Check This Out! Habs Cap Strategy REVEALED!

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Listen, I'm giving you a warning right now. I hate to do this for you, but we're taking you

to school today. Well, actually, I'm going to be going to school today. Professor Dameco

is teaching the class today. Get your pencil, get your paper, get your calculator,

get your mind right because we're talking Montreal, Canadians, cap strategy. Marco, this

and the aftermath of Jacob Fowler shining like a diamond in the final moments in Ottawa,

preserving a three, two, come from behind victory for the Montreal, Canadians, a massive win

on Wednesday night. And the question is, before we get our pencil sharpened and our blank sheet of

paper filled with equations and numbers, Jacob Fowler. I mean, the plan is Mr. Dameco,

Professor Dameco, please stick around. Are we doing, if we're doing Professor Dameco,

we have to, I have to switch. Oh, here we go. He's going to, he's getting another hat.

Oh, listen, he's getting the wide rim hat. Oh, I love that. We're going to do the old,

we're going to do this. I love it. The feather, baby. We're going to. Yeah, that suits you.

Was that Halloween imp costume? What was that? This is actually, this is my grandfather's old hat.

Oh, I absolutely love it. So this is how, this is how we're going to do this episode,

ladies and gentlemen, this school is, school is in session. So it was in session.

For those that want to, for those that asked, we had a lot of questions on this in the show

early in the week. The Canadians called up Jacob Fowler. Why didn't they call up David Reimbacher?

I had a lot of complaints in, in my DMs saying David Reimbacher would look better than Jaden

or Alex Kerry on the Canadian's defense. Why isn't this happening? So fair, but the reason why this

isn't happening is because when the Canadians called up Jacob Fowler, they only had $148,000 in

projected cap space, which means that, you know, if you were to pro-rate the season,

that's only about $789,000 left.

David Reimbacher's cap hit is $866,000. So they're missing about $80,000, give or take a couple

thousand to be able to fit David Reimbacher into the salary cap. So what does that mean? Well,

the beauty about the salary cap is if you have space, that space increases the more you go into

the season because there's less days in the season so you could fit more money in that time.

Out of the need of a 23-man roster limit, the Canadians could call up David Reimbacher as early

as March 16th if they were to keep Jacob Fowler on the roster. So that's the day before they

played the Bruins on the Tuesday on the 17th? Exactly. So if you were to call up David Reimbacher,

it would probably be if, and if you were to, like the as soon as they would call them up,

would be for the March 17th game. Unless Jacob Fowler goes down and David Reimbacher goes up,

which given the way that Jacob Fowler played against Ottawa, and given what I'm hearing in the

organization, there's a chance for anything, but they're going to ride that duo of Dolbesh and Fowler

probably until they clinch a playoff spot. And I would even venture that given the nature of,

you know, the Atlantic division right now, I would see maybe if they end up just going with

the three goalies the whole way because even Coppococcanin in Laval yesterday admitted that he was

ready to take the number one reigns and let Jacob have fun up top. And so just off of that then,

right? With Jacob Fowler's performance, a standout performance on the road in Ottawa,

and now the possibilities you just finished outlining Reimbacher may be a call up the day before

the haves host the Bruins and two lucky winners from the star and Tamiko show will be going there

thanks to our friends at Morella's and one of the proud sponsors of the show. Can we put that in

connection with how well he played plus the limited amount of call ups that it doesn't make sense to

Yo-Yo Fowler? Well, wow, that was high pitch. I apologize. It wasn't ever. Well, well,

yeah, Professor, please, yes. So this year, unlike the years prior, you have five call ups

that you can use. They used one on Fowler. But the thing with me is, who else are they going to use a

call up on David Reimbacher? Yeah. Maybe Adam Engstrom when he comes back to health. They already

have seven healthy defensemen. At Ford, Co-Coffield, Mystagame, Alex Texier drew in and they still had

two other healthy fours that they could call upon in Vallejo and Patrick Lina. Yeah. That you know,

are on the side. So I don't see a forward getting called up. And for those that ask,

signing a player out of the NCAA because we're going to get to Michael Hage does not count as a call

up because you're not, he wasn't in the American Hockey League. He's in the NCAA. So he'll either

go straight to the American Hockey League or straight to the NCAA. We'll have a conversation about

that as well. But I don't think the roster, I don't think the the limit on Cummings and Goings of

Callups is necessarily a problem for the Canadians. And should they feel like Jacob Fowler needs to go

down and then come back up, you know, because for example, the Canadians have a back-to-back tomorrow

and Sunday. And then it's back to normalcy. And then two weeks later, you're going to have two

back-to-back settings within a 10-day period. Well, maybe that's when you call back up Jacob Fowler.

And you know, like the there are possibilities there. And by sending Jacob Fowler down between,

you know, in that less heavy period, well, then you could accrue more cap space. Should you need to

call up more players? Because that's the other thing to keep in consideration is that with the five

man call up limit, until you get into April and you've accrued that cap space more. So you can't call

up many more else right now. You could call it maybe two players at the same time as of midway

next week, but you can't you can't call three, four or five play and you can't do that. So the

Canadians cap limits them more than the Canadians, you know, like limit on recalls at this time.

As you alluded to, we're going to get into Michael Hage and the timeline there, if one exists,

because I saw our colleague Anthony Martino kind of his reporting got taken out of context

last week about, you know, maybe he stays in the NCAA. And I want to talk about the timeline in a

second and the financial ramifications of Michael Hage joining the Montreal Canadians coming up in a

second. By the way, always encourage people to like and subscribe for daily haps content with yours

truly and my partner and crime there, Marco D'Amico. But just as a quick aside, before we continue with

Professor D'Amico and math class and salary cap class today, when you talk about David Rhinebacker,

I'm kind of wishy-washy. I like the sample size. Part of me, Marco wants to see it grow with

the young man playing with confidence and just playing with so many minutes.

Walk me through what you think about that as an option. Does that impact how Alex Carrier slots into

the daily lineup for this team? Or is it better to kind of wait? I know I'm pummeling you with questions

here. Is it better to wait for Adam Angstrom who we've already seen play? Wait for him to come back

from injury and there's a guy that maybe can help up on the right side if the Canadians want to

recall him and not run back or hypothetically? I mean, yeah, it's possible. I think the only the

the reason why there would be a like a even a need to call David Rhinebacker is simply to see where

he's adding his development. Like I don't think they're going to call him up to finish the season

and play in the playoffs. Like that's that's not what's going to happen here from what I'm being told.

If they call him up, it's for a cup of coffee. How you doing? What's your game look like? What

information can the Canadians get from the way that he's playing? Does he look like, you know, he

has a solid chance of cracking the roster after a strong summer? Does he maybe need more time in the

American hockey league? Are they going to, you know, push kick the the can down the line and maybe

reevaluate after the AHL playoffs? Like it's just about getting information. Whereas I feel like

Adam Engstrom is an NHL defenseman that could play right now. So it's a different it's a different

feel and I could see the argument for having either or being called up. I don't think either or

going to be called up permanently unless we really see like a downward swing from Alex Carrier,

Caden Goole or, you know, whoever of James Stubler, Arbor Jackay is in the lineup. But I think it

just offers flexibility. So what needs to be understood is that the longer the Canadians go without

making another call up after Jacob Fowler, the more flexibility they're going to have to be able to

call up a guy or two or three, maybe down the line and have enough space to sign a guy like Michael

Hage. There's Marco Domingo and Sean Star. Thanks so much for being with us. And again, just to recap,

the the belief of around Jacob Fowler is that they're not going to yo-yo him between Laval and the NHL

club. Is that is that the correct read on on what's what's likely going to happen especially when

we talk about his performance in Ottawa on Wednesday night? I don't know about yo-yo. Yeah. You know,

there is a world where Jacob Fowler does get set down because in the end, you know, if you're in

the playoffs, there are very rarely do you have back-to-backs in the playoffs. Like that's,

I think one series out of eight ends up with a back-to-back scenario. So I'm not, I don't see that

being an issue. So you could ride Dolbesh who has a really good record mind you. So you could see

what you have in him. I think the next, you know, handful of games is going to be very telling us to

who the the the organizations true number one is. And then they're going to kind of ride that

goalie into into the playoffs. So could we see him sent down? Yes, that is something that he told

me point blank that he would be prepared for if if it were to happen. And I feel like like we

talked about it the earlier in the episode, he may very well come be called right back up. And,

you know, a lot of people will be like, well, why don't the Canadians just wave Samuel Montenbo,

for example? Well, the thing is is that you can't actually wave a player that

stayed on your roster past the trade deadline. So Patrick Linae, you can't wave him and send

him to Lavala. It doesn't happen. Samuel Montenbo, you can't wave him and send him to Lavala. You

can try to wave them for the purposes of having another team pick them up. But if that team picks

up the player, that player is disqualified from playing for the rest of the season. That's right.

There's no point. And then I'm also, you know, the other argument I get is, well, you could

still complete trades after the trade deadline is just the player isn't eligible for the playoffs.

This is true. But there is no non-playoff team that is going to acquire a Patrick Linae

or a Samuel Montenbo without incentive at this stage. So the Canadians, is it harder? Yes.

Is it impossible? No. This is where Sean's good friend John said what makes his money.

And it's going to be being able to follow the cap dollars just like we've broken down because

the Canadians are going to have enough cap to keep Jacob Fowler and have a three goalie rotation.

And by next week, have enough cap to call up another player if need be. And that cap space will

just continue to become bigger and bigger and bigger as we get into the later stages of March.

And again, that brings us now to Michael Hage. Exactly. Michael Hage is going to be a very

serious thing that could be of topic, possibly in two weeks from now, when we have the big 10

regional, like the NCAA, I guess, regionals. So the first two rounds of the NCAA tournament.

So in a world, does a world exist where the Canadians can afford to have Fowler,

Rhinebacker, both with the team and then Michael Hage's collegiate season ends and now he joins

the team. Does it, does, does those monies work with those three players under the current

cap space that Canadians have left today? Not yet, which is the best answer I can give.

But what it means is if the Canadians, for example, were to call up David Rhinebacker,

not this weekend coming up at the next, they would have enough cap space to keep David Rhinebacker

on the roster for the entirety of the season, because mind you, they could all send him back down

and they probably would. Right. But you would, you would have enough room to call him up for a

cup of coffee, send him back down in the time that he is down between the time that he's down and

Michael Hage signs, you're a crewing cap space and you'd have enough room for Michael Hage. If Michael,

like this, basically, this is how it works for Michael Hage. He has two options. Option number one,

he signs his entry level contract. The moment is collegiate season ends. How early can that be?

March 28th or 29th or April 10th or 11th? Okay. We're sorry, 9th or 11th. Those are the two windows

in which he is season can end. If it's the latter and Michigan gets to the frozen four, which is the

semi-final and final of the NCAA championship, he would likely only be able to suit up for the

last game of the season against the Philadelphia Flyers. So that means he'd probably be, you know,

on the Canadians roster for three or four days, which at a maximum rookie salary of $975,000

means that he's going to count for about 20,000. Okay. So then that answers my other

question. I had two stupid questions, right? I'm filled with them. That's not really stupid.

So Hage gets called up, signs his first pro contract and he plays a game or he plays two games.

He immediately counts against the cap. And then what happens? Even if he doesn't play a game,

even if he doesn't play a game. Okay, even if he doesn't. But what happens? Is that

essentially are they burning the first year of the contract? As soon as they sign me if he plays one

or two games, he's burned one year. Because he turns 20 before September 16th of this calendar year,

his signing age for the collective bargaining agreement is 20. Even though he's 19,

freshman, he's still 19. And what that means is he burns the first year of his contract. Yeah,

he turns, he might actually, in fact, he might actually be able to sign his entry level contract

on his birthday. Yeah. Which, I mean, the signing the signing age and the age age would actually

be the same. What that does, yes, you lose the first year of his contract. But as we saw with

Elaine Hudson and as we'll see with Ivan Demidov, when you burn the first year of your contract,

if you play less than 10 games, NHL regular season and playoffs combined, because this is an

important thing to remember, then that player is not eligible for offer sheets at the end of

their entry level contract. It's the reason why Elaine Hudson signed for so little because they knew

that there was no, there was no alternative waiting for them at the end of the season. The only team

they could negotiate with between July 1st, 2025, and the summer of 2026 was the Montreal

Canadians. Well, the same applies in this case with Michael Hage. Yes, you'd lose a cost-controlled

year, but you'd also get to sign him faster. And as we've seen with Kent Hughes, that's not

necessarily a problem when it comes to contract negotiations. I mean, what would you put the

percentage at that Michael Hage when the Michigan season is over that that he makes the leap in

turns pro? Well, listen, I've you know, I've spoke to those around him that said that they're open

to all situations. If they feel like he's not going to get any kind of playing time whatsoever

and management strongly advocates to him going to the American Hockey League, that may actually be a

thing. But on the flip side, you know, if he plays the one game to end the season and then it's just

around the NHL team during the playoffs, and if there's an injury he draws in. Well, that's a lot

of experience and it helps them learn about the team. It practices with the players. Martijn

Saint Louis gets to know him a little bit better. He gets to know the trainers. He gets to know the

area. And then he comes back in September and he's able to hit the ground running. If he is in

fact NHL ready. So there are pros and cons on each side. My two cents, I'd love to see what he can

do in an Lava rocket playoff run. But, but it's extremely rare to see top end first round picks

in the NCAA go the NHL route. Usually you see that for like goalies as we saw with Jacob Baller

last year. That's right. Or you see that with, you know, like the Jaden Strubles of this world,

guys that are picked second, third, fourth round that maybe don't have the star power of a

Michael Hage. Michael Hage is one of the highest scoring players in college hockey right now.

A first-round pick like they can they they can have some demands, right? And it's the same thing

if with Cole Coffield, for example, if those that remember Cole Coffield back in the day in

2021, Cole Coffield signed his entry-level contract right away because obviously won the

Hobie Baker and played with the Canadians back then the the schedule was elongated into like

I believe mid-May. If I'm not mistaken, so he had he had some time to get used to it and then

was played in the playoffs, right? It's kind of the same mold. Players like that burn their first

year of the NHL deal almost immediately like it's it's almost an automatic. I think the last high

profile first-round pick from the NCAA that didn't immediately burn their their their the first

year of their contract out of college was Dylan Larkin and if not Zach Worenski. And those are those

guys were drafted over 10 years ago. Right. Just to give you an idea. That's all starting to make

sense. I think it's all well explained. And I guess the other thing is I mean Michael Hage's

game like you just referenced you know one of the more more dynamic offensive players in the NCAA

you know physically and his game. You're honest opinion. Is it is it pro ready?

See ready. Pro ready. Yes. Okay. Pro ready. Yes. NHL ready. I think he has the I think he has the

processor to play in the NHL. Does he have the RAM? Interesting. Okay. And so I think that's where

you know the next couple of games are going to be indicative in the NCAA championship rounds and

whatnot. It'll be I think when all is said and done I think the can if the Canadians liked Michael

Hage so much to make him a borderline untouchable piece in trade talks at the deadline. I don't know I

I don't know how he doesn't how how his clan doesn't end up with a with an entry level contract

out of the NCAA. But again I stress and this surprised me. They are willing to consider all

options when it comes to Michael Hage so they're not limiting themselves to entry level contract or

bust. Okay. Good stuff. Professor Domingo. Class is Professor Domingo's out. Thanks brother.

Good stuff as always. I hope everybody understood that. I think that was calmly and slowly explained

and now we've got Marco back. Professor Domingo is retired back. There was almost a professor Domingo.

I stopped at my masters. Considered the PhD but what a grind. Yeah. What a grind. And at least I

don't have to call you a doctor. I mean I don't know if I could have survived that doctor Domingo

in in office. Do you imagine? My there is only going to be one doctor Domingo and that's my sister.

Was that right? MD or PhD? MDDS. Huh? MD. Oh, Fanta. I love that. I love six high achieving successful

people. Good stuff brother. All right, man. Thank you for that. I think the audience and I'll

speak for myself. I appreciate that and I hope you guys did too. I will catch you on the weekend

when the Montreal Canadians double dip against the California teams this time. They're coming here

at the ice storm. Thank you. Thank you everybody and please take two Tylenol at the end of this

episode. Have a good day, y'all. Bye.