I like it, bring in some guys for 1 year to go for the cup and bring it back to Canada before you have to give raises to Mathews Marner and Kapanen, probably need to bring in a defence man too though. Don't make Edmonton's mistake and overpay! Nylander at 7m? 5-6m for 8 years if he will take it, if not bridge for 4 years until Kadri's contract is up. Bridge might be the best bet because Marleau and Kadri will be eating up contract room for 19-20, and you will need to sign Mathews Marner Kapanen and most of your defence man going into the 19-20 season.

I'd personally prefer to give that $6m to JVR over Perron. Can see the Leafs just trying to fill in the wings from the AHL and sign/trade for 1-2 centres

Agree for the most part. I'm sure Lou/Shanny will have an idea for how much it's going to cost to extent Marner, Matthews and Nylander prior to July 1st. That, combined with the performance bonuses they owe, will determine what cap space they have to play with to either go after a Tavares/Carlson type free agent, re-sign any of Bozak or JVR, or fill from within/acquire cheaper options.

I think if they can get Nylander/Marner on a 2-3 year bridge for between $5-5.5 until the Marleau contract is up that's a best case scenario. Cap will hopefully be around $82m at that point and you can see what space you'll have to make major adds. No chance you can get them on a long-term deal for $5-6m tho.

I always wonder if any of these GMs say to their players, listen McDavid, I'll give you 12.5m, but do you like playing Maroon? and how competitive do you want to be? because if you took 8m, you could probably still afford a house and food on the table, and be on a more competitive team. Who knows, maybe Mathews Nylander and Marner realize they have a good thing going, and it won't be as good if they all demand over 8m a year.

Yes I have read the cap should be 80m-82m next year based on Bettman's early comments of NHL revenue this year.

I think JVR is looking for 6x6m so I doubt Toronto will resign him. I have my fingers crossed that Chiarelli finds a way to move Lucic and signs JVR to ride shotgun to McDavid.

I heard some of the radio guys say that McDavid was actually offered (and agreed to) more..but he scaled back a bit...probably both to free up some more money for other players as well as reduce the target on his back if he went over $13m which is what I think the offer was. He only reduced by $700k-$800k tho to get under the $13m threshold.

I'd be surprised if GM's didn't communicate just that to their free agents though, 'if you're willing to come in cheaper, we can spend that money on the team elsewhere'. Probably doesn't work for the handful of teams (*cough, Ottawa, cough*) that don't spend to the cap and still want to get their players under value.

Yup, I’ve heard rumours like that as well. I heard the Oilers would have been forced to sign McDavid at whatever number he chose because there are teams out there like VGK who would have paid 8x15m for him.
Yeah Ottawa needs a new owner, pretty funny situation going on over there!