Would this strategy be an option

whysoserious · Post #1 » by **whysoserious** » Wed Jul 1, 2009 6:50 pm

The Leafs just can't seem to be bad enough to get top line talent through the draft.

Should the Leags employ a strategy in trade talks where they start to take on some bad contracts from teams as long as they thrown in one top prospect and a pick possibly. The Leafs could then take that bad contract and send the player to the Marlies so it won't count on the cap.

The Leafs used to spend upwards of 70 million on salary and now can only spend 58 million per the cap. They could use the additional 12 million they used to spend on the Marlies and start to acquire some good young talent.

PJTucker · Post #2 » by **PJTucker** » Thu Jul 2, 2009 2:15 pm

whysoserious wrote:The Leafs just can't seem to be bad enough to get top line talent through the draft.

Should the Leags employ a strategy in trade talks where they start to take on some bad contracts from teams as long as they thrown in one top prospect and a pick possibly. The Leafs could then take that bad contract and send the player to the Marlies so it won't count on the cap.

The Leafs used to spend upwards of 70 million on salary and now can only spend 58 million per the cap. They could use the additional 12 million they used to spend on the Marlies and start to acquire some good young talent.

It's not a bad idea, but I see a couple of reasons that it won't happen.

1. The Leafs still have to deal with player agents all over the league. If they openly employed a strategy like this, they'd wind up being black-balled by numerous player agents. It could make it even more difficult to sign free agents or even get players to agree to come to Toronto.

2. MLSE is likely too cheap. They did pay 70 million and more when there was a ton of public pressure to do so. Right now, they're able to stick to the cap and they don't take any heat because it's expected of them.

Perhaps when the cap goes down next year you'll see some teams employ this strategy temporarily with thier own overpaid free agents. Teams like NYR, PHI, and TOR can certainly afford it in the short term but I don't think anybody can get away with using it as a long term solution.