Buying out Neal would save $3.8M in cap space for the next four seasons, which is exactly the length of our current window. That's how long we have with all of Gaudreau, Lindholm and Monahan on bargain contracts, which makes those next years our best shot at the cup.
When has a veteran player ever struggled this bad and still turned his game around, especially for multiple years? That's just not going to happen, he's never going to be worth his contract. It's a disaster of a signing, and really the only thing left is cutting our losses.
With $3.8M you'd be in tough to do worse than James Neal, who is currently just dragging his line down. He doesn't do anything well. Doesn't score, isn't physical enough to matter, isn't fast, and he's possibly the worst defensive player on the team. He might not be absolutely terrible, but if he wasn't a big UFA signing he'd be in rotation to eat popcorn. He's playing like an okay 4th liner. Jankowski and Bennett are spending time covering for him when they should be playing with a veteran that either covers for them while they try to put up points or helps them create those goals.
If you can find a team that will gamble on him returning to form with us retaining at most $2M, you make that move and start the car. Otherwise it's just a question of whether you buy him out next summer or hope there's a compliance buyout the year after that.
All that said, it's unlikely anyone will take him off our hands and he's a warm body so there's no point buying him out now. It is what is and most likely there's nothing to be done about the situation this season. He might be worth a couple of goals in the playoffs.
I also think all of this is obvious enough that there's not much of a rational discussion to be had here. Nothing has changed from the start of the season, nothing will change, everyone has their opinions made at this point.
So rant on if you feel like ranting, theres plenty of reason to complain, but please stop fighting about him in other threads. Fights over Smith and Neal keep hijacking thread after thread and it's just tiresome. It's too close to being all there's is to the PGT's, that and Gaskals ATL reports.
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