seanlinden
Registered User
- Apr 28, 2009
- 25,464
- 1,910
Maybe I'm reading your post incorrectly, and if so, I apologize. You can be at the roster limit of 23, and accrue cap. It's your total cap hit, not number of players on the roster.
Here is an example. Buffalo is at the 23 man roster limit. But their total cap hit is $81.7 mil, of a $88 mil cap. So they are accruing cap. At the deadline, they'll have $28.7 mil in "deadline" cap space.
Practically speaking, the Leafs cannot. They currently have a 27 man roster with Dewar, Hakanpaa, Mermis & Jarnkrok on LTIR.
If you assume that all 4 of those guys are healthy tomorrow, the Leafs will need to clear 4 spots on the 23 man roster for them. The spots they'd presumably clear, IMO, would be Myers, Benning, Mermis and Holmberg.
IF they did that today, they'd be under the cap by roughly $200k. If they maintained that $200k in space throughout the remainder of the season, it would baloon to about $600k in "deadline cap space".
The problem is -- they're not in a position to do that today. Jarnkrok isn't healthy. Mermis cannot be waived / assigned when he's injured... meaning they're going to continue to carry Holmberg and Mermis on their NHL cap hit at least until everyone's healthy.
It would be senseless to risk dropping a guy like Holmberg to waivers just in the hope of accruing cap space, when in reality, you're 1 injury away from needing to bring up a replacement player that would eliminate any of your cap space accrual anyways.