Treliving took over a recently blown up club that should have been in the middle of a rebuild, it had a core that included:
Giordano - 30yrs
Backlund - 25yrs
Monahan - 19yrs
Brodie - 24yrs
And a bunch of good veterans like Hudler, Cammalleri, Stajan, Russell, Glencross, Byron, Wideman, etc.
The only less than desirable contracts were:
Stajan 3.125M x 4yrs
Jones 4M x 2yrs
I guess some people might include Wideman but he was playing well at the time.
Some might also include Smid but he got injured which didn't hurt the team capwise.
There was also O'Brien as a buried contract for 1 more year at 2M.
Considering the team was rebuilding, none of these contracts were a problem.
In the pipeline he had:
Gaudreau
Baertschi
Ferland
Kulak
Jankowski
Brossoit
And a bunch of other prospects that didn't pan out, some highly rated.
With 27M in cap space (71M cap), no boat anchor contracts, a fan base that accepted the rebuild and low expectations he walked into a pretty sweet position to build from. He also had all of his draft picks including the upcoming 4th overall.
Let's not pretend he had to clean up a mess, the mess is entirely of his creation.
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