[SCF] Florida Panthers (EC-WC2) vs Vegas Golden Knights (WC-1)

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by dino7c

He isn't as good as the numbers but he can play

Oilers will match anyway....which is the point. Don't let them escape with a bridge, kill their cup window with 2 years of Drai left.

It's a gamble - I'm not paying him $5M and then getting stuck with a guy who's 5-6 on Calgary.

[FanIn80]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

I think Vegas is a good example of doing what other NHL GMs haven't been willing to do TBH.

You can say they "Bought" a Stanley Cup, but they were also managed in an aggressive way that generally isn't seen in the NHL.

- They abused other NHL GMs in the expansion draft. People point to the expansion draft rules but really it was teams like Florida (Marchessault/Smith), Anaheim (Theodore), Minnesota (Haula/Tuch) etc making terrible decisions that built that initial Knights roster.

- They weren't afraid to make bold moves. Stone, Eichel, Pietrangelo, etc

- They weren't afraid to cut their losses when things weren't working and they needed to move on from players. The deal for Tatar didn't work out, and they quickly moved on. Moved lots of pieces for Pacioretty, but weren't afraid to move him for nothing in the offseason when they needed cap space. The move with Fleury which offended him but was probably the right move.

They did have the advantage of playing in a very attractive market, but honestly I wish more GMs would be as aggressive as Vegas has been. Maybe we'd see more than 1-2 big trades a season then.

Honestly, my only real complaint is that they shouldn't have been allowed to use LTIR to add Eichel (who was also on LTI at the time).

My stance is that long-term injury relief should have limited usability. Like just because you have 10M on the shelf, you shouldn't be able to use that 10M to acquire a 10M asset who is also on the shelf. Injury relief isn't actually relief if it's just being used to acquire another injured player.

[FanIn80]

Originally Posted by dino7c

I just meant for players....they are both tier one markets for players

Taxes, weather, ect.

Oh right. I thought you meant from a team standpoint. Like, not every team can afford to actually have a 100M roster, even if they were presented the opportunity to abuse LTIR.

I get what you mean though, for sure. In terms of attracting players, Vegas would be pretty competitive with Florida.

[FanIn80]

Originally Posted by dino7c

Lol, for a 2 month Panther "fan" you are taking this awful hard

Don't confuse my dislike of VGK with my wanting FLA to win lol. The one and only time I would ever be in favour of the Knights winning anything is vs the Oilers, and I would be cheering for FLA (well, Tkachuk) vs anyone except for CGY.

[FanIn80]

Originally Posted by Jiri Hrdina

buy a Stanley Cup?
What do you mean by that?

I can't remember the exact numbers (I posted them in this thread last week), but VGK's dressed roster for every game in the playoffs is over $100M (Edit: $93M). They have 9 $5M+ active players in this series compared to 5 on Florida (VGK and FLA both have another one on LTI).

There are not many owners in this league that can afford a $100M (Edit: $106M (total)) roster. Florida's active roster is (I think, from memory) $79M (Edit: $76M) in comparison.

Edit: Here's the post I was referencing.

Originally Posted by FanIn80

Some "advanced stats" for the two rosters dressing for tonight's game.



"Vegas' depth"
# of players playing tonight with cap hit of $5M or higher
Vegas: 9
Florida: 5

[Johnny Makarov]

Originally Posted by FanIn80

I dunno... what's not intriguing about watching Vegas buy a Stanley Cup?

So salty! lol

[SuperMatt18]

Originally Posted by dino7c

He isn't as good as the numbers but he can play

Oilers will match anyway....which is the point. Don't let them escape with a bridge, kill their cup window with 2 years of Drai left.

Would be interesting to give him a 1 x $4.29M offer sheet, which is only a 2nd round pick for compensation.

Oilers will be hoping for 2-3 years at around $3.5M probably.

So by doing even a 1 x $4.29M means they probably match, but also puts them in a lot of pressure because if he plays top pairing PP all season long then he's going to put up 60 points.

And if he puts up 60 points then next year he's going to want $7M+.

[SuperMatt18]

Originally Posted by FanIn80

I can't remember the exact numbers (I posted them in this thread last week), but VGK's dressed roster for every game in the playoffs is over $100M (Edit: $93M). They have 9 $5M+ active players in this series compared to 5 on Florida (VGK and FLA both have another one on LTI).

There are not many owners in this league that can afford a $100M (Edit: $106M (total)) roster. Florida's active roster is (I think, from memory) $79M (Edit: $76M) in comparison.

Edit: Here's the post I was referencing.

That includes a bunch of people not actually dressing for games.

Their game 4 roster cost $77.8M if you don't include Quick's salary

Compare that to Florida who cost $71M if you don't include Lyon's salary.

So sure Vegas had $7M more in Salary dressed vs game 4 vs Florida...but how much of that is just because Florida was an 8 seed that wasn't a buyer at the deadline. And both team's dressed roster is actually below the Salary cap.

If you look at $6.5M+ salaries instead of $5M+ salaries then Florida has 5 (Barkov, Bobrovsky, Tkachuk, Ekblad, Reinhart) and Vegas only has 3 (Eichel, Stone, Pietrangelo)

So not nearly as big of a factor as your making it to be IMO.

[kipperiggy]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

The move with Fleury which offended him but was probably the right move.

Wasn't the main issue with this move not the fact that they were trading him but how they did? For a vet like Fleury you don't let him find out he's gone on Twitter. I'd argue for any player you don't let him find out on Twitter!

[FanIn80]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

That includes a bunch of people not actually dressing for games.

Their game 4 roster cost $77.8M if you don't include Quick's salary

Compare that to Florida who cost $71M if you don't include Lyon's salary.

So sure Vegas had $7M more in Salary dressed vs game 4 vs Florida...but how much of that is just because Florida was an 8 seed that wasn't a buyer at the deadline. And both team's dressed roster is actually below the Salary cap.

If you look at $6.5M+ salaries instead of $5M+ salaries then Florida has 5 (Barkov, Bobrovsky, Tkachuk, Ekblad, Reinhart) and Vegas only has 3 (Eichel, Stone, Pietrangelo)

So not nearly as big of a factor as your making it to be IMO.

Their literal active roster is over $92M. Subtract whatever you want from it, but just because Quick is on the bench, it doesn't mean they're not paying him. They still had to have an owner capable of spending $106M to be able to ice the roster they have.

And bumping up the $5M cutoff to $6.5M to make your point does nothing to dissuade my point. My point about the $5M contracts was about depth, not high-end. Everyone talks about how Vegas can roll 4 lines, but it's a lot easier to roll 4 lines when you have 9 $5M+ players worth of depth/talent.

Most of the owners outside of NYR, TOR, MTL, VGK, (maybe other huge markets I'm missing) wouldn't authorize taking on a $106M player budget, even if they were presented with the same LTIR opportunities that Vegas had. That's the literal definition of buying a cup.

[SuperMatt18]

Originally Posted by FanIn80

Their literal active roster is over $92M. Subtract whatever you want from it, but just because Quick is on the bench, it doesn't mean they're not paying him. They still had to have an owner capable of spending $106M to be able to ice the roster they have.

And bumping up the $5M cutoff to $6.5M to make your point does nothing to dissuade my point. My point about the $5M contracts was about depth, not high-end. Everyone talks about how Vegas can roll 4 lines, but it's a lot easier to roll 4 lines when you have 9 $5M+ players worth of depth/talent.

Most of the owners outside of NYR, TOR, MTL, VGK, (maybe other huge markets I'm missing) wouldn't authorize taking on a $106M player budget, even if they were presented with the same LTIR opportunities that Vegas had. That's the literal definition of buying a cup.

Vegas isn't actually spending over $100M. Due to salary pro-ration and things like that the salaries for Quick and Barbashev cost much less in real money than their full year cap hit. This is part of being buyers at the deadline instead of sellers.

Total Cap Hit: $107M...but that's not realistic due to people like Barbashev and Quick not actually costing nearly that much, this isn't Vegas actual spend.

Accumulated Cap Hit: $95.8M...this one is more relevant because it is actually what Vegas "paid" but includes Lehner, Weber, and Nolan who didn't play a game this season and account for $11.9M of that, and Vegas likely had insurance for those contracts.

So in terms of actual spend it's probably more like $83.9M which is the accumulated cap hit, minus the guys that didn't play a game all season.

Once again not nearly as bad as you're making it seem.

And the salaries do contribute to the depth question, Vegas can afford more of the $5M players because they aren't paying as many $6.5M players.

I'll use your example of $5M salaries. Vegas has 8 active $5M+ salaries on their roster (Eichel, Stone, Pietrangelo, Karlsson, Martinez, Theodore, Marchessault, Smith), those contribute a total cap hit of $54.6M.

Florida's 8 highest salaries on their active roster (Barkov, Bobrovsky, Tkachuk, Ekblad, Reinhart, Bennett, Verhaeghe, Montour) cost a total of $55.6M.

So Florida's spending $1M more on the top end of that roster (8 highest paid players) than Vegas is. So it's that which allows Vegas to have extra money to spend on their depth. Then you consider that Bob makes $10M while Hill is making $2.8M and it starts to explain why it feels like Vegas has so much more roster depth.

Vegas just has much better cap allocation across it's roster than Florida does. Overpaying for a goalie is such a double edged sword...if they are on their game they can win you a series on their own, but if they struggle then you are really stuck lacking in other areas on your roster. Plus goalies are rarely consistent season to season.

[FanIn80]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

Vegas isn't actually spending over $100M. Due to salary pro-ration and things like that the salaries for Quick and Barbashev cost much less in real money than their full year cap hit. This is part of being buyers at the deadline instead of sellers.

Total Cap Hit: $107M...but that's not realistic due to people like Barbashev and Quick not actually costing nearly that much, this isn't Vegas actual spend.

Accumulated Cap Hit: $95.8M...this one is more relevant because it is actually what Vegas "paid" but includes Lehner, Weber, and Nolan who didn't play a game this season and account for $11.9M of that, and Vegas likely had insurance for those contracts.

So in terms of actual spend it's probably more like $83.9M which is the accumulated cap hit, minus the guys that didn't play a game all season.

Once again not nearly as bad as you're making it seem.

And the salaries do contribute to the depth question, Vegas can afford more of the $5M players because they aren't paying as many $6.5M players.

I'll use your example of $5M salaries. Vegas has 8 active $5M+ salaries on their roster (Eichel, Stone, Pietrangelo, Karlsson, Martinez, Theodore, Marchessault, Smith), those contribute a total cap hit of $54.6M.

Florida's 8 highest salaries on their active roster (Barkov, Bobrovsky, Tkachuk, Ekblad, Reinhart, Bennett, Verhaeghe, Montour) cost a total of $55.6M.

So Florida's spending $1M more on the top end of that roster (8 highest paid players) than Vegas is. So it's that which allows Vegas to have extra money to spend on their depth. Then you consider that Bob makes $10M while Hill is making $2.8M and it starts to explain why it feels like Vegas has so much more roster depth.

Vegas just has much better cap allocation across it's roster than Florida does.

Thanks for that, I suppose it isn't nearly as bad as it looks. I'm not really one to argue (edit: for the most part, lol) in the face of articulated logic!

(Although I'm still pissed they were allowed to use IR to aqcuire Eichel which was essentially just using IR to aqcuire more IR, maybe I shouldn't hate them as much as I do. I'm probably just jealous that they've had more success in their 6 years than we've had since 89.)

[Galakanokis]

I have enjoyed the hockey so far but I hope it ends tonight. It has been decent hockey but it is lacking any real emotion and has been pretty one sided. I don't really care to see another Bobrovsky special to put this game 6. Florida has been thoroughly out skated in this series.

[dino7c]

Season has gone on too long

was listening to the Marek show this morning and they were about half an hour in before even mentioning the game...it was all coaches, trades, contracts, ect.

Its the finals and the cup could be won tonight and its was fourth or fifth on the list of topics

[FanIn80]

Yeah, the scheduling is ridiculous.

[Manhattanboy]

So I guess those Stone and Eichel acquisitions are looking pretty good.

[dino7c]

Originally Posted by Manhattanboy

So I guess those Stone and Eichel acquisitions are looking pretty good.

especially when Stone only counts against the cap in the playoffs

[Manhattanboy]

Originally Posted by dino7c

Season has gone on too long

was listening to the Marek show this morning and they were about half an hour in before even mentioning the game...it was all coaches, trades, contracts, ect.

Its the finals and the cup could be won tonight and its was fourth or fifth on the list of topics

Agree. Season needs to end by May 31 latest before NBA Finals.

Hockey in June is dumb, no one cares.

And start by Oct 1. Or 3rd week of September. Shorten the pre-season.

By mid October everyone is like c'mon already.

And start and end the CFL season a month earlier.

Is this not obvious to NHL and CFL bosses?

[kipperiggy]

Originally Posted by Manhattanboy

Agree. Season needs to end by May 31 latest before NBA Finals.

Hockey in June is dumb, no one cares.

And start by Oct 1. Or 3rd week of September. Shorten the pre-season.

By mid October everyone is like c'mon already.

And start and end the CFL season a month earlier.

Is this not obvious to NHL and CFL bosses?

Does anybody have any idea of the PA's stance on moving the season/playoffs start and end dates? Wish they would. Mid September to end of May would be perfect.

[Manhattanboy]

Originally Posted by kipperiggy

Does anybody have any idea of the PA's stance on moving the season/playoffs start and end dates? Wish they would. Mid September to end of May would be perfect.

You would think the networks would want this as well.