You can't just say they're going to have 16 million in cap room by inventing trades you want them to happen. Everyone who has an expiring contract is going to be due for a raise and the Flames probably want to bring all of them back except Prout and maybe Hathaway. Smith is the only one who would possibly sign for less.
All the players you'd want them to trade also have NTCs so shipping them off to Ottawa isn't going to work. Neal doesn't, but it's going to take at least the Flames' first to get anyone to take on that contract.
- Hunkulese
Word is the cap is going to $82 mill, that leaves about 14-15 mill cap space. Frolik & Brodie are probably good possibilities to trade because they both only have 1 year left on their deals, are both playing well enough to garner not only a demand but the returns would be reasonably good, especially for Brodie seeing he is playing top pair.
Stone may be tradeable but agree it will be difficult without a sweetner. Worst case he can be bought out & we can get a quick 2.4 mill of cap space that way. If Smith has a decent playoff run he will be a reasonable contract, 1 or 2 year deal tops for much lower cap hit if he is prepared to be a backup role playing the 25-30 games per year. Ritter wil be a 2-3 year deal at a not bad price either. He is still an RFA & we can probablty get a 3 year deal done under 3.0 per. Fantenberg will be resigned cheap under a mill, probably Prout money & is a perfect 6-7 D. I like his game & he likes it here. Hathaway & Magpie will be pretty cheap deals, Tre is good at getting good value on these type of deals. That leaves about 10 mill if we just do a Stone buyout to get Matty & Benny inked. I think that can be easily attained with cap to spare with just moving one of Frolik or Brodie. Like Irish said, it will be a bit tighter than normal but nothing to be concerned.
