Willie Mitchell

by brendan1 on Aug 2, 2010 11:58 PM CDT

Bit of an off-the-wall thought, but anyways; According to http://www.nhlnumbers.com the Stars are currently at 44.3 million in terms of player salaries, less Neal, Grossman, Niskanen. Now the talk all along has been the internal cap is at 45 million. Now it doesn't take a fifth grader to realize that these numbers do not jive. Now it is very possible that I do not fully understand the situation and how this internal cap pertains to certain salaries(ie. Sean Avery). However, beyond the point that I have believed from day 1 this "internal cap" is not a hard number......

My initial thought here is about rugged hard-nosed defensemen Willie Mitchell. He is apparently sysmptom free http://prohockeytalk.nbcsports.com/2010/08/willie-mitchell-is-reportedly-symptom-free-after-fighting-concussion-problems.php

Now i'm aware this is about a .05% chance of being realistic however. Given the deals being handed out this off-season Willie Mitchell could probably be had at a heck of a bargain, with a very small risk factor. There would probably need to be some minor moves among the like of Karlis, Lukowich, Woywitka. It would be difficult to pull off and might bust over the teams budget but I think it would be a good value deal that would make this team much stronger in 2010-11.

Aside from the lack of reality to this topic, what do you guys think of the move itself given the financial freedom was available. I'm not sure how some of you feel about the guy after his brief stay in Dallas and recent tenure in much hated Vancouver.

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They don't jive.

That’s why some have been worried the Stars won’t be able to sign them, especially Neal.

The presumption is that, and supposedly this has been backed up by Nieuwendyk, is that the contracts given to these three is under the guise that the sale of the team will be done by the time these start taking effect and the budget is raised.

It’s a bit of a gamble.

One of the last Joe Nieuwendyk supporters in Dallas....
Defending Big D - Dallas Stars news & analysis; SB Nation Dallas-Fort Worth

by Brandon Worley on Aug 3, 2010 11:40 AM CDT reply actions

I'd love to have Willie

Wait, did I just say that?

It’s too bad the Stars never had a shot at him before. Oh wait…

by jabudi on Aug 5, 2010 9:02 AM CDT up reply actions

That is not totally correct.

The stars have a CAP HIT of around $44m for the upcoming season, but given the way certain players’ contracts are structured, the player salaries only add up to just around $41m for this season. One example off hand is steve ott, who is making only $2.1m this season with a cap hit of $2.95m.

The stars internal cap is placed on their real spending in terms of salaries paid and has nothing to do with the league salary cap. Thus, the stars are negotiating deals such that they will hopefully be able to retain all four players at around $4m total for THIS SEASON, though their collective cap hits may exceed $4m.

Management is only working under the assumption that the stars will be sold before NEXT season, and thus next year when the salaries are closer to the cap hit, there won’t have to be a firesale to get under an internal budget. That doesn’t have major influence over the negotiations with our RFAs this summer…these things just take time.

by valente317 on Aug 5, 2010 5:48 PM CDT up reply actions

as a follow up:

steve ott: $2.1 / 2.95 cap hit - .85 below
loui eriksson: $3.2 / 4.27 cap hit - 1.07 below
kari lehtonen: $2.7 / 3.55 cap hit - .85 below

also:

Stephane Robidas: $3.25 / 3.3 cap hit - .05
Wandell - .075
Petersen - .025
barch - .0175
burish - .15

You also have daley making $200,000 above his cap hit and skrastins making 275,000 above…we save 800k with lukowich’s new contract….and there are some other factors involved that i’m not totally familiar with, but the result is that we have more space available under our internal budget than our cap hit would suggest.

by valente317 on Aug 5, 2010 6:02 PM CDT up reply actions

nhlnumbers.com

Actual player salaries listed at 44.338 including Avery, Cap hit number is at 46.276

by brendan1 on Aug 5, 2010 7:17 PM CDT up reply actions

So....

The only difference I can see from that would be how much money the Stars are LITERALLY paying Avery

by brendan1 on Aug 5, 2010 7:20 PM CDT up reply actions

right\, those sites list cap numbers. look at capgeek.com; the cap salary is listed as $44m by adding up the individual cap hits. if you click on individual players, you can see the details of their contracts. the year to year salary is not the same as the cap hit.

again using ott, his cap hit is 2.95 and all 2.95 is added toward the cap salary listed on those spites. however, his year-to-year salaries are

$2.1 (2010 – 2011)
$3.3
$3.2
$3.2

when you calculate the actual player payroll, you have to subtract that $850,000 difference from the cap-based salary. Taking all of the discrepancies into account, we are approx $4m below our internal cap in terms of REAL money (forget the cap).

It looks like joe and his staff might be a pit smarter than most fans give them credit for…they signed ott to a high cap hit to help the team stay above the cap floor while saving a bit of money in the first year because they foresaw the coming financial trouble.

by valente317 on Aug 5, 2010 7:50 PM CDT up reply actions

That's very correct.

And it’s important to differentiate between cap hit and the actual player salaries.

That being said, they’re still using future ownership in order to pay Neal, Grossman, Niskanen.

One of the last Joe Nieuwendyk supporters in Dallas....
Defending Big D - Dallas Stars news & analysis; SB Nation Dallas-Fort Worth

by Brandon Worley on Aug 5, 2010 8:58 PM CDT up reply actions

True after this upcoming season.

A lot of fans seemed to be shocked if not upset when ott was resigned, citing a high salary for a third liner with limited production — even tho he has consistently improved his goal production over the past few years while still being the pest we all know and love (and remember he scored 87 and 88 points in the OHL, he has offensive upside). I wonder if maybe the three years at 3.2/3.3 was an extra incentive for him to accept only 2.1 in the first season.

With that same reasoning, i also wonder if maybe dallas had trouble generating any interest from UFAs given that they would likely have to offer a reduced salary for the first year of the contract. That might even be the stumbling block to resigning our RFAs…even if we offered neal 2 years/3m, it would have to be something along the lines of 2m this year and 4 next, and Neal might not want to wait to cash in on his two 20-goal seasons. i guess we’ll find out when he signs.

by valente317 on Aug 5, 2010 9:24 PM CDT up reply actions