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Montreal Canadiens: Internal caps could create more player transaction

By Omar L

TORONTO, ONTARIO - AUGUST 07: Artturi Lehkonen #62 of the Montreal Canadiens celebrates his goal as Tristan Jarry #35,Justin Schultz #4,Kris Letang #58,Teddy Blueger #53 and Zach Aston-Reese #46 of the Pittsburgh Penguins look on in the third period in Game Four of the Eastern Conference Qualification Round prior to the 2020 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs at Scotiabank Arena on August 07, 2020 in Toronto, Ontario. (Photo by Andre Ringuette/Freestyle Photo/Getty Images)
TORONTO, ONTARIO - AUGUST 07: Artturi Lehkonen #62 of the Montreal Canadiens celebrates his goal as Tristan Jarry #35,Justin Schultz #4,Kris Letang #58,Teddy Blueger #53 and Zach Aston-Reese #46 of the Pittsburgh Penguins look on in the third period in Game Four of the Eastern Conference Qualification Round prior to the 2020 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs at Scotiabank Arena on August 07, 2020 in Toronto, Ontario. (Photo by Andre Ringuette/Freestyle Photo/Getty Images) /
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The financial impact of COVID-19 is leading to cuts amongst NHL teams, including the Montreal Canadiens, and internal salary caps could lead to trades.

We already knew there was going to be a financial drawback from the NHL pausing for so long. We’ve seen some of the effects already with a flat cap, which won’t see the ceiling go up for a couple of years, and now teams are paying attention to salary more than cap-hit as far as trades go. Now there is news of organizations having to reduce pay to team staff, including the Montreal Canadiens, but there is more that can lead to further player transactions.

This comes from Frank Seravalli’s piece on the matter detailing all teams who have to make cuts due to the lost salary from COVID-19. The only Canadian team that isn’t making any cuts are the Toronto Maple Leafs, as even the Habs have to act.

According to the article, the Montreal Canadiens are making a 20% reduction for all staff. Additionally, coaches are now receiving their full pay, but will only receive 80% of it while the remaining 20% will be received later on.

Another interesting thing from the post was talk of teams implementing an internal cap for the future. This isn’t exactly new as teams such as the Anaheim Ducks and Ottawa Senators, to name a few, have been doing that not spending up to the cap ceiling.

Apparently, the Pittsburgh Penguins, Buffalo Sabres and Arizona Coyotes are in talks of having an internal cap that remains in the $70 million range. The Coyotes will go just under $70 million, the Sabres will go a little over that while the Penguins will spend in the low to mid-70s. If that’s the case, Arizona will need to cut over $10 million, as they’re currently at $80,383,902.

The Vancouver Canucks and Florida Panthers are going down this route as well.

With teams needing to make trades to get under their respective internal caps, there’s going to be a lot more deals to make the money work. Players who weren’t meant to be expendable may now be on their way out.

Perhaps Oliver Ekman-Larsson is available now? And this also explains why the Penguins are making Patric Hornqvist, Zach-Aston Reese and Jack Johnson available.

The same thing goes for free agency; those who may have initially been resigned may instead test free agency.

Next. 3 Potential Danault Trades. dark

The Montreal Canadiens can make use of this, especially when they’re heading into an offseason of hopeful improvements even though they’ll need to keep an eye on their cap situation as well.

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