The could sign Calvin de Haan for free

No need to trade Bear. He’s one of your better bottom 4 D-man

The Canes are like a lot of teams now; they have to move salary so doubtful they get anything back of value for Bear. He’s a cap casualty

Pacioretty going to LTIR gives them plenty of space. They’ll have a few months to sort out the cap before he’s ready to come back. No need for an immediate cap clearing move.

They have time, yes but they’ll need to clear space to fit him in.

Potentially. If 2 teams are interested it could create some value. Also, since Canes don’t need to make a move until Feb to become compliant assuming Patches sticks to a 6 month recovery, who knows what’ll happen with other potential injuries. Might not need to make a move unless they’re incredibly lucky from a health standpoint.

Don't think so.

First, I’m surprised your owner has the kind of cash that he can pay out salaries for a partial / full year above the salary cap. I smell a trade coming soon to dump some salary
Second, tough to build your team assuming you’ll run into major injuries. Could happen but that wouldn’t be ideal.
If there are no injuries, then league will know you’ll have to dump salary before you can bring back Patchy, so it’ll cost you. Same predicament a lot of top teams are in now…

Is this anything like having a great turd sandwich?

Lol, nice pot shot in your first point. Uninformed based on his tenure as owner but it sure is a crowd pleaser for non canes fans that never seems to get old!

For your second point - I’m not basing how the team is built on the hope that somebody gets injured. That’s a silly thing to hope and likely wouldn’t be beneficial because it means you’re potentially losing somebody more important than Patches. I’m saying they have flexibility and time on their side so don’t need to rush into making any decisions. Sure they might need to make a move they don’t want to or pay to dump a contract to make room. But they might not. Why would you rush into a making a poor decision when you might not need to. It’s just not smart business.

Wasn’t a pot shot (well, maybe a small one) but i find CF GM’s often overlook real world issues like ownership’s financial $ capacity , especially small market teams like canes (27th in value).
I agree with you - they have time but if/when they have to move someone to make room for someone on LTIR, it may prove difficult albeit not impossible

Dundon definitely doesn’t want to throw money away and he’ll always look for value and bargain deals but he also has always shown that he’s willing to spend his money, especially when it’s attributing to on ice talent. I think ppl misconstrue being cheap versus being mindful and looking for value plays.

It’s true that the revenue and market value of a team like the Canes is lower but he’s not making decisions solely based off of his pocket book. He and the FO have a very strict model valuation and they don’t go past it for most players but they use the cap to the limit every year still.

What do you think then?

Bear is a good player but if Gardiner is healthy then he's likely the odd man out since he's an offensive minded, right-handed shot in the "bottom 4" which would include Pesce (R), Skjei(L), Coghlan(R), Gardiner(L), and Bear(R). I think a pair of Gardiner and Bear would likely be a turnover nightmare, as Gardiner would need someone who can be consistently defensively reliable. They would also need to clear out almost the exact contract of Bear to bring Pacioretty back once he's healthy so it'd likely be either Martinook or Bear who gets traded and realistically, I think Bear has less of a chance of sticking around since there's so much defensive depth.

I think Bear will get moved sooner rather than later. We're good for now with Goalie depth, so no need for this DiPietro fellow who has played a grand total of 3 nhl games. If we need more goalie depth, highly doubt it would be him. Hoping the Canes do some shuffling at the bottom of the D before season starts. Now hearing Gardiner may not be healthy to start the season after all.