Michael Russo of The Athletic: Sources have said that Minnesota Wild GM Bill Guerin has let both Zach Parise and Ryan Suter know that they will have the remaining four years of their contracts bought out.
Michael Russo: “Because both have no-moves, they essentially will get emails from team to waive waivers and become free agents.
Wild decided rather than buying out 1, they’d buy out both for $10.33M in cap relief this year and $2.33M in cap relief next. $15+ cap charges in Years 3-4”
Michael Russo: The Wild will now likely be protecting Zuccarello, Fiala, Eriksson Ek, Foligno, Hartman, Greenway, STURM, Spurgeon, Brodin, DUMBA, Talbot for the expansion draft.
That would leave exposed Rask, Soucy, Kahkonen, Menell + minor leaguers and UFA’s.
Puck Pedia: “Should note that the buyout saves the #MNWILD and costs the players each $3.33M as they had $10M remaining in salary over 4 years and the buyout provides $6.66M paid out over 8 years.”
Puck Pedia: Both Parise and Suter had four years left on their deals with a $7.54 million cap hit. Each will be charged.
Yr 1: $2.37 million cap hit and $5.17 million saved
Yr 2: $6.37 million cap hit and $1.17 million saved
Yr 3/4: $7.37 million cap hit and $167,000 saved
Yr 5-8: $833,000 cap hit
Cap Friendly: Why does the buyout cap hit increase drastically in years 2, 3, and 4?
This is because the contracts were front-loaded, since the initial base salary for those years is so low, the salary savings are reduced, and therefore the cap hit savings are also reduced.
Evan Rawal: “I don’t know what their plan is, but it would be borderline impossible to compete with $13-15M in dead cap space for 3 years. Helps in terms of next season, I guess.”
Frank Seravalli: “In addition to earning two additional Expansion Draft protection slots with Parise and Suter each holding NMCs, structure of buyouts was such that it was either #mnwild buy out one/both now (and take advantage of this season’s $10m savings) or don’t buy them out at all.”
Frank Seravalli: “This is a whopper. For #mnwild, clears out $10 million in space for upcoming season, but only kicks the can down the road. Huge dead cap space hole two seasons from now ($13m) and nearly $15m three and four seasons from now.”
Lance Lysowski: “This might be enough to help the Wild afford a salary like Eichel’s, but Guerin needs to sign Kaprizov.
Also extremely difficult to trade talented prospects to acquire Eichel when you’ll need productive guys on ELC while Parise and Suter are counting against the cap.”
Here’s Zach Parise’s timeline since 2014-15. Surprisingly fairly steady although the defence and workload has been declining recently. pic.twitter.com/dqosdMpHrF
— JFresh (@JFreshHockey) July 13, 2021
Suter
Here’s Ryan Suter’s timeline since 2014-15. Two-way game eroded but consistently effective at one end at least. pic.twitter.com/NNImbFQKYN
— JFresh (@JFreshHockey) July 13, 2021
Presented without comment. pic.twitter.com/hRshqc3GYr
— JFresh (@JFreshHockey) July 13, 2021
Majority of Suter’s comps played two years after their projection, but only 12 percent made it to Year 4 which is when his deal would’ve expired. pic.twitter.com/4gheg2KXwm
— dom at the athletic (@domluszczyszyn) July 13, 2021