Management Discussion | Just Have a Plan

[MarkMM]

I don't know the exact job description, but let say you are correct and her job is to find comparables. What comparables did she use for Boeser? A one dimensional soft winger coming off 2 disappointing seasons, with injury history, and has no leverage as a RFA. How did that turned into a 3 years $6.6 per extension?
JTM is more understandable given his offensive output, but isn't it her job to recommend against signing a long term contract with a soon-to-be 30 years old moody forward in a flat cap world?
Giving Bo the Nuge extension might make sense to some, but clearly Horvat took it as an insult. Asking somebody who is scoring at an accelerated rate to take a pay cut is generally not going to be well received. I wonder if there are any other comparables used with that contract, because off the top of my head, RNH is the only such contract signed recently.
Signing all those contracts in the summer then having to spend a 2nd to ditch Dickinson seems like a lack of foresight to me but I'm sure some can explain it away. It's looking like a high 2nd pick, could come back and bite us big time.

I don't know the inner workings so I'll admit I could be wrong, if her job is such that management comes to her and say "I want Boeser and JTM signed to term at any cost, but lowball Horvat for me" then sure she is doing ok within that parameter. I would hope the capologisy has some say on long term planning though.

Simple; she had to deal with Benning's poison pill qualifying offer, we either sign Boeser at $7.5 million (way worse than $6.6M especially when we were entering the year strapped for cap space and needing every bit of space) only to then risk him being UFA?

If the team felt he was worth keeping around, then Boeser had all the leverage and the deal he got was the best we could manage. I was. uncomfortable with the deal but I understood the position they were in with him.

His QO was like $7 or 7.5MM. So that was a Benning special. He signed for under that which was a small win in negotiation but the more prudent move was a trade.

This ^^

 

[arttk]

I don't know the exact job description, but let say you are correct and her job is to find comparables. What comparables did she use for Boeser? A one dimensional soft winger coming off 2 disappointing seasons, with injury history, and has no leverage as a RFA. How did that turned into a 3 years $6.6 per extension?
JTM is more understandable given his offensive output, but isn't it her job to recommend against signing a long term contract with a soon-to-be 30 years old moody forward in a flat cap world?
Giving Bo the Nuge extension might make sense to some, but clearly Horvat took it as an insult. Asking somebody who is scoring at an accelerated rate to take a pay cut is generally not going to be well received. I wonder if there are any other comparables used with that contract, because off the top of my head, RNH is the only such contract signed recently.
Signing all those contracts in the summer then having to spend a 2nd to ditch Dickinson seems like a lack of foresight to me but I'm sure some can explain it away. It's looking like a high 2nd pick, could come back and bite us big time.

I don't know the inner workings so I'll admit I could be wrong, if her job is such that management comes to her and say "I want Boeser and JTM signed to term at any cost, but lowball Horvat for me" then sure she is doing ok within that parameter. I would hope the capologisy has some say on long term planning though.

Boeser’s value is whack because of his 7.5M qualifier. If he took the qualifier and then enter UFA, based on his history and projection at that point, he would’ve gotten a 6.5M contract in the open market. So he probably would’ve gotten like 7M average per year for 2 years at the very least if he just took the qualifier. There is no reason for Boeser to sign anything lower unless you give him more years.

So the management can either sign him to a qualifier which will mess up their cap structure more and at the same time make him less valuable because we will only be able to sell him as a rental.
The other option is to trade him at that point but the 7.5M effectively killed any trade value he had so you would’ve gotten like a low pick + cap dump.
Another option is to let him walk which means we lose all value.
The remaining options are to sign him to a 2 year or 3 year deal. His cap would still stupid high for 2 year as stated above and his trade value would be crap. 3 years you can get it down to a number where you can project Boeser being worth it. 6.6M you would expect around 65pts. As the cap is projected to go up by his final year, he would only need to put up 60pt to justify it.
At the end of the day, the question they asked probably was, would Boeser bounce back. If he bounces back then the team have options. If they think he can’t then the best option is to let him go and get nothing really or to get a low pick and a cap dump.

They weight the risk vs return and went with 6.6Mx3.

All the options f***ing suck because of the qualifier Benning and Gear put in.

Also I don’t think her job was simply come up with contract to get Boeser signed. I think her job was probably, how the hell do we get the number lower so he can actually be worth the cap hit and he will actually be willing to sign it.

 

[Canucker]

Boeser’s value is whack because of his 7.5M qualifier. If he took the qualifier and then enter UFA, based on his history and projection at that point, he would’ve gotten a 6.5M contract in the open market. So he probably would’ve gotten like 7M average per year for 2 years at the very least if he just took the qualifier. There is no reason for Boeser to sign anything lower unless you give him more years.

So the management can either sign him to a qualifier which will mess up their cap structure more and at the same time make him less valuable because we will only be able to sell him as a rental.
The other option is to trade him at that point but the 7.5M effectively killed any trade value he had so you would’ve gotten like a low pick + cap dump.
Another option is to let him walk which means we lose all value.
The remaining options are to sign him to a 2 year or 3 year deal. His cap would still stupid high for 2 year as stated above and his trade value would be crap. 3 years you can get it down to a number where you can project Boeser being worth it. 6.6M you would expect around 65pts. As the cap is projected to go up by his final year, he would only need to put up 60pt to justify it.
At the end of the day, the question they asked probably was, would Boeser bounce back. If he bounces back then the team have options. If they think he can’t then the best option is to let him go and get nothing really or to get a low pick and a cap dump.

They weight the risk vs return and went with 6.6Mx3.

All the options f***ing suck because of the qualifier Benning and Gear put in.

I agree that all of the options sucked thanks to Jimbo...but the one option I would have taken was club elected arbitration. They could have possibly knocked his cap hit to $6.375m on a 1 or 2 year deal.

 

[Vector]

@arttk Boeser wasn’t going to be UFA if he took the qualifier. Would have been another RFA season with a 7.5 QO.

 

[arttk]

@arttk Boeser wasn’t going to be UFA if he took the qualifier. Would have been another RFA season with a 7.5 QO.

Umm Boeser would 100% take the QO. I mean the option was for the management to not qualify him.

I agree that all of the options sucked thanks to Jimbo...but the one option I would have taken was club elected arbitration. They could have possibly knocked his cap hit to $6.375m on a 1 or 2 year deal.

That option has significant risk as well. It’s fine to do it if the player was dogging it but the rationale for his bad play was his dying dad. That would’ve done a lot of damage to the trust between players and management, a lot. And you are not even guaranteed to win the arb case. The arb can award anything in between and they don’t look at just last year but also years prior which helps Brock’s case.

 

[Reverend Mayhem]

I think they tried to make the best of the shit options they had, but in retrospect we probably should've traded him.

 

[TruGr1t]

I agree that all of the options sucked thanks to Jimbo...but the one option I would have taken was club elected arbitration. They could have possibly knocked his cap hit to $6.375m on a 1 or 2 year deal.

This absolutely should have happened, and in a well-run organization, I think it would have. Of course, here we have to treat players with kid gloves and worry about their feelings, so that wasn't on the table.

 

[Diversification]

Boeser’s value is whack because of his 7.5M qualifier. If he took the qualifier and then enter UFA, based on his history and projection at that point, he would’ve gotten a 6.5M contract in the open market. So he probably would’ve gotten like 7M average per year for 2 years at the very least if he just took the qualifier. There is no reason for Boeser to sign anything lower unless you give him more years.

So the management can either sign him to a qualifier which will mess up their cap structure more and at the same time make him less valuable because we will only be able to sell him as a rental.
The other option is to trade him at that point but the 7.5M effectively killed any trade value he had so you would’ve gotten like a low pick + cap dump.
Another option is to let him walk which means we lose all value.
The remaining options are to sign him to a 2 year or 3 year deal. His cap would still stupid high for 2 year as stated above and his trade value would be crap. 3 years you can get it down to a number where you can project Boeser being worth it. 6.6M you would expect around 65pts. As the cap is projected to go up by his final year, he would only need to put up 60pt to justify it.
At the end of the day, the question they asked probably was, would Boeser bounce back. If he bounces back then the team have options. If they think he can’t then the best option is to let him go and get nothing really or to get a low pick and a cap dump.

They weight the risk vs return and went with 6.6Mx3.

All the options f***ing suck because of the qualifier Benning and Gear put in.

Also I don’t think her job was simply come up with contract to get Boeser signed. I think her job was probably, how the hell do we get the number lower so he can actually be worth the cap hit and he will actually be willing to sign it.

In retrospect, the correct decision was to walk away because there wasn't going to be a number that BB would sign at that would be commensurate with his actual contributions (3M).

Better to gain back cap space and allocate it elsewhere - being in a position to take on Bjorkstrand for a song for instance.

 

[Vector]

Umm Boeser would 100% take the QO. I mean the option was for the management to not qualify him.

I'm just adding in that even if he took the qualifier, he still wouldn't have been UFA afterwards since he had another year of RFA status.

Boeser’s value is whack because of his 7.5M qualifier. If he took the qualifier and then enter UFA, based on his history and projection at that point, he would’ve gotten a 6.5M contract in the open market. So he probably would’ve gotten like 7M average per year for 2 years at the very least if he just took the qualifier. There is no reason for Boeser to sign anything lower unless you give him more years.

 

[arttk]

I'm just adding in that even if he took the qualifier, he still wouldn't have been UFA afterwards since he had another year of RFA status.

Oh shit you are right. I thought he was a UFA after. Wow that makes that QO worse lol. He could’ve taken a 1 year and then I suppose they will be back at the same spot.

 

[Nucker101]

Oh shit you are right. I thought he was a UFA after. Wow that makes that QO worse lol. He could’ve taken a 1 year and then I suppose they will be back at the same spot.

That was the move to make though. Way less risk for the team, only thing it would’ve hurt is some extra cap this year.

They probably thought they were buying low

 

[credulous]

teams should be more willing to let players walk imo. the nhl is turning into the nba where the middle class of players who help you win but aren't irreplaceable are being squeezed out. over investing in middle six forwards and bottom 4 dmen is a quick route to cap hell. teams that realize this first will have a huge advantage

 

[racerjoe]

This absolutely should have happened, and in a well-run organization, I think it would have. Of course, here we have to treat players with kid gloves and worry about their feelings, so that wasn't on the table.

People often say this like we shouldn't, but the simple fact is the world has changed and yeah you do now have to. the days of the old school coach like Keenan was or Bobby Knight are gone.

That was the move to make though. Way less risk for the team, only thing it would’ve hurt is some extra cap this year.

They probably thought they were buying low

Even that wasn't a good option, the Canucks were already in a bind Cap wise imagine adding another 1.3 mil

There was no good options. The probably should have dealt him at the deadline as a rental, that was probably the best option, but with his dad, I understand why they wouldn't want to.

 

[drax0s]

edit: He came out late.

 

[Canucker]

Umm Boeser would 100% take the QO. I mean the option was for the management to not qualify him.

That option has significant risk as well. It’s fine to do it if the player was dogging it but the rationale for his bad play was his dying dad. That would’ve done a lot of damage to the trust between players and management, a lot. And you are not even guaranteed to win the arb case. The arb can award anything in between and they don’t look at just last year but also years prior which helps Brock’s case.

For me, I don't see a "significant" risk, any more so than signing him for 3 years at higher dollars. And I don't really believe it helps Brock's case for getting close to his QO numbers...even if they awarded him more money you can just take the 1 year and walk away...IMO I'd take him to arbitration and see if it motivates him or makes a pouter out of him...either way you get to make a decision on him sooner than 3 years.

 

[Toss it to Tanti]

So far she hasn't done a very good job at all, if those are the areas she oversee. On paper she should have all the education and/or experience required, but either she doesn't have a voice (so she is just hired to check off some employment equity boxes, which I find unlikely), or she just isn't very good at her job (which is disappointing because I had high hope for her.)

I really don't see how you need a law degree or finance background to navigate the cap system though. Sure there are some technical stuff, as with LTIR or finer points in contracts. But the things that are tripping up the organization are VERY easy to see and understand. Any one of us spending 5 minutes on Capfriendly can tell you that the contracts to Boeser and JTM will handcuff us big time going forward, and adding to the problems that already exist (OEL, Myers, recapture, etc). And then spend another 30 minutes browsing other team's Capfriendly page will quickly realize that most of the teams are capped out so moving out contract is going to be costly, if not impossible. It really isn't THAT complicated.

this is wrong. the only year it's "friendly" to buy out miller is the last year where you can save 4.7 mil and only pay a 2.3 mil penalty the subsequent year. it's one of the least buyout friendly contracts in the entire league

The 4th year of his contract has no signing bonus as well. Meaning you get 5+ million in cap savings that year, and then 3.5 for the next 2 and finally another 5 in the final year. That will cost us 1.83 against the cap as dead money for 3 years after the contract is over. There are two contracts on our team that were signed or acquired by the previous group that are 100x worse than JTMs (OEL + Meyers, not to mention Boesers ridiculous QO based off the contact he signed). What parameters are you using to determine it’s one of the “least friendly” buyout contracts in the NHL?

 

[arttk]

That was the move to make though. Way less risk for the team, only thing it would’ve hurt is some extra cap this year.

They probably thought they were buying low

I don’t know the details of what happens after the arbitrator decides on the number but like I said, Brock scored at a 64 point and 72 pt pace the 2 years before last year when he was at a 50ish point pace. It’s hard to tell what the arbitrator will award. Nevermind to get there you literally have to argue why he sucks. Can you imagine if you go through all that and the Arbitrator awards like 7M?

 

[Orr4Norris]

I agree that all of the options sucked thanks to Jimbo...but the one option I would have taken was club elected arbitration. They could have possibly knocked his cap hit to $6.375m on a 1 or 2 year deal.

The irony is BB’s contract was probably one of JB’s better decisions. A lot of people at the time were clamouring for a long-term deal. And the reported ask on a long-term deal was 7×7. The Canucks took the less risky option, most likely, just to save cap space in the moment. But it turned out to be the better decision, even if made for the incorrect reasons.

 

[Toss it to Tanti]

I don't know the exact job description, but let say you are correct and her job is to find comparables. What comparables did she use for Boeser? A one dimensional soft winger coming off 2 disappointing seasons, with injury history, and has no leverage as a RFA. How did that turned into a 3 years $6.6 per extension?
JTM is more understandable given his offensive output, but isn't it her job to recommend against signing a long term contract with a soon-to-be 30 years old moody forward in a flat cap world?
Giving Bo the Nuge extension might make sense to some, but clearly Horvat took it as an insult. Asking somebody who is scoring at an accelerated rate to take a pay cut is generally not going to be well received. I wonder if there are any other comparables used with that contract, because off the top of my head, RNH is the only such contract signed recently.
Signing all those contracts in the summer then having to spend a 2nd to ditch Dickinson seems like a lack of foresight to me but I'm sure some can explain it away. It's looking like a high 2nd pick, could come back and bite us big time.

I don't know the inner workings so I'll admit I could be wrong, if her job is such that management comes to her and say "I want Boeser and JTM signed to term at any cost, but lowball Horvat for me" then sure she is doing ok within that parameter. I would hope the capologisy has some say on long term planning though.

You can absolutely argue the point on long term cap structure. There’s nothing I can do to defend the utter hell hole we have found ourselves in.

With JTM - why would he accept a 3-4 year term contract? He knew that if he made it to free agency, he would have got a 7 year deal. Sure she can absolutely outline the risks, but ultimately if she’s told to find a contract range for him knowing that he would only accept a 6-7 year deal, her hands are essentially tied. Again we can quibble about the player and how he should have been traded (which is the school of thought I subscribe to), but that has nothing to do with Emilie.

On Boeser - there isn’t a comparable that makes sense. Also, how does Boeser not have leverage? He quite literally had all the leverage. He either walks straight to UFA if he isn’t qualified and gets a 6-7 year deal at 6 million+ from someone, or he takes his 7.5 million dollar QO and then walks straight to UFA and executes the above plan. Again, I don’t think Brock is worth the money we’re paying him, that’s obvious; but if you’re told that this is a player that management/ownership want back on the team you do the best you can to make that happen.

Edit: Didn’t read through everyone else’s responses, but @arttk & @MarkMM summed it up perfectly as well.

 

[gringo]

Holy Jesus if the rumours are true that the canucks are trying to attach a bad contract to the Horvat trade I’ll be so pissed. Why tie an anchor to the most valuable trade chip you have? Holy Jesus. We need to max the return value with this trade not clear cap space. I’m dismayed. Please let this be bullshit.

 

[Canucker]

The irony is BB’s contract was probably one of JB’s better decisions. A lot of people at the time were clamouring for a long-term deal. And the reported ask on a long-term deal was 7×7. The Canucks took the less risky option, most likely, just to save cap space in the moment. But it turned out to be the better decision, even if made for the incorrect reasons.

Yeah, I wouldn't agree with that...I didn't want to lose Boeser for nothing, but I was not interested in a long term deal at those prices...short term deal and hope for a rebound and then make a decision to extend or sell...there is no way he earned that sort of investment after the last couple years. For me, it should have been arbitration.

 

[arttk]

For me, I don't see a "significant" risk, any more so than signing him for 3 years at higher dollars. And I don't really believe it helps Brock's case for getting close to his QO numbers...even if they awarded him more money you can just take the 1 year and walk away...IMO I'd take him to arbitration and see if it motivates him or makes a pouter out of him...either way you get to make a decision on him sooner than 3 years.

I don’t think taking him to arb to lower his QO is really an option because of all the baggage that comes with it and the uncertainty in being able to lower the number down to a point where Boeser can meet the expectation.


And then with that option out of the way, then you are just really looking at the scenarios and try to weight the risk vs return. The best scenario is Boeser becomes a player that is worth that money so if he does, you can choose to keep or trade and if you trade you get 1st + prospect + roster player. That’s the highest upside and in truly I think a lot of us thought he could do it because of the distractions going away.

For the other scenarios, the upside is less and less and the risk is also less. You walk away you get nothing and you can use that cap on something else and the upside is maybe a 1st or multiple 2nd and that’s probably a better scenario than trading away his RFA rights because teams will ask us to take back a cap dump.

i think people blast management for not taking risks or whatever, well they probably took the most risky route in this transaction. What they chose to do was not the most conservative option because if it doesn’t work, we get what we have now.

 

[Toss it to Tanti]

Holy Jesus if the rumours are true that the canucks are trying to attach a bad contract to the Horvat trade I’ll be so pissed. Why tie an anchor to the most valuable trade chip you have? Holy Jesus. We need to max the return value with this trade not clear cap space. I’m dismayed. Please let this be bullshit.

That was just speculation from Dhali, he even made sure to clarifying that he wasn’t reporting, just speculating.

It doesn’t make sense if you’re trading Horvat to a contending team, as they won’t have space to house an inefficient contract. However, if it’s a sign and trade to a Detroit/Columbus/etc, that is the worst case scenario, and shows the ownership is likely heavily involved. I would be livid if that’s the case.

What that tells me is that FAQ doesn’t want to pay the $5 million bonus to Myers on July 1, because at that point he probably becomes a tradable asset; and that $6 million cap hit is gone.

 

[Canucker]

I don’t think taking him to arb to lower his QO is really an option because of all the baggage that comes with it and the uncertainty in being able to lower the number down to a point where Boeser can meet the expectation.


And then with that option out of the way, then you are just really looking at the scenarios and try to weight the risk vs return. The best scenario is Boeser becomes a player that is worth that money so if he does, you can choose to keep or trade and if you trade you get 1st + prospect + roster player. That’s the highest upside and in truly I think a lot of us thought he could do it because of the distractions going away.

For the other scenarios, the upside is less and less and the risk is also less. You walk away you get nothing and you can use that cap on something else and the upside is maybe a 1st or multiple 2nd and that’s probably a better scenario than trading away his RFA rights because teams will ask us to take back a cap dump.

i think people blast management for not taking risks or whatever, well they probably took the most risky route in this transaction. What they chose to do was not the most conservative option because if it doesn’t work, we get what we have now.

Yeah, I pretty much disagree with this...I think club elected arbitration was the lesser of all evils with the lowest amount of risk without just giving up the asset...even if you get stuck with a $7m award for 1 year, just try to build him back up as best you can and trade him at the deadline as a rental with retention.

 

[bossram]

This absolutely should have happened, and in a well-run organization, I think it would have. Of course, here we have to treat players with kid gloves and worry about their feelings, so that wasn't on the table.

Never forget that But Gillis! actually did this with Mason Raymond to get to a more accurate AAV. Imagine a guy knowing and actually using the tools provided in the CBA.

Holy Jesus if the rumours are true that the canucks are trying to attach a bad contract to the Horvat trade I’ll be so pissed. Why tie an anchor to the most valuable trade chip you have? Holy Jesus. We need to max the return value with this trade not clear cap space. I’m dismayed. Please let this be bullshit.

Because this management group is nearly as terrible as the last.