Dallas Stars’ Cap Situation After Shore’s New Deal
By Summer LeBel
The Dallas Stars signed Devin Shore to an extension yesterday a week before his arbitration hearing, so where does that leave their cap situation?
There are still three pending RFAs left for the Dallas Stars to sign, two of whom have arbitration hearings set. Beyond that, they have 19 roster players signed for next year with $8.3 million in cap space left.
The Dallas Stars have used just over $71 million in cap space. That breaks down to 11 forwards, 6 defensemen, and 2 goaltenders. That leftover $8,370,001 to be specific needs to cover the contracts for Mattias Janmark and Gemel Smith as well as two other roster players to get them to 23.
With Shore getting $2.3 million, it stands to reason that Janmark may go above $3 million. Smith will likely make less than Shore, perhaps in the region of $1.5 million. Dillon Heatherington will also get his own extension, but his will probably be a two-way contract to give the team flexibility to send him down to the AHL.
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If Heatherington stays up as the seventh defenseman or if the seventh defenseman is someone like Miro Heiskanen who will have a cheap contract, the Stars are probably looking at something in the ballpark of $2.5-3 million to fill their last roster spot. That’s enough for a decent depth scoring forward to round out their offense.
The team does have to take Tyler Seguin‘s extension into consideration when looking at what to do with that free space. They don’t want to hamper themselves next year by giving out too big of a contract.
On the flip side, there is going to be a decent amount of space opening up next offseason. Jason Spezza‘s $7.5 million comes off the books, as does Marc Methot‘s $4.9 million contract and Antti Niemi‘s $1.5 million buyout. Methot and Spezza will need to be replaced on the roster, but the combined $13.9 million in addition to the current $5.75 million of Seguin’s current contract leaves them with almost $20 million in cap space, enough to easily extend Seguin and replace Spezza and Methot.
With rumors swirling about Erik Karlsson and previously John Tavares, it brings up the question of how the Stars fit a contract like that, which they could do with a trade or two. If they do trade away someone like Spezza this season, that’ll obviously lower the amount of free cap space opening next year, but it’s still possible to make Seguin’s contract work with another big name signing as well if the Stars are set on that path.
Next: Arbitration Hearings Scheduled With Remaining Two Players
The Stars are still in decent shape at the moment on cap space, even with Shore’s contract a little higher than some fans expected. They just need to be careful looking forward, but Nill is definitely considering every possibility before making any deals. He just needs to get deals done with Janmark and Smith in the next two weeks or risk letting the arbitration process determine the team’s cap.