Welcome back my CapFriendlies! Had my coffee and ready to chat all things fantasy hockey and the salary cap, as we have some extensions and trades to discuss. Trade deadline is Friday and so far, the stove has been…I'll go on but only like that little burner in the back right. Watching NHL Network awkwardly try and fill five minutes of air breaking down a trade for a bottom six winger for a fourth round pick is a hockey tradition unlike any other. That said, at the time I'm writing this my iPhone is buzzing with different trades that are taking place across the league. Here I thought trade deadline was on Friday, when as it turns out it was Wednesday all along.

Elias Pettersson – C/LW – Vancouver – 25 years old
Contract: $7.35 – Extension 2024-'25 – 2031-'32 – 8years x $11.6M (NMC '25-'32)

Vancouver, what took you so long! I'm actually sort of serious here, this got to the point where there were rumors out there about potential trades involving Elias Pettersson and whether there was any validity to that, I think there was some smoke here…which could have been a fire. I've officially adopted Vancouver as my west coast watch team and the chatter around how the contract talks might have been impacting Pettersson's play might be well-founded as the team and the player just didn't look like the club I've watched for the past four weeks. 

Back in December I wrote about what a contract for Pettersson could potentially look like and I had speculated a deal that looks like 7-8 years in length with a $10M AAV. Right on the term but slightly under on the AAV but I think if there's one word to describe this contract, it would be reasonable. I like this for the player, the team, and the fans as this extension takes Pettersson into his age 33-34 season. Canucks fans let that sink in…you get Elias Pettersson, a star in this league, for eight more seasons and when your favorite team makes a move like that it's always a great feeling to have. I'm glad this deal got done now, instead of him going into an RFA season then in all likelihood walking to free agency after next year. For the Canucks as a whole this was a club that not too far back had some really "bad" money lingering around on their blueline but have since been able to shed a good portion of that cost and are in a good spot cap-wise moving forward. Pettersson does take a chunk of what I estimated would be around $30M in cap space this summer, but again this is a player that you sign ten times out of ten. Want more good news? Outside of the club playing well, the next big name to come up for them as a UFA will be the trade-machine darling himself, Brock Boeser. One more time for old time's sake, I'm hearing that Boeser will be on the move to (at the time) Minnesota for, gasp, Matt Dumba and a pick. I will say though when it comes to the Canucks contracts this summer, I would not be surprised if we see Filip Hronek sign for a higher number than we all anticipate with him currently sitting at $4.4M, just throwing that on everyone's radar now. The same probably does not apply to Ian Cole.

Rasmus Sandin – D – Washington – 23 years old
Contract: $1.4M – Extension 2024-'25 – 2028-'29 – 5years x $4.6M

A Rasmus Sandin extension off the top rope! When I had first heard of a possible Sandin extension my thoughts were that the Caps wanted to get something in place to make him more lucrative to trade for with term, but this is opposite of that. This is betting on a younger player for what could very soon be a younger core of Washington Capitals. I like this deal again for both sides, as this was a player that was taken in the first round that has not looked out of place at all in Washington. Not the largest fantasy impact out there, but there's a good portion of the Fantrax folks that are rostering him for dynasty and I don't dislike that move at all.

Jonathan Quick – G – NY Rangers – 38 years old
Contract: $825k – Extension 2024-'25 $1.27M – M-NTC

I just have to speak on this here quick (no pun intended), that it's 2024 and I'm writing about Jonathan Quick signing a contract extension with the New York Rangers. I like this again for both sides, as I look at this as basically what a club would pay for a backup goaltender although that would probably be without an M-NTC to go along with the contract. The Rangers get another season in 2024-'25 before Igor Shesterkin's is set to become a UFA and will have, at least so far, a solid backup goaltender in Quick. For those that start more than one goaltender in fantasy, I'm sure Quick has value and of course he is always a good play for a Sunday start or when the Rangers are on a back-to-back.

Thomas Novak – C – Nashville – 26 years old
Contract: $800K – Extension 2024-'25 – 2026-'27 – 53years x $3.5M

I remember a few seasons back, it felt like Nashville was more in the spotlight than they are now. It also feels as if they are further from the limelight now, allowing Thomas Novak to go somewhat underrated for the role he plays for this club. This is another excellent deal for all involved here as the roadmap is already in focus here of Nashville being very strong up the middle with good special teams, and good goaltending. If anyone out there is interested on how a hockey team can be good, I just listed it right for you. For fantasy he's 50/50 on ESPN and Fantrax but only 5% over on Yahoo. Maybe he's not in the player pool over there? Yahoo people sound off, what's going on over there.

Vladimir Tarasenko, traded to FLA. $2.5M retained – 50%. Upcoming UFA.

Whenever Vladimir Tarasenko is not on screen, all the other characters should be asking, "Can Tarasenko return to his 2021-'22, 90-point season". I wanted to touch on this deal because there's some salary retained here for Florida but nothing to where the two clubs involved in the deal had to go out and find a third party and that's sort why I think Ottawa got back maybe less than we all would have anticipated in return, along with making the trade happen now before they lose the player without receiving anything back. Tarasenko has higher roster numbers in fantasy and if you're rostering him, you just hit the jackpot. Tarasenko goes from getting passes skipping over his blade from Dominik Kubalik to potentially skating alongside Sam Reinhart…who on pace for the contract Elias Pettersson just got. Defensively there is a worry here for sure when it comes to Tarasenko but for fantasy purposes, this could really benefit fantasy owners down the stretch and into playoffs.

Three-team trade :
ANA:
From EDM – 2024 1^ST round pick, 2025 5^th round pick (EDM) with a 4^th round condition if Edmonton wins the Stanley Cup.

EDM:
From ANA – Sam Carrick $425K retained – 50%, 2024 7^th round pick (ANA)
From TBL – Adam Henrique – 50% retained at $1.4M

TBL
From ANA – Adam Henrique – $1.4M retained – 50%
From EDM – 2025 4^th round pick with a 4^th round 2026 condition if Edmonton wins the Stanley Cup

Okay lot to digest here but I wanted to bring up this trade because I think it has some salary cap implications that are worth noting. First off let's just get Edmonton out of the way here, I liked what they did last season with Mattias Ekholm, and like what they have done so far this deadline as well. They get a good two-way player in Adam Henrique and for Sam Carrick they get someone who will improve their offensive zone entries.

Now to the fun stuff starting with Tampa Bay. I did not have the Tampa Bay Lightning as a broker club on my 2024 trade deadline BINGO card and wonder in the back of my head if this is the club that is picking up the phone to make calls but just can't seem to find a dance partner for a trade. Still some time left here but did not see Tampa getting involved in retaining salary. The Ducks though is where things get a little interesting. This is a club that right now has close to $9M in available which makes them an obvious candidate to be a third-party broker-type club here, but they now retain dead cap in Adam Henrique, Same Carrick, and Ilya Lyubushkin who was traded to Toronto. Teams can only retain three salaries at a time which could effectively take them out of getting a mid-low round pick in a trade. Granted if they wanted to move a piece at the right price, they could eat whatever salary they needed too, but for one of the clubs with cap space potentially off the table, it could make navigating a trade for a player with a larger AAV more difficult.

*Salary Cap data from CapFriendly.com

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