more for miller especially with retantion

Not poking a huge hole in the plan, but would be interest to hear the rationale behind Seattle taking both Bean and Gardiner. Why wouldn’t they just take Bean? I’ve thought about this myself, but if Seattle really just waits it out, they will get either Skjei or Bean without taking on Gardiner.

my thought is that francis wants bean a lot more than Skjei and it’s basically down to which one the canes leave unprotected so we call up ronny F and tell them we’ll leave bean for y’all if you take gardiner

That’s one way to play it.

I think the factor against the Canes is that there are almost an infinite amount of possibilities the XD could play out. I think that unless Seattle actually wants Gardiner (either the salary or player) there isn’t a reason to take him just to get Bean. Take the players out of the equation and just think of Bean as an upside young Defenseman, Skjei as an established Top 4 D. I think there will be other possibility’s for both young defenseman and established top 4 guys available to them. I think there will be a buffet of defenseman available to them.

In other words, if I’m Francis…I’m saying unless you give me draft picks equal to $8Mish of cap space over 2 years. I’ll just wait you out and take the one you expose and use that $4M AAV in a rich UFA market.

I know the point of this is to rework the defense if Dougie leaves but that Martinez deal makes me queezy. I’d rather give Hamilton his long term deal if we’re signing Martinez for anything more than a 2x4 personally.