r/AnaheimDucks

As we wait and see what Pat does with Leo, I wanted to see what the actual impact of signing signing has on the Ducks. I feel like this offer sheet on the Ducks could be the tipping point that removes the narrative/expectations around the league surrounding offer sheets, and we see it become something that teams strategically use to get players to bring in or create cap nightmares for other teams. We have already seen that teams are paying top dollar for their players out of RFA; bridge deals at lower AAVs become less and less prevalent.

Here's a breakdown of what Anaheim is looking at in 2028, assuming it's a $123M cap. I projected $12 million for Cutter and $10 million for Beckett (obviously could be less or more) and included the rest of the guys that are signed through the 2028/2029 season

2028/2029 Duck Roster - per Puckpedia

Contract AAV	Percentage of New $123M Cap
Leo Carlsson	$18,000,000
Cutter Gauthier	$12,000,000
Beckett Sennecke	$10,000,000
Jackson LaCombe	$9,000,000
Pavel Mintyukov	$7,200,000
Troy Terry	$7,000,000
A.J. Greer	$4,250,000
Ryan Poehling	$3,750,000
Jeff Malott	$1,850,000
Lukas Dostal	$6,500,000
Total	$79,550,000

So, here's the problem -

$79,550,000 core commitment and leaves the Ducks with exactly $42,450,000 to fill the remaining 14 roster spots.

The Average Space: $3,032,142 per player for the rest of the lineup........

In 2028, wherever the league may be, the 2nd pair's defence will be asking for 7-10 million, and the 3rd pairing will be asking for 2-5 million, of which the Ducks would need 2 of each. And for the 3rd and 4th lines and beyond, which the Ducks would need, you'd be looking at 2-5 million per player. That said, I am just putting numbers that I could see the NHL being, so obviously take it with a grain of salt, and it probably will be different.

Curious what others think about the whole situation and some players that could be targeted in the future. Overall Pat should be fired for the blunder.

We all know the situation we're in but I've spent the last couple of days looking at the options and now that we know exactly what Mintyukov will cost we know what we can pay Cutter even if we retain Leo, which we absolutely should do. Here's how I see it:

The following lineup costs $90.18 million:

Kreider / Carlsson / Gauthier
Killorn / Granlund / Sennecke
Wahlberg / Poehling / Vatrano
Greer / Washe / Colangelo

LaCombe / Luneau
Mintyukov / Jensen
Moore / Helleson

Dostal / Brossoit

Scratch: Malott / Nesterenko / Hinds

I've put Gauthier and Hinds in bold and italics because they both need to be re-signed. The cap is $104 million so that leaves just under $14 million to play with. If the Ducks signed Cutter to a two-year, $24 million deal and Hinds to a three year, $3.5 million deal that would bring the salary to $103.34m. Under the cap.

The problem would be kicked down the road a bit but eventually Terry would return from IR meaning the Ducks would need to clear $7 million in space to activate him. That could mean trading Kreider, assuming the entire roster is healthy and other players aren't on LTIR by then.

If you add $7 million (Terry) to that salary but subtract $6.5 million (Kreider) then you're still under the cap at $103.84 million. It's doable.

Now, why sign Cutter to a two year deal? Because a year from now you can sign him to a seven year extension at BIG money. Kreider, Killorn, Vatrano, Granlund and Jensen would all be off the books before that extension kicked in during the 2028-29 season and by then the cap is expected to be $123 million per team. Plus, guys like McQueen, Klepov, Solberg and others should be ready for NHL minutes by then to help save money on depth positions.

There was a lot of voodoo, etsy witches, and amharic curses at the end of the season. The black magic brought forth doom upon us. We should have learned this from the Calgary Flames after they did it to the stars in 2022.

What are the ramifications of placing someone on LTIR if they aren’t going to miss the full season?

For a Ducks fan, the last decade has been rough. After coming so close in 2015 and making a solid run in 2017, the team has been mostly terrible. Terrible might even be underselling it, sometimes the team was borderline unwatchable (Max fuckin Comtois was the top scorer at one point, enough said).

After the Dallas Eakins era and after watching Greg Cronin ruin the development of the young players for two years, we get a decent season and things are looking up. For like a few months. After seeing the offer sheet, all my optimism went down the drain. It's not just about overpaying for Carlsson, it's a clear sign that the management is incompetent and missed their window to make proper decisions. All the years of suffering that brought the high draft picks to Anaheim will most likely not amount to anything. I will not stop cheering for the Ducks, but my hope that this core will compete for the Stanley Cup for years to come was pretty much killed overnight. It's way worse than losing a single series or watching a fan favourite getting traded out of town. I feel like we just watched a generational rebuild fumble.