thing, I hope he's wrong because I want the Oilers to draft Yakupov. I'd much rather be facing cap juggling problems down the road because our players are so good vs trading away a #1 overall pick to plug in somebody(s) who is cheaper just for the sake of avoiding something that may or may not even happen. EXACTLY. It's not absurd to think about, but it IS absurd to act on it in that way. As others have said, once Yak's (or whoever we end up drafting)ELC is up and he's proven himself either way, one has to figure that certain players will already have been shifted or signed for less or replaced with cheaper alternatives, etc. wow that shows just how bad it is. Even if everything goes right we will be tight against the cap. Tavares signing for 5.5 per year gives me hope I suppose. Keeping Yakupov definitely creates a huge set of challenges for management, but of course the rewards are extreme since no team in the league could touch our top six in talent. This aspect of team building is the exact reason I don't like what Smyth is doing. We have the cap to pay him now but fighting for every last dime he can get is a bad influence on the young guns, who would command 7+ million as free agents. You could say though that it looks equally bad on the Oilers part to not to try to sign him while