Let's talk roster moves;
25.5m in capspace;
BUT 12RFA's (including Price and Subban) and 4UFA's (None of real note)
This sort of puts this all into perspective;
http://capgeek.com/depth_charts.php?team_id=2Clearly we want to keep Price, Subban, and I would imagine Geoffrion at a minimum.
We also need to keep in mind lead scorer Max Pacioretty is an RFA next summer, as is assist leader David Desharnais.
So whats the priority?
Goal: Clearly you give Price an extension, and you can keep Budaj around on his reasonable deal. the question becomes what does Price command?
I think the conversation starts somewhere between Cam Ward's 6.3m a season for seven seasons and ends somewhere around Pekka Rinne 7m a season for seven years.
If we assume that Price takes him 7m our capspace falls to 18m or so this summer,
Defense: Markov is back, and I am somewhat surprised by Tomas Kaberle's 22pts in 40 or so games he may prove useful moving forward, Gorges is locked up, and then you have to deal with Subban who I would imagine will be making somewhere north of Gorges's 3.9m.
Which leaves us around 14m and a bunch of holes at:
Forward: What a mess.
I think the conversation has to be had with management to just take the suck on Gomez's deal. While it may spread the caphit out, it saves us around 3.6 this season against the cap and 4.5 next season and next season when we have to deal with Desharnais and Pac's contracts is when we will need it.