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Yzerman doesn’t like offer sheets

Steve Yzerman

Last week, we wrote about the likelihood of offer sheets being extended to restricted free agent goalies this summer. The Globe and Mail’s James Mirtle reported a number of league executives he’d spoken to were speculating that general managers like Tampa Bay’s Steve Yzerman and Toronto’s Brian Burke could force, say, Vancouver to match a big proposal for 26-year-old rising star Cory Schneider.

Today, however, the Tampa Bay Times reports that Yzerman isn’t a huge fan of offer sheets.

“The only way a team doesn’t match the offer is if you grossly overpay the player,” Yzerman told the Times. “That’s why I don’t like it. If you do a contract for the right value of a player, chances are the other team is just going to match it.”

In the case of the Canucks, it would take a massive offer to let Schneider go for compensatory draft picks.

Under the current CBA, RFA compensation works like this:

$1,034,249 annual cap hit or less: No compensation
$1,034,249 — $1,567,043: Third-round pick
$1,567,043 — $3,134,088: Second-round pick
$3,134,088 — $4,701,131: First and third-round pick
$4,701,131 — $6,268,175: First, second and third-round pick
$6,268,175 — $7,835,219: Two first-round picks, a second and third
$7,835,219 and higher: Four first-round picks

Of course, much of a team’s decision to match or not depends on term. For Schneider, even an offer like five years and $30 million would probably be matched, regardless of the Canucks’ cap situation. The compensation just isn’t enough for a contender like Vancouver. So a good, young goalie gets overpaid by a couple of million per season. A team with deep pockets can deal with that.

Maybe the Canucks would let Schneider walk if the offer was north of $6,268,175, but would Yzerman make it?