Now 1 year into Ron Francis' time as Canes GM, we have some track record to begin to understand and evaluate Ron Francis as a GM.
* He went outside the old playbook and used an early draft pick to take a defenseman in Haydn Fleury.
* He went real light in free agency, instead choosing to leave spots open to be won by players in the system.
* And when a playoff miss was a forgone conclusion at the trade deadline, he sold and sold aggressively to collect assets for the future.
But when you look at the details of what Ron Francis inherited, it becomes clear that we are still at least 18 months away from seeing something close to a Ron Francis-built team. Between here and there is what looks like a burning bridge or 1 of those disintegrating rope bridges between 2 cliffs in an action movie.
This is because of the financial situation Francis inherited from Jim Rutherford. The current roster is heavy on long-term, big dollar contracts too many of the variety of underperforming players. On top of that, any budget flexibility to the upside has been pulled away by lack of playoff money and a season ticket base that is taking hits every time the team misses the playoffs again. Between last summer and this summer, only modest contracts have come off the books which creates very little flexibility when you have to either re-sign or replace these players. Francis did shed some salary in deadline trades of Tlusty, Sekera and Gleason, but in total, they earned only $6M (salary, not cap hit) and must be replaced. An equal replacement for Sekera alone could cost $4-5M if the Canes can even get one. And not much else comes off the books that can be replaced for less than the 2014-15 cost.
The wild card would be if Francis can and does trade a big salary or 2 but between the complexity of these deals in a salary cap world and that a couple of these are probably untradeable, I would not count on this. So if you start from the current roster and assume a budget not much higher than last year (if not lower), it looks challenging just to fill the current holes on the cheap to tread water financially and competitively. But how is Francis going to significantly improve a team that missed the playoffs by a mile?
I see 2 answers:
1) He is going to hope like heck that the underperforming players with big contracts from last year can rebound.
2) He is going to wait until next summer (making this season the treacherous bridge).
Next summer is a very different story. A whopping $17.6 million (again salary, not cap hit) comes off the books. (EStaal $9.5M, Ward $6.8M, Ruutu salary retained $900k, Harrison salary retained $375k). It is not implausible that Francis could re-sign Eric Staal, cut budget to better match recent ticket sales and still net $5-6M to spend adding an impact player or 2.
It is that financial flexibility that will allow Ron Francis to build his 1st Canes team next summer, but between here and there is the treacherous bridge of 2015-16.
What say you Canes fans? Will Francis swing a big contract trade or 2 this summer to create flexibility and options for this summer? Or is he mostly handcuffed financially for another season? Can he pull some Houdini-like magic filling a couple holes on the cheap and improve the team without much budget? Or is my burning bridge/disintegrating rope bridge about right for 2015-16?
Twitter=@CarolinaMatt63
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