You're just dumping your worst players and having teams overpay for them...

Oilers wont touch Johnson with a ten foot pole

Can you explain what you are clearing space for? Toews? Hall?

cap space

Can you imagine a team paying for Smith?? And over the cap Vegas giving up a 2nd to lose a player in the expansion draft which they are exempt from???

Rangers need to have a lot of extra cap space due to all the bonuses they'll likely have to pay for Kaapo, Gauthier, Fox, Shesterkin, Lafreniere, and Kratsov. If they all hit their bonuses, that could be an extra 10 million the Rangers have to pay and it goes against the cap. The NHL, I believe, allows an extra six million to be allotted for bonuses but after that you get a cap penalty for the following year. So the Rangers need to have a cap buffer this year so that they can spend to the cap in the future.

i know that lol, i asked what for

For later paying guys like fox and kakko and also signing some big name free agents