Sucks to lose Gio like this, but I still think Seattle's plan A is to extort a king's ransom to protect him and then take a player like Kylington or Phillips that they may have wanted anyway.
I do think you have to take into account the value of ~5.5M in cap. Sure, Gio's more valuable than Kylington in a vacuum, but what about Kylington plus a Ladd-style cap dump trade (2 2nd-rounders)? What if by taking Kylington you can also add Tyler Johnson + a pick for free?
I think it does depends on a few other players: Carey Price especially. If they're spending $14M on goalies with Driedger, and if they add a few expensive players like Tarasenko, it really changes the math. Whereas if they stay cheap on the rest of the roster, then Gio's cap hit has no impact.
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