Below is an excerpt from the ESPN article by Pierre LeBrun who reviews a few situation from around the NHL including Bob Gainey UFA problems:
Lots of work ahead for Montreal’s Bob Gainey
The Montreal Canadiens are off to a tremendous start on the ice. Off the ice, GM Bob Gainey has his work cut out for him. He’s got 10 potential unrestricted free agents at season’s end, including Alexei Kovalev, Saku Koivu, Alex Tanguay and Mike Komisarek, plus potential restricted free agents in Christopher Higgins and Tomas Plekanec.
We’re told contract talks have yet to begin on any of those fronts. It’s a tough situation for Gainey. The risk of signing one guy is that it may look like you’re playing favorites. But, on the flip side, some agents for these players are getting a little restless. My sense is that Gainey may take care of a few of these players in the second half of the season or near season’s end.
Of course, the interesting thing in all this is whether the salary cap possibly goes down next season because of the global economic meltdown (at this point, it’s impossible to tell either way). But the Habs might be in the best position of all — they won’t be in a payroll jam like most other teams.
Habster:
Granted, Bob Gainey will have his hands full with no less than 10 UFAs to deal with at season’s end (why he insists on waiting is beyond me!!) but as LeBrun states, Gainey will be in a good position to deal with any potential downward cut to the salary cap.
Over the past five years as the Canadiens headmaster, Gainey has bucked the NHL trend of signing players to hugely inflated, long term deals which, in the long term, will give him more flexibility without a large anchor around his neck.
He potentially will have between $30-$35 million to work with during the off-season with the majority of that money going towards locking up some of his UFAs.
Players like Komisarek, Tanguay, Koivu and Kovalev will take up a chunk of that money if Gainey wants to sign them and these players don’t out price themselves. There is also the problem of signing Higgins and Plekanec to longer term deals before they get offer sheets from other teams………needless to say, it will be a very interesting off season for Gainey and habs fans!!