Who would give up 4 first round picks for Marner @ $10m/season?

[4T2]

rtstr raised an interesting question in the Marner rumour thread about who would give up their last 4 first round picks to have Mitch Marner at $10m/season? That would be the required compensation for signing Marner to an offer sheet at that price.

So I decided to do a little exercise. To keep it simple, I've only used teams that actually drafted with their last 4 first round picks. If they were traded to another team, I didn't bother as it would require too much work.

There are 8 teams who have used their last 4 first rounders to draft their own prospects.

Buffalo Sabres- Rasmus Dahlin, Casey Mittelstadt, Alex Nylander, Jack Eichel
Better off sticking with what they've got, that's some top-notch talent right there. Easy to amass when you are consistently near the top of the draft.

Carolina Hurricanes- Andrei Svechnikov, Martin Necas, Jake Bean, Noah Hanifin
Not quite as good as Buffalo but still some pretty decent talent here. Tough decision but I'll lean towards keeping the guys they drafted

Colorado Avalanche - Martin Kaut, Cale Makar, Tyson Jost, Mikko Rantanen
Rantanen makes this an easy choice to keep what they've got

Dallas Stars - Ty Dellandrea, Miro Heiskanen, Riley Tufte, Denis Gurianov
Wow, even with Heiskanen, I would swap this group for Marner in a heartbeat! Might be time for Dallas to look at their scouting department

Edmonton Oilers - Evan Bouchard, Kailer Yamamoto, Jesse Puljujarvi, Connor McDavid
Only disqualified due to McDavid. Under any other circumstances, I would say that the Oilers should give up 4 first rounders for Marner every time. They obviously don't know how to draft/develop so why not take the proven talent.

Florida Panthers- Grigori Denisenko , Owen Tippett, Henrik Borgstrom, Lawson Crouse
Yuck, give me Marner over this group any day

Montreal Canadiens- Jesperi Kotkaniemi, Ryan Poehling, Mikhail Sergachev, Noah Juulsen
I'm sure there will be people who would argue this one, but personally, I would take Marner over this group as well.

Vancouver Canucks - Quinn Hughes, Elias Pettersson, Olli Juolevi, Brock Boeser
Pettersson looks like a superstar and Boeser is nothing to sneeze at here so I think I stick with the prospects.


Overall, 3 of the 8 teams would probably have been better off signing a top player like Marner to an offer-sheet than to have drafted with their own first round picks. If you extrapolate that (obviously less than scientific method due to all the variables), that means there are probably 12 teams in today's NHL who would be better off signing Marner to an offer sheet and giving up their next four first rounders. That seems about right to me.

[MZac]

Nice job with this.

Florida, Dallas, and Montreal. Still each team is losing at least one productive promising piece. Not to mention super cheap as opposed to 10+ mil per.

I don't think offer sheeting a winger is generally a good idea. The cost is just too high for the least important position in real life.

[metaldude26]

When I went through this I left Dallas off because of how high I am on Heiskanen, but came to a similar conclusion. Somewhere between a third and half the league would do it looking back. The question is whether they could create the cap space.

[Rylant]

It’s an interesting conversation. Also have to take into consideration; Is Marner worth 10 mil a season? As well, the team signing him to an offer sheet has to have all 4 of their original next 4 first round picks in case Toronto doesn’t match. I haven’t looked, but does anybody know which teams have any of their next 4 first round picks missing? Oh, and of course, Marner has to be willing to sign the sheet with the team in question. No doubt that would take several teams out of the running.

Rylant

[metaldude26]

It’s an interesting conversation. Also have to take into consideration; Is Marner worth 10 mil a season? As well, the team signing him to an offer sheet has to have all 4 of their original next 4 first round picks in case Toronto doesn’t match. I haven’t looked, but does anybody know which teams have any of their next 4 first round picks missing? Oh, and of course, Marner has to be willing to sign the sheet with the team in question. No doubt that would take several teams out of the running.

Rylant

I believe the only 2020 and beyond 1st rounders that are traded are conditional picks on Duchene and Zuccarello re-signing with their respective clubs. I'd suspect that giving either of those two new deals would effectively clog the cap space to hand out $10+ M on an offer sheet anyhow.

[stevegamer]

Offer sheet rules require the teams have to have their own first rounders moving forward, right? I'm thinking that if you looked at teams that selected once in each year, even with other teams' picks, you could get some more info.

I would think that there are some teams that would consider doing this. For example, the Flyers have the cap room for next year, barely. They have all of their own picks in question, and might be able to work out a way to move Andrew MacDonald in his final contract year.

[Eskimo Brother]

Offer sheet rules require the teams have to have their own first rounders moving forward, right? I'm thinking that if you looked at teams that selected once in each year, even with other teams' picks, you could get some more info.

I would think that there are some teams that would consider doing this. For example, the Flyers have the cap room for next year, barely. They have all of their own picks in question, and might be able to work out a way to move Andrew MacDonald in his final contract year.

And have a stocked prospect cubboard to boot.
Plus Marner's old linemate in JVR.

[Eskimo Brother]

And have a stocked prospect cubboard to boot.
Plus Marner's old linemate in JVR.

On top of that, it was Holmgren who was the GM that tried the massive offersheet on Weber (things I don't forget), and guess who is still hanging around the Flyers' organization as team president? ...well yeah I made that obvious. Philly makes some sense all around if it was to happen.

Not that I think it will, but it's always fun to speculate.

[bondon]

The only way that I can see a team placing an offer sheet for that much is if they already have an established core that is under pretty good control cap wise, and needs that final push to make them a legitimate Stanley Cup contender. That way you're not worried about the four picks becoming lottery picks down the road and it gives you at least a 3 year window to win. This thread convinces me that there's no chance in hell this happens.

I think Johnsson and Kapanen are the more likely candidates.

[lucafen4]

The only way that I can see a team placing an offer sheet for that much is if they already have an established core that is under pretty good control cap wise, and needs that final push to make them a legitimate Stanley Cup contender. That way you're not worried about the four picks becoming lottery picks down the road and it gives you at least a 3 year window to win. This thread convinces me that there's no chance in hell this happens.

I think Johnsson and Kapanen are the more likely candidates.

Agree...

Would add, it's also more likely Nylander is traded than Marner gets sheeted

[metaldude26]

I think Johnsson and Kapanen are the more likely candidates.

I've always felt these two made more sense, not only because they are more expendable for a Toronto team but also because the compensation both in money and in draft picks would be much cheaper. However, this would also require that the players in question would be willing to sign the offer sheet. But let's say that they were, if we use the Philly as an example, they could sign Kapanen for $6M (requiring a 1st and 3rd as pick compensation) and Johnsson for $4 million (requiring a 2nd as pick compensation). They'd likely have to make these contracts shorter to make Toronto less likely to match. Toronto probably matches one of these anyway, but in the most costly scenario, Philly acquires two good wingers and shells out three draft picks, but they would still have 5 picks in 2020 (albeit all in the 4th round or later) thanks to the Wayne Simmonds trade.

The Flyers would want to have taken care of their own RFAs before engaging in this plot, which could prove difficult considering they have 6 to re-sign at the NHL level. That said, if they can take care of their three most important ones (Provorov, Sanheim, Konecny) they should be just fine.

All this said, I'm not sure it's very Flyers to make the clever approach when they could go the splashy route on Marner. Again, all of this assumes the player is even willing to sign.

My issue with the Marner offer sheet is that it is very unlikely that Toronto doesn't match if another team can even get him to sign one. They'd have to go short on term to make it most damaging, but that would risk the player walking after his contract is up. Wouldn't you rather take a run at Panarin as a UFA and not have to give up picks? The advantage of getting a guy like Marner is that he's so young shelling out $10+M a year and four 1sts would be worth it if you can get him for his entire prime. But Toronto is matching a 7-year offer sheet. You have to go somewhere in the 1-4 -year range at an exorbitant sum that would crank up the cost of the qualifying offer if he remains an RFA when the deal expires or walks him to UFA as soon as possible (if you go the 4-year route). I'd rather shop in the UFA market if it takes a 4-year deal at $13M to get Toronto not to match the offer sheet.

[Skippy]

Just for fun, the only teams (7 of them) that can not offer Marner an offer sheet that requires four 1sts as compensation are: SJ, DAL, STL, WPG, TOR, OTT and CLB.

[Eskimo Brother]

I think the offersheet would be signed after the 2019 draft, so really the only ones are the Stars/Jackets since their 2020 picks are currently tied up in conditions. Toronto also obviously can't, which leaves 28 teams that could theoretically make the offer.

[Dennis]

I think the offersheet would be signed after the 2019 draft, so really the only ones are the Stars/Jackets since their 2020 picks are currently tied up in conditions. Toronto also obviously can't, which leaves 28 teams that could theoretically make the offer.

Ottawa has San Jose's 2020 1st round pick.

[Eskimo Brother]

Ottawa has San Jose's 2020 1st round pick.

Correct. Missed that one.