clowe|--
Pens|15|$52.6M||Martin (2x$5M)
Rangers|16|$51.8M|McDonagh, Stepan|Redden (1x$6.5M)
Wilds|16|$51.1M|Backstrom|Heatley? (1x$7.5M)
Canes|15|$50.7M||--
Sabres|14|$49.6M|Hodgson, Regehr, Leopold|Leino (4x$4.5M)
Kings|13|$49.4M|Gagne, Penner|--
Avs|19|$49.3M|Hejduk|Jones (3x$4M)
Oilers|14|$48.5M|Gagner|Horcoff (2x$5.5M)
Flames|14|$47.9M|Iginla|Stajan (1x$3.5M), Wideman (4x$5.2M)
Preds|13|$45.4M|Hornqvist|--
Wings|15|$45.1M|Howard, Filppula|--
Caps|12|$44.8M||Ward (2x$3M)
Blue Jackets|14|$42.9M||--
Panthers|13|$41.9M|Theodore, Weiss|Jovanovski (2x$4.1M), Campbell (3x$7.1M)
Leafs|13|$41.5M|Lupul|Komisarek? (1x$4.5M)
Sens|13|$39M|Alfredsson|--
Stars|14|$34.1M|Benn, Ryder, Roy, Morrow|--
Jets|9|$33M|Bogosian, Wheeler, Little|--
Yotes|10|$33M|Korpikoski|
Ducks|12|$32.8M|Getzlaf, Perry, Selanne, Koivu|Souray (2x$3.6M), Cogliano (1x$2.4M)
Devils|13|$32.4M|Elias, Zajac, Henrique, Zubrus, Clarkson, Zidlicky|Volchenkov? (3x$4.25M)
Blues|12|$32.1M|McDonald, D'Agostini, Berglund, Stewart, Pietrangelo|--
Isles|12|$31.5M|Bailey, Visnovsky, Streit, Hamonic|DiPietro (8x$4.5M)[/table]

Obviously, the welfare / non-cap ceiling teams are in the best position. Chances are, they won't start spending to the cap all of a sudden, so they won't be able to use the new CBA to their advantage (other than making use of the lowered cap floor). The Habs, Flyers, Hawks, Bruins, Canucks, Bolts, and Sharks are in serious trouble. The Leafs, Sens and Jets are in decent position to cash in on some other team's misfortunes.

Any other candidates you guys can think of? Any of them Burke should be going after should they be amnestied? If so, how much would you offer them?
Click to read more...
 
Last edited:
Nice chart.

Shows which teams have the most cap space for UFA's.

Leafs are one of the teams in better condition, but hardly along in that regard.

With more revenue sharing more teams are going to have opportunities to sign players.
 
From that list, if I'm the Leafs, I would target Volchenkov. Offer him 3.0 mil per year, NJ is only on the hook for 1.5. He would be the perfect replacement for Komisarek once we amnesty him.
 
Looks good, nice job.

Just a heads up, it looks like you mixed up Buffalo and Chicago with the Notables not signed for '13-'14.
 
WRT Volchenkov, the only reason I included him on the list is, from what I gather, he didn't have a great showing in Jersey last season. If he stinks it up again for this partial season, he could very well be a candidate. If he returns to his form in Ottawa, I expect the Devils to want to hold onto him.

As for Komi, yes, he's the obvious choice. My question is, is it really worth burning the amnesty for one season of $4.5M if his contract will not prevent us from obtaining anyone? How would people feel about trading for DiPietro's contract (and then amnesty him) to get them off the Isles' books for some compensation? What would the compensation have to be in order to consider such a move?
 
4evaBlue said:
WRT Volchenkov, the only reason I included him on the list is, from what I gather, he didn't have a great showing in Jersey last season. If he stinks it up again for this partial season, he could very well be a candidate. If he returns to his form in Ottawa, I expect the Devils to want to hold onto him.

As for Komi, yes, he's the obvious choice. My question is, is it really worth burning the amnesty for one season of $4.5M if his contract will not prevent us from obtaining anyone? How would people feel about trading for DiPietro's contract (and then amnesty him) to get them off the Isles' books for some compensation? What would the compensation have to be in order to consider such a move?
Click to expand...

You are assuming that you will be able to trade and buy-out?

I'm betting the rules won't allow that.

Komisarek seems like the likely player to be bought out for the Leafs.
 
With there being 2 amnesty buyouts (apparently) in the next CBA it really sucks we bought out Armstrong this past summer and have his $1M count against the cap for 2 seasons (though I guess it won't matter in the first season).

He would have been an ideal candidate. He and Komisarek.

Connolly/Lombardi don't matter because they are UFA's in a few months anyways.
 
Is the cap going to be $60M?

I thought Bettman was sooo gung-ho about the CBA being whole,
and this is a part, and its seemed (at this point) signed in quicksand.
 
I swear I heard Lebrun say on SC this morning that in the current deal there is 2 amnesty buyouts per team, not just one.
 
Why the fudge would we buy out a player who has half a season on the books?

How about this: Team X has a player they need to get rid of, but don't want to spend the money. They trade player to us + asset, we buy him out and keep the asset.

Lombo and Connolly will be gone next season anyway.
 
ULF_55 said:
Nice chart.

Shows which teams have the most cap space for UFA's.

Leafs are one of the teams in better condition, but hardly along in that regard.

With more revenue sharing more teams are going to have opportunities to sign players.
Click to expand...

A team like Detroit with only $45 mil before any amnesty buyouts and $15 mil in cap space with a perennial contender will be at the top of the list as suitors for players.

Corey Perry and others playing with the likes of Datsyuk and Zetterberg as his center would be really enticing and close to home for example.

Vancouver resolving their cap situation of a Luongo trade to Toronto seems rather obvious for both teams.
 
achtungbaby said:
I don't believe you'll be able to trade for a player and then buy them out. I'm also certain you can't buy a player out and then resign them.
Click to expand...

No problem trading and buying out a player .. ie Nashville did it in the Lombardi/Franson deal for Brett Lebda

You're correct however that you can't re-sign a bought-out player in the same season in which you bought him out.
 
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