People are making an educated guestimate of $92-93m cap which is a $4-5m increase over the set $88m cap for the 2024-25 season. That guess sounds reasonable to me. Businesses use projections, which are basically educated guesses, all the time when calculating budgets. I don't see why NHL teams and fans should be any different.
I used the same $4-5m increase for the 2026-27 cap. Could be less. Could be more... but I wouldn't be surprised if it's in the ball park barring some kind of catastrophe/pandemic.
Edit: You're right. Puckpedia used 2024-25 $88m cap when calculating the 15.9 cap% for Draisaitl. I don't think that's right. They should be using, right now, an estimated cap of $92-93m, which would drop his % to 15.2-15.05. They should put an asterisk beside the number since it would be a guesstimate.
It's funny because looking at 2026 (when we are allegedly paying 40 million for 3 guys)... there are not many guys signed for 2026. Others gone by 2026 as of now
Both our Goalies
Skinner and Pickard
These forwards
McDavid
Kane
Arvidson
Henrique
Skinner
Perry
Brown
Podkolzin
Ryan
These D
Ekholm
Bouch
Kulak
Emberson
Stecher
I was excited for a second because Neal goes off the books and we save a million.
However, Campbells buyout goes from 1 mill to 2 mill so we still have 2 mill in dead cap.
My point, 2026 is a long ways away and a LOT can change.
Eg. I love Bouch but a lot of HF guys thinks he sucks and is carried, maybe Oilers management sees it the same and trades him at his peak instead of signs him?
The only 2 D we have signed are Nurse and Josh F'n Brown.lmao
Forwards are Drai, Hyman, RNH and Janmark.
So 6 guys are currently signed for 2026. 36 million. They could also be traded by then.
I'm going to stick to 2024 where I think we have a great cap situation:
23 mil for Bouch/Drai/McD offsets Nurse overpay IMO
OR
Put another way, 32 million for Bouch/Drai/McD/Nurse is actually good value as 3 guys are underpaid and only one is overpaid.