Here we are Monday August 18th, and all of the NHL is holding it’s breath on where Mats Sundin will land next season. Of course, first he has to decide if he is going to play in the NHL again. That’s when the derby will really begin. Watch the rumour mill go wild, like it’s not already. Teams interested in him, will scramble to clear cap space in order that his contract fits in. Only Vancouver would only have to clear about a million in cap space to fit their offer to Sundin.
The Rangers are pretty close to the cap, as they have less than a million in cap space. The Flyers also have cap issues, as they are over the season limit of 56.7 million. Philadelphia is 1,031,667 $ in the red. Trading Jeff Carter for Bouwmeester, will not solve their cap problems. According to former RDS analyst, Yvon Pedneault, the offer the Canadiens made Sundin, was around 8 million, and the Habs fave about 6,564,699 $ in Cap space. No doubt Gainey will have to make a few trades for draft picks to make way for Sundin, if he returns to La belle province to play an another season.
Joe Sakic, like Sundin is still undecided about his future in the NHL, but unlike his former teammate from the Quebec Nordiques days, Sakic will either play in Colorado or retire. The Colorado Avalanche have enough cap space to sign Sakic, they have 12,725,000 $, so there is no cap issue in this case.
I don’t think too many Leafs fans will be to disappointed to see Bryan McCabe leave Toronto in two weeks, the day he recieves his bonus money from the Leafs and is officially traded to the Florida Panthers. His last game as a Leaf, was in Montreal when speared young Gregory Stewart in the groin area and left the ice giving the fans the bronx cheer.
