Report: Blackhawks Could Buy Out Defenseman This Offseason.
The Chicago Blackhawks will once again have some salary cup puzzle pieces to figure out when it comes to the offseason. With the NHL already announcing that the salary cap will stay the same next season, that leaves the Blackhawks with $7million in salary cap space and just 18 players signed. Factor in that the team needs to re-sign Corey Crawford and that doesn't leave general manager Stan Bowman much room to manoeuvre with. While people want to see Brent Seabrook bought out, it's not happening but as The Athletic reports there is another defenseman that the Blackhawks could likely buy out. That's Olli Maatta. Maatta hasn't really been able to find his groove in the Blackhawks organization and still has two more years left with an AAV of $4.083million. Buying out Maatta would open up $3.4million in cap space for the next two seasons and only bring a cap hit of just under $700k for 2022-23 and 2023-24. Here's what Scott Powers had to say."The Blackhawks need to create some cap space to afford everyone. Buying out Maatta is one of the possible ways to do this. If they bought out Maatta's final two seasons, they would carry a cap hit of $680,600 for the next four years. It would save them a total of $5,444,533. For the 2020-21 season, it would give them an additional $3,402,733 to work with."
Do you think Bowman should buyout the 25 year old?
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