SabresBeat Posted March 30, 2007 Report Share Posted March 30, 2007 Jon Vogl on potential RFA Offer Sheet Issues Long-time reader and frequent commenter dandaman asked the following this evening: Hereâs a hypothetical situation that scares me. Supposing the Flyers whom have made it clear that they covet Briere,make a phil kessel-like offer to vanek(way more than the sabres can afford given cap space)as well as a huge offer to Briere. Teams at the trade deadline were giving away more (as in draft picks)to players with less upside than Vanek, so itâs not entirely unrealistic that it could happen to Vanek. First things first… Let’s look at the Sabres cap situation for next season, here. I covered this a bit earlier in the season as well here where I laid out a strategy for retaining both Briere and Drury. With the cap going to 48.5 million or so, and without the 3 players in questiion, the Sabres have a cap hit of 35.0 million which includes the following contracts given out: Derek Roy: 3 years, 8 million (cap hit $2.666 mil) Dan Paille: 2 years, $1.35 million (cap hit $675K) Nathan Paetsch: 2 years $1.4 million (cap hit $700k) That leaves $13.5 million for Drury, Briere and Vanek and retaining everyone currently under contract except Adam Mair and Andrew Peters and Teppo Numminen (who retires with a Cup *grin*) and adds Clarke MacArthur, Andrej Sekera and Drew Stafford. In any scenario where the Sabres sign either Drury or Briere (max $6 million), there’s more than enough money to cover a potential RFA offer sheet to Vanek. The worst-case scenario is a $4.99 million offer sheet, which would only return 2 1st rounders, 1-2nd and a 3rd. The price for $5+ million is 4-1st Round Picks, which means that the offer will be substantially higher than that to offset the higher price and making Regier more likely to decline to match. Think $6 million. Now, if anyone thinks that Thomas Vanek at this point in time is worth a 4 year $24 million dollar contract along with all of their 1st rounders over the life of that contract and this person currently holds a job as a GM in the NHL then I say he’s certifiably insane (along with the owner who employs this hypothetical moron) and Regier thanks him for making his job that much easier. At that point, Regier can afford to overpay for one of his captains and should do so. Regier will try and get Vanek locked up for 4 years at $3.5-3.75 million per. Getting that deal done quickly will determine if he can get Drury and Briere back in the fold at $5.5 to $6 million per year. To keep all 3, someone will have to go. If he has to match a stupid offer sheet, the cap room will exist if he doesn’t re-sign both captains before getting Vanek to sign. Tactically, Regier has to be very careful about the order of his signings. On a related-note, getting Vanek signed to a reasonable contract quickly renders most of this scenario completely moot. If the offers for Briere and Drury are far in excess of what the Sabres are willing to spend, then don’t be surprised to see Regier make a play to retain Dainus Zubrus to replace one of them at around $3.25 million. Talking about all of this without having any idea what kind of player Tim Connolly will be when he returns makes handicapping this difficult at best. Assessing the worth of the Captains in their roles without being able to assess Connolly’s effectiveness is really frustrating. I would be okay with the following lineup in the unlikely scenario of the Sabres losing both Drury and Briere to Free Agency: Kotalik/Connolly/Afinogenov Vanek/Roy/Stafford Hecht/Zubrus/Pominville Paille/Gaustad/Mair Tallinder/Lydman Kalinin/Campbell Spacek/Paetsch Miller/Conklin Reserves: Peters, MacArthur, Sekera Total salary: $40.5 million ($42 million if Vanek gets bidded up to just under $5 million). Adding one of the captains pushes this to $46.5 million, minus the player you need to move to make room on the roster. Don’t forget that Patrick Kaleta will challenge for Adam Mair’s job next fall as well, though there’s no real savings there, as Mair’s not worth much more than league minimum. No matter how you slice this, I don’t see us losing more than 2 of 3 of those players. If that happens someone of quality (and my recommendation is Zubrus) comes in via free agency. In reality I don’t see us losing more than one guy. Ta, http://www.sabresreport.com/blogs/?p=457 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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