Per the team: "The Washington Capitals have signed defenseman Shaone Morrisonn to a one-year contract, vice president and general manager George McPhee announced today. In keeping with club policy, financial terms of the deal were not disclosed."Per Vogs (who, of course, works for said club): "The arbitrator has ruled that the 25-year-old blueliner will receive a one-year contract for $1.975 million for the upcoming 2008-09 NHL season."
That's a decent deal for the Caps (and a very good deal for Mo), but, at least by my math, the new contract will necessitate some roster juggling in order to get under the cap.
UPDATE: Just a reminder that "[p]er league rules, [and arbitrator] must render his salary decision within 48 hours of the hearing. Once the award has been made, the [team] then [has] a 48-hour window to reconsider the structure, and payroll, of their 2008-'09 roster.
Among the considerations the CBA allows: the possibility of a club to buy out up to three players on the roster." [Link]
28 comments:
Well, with a 23 man roster, consisting of Ovechkin, Green, Nylander, Semin, Theodore, Fedorov, Poti, Clark, Kozlov, Backstrom, Laich, Morrisonn, Alzner, Brashear, Bradley, Jurcina, Johnson, Schultz, Fehr, Gordon, Flash, Steckel and Erskine
and Potheir on LTI which factors out his 2.5 million, and including Clymer's buy out
The teams Cap number is 57,656,101, which places us 956,101 OVER.
Players above are listed from highest to lowest cap number
Yeah, that's the number I've got on the spreadsheet I linked to in that last line.
Alzner starts the season in Hershey?
Clark goes to LTI?
Fedorov re-reads the contract he signed and realizes it's for two years?
yeah if Fedorov had signed for 3 million, we'd be home free. Oh well. Something's gotta give.
If huet signed we'd be screwed
Hmmmm...sure wish Brash and Feds were cheaper. I guess "Intangables" dont come cheap?
Sounds like Mo won his arbitration handily. I don't think the Caps could have been expecting a salary quite that high. I guess that's what happens when Jeff Finger get's $3.5M/year.
I vote they trade, waiver, or send to Hershey both Erskine and Fleischmann if Alzner's ready.
If Alzner isn't ready, send him to Hershey and that takes care of it until he's ready to be called up; if there's a cap issue the team can deal with it at that point.
That's big money for a 4-5 defenseman, no? Trade him.
stinky-Mo's a top pair D-man (for us), and he's not going anywhere.
Now had you said Jurcina...
Morrisonn isn't a 4-5 defenseman, he's more like 2-3 or 3-4 depending on how a team does its pairings. Plus he's the closet to what the Capitals have to a shutdown guy. Plus Mike Green plays a lot better when he's out there.
have to say it: i was sour on the fedorov deal from the beginning, but if it forces GMGM's hand with alzner, the caps have really put themselves in a hole going into the season. $4 million for a third-line center? because of his leadership qualities?? i imagine $3 million would've still been above market value, and the team could live without fear of last-minute cap maneuvering.
wishing GMGM had made feds come down on his contract demand. although i know it's not this cut and dry, i don't think #91 is worth having our hands tied and possibly missing out on #47.
Fedorov isn't just a 3rd line center though - he's also an excellent penalty killer and play forward or the point on the powerplay.
Personally I'd rather have Fedorov at $4 mil than not at all.
The big question remaining is Chris Clark's status. GMGM has to plan for the worst and build the team as if he won't play. So I don't expect any moves to be made until they have an idea about Clark. If Clark goes on LTIR that frees up $2.63 million.
if Moobs doesn't start training hard soon, it'll be him on the third line
Well, for starters there will be trades before the season starts. Secondly, just because they can carry 23 players doesn't mean they have to. I'd say look for a couple of guys to be shuttling back and forth from Hershey. That should solve the problem. And finally, injuries will happen. That will also reduce the payroll. They're in a bit of a jam but it's short term pain. Next year, things ease up considerably.
Given the salaries some of the UFA Defenseman signed the deal seems fair even just on ShaMo's +/- numbers and his TOI numbers.
Also his fan appeal would be factored in and I'm sure his agent had pics of everyone who ever wore a # 26 jersey to a game last season. This is a fair deal. The guy who is probably a little overpaid right now is Nyls - but only a little.
I'm glad they have Feds and like dmg think $4M is fair. As for expecting Federov to take less than $4M a season, like I saw in comments over at Caps Insider, next year dream on. If Federov has a similar positive impact this coming season as he did after he joined the Caps and in the Playoffs, which is what we want to have happen - he'll rightfully looking for the same $6+M he made in Columbus if he doesn't want to retire at age 39.
The facts are this is what happens when you have a salary cap and a talented team. I'm actually thankful that's the situation here in DC now. I can't wait for the season to start. Yes there will now be some additional moves as a result of the ripples this puts on the pond.
LETS GO CAPS!!!!!
>>>"Sounds like Mo won his arbitration handily."
I'm not so sure. Check out Vogel's blog post a day or two before Mo's arbitatrion. The compariable that he said the Caps would point to would be Kurt Sauer, who signed a four-year, $1.75 million, which is pretty close to what Mo got.
I know Vogel is technically on staff with the Caps, but he's obviously not using inside information pointint to the Sauer deal. Sauer was a UFA when he signed that contract, and therefore his contract was invalid for use as a comparible in arbitration, per the CBA.
Yeah, I had mentioned Sauer and some other guys as comparables three weeks ago, but as anon notes (and as I noted back in that post), those guys aren't "comparables" in the sense that they can be used in arb. UFAs and RFAs are different ballgames, and I do think that Mo was the winner here.
Nice job by the Post this morning of missing the real news of the 26 signing: The cap implications. That's our local paper, Caps/hockey-aware as ever.
While Fedorov's contract is making things a little tighter right now, the guy is well worth it. He's a top-notch PP and PK guy, is a good 2-way center, and is an invaluable mentor for all of our young players, especially Semin.
The tough questions right now, I think, are whether Clark is ever going to get healthy/is worth keeping, and whether we really need Nylander with Fedorov in the fold. I'd like to keep Nylander because I think Fedorov is going to retire after this year, but it's a big luxury to have Backstrom, Fedorov, and Nylander up the middle.
@tyler: There are many reasons why I usually call that particular paper either the Compost or the Pest.
@ jason:
"it's a big luxury to have backstrom, fedorov and nylander up the middle."
i agree. and i agree that fedorov was an invaluable piece after the trade deadline last season. i just don't think "invaluable" = $4 mil. and if an injury doesn't solve this for us, we're looking at that extra $1 mil in fedorov's contract costing us one of alzner/flash/gordo on the big club this season?
as much as we all like fedorov, it's hard for me to believe that any other team was willing to offer $3+ mil for him. that was my only point. a million dollars SOMEWHERE would've saved the caps, and from my perspective, the million that sticks out like a sore thumb is the extra mil we gave to feds in order to meet his demands.
i'm also wondering if nylander's injury last season has caused people to undervalue him. a far more productive player than fedorov the past few seasons.
as much as we all like fedorov, it's hard for me to believe that any other team was willing to offer $3+ mil for him.
Maybe, but there's also the retirement option and I'd rather have Fedorov at four million than not at all. The Caps has several options they can pursue to get under the cap, and under all of them the team is better with Fedorov.
@ dmg:
okay, i'll cool my jets until we see the fallout. that's fair enough. i just don't like the options available to GMGM at the moment. cutting or trading a player could hurt us for the long term, whereas we've got $4 mil feds as center #2/3 for one year.
>>>"those guys aren't "comparables" in the sense that they can be used in arb."
Doesn't matter...the fact is Vogel does work for the Capitals, so he would have an idea of the price range the organization would seek in arbitration. His use of Sauer's contract was only an example to get that information across. I honestly don't think the Capitals offered Morrisonn less than $1.5 million, and depending on how long negotiations went, probably inched close to $2 million. Morrisonn's agent, with his client putting in top pairing minutes for a playoff team, probably wanted something well over $2 million. Yeah, speculation on my part, but given what top-pairing guys get in this league and how RFA contracts have gone (see: Laich contract), I think it's not that much of a stretch.
I don't think an employee of the team is spilling the team's negotiating strategy to the world in a blog post, and would be very surprised (shocked, in fact) if the Caps had submitted an offer of more than $1.5m to the arbitrator.
Don't overrate Mo. He is, at best, the team's third best defenseman, and could very well be its fifth best blueliner by season's end.
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