Montreal Canadiens: Looking at the Team’s Salary Cap Situation
By Omar L
The Montreal Canadiens future salary cap has been discussed a lot after Carey Price’s extension, but the team’s situation should give no cause for worry.
Going into the offseason for the Montreal Canadiens, one of the main focuses was Carey Price. He was set to enter the final year of his deal with the team and would need an extension. The Habs could start negotiating a new deal with the goaltender after July 1st, and the hope was that it could finalized sooner rather than later.
Fortunately for Canadiens’ fans, the wait didn’t take long. On July 2nd, Price agreed to an eight-year $84 million contract. Many people were happy. The Habs will have their number one goaltender for eight more years after this season. However, there were those that criticized the deal.
Apparently $10.5 million per season is too much for the best goaltender in the league. Is it though? Henrik Lundqvist has a cap hit of $8.5 million on the New York Rangers, and he’s a top goaltender in the league.
Thankfully the Price’s new contract and the Montreal Canadiens’ cap situation as a whole was left alone for a while. That was until Leon Draisaitl‘s extension with the Edmonton Oilers.
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A lot of people have taken notice that the Oilers will have $21 million tied up between Draisaitl and Connor McDavid in 2018. Additionally, some have turned the finger towards Montreal bringing up that the Habs will have $18 million tied up between Price and Shea Weber once the extension kicks in.
So what? The Montreal Canadiens are far from a team that needs to worry about their salary cap. It may not be ideal, but the team has $8.5 million in cap space. Looking into the future, the Habs don’t have much to worry about either.
Breaking Down the Cap Situation
Assuming the Montreal Canadiens don’t bring any UFAs back, they’ll be freeing up around $10.7 million. Additionally, the Habs have the majority of their key players signed for the next two seasons.
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- Alex Galchenyuk – $4.9 million per until 2020
- Jonathan Drouin – $5.5 million per until 2023
- Max Pacioretty – $4.5 million per until 2019
- Andrew Shaw – $3.9 million per until 2022
- Brendan Gallagher – $3.75 million per until 2021
- Shea Weber – $7.85 million per until 2026
- Jeff Petry – $5.5 million per until 2021
- Karl Alzner – $4.625 million per until 2022
The team will not have to make any difficult decisions until Pacioretty needs to be resigned. Considering the fact that he’s the team captain, it would be surprising if he takes a deal that will hurt the team financially.
Even if players will need to be moved out, the team has younger players who will be on cheap deals who could contribute.
Montreal is far from being one of those teams handcuffed by the cap. They have flexibility now and they will have it for the years to come. To say that Price’s extension is going to hurt the team just doesn’t make any sense. You have to pay the price to sign talent, and the Canadiens have the room to get through it.