The Tampa Bay Lightning and Nikita Kucherov remain calm with no extension in place
Pierre LeBurn: The Tampa Bay Lightning and pending UFA Nikita Kucherov are pretty calm that a contract extension isn’t in place before the season is about to start.
There is lots of time before July 1st, and get the sense it will happen when it happens. He wants to stay in Tampa and they want to have him there long-term, but it’s hard to say when it will get completed.
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Could the salary cap go up to $127.5 million in two years?
Sportsnet: Elliotte Friedman, on 32 Thoughts: The Podcast – Don’t Tuck Your Shirt In Episode, on how much the NHL salary cap could go up in the next two years.
** NHLrumors.com transcription
Kyle Bukauskas: “The salary cap, looking ahead. Something you have learned. We know the cap this year is $104 million. We know the salary cap next year, as it stands right now, is $113.5 (million). Beyond that, we really weren’t sure, until something you have learned over the last little while. What’s going on?
Friedman: “So it’s not unusual for it to take a few days for things to seep out of there, but one of the things they did was they gave a guesstimate of what the 28-29 cap could be. And I stress this is a guesstimate because it’s not set in stone.
Three-year agreement that they made with the Players Association, and we’re in the second year of it. As you said, 104 this year, 113 next year.
You want to take a guess at what they put up there or what they told people? I don’t know if it was like on a slide or they said it or what they did, but you want to take a guess at?
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Bukauskas: “Just looking at your face right now, Elliotte, I’m guessing we’re well into the 120s. Am I close at all? Am I warm at all, there?
Friedman: “That is an excellent guess. We are well into the 120s. The guesstimate was $127.5 (million). And the interesting thing about that, Kyle, is that if it was to be 127.5, that would be a $14 million raise from next year to the year after. And that would be the biggest single-season raise since the cap came in in 05-06. That is a massive, in all caps, massive number.
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