The moment that Kyle Dubas and the Toronto Maple Leafs signed John Tavares to a 7-year, $11M AAV contract, everybody knew that Dubas immediately stepped into a nice heaping pile of financial dog shit. Don’t get me wrong–any time your team has the opportunity to sign John Tavares still in his prime, you have to take it. But you dish out $11M per year to Tavares in the summer of 2018, and then you know you’re going to have to pay Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner in the summer of 2019, and William Nylander still doesn’t have an extension. So here’s an example of what Kyle Dubas is going through right now.

The Coke Zero Effect

Everybody loves Coke Zero, correct? A nice cold Coke Zero on a hot summer’s day? It’s delightful plus it has zero sugar so you don’t have to feel guilty about it at all. So for a while, the Leafs were a really good 1500 ml bottle of Coke Zero. Not quite a 2 liter but not just a can either. But the moment they signed John Tavares, the Toronto Maple Leafs became a 2 liter of Coke Zero. The only issue now is that they only have a 2 liter bottle to fit all these different cans and bottles of Coke Zero into. They need to take the mini cans like Connor Brown and Zach Hyman’s contracts. They need to take the standard bottles like Kadri and Morgan Reilly’s contracts. And then they need to not only fit John Tavares into the 2 liter, but also save enough room for the Matthews and Marner extensions. Their 2 liter of Coke Zero currently has a decent amount of empty space in there but come next summer, it is going to be overflowing everywhere. As it stands right now, the Leafs have a little over $12M in cap space.

That number will jump up a little at the start of next summer with a few contracts coming off the books.

(obviously you have to account for Auston Matthews in their as well but he’s on IR right now)

So the biggest contracts that come off the books next year are Jake Gardiner and Ron Hainsey. Hainsey is 37 so he most likely won’t be sticking around. For a team who lacks defensemen, it’ll probably hurt a little for them to lose Gardiner but considering Matthews is probably going to take up most of the $12M that is currently available, you’re going to need Gardiner’s money to go to Marner. The rest of the contracts coming off the books next year are all under $1M each. So considering most of that available $12M is going to Matthews and then whatever else is available will go to Marner…. well there doesn’t seem to be much available for William Nylander. ESPECIALLY not the $8M he’s been asking for. There is simply too much Coke Zero to fit in one 2 liter bottle.

***UPDATE ON THE COKE ZERO ANALOGY SINCE SOME OF YOU ARE TOO DUMB TO GET IT: Coke Zero is delicious. The Toronto Maple Leafs have a delicious team. But there is a salary cap in the NHL. So you can’t just have a pool filled with Coke Zero. It is capped out at a 2 liter. So the Maple Leafs need to figure out how to fit all their Coke Zero in a 2 liter bottle, which is seemingly impossible considering how much of it they have. Get it? Good. Imbeciles.***

So What Happens In A Month?

Like the headline mentions, we are now just a month away from William Nylander’s deadline. If William Nylander is not signed by December 1st, then he will be ineligible to play in the league for the rest of the season. Which means that he’ll probably play in the KHL for the rest of the year while, I believe, the Maple Leafs will still own his rights come July 1, 2019. But I don’t think anybody wants to see William Nylander sit out the whole season. That’s not great for anybody involved. It’s obviously not great for Nylander because he’ll be missing a year in the NHL and trying to negotiate a new contract next summer is going to be even harder than it is right now, so he 100% won’t be getting the money he’s looking for. It’s not great for the Leafs because a year out of the league for Nylander is only going to drive his trade value if Toronto has any plans to sign and trade him. And it’s also not great for the Leafs because they could probably use another offensive weapon especially right now while Auston Matthews is out with a shoulder injury. So nobody wins if Nylander isn’t in the NHL by December 1, except maybe for Russia and the KHL. Do we really want Russia to win this whole saga? Fuck no.

Obviously what makes the most amount of sense is if both sides just grow up a little here, both swallow some pride, and sign a bridge deal. Marleau’s $6.25M contract is up after the 2020 season. Connor Brown’s $2.1M contract is up after the 2020 season. There’s your $8M for William Nylander right there. All it’s going to take is for Nylander to sign a 2 or 3-year deal at like half of what he’s asking right now in order for that to happen. I know that Willy wants his money. I know that the Leafs want him to sign long term.

Jordie’s Final Prediction

I think that William Nylander ultimately ends up playing for the Maple Leafs this season. I think both sides have been very vocal about wanting to stay with each other. I think Kyle Dubas would be the biggest snake in the world if he ended up trading William Nylander at this point after how many times he’s said that the team wants him back. I know that they already landed their biggest free agent in John Tavares but it would be really hard to ever bring in another free agent if Dubas pulled a move like that now. And I don’t think that they’d want to go an entire year without him on the ice, especially considering how much more difficult that will make negotiations this coming summer. So I think Nylander signs a bridge deal at some point soon here and ends up getting the money he’s after once Marleau hangs ‘em up. In the meantime, I’d offer sheet the fuck out of William Nylander right now if I was any other GM in the league. I know that the final price to offer sheet Nylander at the money he’s looking for is going to completely wreck your draft stock for the next few years, but it’ll still make life more difficult for Kyle Dubas and the Toronto Maple Leafs, and that’s all anybody wants to see.

@BarstoolJordie