The Montreal Canadiens Have A MASSIVE Decision To Make

The Montreal Canadiens Have A MASSIVE Decision To Make

back with a brand new week. Uh, welcome, welcome, welcome. Proudly presented by betonline.ag. Marco Demo, what is good, brother? Welcome to the offseason, uh, local local offseason, NHL playoffs on in a big way, but locally, this is this is our offseason. What’s good, man? Man, it’s could be offseason for some, but there’s so much going on. There’s the World Championships. Yeah. Uh, there’s still playoffs going on in the AHL. Laval Rocket off to the second round or sorry, third second round. Second round. Yeah. this play in first round, second round, you don’t know anymore. Yes. Um and then, you know, you have uh what I think to be a really fun, you know, notwithstanding the officiating, very fun playoffs going on right now. No kidding. It’s uh it’s definitely still busy. It’s definitely still a good time, but I could definitely tell you there’s uh eight teams left in the playoffs right now. Uh and there are 20 plus general managers that are very busy talking to each other, setting the ground. We’re going to talk obviously about what’s coming up with the Montreal Canadians as it relates to their salary cap space and a big ticket item and what the plan is exactly. That’s coming up in just a second. But right now, as Marco alluded to, we’re still very much in the thick of the race for the Stanley Cup playoffs. And would you look here? Betonline.ag has your Khan Smite nominees and the odds on favorite. I mean, is this it? Is the streak going to end? Conor McDavid at plus 500 is your odds on Stanley Cup playoff MVP. Your boy Miko Ranton is next, followed by McDavid’s running mate as these boys hook up, making Jack Eel look flatfooted and McDavid to dryle. Edmonton wins. Dryidle plus 900. What do you got for me in the uh in the second round of the playoffs as a potential legitimate Cons award winner? Marco, what do you got? Yeah, I’m not gonna blow anybody away with this, but this like and Sean like you could vouch for this, but I had Mo Ranton in at the beginning of the playoffs. Yes, you did. Yes, you did. I had Dallas at the beginning of the playoffs, like to to me what they’re doing is incredible. And I I I remember we had this conversation. If they get highkinn in Yeah. back and they get a healthy like like like Robertson starts getting healthy healthy. Oh lord. Right. cuz they beat Colorado with like arguably two of their best players out, if not one, like two of their top three or five best players out, which is insane. It would be the equivalent of like the Montreal Canadians beating the Washington Capitals without, you know, uh, Cole Cfield and Lane Hudson. Like, good luck, you know. So, exactly. So, it just absolute bonkers. And so, for me, Miko Rantin has been the best and most clutch player. Um, so I’m going to I’m going to continue with that and see how it goes. But I honestly think that we’re headed toward a Dallas Edmonton Western Conference final. And what a final that would be in the West. No kidding. Um, if you’re back in De Mo Ranton to win the Con Smite at plus 700 at betonline.ag a $10 wager on that brings you back $70. Looking for a little bit more of a long shot, but still with the likeliness of winning. And listen, I mean, we have a favorite who’s a Canadian, plays on a Canadian team. Don’t laugh at me. What about Connor Hellbuck at plus 4,000? Now, listen, I understand he’s been very dramatic in goal. He does have a shut out, so maybe he’s found something. I don’t know. It’s a It’s obviously a very much a literal gamble, but plus 4,000, a $10 bet on Connor Hellbuck to win you the consm gets you 400. Pipe dream or worth risking $10, Marco? Listen, I I I I’m gonna have to call that a pipe dream. It’s just which is insane to say for probably a guy who’s going to win the VZNA for the second year in a row. Exactly. But it’s just incredible inconsistency, you know, like yeah, he gets a shut out, but then he, you know, he let in like six goals uh you know, the the the game before and then it’s just like it’s very hard to find like a middle ground. Correct. Correct. Uh it’s just to me again it’s unfortunate but we we’ll see what comes of it. I think uh you know their series with with Dallas is definitely not over. I think it’s going to be uh it’s going to be ground and pound for a while but to you know to shut out the Dallas Stars is not an easy thing to do. So no kidding. It’s especially if you’re looking at both sides. I like the rent and pick. I like I’ll give you this. Yeah. If if uh Winnipeg gets through Dallas, it’s because of Conor Hobb. Agreed. Agreed. And that plus 4,000 won’t be 4,000 if we’re here next week talking about Winnipeg on the cusp, right? But uh interesting timing because I want to talk about goalending. Let’s talk about the $10.5 million man with the Montreal Canadians. Let’s talk about Carrie Price with the Montreal Canadian salary cap space here. And Carrie Price in year seven of an eight-year deal. Uh his his his UFA year is is next season. Obviously, he’s retired and not playing, but what do we make of this? Because there’s been a confusing narrative around you can go to your friend’s house, have an outdoor barbecue, and you’re talking hockey. One of your pals, Canadians have so much cap space. They’re going to be one of the fat cats in hockey. Marco, walk us through where the Canadians cap space is. And let’s talk about carry prices. 10.5 million. What are they going to do with that? Yeah. Well, for you know, a lot of people are like, “Oh, you know, the Canadians, I saw um I think Bipam Spa had a had a segment on this with George Lorac and Stefan Gonzalez where they were saying, why not offer sheet a guy like uh Mason McTavish at 9.16 mil? What a dream. It would cost you a first, a second, and a third.” And, you know, would Anaheim really want to throw that kind of money at him? You know, and the idea is you could do that, but the Canadians don’t even have the cap space to do that. And a lot of people are like, “What do you mean, right? Don’t they have all this cap space?” Not really. Uh they got double doomed in uh in in this situation. So, on the on the front end, they were using long-term injury reserve this season, right? And then a couple of players, Lane Hudson most notably, hit their bonuses. This is the thing. This is the uh the double-edged sword. When you use long-term injury reserve and you’re a young team, right? Any and all bonuses earned because you’re over the cap now, right? You’re using LTI to go over the cap. It’s not free cash space. You’re going over it. So, they give you this this relief. But if any of your young players or any of your older players 35 and up earn bonuses, those bonuses go to next year. I see. So for example, the Canadians were projected to have about 10 million in cap space, you know, with notwithstanding carry prices LTI, but with all the bonuses that that were acred from Slukovski, from Hudson, uh it’s actually now uh 8 million. They lost 2 million because of of bonuses. Now, the problem is the Canadians want to add to their roster this year. Yeah. So unless, you know, and and you know, we’ll get into the topic of what they want to do with Patrick Lanny. A lot of people want to see him bought out. I don’t see I don’t think the Canadians are going to do that. Some would like to see the Canadians retain 50% of his salary and trade him. I don’t see that happening either. So, you know, we’ll just hold our horses there. But all things being con consistent, the Canadians have about 8.5 mil in real cap space for next for this summer. They have to resign uh a couple of players, Emil Heinman and I believe Jaden Strubel. Uh minimum salary is probably going to be about a million for each. So bring it down to 6 million. You’re not going to be able to bring in an impact player 6 million and then the factor is you can go over the cap in the summer by 10%. But you have to be cap compliant by day one, right? Or you can use long-term injury reserve. Now the Canadians even last summer did not want to use long-term injury reserve. Even after they acquired Patrick Line, they did not want to use long-term injury reserve. They were hoping that they would be able to pull off a trade to shed a contract which they were unable to do and then line a got injured and they were forced to use LTI. You know, from what I’m being told, the Canadians would like to avoid using LTI at all costs and in fact moving carry prices contract is actually the best way to do that. Now, a lot of people are going to be like, well, why can’t they just spend on the LTI and and and you know, that’s it. You know, it’s it’s free cash base. It is not free cash. Yeah. So can you can you clarify that because I think that’s a a common misconception around that like oh $10.5 million they’re not using it to to spend on a player who produces for them on the ice therefore they can stash that money and then the misconception is the 10.5 million is now freed up money so that’s how people get to the point where oh Marco says they have eight they put carry price on LTI 10 plus 8 is oh Marco they have $18.5 million now. Yeah, that’s not true. That Well, no, it’s not in the sense that like first of all, you have to get as close to the salary cap as possible before putting the player on long-term injury reserve so that you can maximize the full 10.5 million. If you’re 2 million short and then you put carry price on on LTIR, you actually only have eight and a half. Right. Right. So, like that’s that’s the situation. And further to that, when you’re using long-term injury reserve, you don’t acrue cap space. So, for example, three million in cap space at the beginning of the season is actually worth more at the trade deadline than 10 and a half million in LTI throughout the entirety of the season. Why? Because if you keep 3 million and everyone’s salary continues to get paid, that 3 million becomes bigger and bigger and bigger as you get to the end of the season because it’s prorated. So it allows you, for example, to bring in a contract or a couple of players that at the beginning of the season would have put you over the cap, but at the end of the season, their salaries are 1/8. Fair, right? So you can bring in that salary without it actually damaging you. If you use LTIR, for example, I could give you a direct example. If you want to bring in a guy that makes 7 million and you want to bring in a deaf player that makes three million, you can’t do that at the beginning of the season. You can only do that at the towards the end of the season, right? That’s how it would work. On LTIR, you could do that, but then it would limit you from being able to move players up and down. So, there’s that’s one aspect of it. The second aspect is bonus carryover. And we talked about this earlier, right? The Canadians next season are going to have Lane Hudson, Ivan Demidov, y Oliver Kaepern, and potentially David Rybacker. That’s the potential for $5 million in bonus overages for next year. Yeah. And Ivan Demadov has a serious chance of hitting. He’s the big fish in this situation where he could hit up to three million in bonuses. And to me, he’s the one that’s the likeliest. Well, I mean, Hudson obviously, but Hudson’s already, you know, he’s got he’s capped. I think he can only earn 1.5 mil over two years. He’s already earned one. So he could potentially gain another 500,000 potentially. He he likely will. And then you have Demadov and then you have Rybacker. So if Rybacker plays a significant amount of games, he’s going to get, you know, 500,000 600. I noticed you didn’t put Logan Mayu’s name in there. I don’t I don’t remember if Mayu has bonuses. I’d have to look that up. Okay. Yeah, I’d have to double check, but not if he does, it’s not to the degree that that the others or so. Those are the big three guys. And then there’s obviously Oliver Kappa who’s got a couple hundred thousand as well. Wow. So complicated. So complicated. But this is why LTI like is going the way of the dodo because the cap is going up so quickly, right? Yeah. Right. Seems less reliant on this. So what’s what’s a realistic option? Like what how do you envision the Canadians handling the carry price contract? See, this is the thing, right? So, there’s going to be an argument for uh letting him just write out the last year of his contract and so be it and use LTI and that’s it. Okay? Because, you know, he’s done so much for the organization and and this and that. I agree that that sentiment, you know, I’m not going to discounted from fans that just want to see him finish off his career with one franchise and that’s it. Yeah. But on the flip side, do you think that, you know, the uh do you think the Detroit Red Wings gave a hoot about sending over Pavle Datsuk’s contract to Arizona? Come on. How many teams has Shay Weber played for at this point? You know, well, okay. How many like Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And exactly my point, right? So, you saw the Chicago Blackhawks acquire Sheay Weber’s contract for the last year so that they could reach the cap floor last season as they, you know, siphoned off a bunch of players left and right. So, that’s the exact same kind of team the Canadians are going to have to target because I believe they have to trade Carrie Price’s contract. Now, a lot of people are going to be like, well, you know, he has a no movement clause. Maybe he’ll say no. No player on long-term injury reserve that is retired has ever refused the trade. Nor would they because then the team would just basically contest the contract and be like well then retired. So do you think you’re going to do that though? Do you think that’s a viable as opposed because you presented two options. Maybe he rides off into the sunset always a Canadian forever Canadian or does he get that kind of Chris Pronger Shay Weber kind of treatment and teams that need to minim you know get to the floor. Yeah, that’s maybe most realistic option. That’s going to be the thing this year, right? There’s going to be a lot of teams the cap is going up in such an aggressive way, right? It’s going up by like what, eight mil? About a lot for the poppers of the league, man. Yeah, it’s a lot considering like some teams, you know, didn’t necessarily get the outcome that they they wanted. The league revenue was off the charts, but obviously big markets are the ones pushing that, right? I don’t foresee, for example, a team like Anaheim magically spending to the cap. Right. Right. They’re going to have to resign some players like like McTavish, for example. They may try to go after some unrestricted free agents, but if they strike out, they still have to hit, you know, they still have to to get there and then they have to leave themselves some loose. You know, you you’re talking about them. You’d be looking at the same thing with like a team like Columbus. If there’s a team that starts to deconstruct, right? If there’s a team that decides to start blowing it up in their rebuild, they may want to siphon off some players and they may need a contract just to hit the floor because they know that they’re going to continue that process at the next year’s trade deadline. And you want to be able to trade players without having to worry about the salary cap floor. Those are the kinds of teams that the Canadians are going to have to target. But realistically, trading away carry prices contract, you know, a lot of team a lot of people like, “Oh, the Canadians are going to have to like give tons of assets.” I don’t necessarily think so. If a team wants to hit the salary cap floor, consider this. Carrie Price’s cap hit is $10.5 million. July 1st, okay, just consider this. his his uh total earnings for the last year of his contract is $7.5 million. Right? So, it’s a when we do the the cap hit, it’s the average over the life of the contract, right? So, he over the life of the contract, he earned uh I believe $84 million. Correct. Hence, 10.5. Yes. But it was front-loaded. Yes. So, now what’s going on is at the beginning at the the last year of his contract, it’s 7.5. slower. To top that off, July 1st, 5.5 million of that 7.5 is paid out in bonuses. So, as of July 1st, it’s actually $2.5 million or sorry, $2 million in salary and it’s insured. So, you know, I I don’t I’m I’m unaware uh of I don’t think signing bonuses are uh covered by insurance, but I I know salary is, right? And so that 2 million would be salary. So, the Canadians would be able to pay the the signing bonus and then be able to move him. Okay. Because he’s due a $5.5 million signing bonus. Now, as you alluded to, you know, the first two years, he got $26 million in bonuses in the first two years of that eight-year deal. Yeah. And then it started to dwindle down from that 13 to 875 to 11 to 675 to 6 and a half and five and a half in the final two years. Yeah. And going into the eighth and final year of the deal. Exactly. So as of July 1st, he becomes an incredibly uh attractive contract to acquire if you’re just looking to add salary. Got you. had the roster in case there’s ever a situation where you have to move a big salary player for futures and then you don’t have to turn around and make a subsequent move to get over the salary cap. Here’s your buffer, right? So, I don’t think the Canadians are necessarily going to have to pay through the nose to move a contract like that. I know that there’s this old connotation about it, but there is going to be at least three or four teams that are going to need that kind of situation, especially if they strike out with free agent. point. Fair point. This is the reality of the transition and I know a lot of us are still in the mindset and obviously lasted five years but in the mindset of a flat cap, it’s no longer the case. That’s right. And so for one year there will be teams interested just like Chicago is interested in acquiring Shay Weber’s contract. Um it’s just who uh will likely be determined uh closer to July 1st than today. $123.5 million in total career earnings. Well, I think Canadians fans will tell you uh you know, I doubt there’s many that don’t think he was worth that money. He was worth it to me. He was, as I’ve said for I’ve said for years, uh regardless of, you know, the fact that yes, the Canadians didn’t have, you know, an equivalent to a Nick Suzuki or Cole Cfield in front of him. How about this? How about this statement? If the Canadians had Nick Suzuki during Carrie Price’s time with Thomas Buchanan as a second line center. Yeah, they’re much more consistent. I think assume championship. I can never assume championship. I I think there’s a Stanley Cup in there. Okay. Prime M Suzuki in those on those like 2013 2014 2015 teams. Yeah. Yeah. I think there may have been a cup in there. Yeah. Listen, I’ve I’ve said for years he was, you know, in his heyday, he was the Canadians version of Conor McDavid. It’s who they had. That’s who they had. They had a superstar in goal. He is the reason why the Canadians did not rebuild when they needed to. Uh you can follow Marco Demo on XM Demo and check him out at RG Media where they’re hiring. So if this is something you want to explore in terms of a career, a pivot perhaps, here’s what they call an opportunity. Thank you, Marco. Thank you guys. Have a good one.

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Join Shaun Starr and Marco D’Amico as they discuss what the Montreal Canadiens plan is with Carey Price’s contract. What are their best options and how do we think the management team figures it out.

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