Little dig on the Ilitches right off the top there? Transforming downtown Edmonton around the arena district which will open fully in about a year….

Posted by Steeb on 05/07/19 at 12:04 PM ET

Is it just me, or does this sound very somber and dark? Not like Christmas morning, but like your dog just died…

Posted by Down River Dan on 05/07/19 at 12:13 PM ET

Posted by Down River Dan on 05/07/19 at 12:13 PM ET

He does sound dark… almost bitter.

Posted by Alan from Atlanta on 05/07/19 at 12:28 PM ET

I was in and out during the press conference, but I believe I heard Kenny say “...when I learned that Stevie would be coming back…”

That seems to be directly opposite from the Detroit press conference when it was suggested that Kenny was a driving force in recruiting Stevie to come in as GM.

Not trying to be a conspiracy guy, but it sure seems that leaving the GM role really wasn’t Kenny’s decision, but Chris Illitch’s .

Posted by Down River Dan on 05/07/19 at 01:17 PM ET

Caught that too DRD, he did say he sacrificed his own position to open up the spot for Yzerman.

Just posted the replay of the presser in A2Y.

Posted by Paul from Motown Area on 05/07/19 at 01:20 PM ET

Thru the whole process I had the feeling that Chris I told Kenny he could take a bump up the ladder or be fired in favor of Stevie. Ken took the bump and certainly had an out clause in his extension. I don’t imagine anyone involved thought he’d stick around to see the whole contract thru, but I’m not sure anyone expected him to leave this fast.

Also, in the presser, Kenny said that he left Stevie $20mil in cap room, and that just isn’t true. Not sure where he got that number from.

Posted by Steeb on 05/07/19 at 01:23 PM ET

Also, in the presser, Kenny said that he left Stevie $20mil in cap room, and that just isn’t true. Not sure where he got that number from.

Posted by Steve in San Francisco on 05/07/19 at 01:23 PM ET

That sounds about right. Unless I missed some players with high salaries, there are a little over 60Mil on the books right now, so with cap expected to go up to over 80Mil, 20mil sounds about right.

Posted by George0211 on 05/07/19 at 01:36 PM ET

According to CapFriendly https://www.capfriendly.com/teams/redwings Stevie has about $8mil in projected cap space. Add Franzen and Z LTIR that’s about another $10mil, so maybe $18 best case scenario. Close, I guess.

Posted by Steeb on 05/07/19 at 01:42 PM ET

Add Franzen and Z LTIR that’s about another $10mil, so maybe $18 best case scenario. Close, I guess.

And then add in to amount the cap will be going up to…

Assuming that Green is healthy enough to play and assuming the cap goes up to $82M, Yzerman will have more than $20M to play with.

Posted by CharDeeMacDennis on 05/07/19 at 01:55 PM ET

I did that and factored in Svech coming off LTIR and had the cap at $83mil.

Posted by Steeb on 05/07/19 at 02:02 PM ET

So yea, I guess about $20 mil, minus pre-caffeine math… 

Posted by Steeb on 05/07/19 at 02:04 PM ET