The Montreal Canadiens, as well as everyone else around the NHL, will have the opportunity to open up some salary cap space beginning today. Teams often have some regret after signing a player to a long term contract and this is the time of year they can undo some of those mistakes.
Now, they don’t exactly have a get out of jail free card. But teams can buyout contracts starting today. A player would then be paid out two-thirds of their cap hit over double the remaining term. That means if a player has one year left on his contract with a $6 million cap hit, a team could buy them out and pay a total of $4 million over two years, or $2 million per season.