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So, what's next?

uncus said:
Hey gm if the leafs have to carry hortons 5.3 million all season, why worry about the bonus overages?
Doesnt hortons contract come off the books at sonetine duri g the season? Just use that to pay the kids performance bonuses. Or maybe i am getting wrong.
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It is because you can't use LTIR space on bonuses. So if they go into LTIR the bonuses automatically carry over to next year. This is because with LTIR Horton's contract doesn't actually come off the books, rather the Leafs are allowed to go over the cap by the amount of Horton's contract. So they have to be at or near the cap to use LTIR in the first place.
 
MindzEye said:
Yep, but what would the cost be for that? Cap space trades aren't cheap and that's 2 years of 5.3M
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Not cheap. One the one hand, it does help that Horton's contract was somewhat front-loaded, and dips down to $4.5M this year & $3.6M next year.

But that's still a fair chunk of cash to pay out, and obviously a pretty different situation than a guy like Marian Hossa, who's actual salary is only $1M for the remainder of his deal. Unlike some other players on LTIR, none of that money is covered by insurance either, which was the reason Columbus was willing to trade that contract to Toronto for David Clarkson in the first place. Most of the broke-ass teams that usually acquire these kind of contracts just wouldn't be at all eager to eat that kind of money.


Because the alternative is simply to not sign someone like Enstrom (who we don't need), and see where we're at later in the season when both the cap space stretches a lot further, and the possibility of bringing in someone on a multi year deal as a Hainsey or Gardiner replacement is there.

Right now our only real choice is the pay a meh veteran that we probably don't need. Hard pass.
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Agreed. Unless something spectacular & unexpected popped up on the trade market, I don't see any reason to access Horton's cap space right now, and pay the price that we'd need to pay in order to do that. Not budgeting for Marner & Matthews' bonuses this year also seems like it would be a mistake.

At the moment, the right move seems to be to wait to see how our current forward group shakes out, and to see what we can get out of our internal options on defense. And in the meantime, the $3M or so that we'd have available to spend after accounting for Horton and the rookie bonuses would allow us to add a decently big-ticket player or combination of players by the time we get closer to the trade deadline. And at that point, we'll have a much clearer picture of what we've got in house, and where the holes still are on this team.
 
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Yeah it would be too expensive to trade Horton because the contract is not insured and it wasn't front loaded. You have to pay a team to pay out $8 million in real cash. So a team like Arizona would have no interest.
 
The Habs have the cash for that... but you'd have to pay a fair bit I'd think. Probably not worth it for the Leafs.
 
uncus said:
But i just hate losing something for nothing.
That would be 2 possible first rounders in two years, the leafs would have missed out on aquiring. Jvr and gardiner
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Imagine how many first rounders you could get for Marner.

Sucks that we need to keep him to win!

Forget about UFAs walking. It’s the cost of doing business as a contender. Also, as a good team, we’ll have players coming to us as UFAs, such as Tavares, so it evens out in the wash and thensome.
 
Habspatrol said:
The Habs have the cash for that... but you'd have to pay a fair bit I'd think. Probably not worth it for the Leafs.
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The other issue with Montreal is that Bergevin still probably genuinely believes he's in "win-now" mode, or at the very least he knows the moment he tries to shift gears into a rebuild is probably the same moment he loses his job, so I can't see him acquiring dead cap space for future assets.

But in theory a team like Montreal or the New York Rangers would be the kind of trade partner the Leafs would need in a Horton deal. A deep-pocketed team with a bunch of cap space that's in the middle of a rebuild or reload, and knows that they aren't seriously competing for anything this year & next.
 
LeafOfFaith said:
Imagine how many first rounders you could get for Marner.

Sucks that we need to keep him to win!

Forget about UFAs walking. It’s the cost of doing business as a contender. Also, as a good team, we’ll have players coming to us as UFAs, such as Tavares, so it evens out in the wash and thensome.
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Unfortunately, those free ahents cost money ..... so.ething the leafs wont have alot of, for the next 2 or 3 years by the sounds of it
 
So I read that nash is going to make a decision this week ... to play or retire.
I think he would be a player of interest, if I was the leafs.
I know some will say that he has zero interest in playing for a canadian team, I say goobly gop to that.
Every single professional athlete wants to win and be successful, and nash might have his best opportunity to out on a bang with the leafs.
As mentioned on earlier posts by others here, a 1 year contract (hopefully team friendly) and a commitment by the team to allow him maintenance time throughout the season to stay healthy, with an eye to the playoffs. He could be an excellent addition.
How often has nash had the opportunity to play with centermen like matthews and tavares .... he is a beast in the corners and on the boards, he still has some offence in thise paws, and he can still skate.
Could be a perfect storm for him and the leafs.
 
I like Nash. He's actually decent without the puck and does not need to be sheltered, and scores at a similar rate to what JVR provided. He also adds some size and jam to our forward group that we do not have. I'm not paying him much more than 1 year $900 though, because ultimately there isn't much of a role for him here.

But Nash-Ennis-Brown would be a pretty good 4th line.
 
uncus said:
So I read that nash is going to make a decision this week ... to play or retire.
I think he would be a player of interest, if I was the leafs.
I know some will say that he has zero interest in playing for a canadian team, I say goobly gop to that.
Every single professional athlete wants to win and be successful, and nash might have his best opportunity to out on a bang with the leafs.
As mentioned on earlier posts by others here, a 1 year contract (hopefully team friendly) and a commitment by the team to allow him maintenance time throughout the season to stay healthy, with an eye to the playoffs. He could be an excellent addition.
How often has nash had the opportunity to play with centermen like matthews and tavares .... he is a beast in the corners and on the boards, he still has some offence in thise paws, and he can still skate.
Could be a perfect storm for him and the leafs.
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As part of his last contract with the Rangers, if requested, Nash had to submit a list of 12 teams that the Rangers were allowed to trade him to. And in the lead-up to the deadline, it was widely reported that the Leafs were one of the 12 teams that Nash was willing to be traded to. Nash himself also confirmed in an interview with the New York Post that multiple Canadian teams were on his trade list.

So, it's probably fair to say that, as was the case with Stamkos, and as probably would have been the case with Tavares a few years ago---what Nash didn't have any interest in was attempting to be a saviour for a bad Maple Leafs team. But joining a Maple Leaf team that's a legit contender? It's almost a certainty he'd have interest.

As for whether the Leafs should be interested in him---I've never been Nash's biggest fan throughout his career, mostly owing to his playoff failures and how overrated he's been at times. But if he was willing to take a very cheap, one-year Cup-chasing deal with the Leafs, I don't see the downside from a Leaf perspective. With JVR's departure on left wing, the Leafs' two most established natural left wingers at the moment are a 39 year-old Patrick Marleau & Andreas Johnsson, with his 15 career NHL games. So Nash would give us some welcome depth there.

When I say a cheap deal, though, I mean cheap. Something in the neighbourhood of $1M, so we're not chewing up the majority of our remaining cap space on an addition that'd be a pure luxury for this team at this point. If Nash would be interested in that because he'd like to try and win a Cup here and he's already been paid $90+ million in his career, then great. But if he'd still like to be paid something approaching his market value, when it comes to either salary or term, then we'd be better off if he did that elsewhere.
 
Volcanologist said:
Rick Nash’s playoff numbers:

GP: 89
G: 18
A: 28
P: 46

Pretty sad for a supposed star forward.
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The Demar DeRozan of NHL "star" forwards, when it comes to the playoffs.

And even at his peak, his typical offensive production in the regular season falls somewhere between peak JVR & Max Pacioretty. Which, of course, is not bad at all. But it's a little underwhelming for a 1st overall pick, and it means that he was never truly among the NHL's best players at any point in his career.

As for Nash today, he appears to be a 20 goal/35-point winger. Which, if you can add for free and for a cheap salary, then great. But he's more of a depth guy than a game-changer.
 
his hype always outpaced his production. but that doesn't mean he doesn't have value. he's just not a top-6 winger at this point.
 
He's not the player he was, but he would have value - size, possession, etc and would definitely be worth more than a minimum salary - maybe performance laden contract?
 
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