they certainly can find a way to keep everyone, but where do you think that team finishes in the standings?

If the option are Moore and Marchment playing big minutes and Timashov, Brooks on the team, and Holl and Sandin playing regularly next season, the Leafs will be much better off keeping Kadri, Zaitsev, Brown and Hyman and keeping their picks, and let Marner go and take the picks. What team has 12m for a Marner signing?

Lol. It most certainly would not take 2 future 1st round picks to off load Zaitsev.

The Islanders could find 12 million for Marner

Buffalo has 12 mill

Exercise was more to prove a point because most people would agree Kap/AJ/Marner each sign for at least 1 mil less than the values i have up there, at which point you can find a way to keep at least 1 out of the 4 guys i moved.

but sure let's say this is the team

Zaitsev / oleksiak is a wash in my opinion. debatable, but i think it's close.

Hyman hurts but he puts up about 0.5 ppg, but based on AHL to NHL ppg conversion tables an AHL point is worth about 0.47 NHL points. So we need to find a player that produces at a ppg in the AHL to replace him. Well Moore/Bracco/Mueller are all there, although mueller is more of a career AHLer. Of the 3 i think one of them could fill in. I like those odds if it means saving 1 mil plus.

Marchment/Timashov/others replace brown / ennis on the 4th line. Not a huge deal 4th lines shouldnt be the concern of a hypothetical.

The biggest drop off is Kadri, there is no doubt about that. A full season of nylander would offset some of the loss, but not all. Now Kadri hasn't missed a lot of time over the last few years so it's hard to say, but leafs finished with 105 pts last year and they likely finish around that this year. On the aggressive end kadri might cost them 10 points over a season. That's a fringe playoff team, but the year after marleau's contract is gone, the cap rises, and the leafs can probably make up some of that gap then.

And yes you could always take the picks. Four 1sts for marner at 12 mil, let's you easily keep kadri and grab a 7.5 mil player through free agency or trade, since there arent many players you cant get with four 1sts.

kind of the point. Regardless of how you value any of the players I traded, they are easy moves to make because no GM that has the room would really refuse them.

Do Sabres in the future when their RFAs get contracts. That's really the issue. 12m for Marner, 10 for Eichel, is going to be 8 for Skinner, My opinion that Leafs wouldn't overpay that much for Marner so they could keep their lineup in place. So the Leafs just spend the 9m or so they have allotted for Marner on other players and have the four picks.
I don't think teams are really that concerned about offer sheets, because they still have the cap space to spend and get the picks too. Sure teams don't like it but it's not as devastating as so many on this site think. Wouldn't the Sabres be a lot better off even offering an UFA 12m....think Panarin or Karlsson and then they still their four first rounders, which is really the reason there are so few offer sheets. Spend the money on a UFA, provide a much better value and you keep your picks.

Sabres have a lot of money coming off the books too, plus cap managment is why Botterill was hired. The 4 1st rounders is the only thing that would hurt as you said

First off, Brown is worth a 3rd, Hyman a second, and Kadri at least a 1st and 3rd, or you could include him in that Dallas deal with Zaitsev. But Johnsson and Kappy probably make 3 million on one or two year deals, Marner will get 10 mill over 5-7 years. Hyman isn't going anywhere but Brown is all but gone with Moore, Bracco, and Ennis filling out the bottom 6. I'd like to see Nylander at centre and Kadri traded, not because I don't like him, but because he can fetch a cheap top 4 dman.

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