On Tuesday night with the #13 selection in the 2020 NHL Draft the Hurricanes drafted forward Seth Jarvis from the Portland Winterhawks of the Western Hockey League. Jarvis is a bit undersized but rates high for playmaking, creativity and hockey smarts. My intent is to cover the Canes drafted players after the draft concludes on Wednesday.
A recurring theme during the off-season in considering lineup changes has been the fact that the Hurricanes have a bit of salary cap budget flexibility for 2020-21 but need to be careful overcommitting for 2021-22 when Andrei Svechnikov needs to be re-signed. I touched on some of the upcoming contract specifics in an article on September 22 entitled, “Money matters.” Today’s Daily Cup of Joe looks at the Carolina Hurricanes salary situation in more detail for 2020-21 and 2021-22.
2020-21 Carolina Hurricanes salary cap situation
For 2020-21, the previous roster is mostly already signed with a bit of room to possibly add another player or two. The team has 11 forwards under contract with Warren Foegele as a restricted free agent with arbitration rights. Foegele’s 30-point season will garner a raise from his entry-level contract, but should be modest.
On defense, the Hurricanes have six defensemen under contract counting Jake Bean and have Haydn Fleury as a restricted free agent with arbitration rights for a seventh. With a season spent mostly in a third pairing role with a modest point total, Fleury’s raise should be modest like Foegele’s.
Finally, in net the Hurricanes have Petr Mrazek, James Reimer and Alex Nedeljkovic all under contract.
Estimating Warren Foegele and Haydn Fleury at $1.8 million each and also adding Jake Bean, Morgan Geekie and Alex Nedeljkovic to the CapFriendly total leaves the Hurricanes with only $1.8 million of remaining cap space with 22 players on the roster including three goalies.
The easiest path to a bit more wiggle room would be trading one of the veteran goalies to bump Nedeljkovic into the #2 slot and free up about $3 million.
So for 2020-21, the Hurricanes can make the current roster work easily but will need to do the math to make any additions.
2021-22 Carolina Hurricanes salary cap situation
The challenge increases for the 2021-22 season. The Hurricanes immediately save $2.3 million when Alexander Semin finally comes off the books. The team saves another $20.7 million from a number of players’ contracts ending. While that does present some flexibility the math is still challenging. Most significantly, Svechnikov will come off his entry-level contract for less than $1 million and likely earn something in the $6.5 to $9 million range. In addition, most of the other free agents are coming off modest contracts such that there will not be much savings trying to replace them if the team tries to cut costs.
Counting Svechnikov at $7.5 million, the Hurricanes will have nine forwards under contract for about $41 million total and the need to either re-sign or replace Ryan Dzingel, Jordan Martinook and Brock McGinn.
If one assumes that Dougie Hamilton is re-signed for $7 million, the blue line costs about $28 million.
Finally, in net the Hurricanes could start with Nedeljkovic estimated at about $1 million and will need to add another goalie.
The total cost is about $70 million which leaves about $11.5 million assuming the salary cap stays the same at $81.5 million. That $11.5 million must cover the cost of three depth forwards and probably a starting goalie. That math is possible but a bit tight. If the Hurricanes again go with a 1A/1B type goalie for $3-4 million and budget $1.5 million each for three forwards, the salary cap total rises to $78 million leaving about $3.5 million of wiggle room in case Svechnikov or Hamilton’s contract runs higher or if the team wants to add another player.
This math also illustrates the potential problem with adding a higher cost player like Patrik Laine. For certain, such an addition means money must be saved somewhere else.
Additional flexibility could be gained from losing a player to the expansion draft and/or buying out a player like Niederreiter or Gardiner if they do not have stronger 2020-21 campaigns.
Netting it out
By no means are the Hurricanes up against the salary cap in a way where they must cut salary like the Tampa Bay Lightning this off-season. But at the same time, the Hurricanes do need to consider salary cap implications both short and long-term with each and every transaction/decision.
What say you Canes fans?
1) Are you surprised to see the Carolina Hurricanes right up against the salary cap pretty much for the first time since the arrival of the NHL salary cap?
2) Of the players on the current roster, which might you consider trading or buying out to free up additional salary cap space?
3) Do you think the Hurricanes will be able to will be able to keep Svechnikov and Hamilton and either re-sign or add a medium to higher-end goalie to keep most of the group intact for the 2021-22 season?
Go Canes!
Niederreiter and Bean/Keane to Detroit for one of their aging forwards. Will clear a couple million this season and more than $5M a year going forward.
As Bob McKenzie said last night, so many teams are trying to shed salary that it’s going to be very difficult to make moves like this. Detroit has the cap space and Yzerman has made it clear he’s building for the future, but the Canes aren’t the only one with his phone number.
1. Surprised, but worried that this state of affairs may quickly change, given the tough market out there, though a lot of very rich people are making oodles of money, so maybe TD is richer than ever, still not rich enough to resign Forslund (reported ask $300K).
2. A few options:
* Try to ship Gardners contract (longshot, a very longshot)
* I do not expect the team will renew Hamilton, I will be sad to see him go. If that is already decided, team could try to trade him to Tor for one of their forward, Andreas Johnson etc. even retaining 2 or 3 mill of his salary (Tor wants to go all in and are desperately looking for top D men). Something like Hamilton + Reimer to Tor for Anderson + Nylander or Andreas Johnson (maybe some salary retained or picks exchanged) would make some sort of sense for both teams, though replacing Hamilton’s production is a very hard thing to do.
* Team could buy out the last year of Jordan Staal’s contract or trade him to another team that needs a veteran presence for the 21/22 season, maybe retaining a portion of his salary.
* Try to trade Niederreiter or MacGinn to a team needing two-way forwards, a tough sell
I would expect that the market for contracts may look better after the upcoming season, hoping the Covid-19 situation can be addressed and life can return to some form of normal. The Canes were good enough to get into the playoffs last year, despite some players on the roster having more to give. They can get through it again this year and start retooling at the playoff deadline.
1) Not really surprised—something like 25 of the 31 teams are “up against” the cap.
2) To answer this question tangentially, I think the front office dug an unnecessary financial hole last season by acquiring Trocheck, Skjei, and Gardiner.
Tampa entered last off-season with exactly one forward they didn’t draft or sign as an undrafted free agent. During the offseason they did add Maroon for 1 year at $900k. Then added two inexpensive forwards (Goodrow and Coleman) for the playoff run. They were able to do this because they trusted their development system and ended up with Point, Cirelli, and Cernak. They also played three rookie forwards (Verhaeghe, Stephens, Joseph) at total of 129 games last season.
Meanwhile the Canes traded away players who helped the Checkers win the Calder Cup with little (Gauthier, Luostarinen) or no (Kuokkanen, Bean) NHL exposure. Geekie and Ned would have likely fallen into the latter category if not for injuries. The team also traded Roy who quickly demonstrated he is competent at the NHL level and might end up a dependable two-way 2 or 3C.
Regular-season and playoff experience would have done much for Bean and others. Instead the team is committed to playing Skjei 18-20 minutes per night because of salary. The story is similar with Gardiner. Trocheck might limit Necas or Geekie from getting a real shot at centering a second scoring line. Basically the organization is committed to higher cost options in the specific places where rookies might be turning into the next Cernak or Cirelli.
Teams that have extended runs of success develop internal talent. That allows for financial flexibility.
3) I am skeptical that Hamilton re-signs. The once-in-a-lifetime financial situation might make it easier. However, that same situation also means the cap isn’t going up for 2-3 years. The Canes have entered the hard calculus of NHL teams with several high-end players.
It looks like the Preds boght out an old Canes killer, Kyle Turris.
Wonder if he’s got anything left in the tank, he used to have a scoring touch, and if he was bought out he’s probably desperate for any contract.
1. I am surprised more because of the revenue-strapped season we have ahead of us. How is TD, who doesn’t like to spend money for naught, going to feel about all that outflow to player with no or limited inflow from fans.
I am surprised that with all these draft picks we had this season we didn’t bundle them with the close-to-albatross contracts (when taken in total) that ct identifies to reduce salary.
2. I think our window has shut – we are not going to be able to trade away the players that should be trade because we don’t sugar (in the way of picks and prospects) to include with them.
That said, I can see the team being able to move Staal – again, I talked with the Big Rig at a Bulls game in the summer of 2019 about that prospect happening this season or next. But Trocheck, Skjei, Gardiner are all claims on salary that we will find hard to move.
But buy out Gardiner, if you are going to buy out any window. When does the buyout window close???
3. I doubt it – Svech has already been lowballed the same way Aho was; he is going to want more for less term. And you cannot expect Hamilton to take $7M just to be a Cane. That’s not worth $8-12M over 5 years.
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ct’s response to #2 is well worth reading over and over again. He is dead on with his assessment, in my opinion.
And if not Gardiner, buy out Nino.