JVR's Value

(For the future)

Here is my reasoning for trading JVR and Bob this upcoming offseason. I they are both valuable players and have yet to reach their full potential, but in order to build a cup contending team, they cannot remain a part of the roster. If one looks at the cup winning teams over the past several seasons (and mostly since the lockout and beginning of the salary cap era) one trend becomes obvious; each team had a core of talent that was paid at or below market value (many were still in RFA controlled scenarios):

2010-2011 Boston Bruins:

Partice Bergeron/57 pts/$4,750,000

David Krejci/62 pts/$3,750,000

Milan Lucic/62 pts/$4,083,333

Nathan Horton/53 pts/$4,000,000

Zdeno Chara/44 pts/$7,500,000

Dennis Seidenberg/32 pts/$3,250,000

Tim Thomas/0.967%/$5,000,000

2009-2010 Chicago Blackhawks

Patrick Kane/88 pts/$3,725,000

Jonathan Toews/68 pts/$2,800,000

Patrick Sharp/66 pts/$3,900,000

Duncan Keith/69 pts/$1,475,000

Brian Campbell/38 pts/$7,142,875

Brent Seabrook/30 pts/$3,500,000

The trend also continues with the 2008-2009 Pittsburgh Penguins (although I am too lazy to write out all of the numbers for them).

After the core players, each team has also had a set of veteran players that the teams spent market value on for their respective roles:

2010-2011 Boston Bruins

Mark Recci/48 pts/$1,950,000

Gregory Campbell/29 pts/$1,100,000

Blake Wheeler/32 pts/$1,584,946

Thomas Kaberle/47 pts/$1,188,172

2009-2010 Chicago Blackhawks

Marian Hossa/51 pts/$5,275,000

Dustin Byfuglien/34 pts/$3,000,000

Brent Sopel/8 pts/$2,333,333

Nick Boynton/1 pts/$1,500,000

Cristobal Huet/0.895%/$5,625,000

After the veteran players (not all were included for brevity's sake, but you get the idea), there was a plethora of cap-controlled players that were playing for well below market value (many of the core players could be included in this list):

2010-2011 Boston Bruins

Tyler Seguin/22 pts/$3,550,000

Brad Marchand/41 pts/$812,832

Shawn Thornton/20 pts/$812,500

Adam McQuaid/15 pts/$575,000

Steven Kampfer/10 pts/$850,000

Tuukka Rask/0.918%/$1,250,000

2009-2010 Chicago Blackhawks

Kris Versteeg/44 pts/$3,083,333

Andrew Ladd/38 pts/$1,550,000

Ben Eager/16 pts/$965,000

Adam Burish/4 pts/$712,500

Colin Fraiser/19 pts/$700,000

Nicklas Hjalmarsson/17 pts/$643,333

Jordan Hendry/8 pts/$625,000

Antti Niemi/0.912%/$826,875

When you take into account the number of core players that were also under cap-controlled contract (I love alliterations!) the trend becomes even more obvious: successful teams have had a talented, young core, and a vast amount of underpaid talent (within their respective roles). By having a large amount of cap-controlled players, the teams were then able to fill the roster holes by spending market value on veterans.

This brings me to the Flyers: They have their somewhat cap controlled core in Giroux, Schenn, Couturier, Timonen, Coburn, Meszaros, and Bryzgalov. They have some cap-friendly youth in Voracek, Simmonds, Read, Rinaldo, and Wellwood. They have some veteran players in Briere, Hartnell, Talbot, and Grossman.

This past season has exposed many of the teams flaws, and in order to address those, money needs to be spent. The Flyers (as we all know) are in a cap situation that calls for conservative spending, so they will need to free up cap space in order to address those needs.

By trading JVR and Bob the Flyers will be sending away players that are overpaid for their roles. The returns are not guaranteed, but the upside is that by trading them for prospects and picks, the Flyers will have more cap-controlled players that can fill roles, even if they are not significant ones.

In the hypothetical scenario that I propose, JVR would be traded for a mid-first round pick in this year's draft. As noted by other articles, the best we could expect in return for Bob is a second round pick. In the case that those picks were acquired, the Flyers could reasonably expect two players from this year's draft to make an impact on the current roster. These players may not produce amazing results like this past years rookies did, but the new rookies would provide valuable playing time for expected cap hits below $1,000,000. With the extra cap room, the Flyers could then address the other team needs, and sign a veteran defenseman.

I apologize for the poor writing, as I put this together in 45 minutes or so...