from CBSChicago,
A day ahead of a third championship parade in the past six seasons, Blackhawks general manager Stan Bowman admitted his latest Stanley Cup champion will look a lot different soon enough.
“Obviously, there will be some changes,” Bowman said Wednesday afternoon at a season-ending press conference.
The NHL has a hard salary cap, and while it’s not yet set for the 2015-’16 season, it’s expected to be around $71.5 million. With stars Jonathan Toews and Patrick Kane set to have matching eight-year, $84-million contracts kick in, Chicago will have to cut some salary. As it sits now, the Blackhawks have 14 players under contract in 2015-’16 for around $64 million, according to Spotrac.com, leaving them no room to pay market value to everyone else.
Antoine Vermette, Andrew Desjardins, Brad Richards and Marcus Kruger are the big-name forwards who are unrestricted free agents. Defensemen Johny Oduya and Michal Rozsival are also unrestricted free agents.
Bowman wouldn’t yet get into specifics on who will be back and who will be leaving, even when specifically asked about Vermette and Desjardins, a pair of trade deadline acquisitions whose strong play was instrumental in the Stanley Cup run. He only said it made him happy to see their quality play, even if it priced them out of the Blackhawks’ range on the open market.
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