Today, Bruins General Manager did what some thought he didn’t have the balls to do. He placed defenseman John Moore and right-wing Chris Wagner on waivers.
Teams now have 24 hours (2:00 pm Sunday) to put in a claim. The 23-man rosters must be submitted to the league by 5:00 pm Monday. There are options for the Bruins here if both players go unclaimed. They could send one or both to Providence, or they could keep one or both with the big club for 30 days or they play in 10 games. They could, at any point in that time send one or both to Providence without having them go through the waiver process a second time.
One of my first articles here was the affect it would have on the Bruins cap if Wagner were sent to Providence. So, how does this affect the Bruins cap going forward.
Let’s assume for a moment that neither player gets claimed in the waiver process. The Bruins could send the pair to Providence and get a cap relief of $1,125,000 per player. The remainder of their cap hits would count as buried cap hit.
Here’s how that looks:
As you can see, the Bruins cap space jumps from about $1.6 million to just over $3.1 million. But more importantly, their deadline cap space jumps to $14,880,758. That means they can add AAV’s totaling that amount at trade deadline. For you dreamers out there, yes, they could then add Jack Eichel.
Of course, there are other scenarios that could happen which greatly affects the numbers like both getting claimed. But we won’t bore you with all the numbers. What it does do is open up a roster spot on the 23-man roster for Jack Studnicka or Karson Kuhlman. Or Sweeney sticks true to his belief in carrying 8 defensemen and adds Urho Vaakanainen to the club.
In the end, whichever way they decide to go, and whatever happens, the Bruins have opened up even more cap flexibility over other contenders (yes, I know some of you don’t believe they are contenders) than they already held.
And that brings with it some maneuverability.
Dom - Hockey 