How do teams throw dead-weight contracts overboard now?

[rickmac19]

Obviously under the new CBA, each team received two buyouts.

Once a team has used its buyouts, or after 2014-15, how does a team offload a "Wade Redden" contract?

(This will become an issue soon when some team realizes that its big off-season FA acquisition is a stiff...)

Obviously under the old CBA, a team could "Baumgartner" him--send him to the A if he clears waivers, pay him but have his salary come off of the cap. With a sheer underperformer, most teams knew which players would not attract interest in a waiver claim even at half of their gargantuan salary.

How do teams shed big salary for rich slackers now?

Briere and Bryzgalov's buyouts just came down to value-for-the-money. No team can remain competitive paying that much money to players who give only the value they did. Obviously, if the Flyers wanted Bryzgalov-quality net blocking, they could have signed a Ray Emery for far less money. I'm not saying that Bryzgalov did not play well in stretches nor that he never made a great save, but that for the money the Flyers paid him, he needed to change games and steal wins. I do not remember seeing that or reading much about it either. Regardless of personal feelings toward Bryzgalov, I think the Flyers HAD to buy him out. A player paid that kind of money needs to lead the NHL in something besides a dubious category, no?

[jammer2]

@rickmac19 "How do teams shed big salary for rich slackers now?"

Simple answer, as far as I can figure out is....you don't. This was aimed at saving GM's from themselves. Once you get burned once, or see a pier suffer through a similar fate, you learn your lesson and smarten up with the long term deals.

Edited June 26, 2013 by jammer2