The Florida Panthers and the Edmonton Oilers are in a battle for the Stanley Cup, game two is tonight, and the hockey world is atwitter…about the sale of a relatively obscure website to the Washington Capitals. Cap Friendly, a data aggregation site focused on each NHL team’s (and player’s) salary cap situation was snatched up by the Washington Capitals. Apparently, they intend to shutter the site and use it for their own internal purposes. The eulogies for the site are something to behold.
For journalists like me, the site’s closing means little. I find the handwringing and speculation over the salary cap issues much less entertaining than, you know, actual hockey. Alas, not for the first time in my life, I am in the minority. Many will miss knowing that despite being a rebuilding team, the Philadelphia Flyers are projected to have the least amount of cap space in the league when the new season opens. Conversely, the Utah Team To Be Named Later can double their current payroll and make the cap. I guess we know who’ll be in the final next year!
Joking aside, the hard salary cap is a factor in the NHL…just ask the Vegas Golden Knights. Cap Friendly also conveniently has a list of Unrestricted Free Agents at the top of their homepage. It’s a great tool for shady real estate investors to quickly figure out who might have a few extra bucks this summer to invest in an arena in the Phoenix area. But the real thrill is diving in on that third line player who cost your team a playoff spot to find out that they are making more than Wyatt Johnston, allowing you the fan to melt down for the entire offseason while combing through reams of draft analysis looking for this year’s Wyatt Johnston.
Sites like CapFriendly are a critical component to fan enjoyment and critical component of first-rate NHL reporting, allowing the fans to see exactly why Macklin Celebrini is excited about joining the Sharks this fall. The biggest question that I had when I heard the news was why the Washington Capitals were the buyer? Maybe they want us to forget the $3.9 million in dead cap money they owe on Evgeny Kuznetsov next year?
Either way, it seems there will be no shortage of serious hockey analysts who seek to fill the deep chasm left by Cap Friendly’s disappearance come July. I hope they succeed, or else I might miss some critical details in my upcoming analysis of the New York Rangers‘ offseason plans.
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