Amnesty Buyout

[coco_canuck]

Depending on what the Canucks get back in a Luongo deal, the Canucks could possibly avoid buying anyone out this summer if they can start the year with someone on IR.

This way they can see how the cap plays out for 2014-2015 and use a buy-out or two in summer 2014 if necessary.

Regardless, all of this is too far away really know what they should do. It depends on Booth & Ballard's performances and how Higgins, Raymond and Lapierre play and whether the Canucks are better of re-signing any of those players.

[Benjo]

Ballard's as good as gone regardless how he does this season, otherwise Gillis may as well let Edler walk. Welcome to Buttman's 'level playing field'.

Edit: depending on the CBA, there may not be much coming out of the owners' pockets as the buyouts will come out of the players' share of HRR (which I would interpret that to mean the money would come out of their escrow - employees paying themselves out of their contracts ).

Does it actually make any sense to buy these guys out?
I'm still trying to figure out exactly how the Amnesty buyout works, but from what I've read, the owner pays 2/3 of the remaining salary up front, which comes out of HIS pocket (not the escrow), however the amount is calculated as part of the players HRR %.

So for Keith Ballard, you pay him $2.8 mil to go away, leaving you the remaining $1.4 mil to find & pay an NHL caliber defenceman to take his place. Do we have someone else to play the #5 D-man position? Would we rather have Alberts?

The cap space isn't really an issue at all, as either Ballard or Booth could be sent down to the Wolves to clear cap space (if needed) and then recalled if we have a bunch of injuries.
With the compressed season there is a good chance that we might lose a top 4 D-man or a top 6 winger, so having Booth or Ballard would probably be better than the alternative.
And looking at the going price for free agents, I doubt that we'll find a significant upgrade on the market in the $1.5 - $2 mil range...

I can see a team like NJ trading for a guy like Booth (when he comes back from injury), instead of buying him out this offseason you could trade him for Zubrus at the deadline, he's a perfect forward for our 3rd line center, he's a UFA at the end of the season, but we could re-sign him a bit cheaper with a bit of term if MG wanted.

With Ballard, his value should go up with this rusty defense this season, so we could get something decent for him at the draft I bet.

To the NYI for Grabner and a first maybe?