The Lightning reportedly resort to devious and disrespectful tactics to move McDonagh
Tampa began shedding salary in an effort to free up cap space to sign Ondrej Palat among other UFAs this weekend. They did so by sending Ryan McDonagh to Nashville in exchange for Philippe Meyers and Grant Mismash. While pulling off deals to create cap space isn't exactly out of the norm, the method in which the Bolts did certainly is.
McDonagh has 4 years left with an annual cap hit of $6.675M per season. Tampa is still $933K over the cap, but with some more maneuvering, they should have enough money to resign both Palat and Jan Rutta. According to Nick Kypreos though, McDonagh waiving his no trade clause to go to Nashville was only because Tampa had a side deal with Columbus in case he didn't agree to waive.
So, the way it was described to me was, we've got a couple of teams that are interested in you. And I, I don't think he was thrilled about going to Nashville at this point, probably, because of the things that we discussed, how really close are they, right? And he had some control with the no trade.
But the no trade isn't a no move and apparently that if he didn't agree to be traded, he was going to be waived and Tampa had a commitment from Columbus to claim him. And now it's you want to go to Columbus, or you want to go to Nashville.
-Kyper on the McDonagh trade situation
As Kypreos explained, had McDonagh not waived his NTC to go to Nashville, the Bolts had an agreement with Columbus that Tampa would place McDonagh on waivers and Columbus would then claim him. It's an absolutely devious move by the Lightning, but unfortunately was necessary to force McDonagh's hand and allow the Lightning to free up space. As sad as it is to say, it's just a part of the business side of things.
| POLL | ||
5 JUILLET | 224 ANSWERS The Lightning reportedly resort to devious and disrespectful tactics to move McDonagh If true, should the league step in and block the trade? | ||
| Yes, that's not exactly bargaining in good faith | 104 | 46.4 % |
| No, it's a part of the business | 59 | 26.3 % |
| If players signed fair deals, there'd be no issue | 20 | 8.9 % |
| He got his Cups and cash, I don't feel bad for him | 41 | 18.3 % |
| List of polls | ||
