Kevin Allen recently said Tatar might be signing with a KHL team. They start their season in August IIRC. But maybe he's using that as leverage with NHL teams. I sure as hell wouldn't want to be playing in Russia right now! 😲

If Frederic and Swayman make it to arbitration, they're likely getting ~2.5m and ~$4m. This leaves no room to add someone like Tatar, even at that cap hit (which he is definitely not taking).

Also, I think they want more opportunities for guys like Boqvist, Merkulov and Lysell. Just doesn't make sense.

Frederic isn’t worth 2.5 at least not yet and if an arbitrator decides 2.5 I think Sweeney will take a look into his trade market

I'm not saying that he is, but if they go off of comparable contracts, it will be around that much.

He's going to have to look at trading someone either way, they're not signing Frederic, Swayman and Bergeron for under $5.4m while keep a 23 man roster.

The trade market is terrible so he'll have to decide who's least expensive to dump. It won't be Frederic, Swayman, Ullmark or Grz, they have too much value to get underpaid on.