They didn't know anything, and both speculation and the maximum possible increase at the time were well below where it ended up.
They both want to stay. Draisaitl could have waited, but he chose to sign early, because his team worked hard to sign him and offered him 14m, and he wanted to lock that in and not take any risks. Also probably easier to do when you don't have a barrage of toxic, irrational fans blaming you for everything.
It's not an easy assumption to make. Not signing early =/= only caring about money. That's such a massive logical leap.
Agents still need to communicate with players to properly represent them, and players are allowed to not want those distractions while they're working. The team was aware of this and could have done something last offseason. The contract wasn't even dominating discussion until the GM started playing stupid, pointless games at the deadline and put it into the spotlight.
Round number is meaningless in our current system. It provides no insight into the quality of your team, what you faced, what happened, and why. 1st round often features some of the toughest matchups, and the outcome of a series has nothing to do with what happened in past years.
We've actually dealt with quite a few injuries and losses over the years. Kadri in 2018. Kadri, Hyman, and Gardiner in 2019. Muzzin and Johnsson in 2020, plus Mikheyev playing his first games after his sliced wrist. Tavares, Matthews, Muzzin, and Foligno in 2021, plus Hyman playing his first games after another big knee injury. Bunting in 2022. Knies, Bunting, and Samsonov in 2023, plus the permanent loss of Muzzin. Matthews, Nylander, McMann, and Woll in 2024. It's possible to win despite injuries, but let's not pretend that injuries haven't been one of the contributing factors here, especially with the margins so tiny.
Well aside from you putting words in my mouth, and aside from the fact that it wasn't only 1st round exits, the series outcomes don't erase what we were. Some of the best teams in modern history lost in the first round; some in much worse ways than anything we've done. Losing to Cup finalists by the margins we did in the circumstances we had doesn't make us and everybody associated with us bad. Crazy enough, from 2019-2020 to 2022-2023, we actually had a positive playoff goal differential. I know you'll say who cares, but it's a good example of how the narrative born out of looking exclusively at playoff series record doesn't reflect how we actually performed or the miniscule change required to flip the outcome.
Blaming our outcomes on the cap hits of those forwards is such a lazy argument. They aren't the reason we've lost. Their cap hits aren't the reason we've lost. Getting rid of them isn't going to help us win. We had an even worse playoff record when these guys gave us more surplus value than anything we could ever dream of, and the rising cap environment really changes what "continue doing it" even means.
There's more to hockey than points, and not only is that playoff production not even bad, it's even more understandable when you don't intentionally ignore all context.
Every playoff game is important. Nitpicking when points come is ridiculous. Especially when his late series production has been more so a result of abnormally low point credit for goals he contributes to, and conversion struggles by others, more than him changing.
Maybe it's time you start to look at your eye test and overreliance on series outcomes and points in small samples without context, and begin to realize how flawed they are. The analytics that teams use are more detailed and in depth, but are based on similar fundamentals and methodology.
It is our team's main goal. Wanting to be paid properly for your work like everybody else does not mean you aren't trying to win. Matthews, Tavares, and Marner all could have gotten a decent amount more pennies if they really wanted to push it and use their leverage.
There is a difference between drawing from one aspect of futures during a competitive phase to improve the present, and just outright making yourself worse in both the present and future for no reason. You're underrating Marner's impact on all aspects of this team (offense, defense, transition, etc. in every game state and situation, not to even mention off-ice in the room), while overrating the alternative options that actually exist, and how much is actually accomplished with ~13m in UFA under a 95.5m cap. And if our pool is so trash, and our draft picks are so depleted, what are we trading?
First off, there's a big difference between getting that cap space from losing what is essentially dead cap vs. losing one of the best players in the world. And second, you're pointing at an outlier that wasn't even really about cap. It was a mixture of some good moves working out, improvements in existing players, and some overachievment.
Protas and McMichael exploding isn't about cap. Ovechkin's last gasp isn't about cap. Logan Thompson putting up the 2nd best GSAx in the league for 767k isn't about cap. We could have signed Roy. Even Chychrun is only 4.6m. Making good moves doesn't mean or require getting rid of your best players to throw cap at stuff in UFA.
So if we arbitrarily remove the times when the team lost without Marner, we can pretend that the team is good without Marner? Come on man. Yes, these "without X" records are meaningless. No, the solution is not to manipulate them until they work for your argument. Nobody "gave up" on Babcock. Babcock just sucked.
The point is, we've already had the kind of depth that costs that amount in UFA. Paying more for them doesn't improve anything. What made us good was having both our core pieces AND those depth pieces. Trading the better core pieces that can't be replaced for cheaper for the worse depth pieces that can be obtained for cheaper doesn't give you a better chance of winning.
Not even sure what you're attempting to argue here. We've had cheap and effective depth in all positions and roles throughout the lineup. And being able to play with players like Marner really helps elevate and shelter the ones playing in our top 6, and boost the surplus value they bring. Nobody has said that our offense would "dry up". But it's pretty silly to think that it wouldn't be affected by losing one of the best offensive players in the league. Not to mention all of the other things that would be impacted.
With Tavares at 7 and Marner at 13.5, that would be 71.5m for the core 4 + top 4 + 2G, not 75m. Knies and McMann finish off our top six for what, 7m? If we keep Domi, Laughton, and Jarnkrok, that's another 7m. Which leaves 10m, and only 4th line and bottom pairing to fill. And then an extra 9m the next year with our main pieces already signed. Same the year after that. Where's the crisis?
Not sure what you're talking about. Florida had depth players on depth contracts in depth roles. They haven't been able to keep everybody. 9 of the 22 players Florida used on their way to the cup weren't there the year before, and 9 of those 22 players are gone this year, including the likes of Montour. They're likely looking at more losses - potentially Bennett - this offseason. That's the cap world. What Florida actually did is re-sign their most important players, which is what I am advocating for with the likes of Marner/Tavares/Knies.
That 10m goalie went on an amazing run... and a couple months prior, he had lost his net to a fringe backup, and that GM was rumoured to be looking to retain millions for years to dump his ass. Just goes to show how fast things can change in the NHL.
What available goalie would you like to spend 10m on? It's great for Florida that Bobrovsky went on a run at the right time, but even if you get the opportunity for a signing like that, there is a big risk involved in spending so much on such a volatile position where cost has such a weak correlation with performance. It can carry your team, or absolutely sink it. Heck, at the same time, Florida was paying another goalie who didn't even play for them more than our entire goalie budget this year.
