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Red Wings general manager Ken Holland probably won't be adding many players during the short offseason because Detroit doesn't have the cap room, NBCSports.com contributor Kevin Dupont says.

Hey, we're back! Our NHL Expert, Hockey of Hall of Fame honoree Kevin Dupont of the Boston Globe is here to answer your questions. Since we've all waited long enough for the lockout to end, let's quickly move to the first question and get started. And if you have a question, please submit one at the bottom.

Q: Which GMs should we most keep an eye out for during the expected feeding frenzy leading up to the start of the season?
— Dave in Southfield, Mich.
A: Great question, Dave, and I’m not sure there is a great answer, simply because of the size and scope of that feeding frenzy.

Yes, there should be tremendous talent available, and clubs with a lot of room under the cap — Washington and Boston perhaps with the greatest wiggle room of all — would be the obvious candidates to make the biggest splashes. George McPhee in Washington and Mike O’Connell is Boston should be two of the busiest horsetraders.

If we are to believe the common wisdom out there now, clubs with higher payrolls and deep rosters (just in terms of sheer numbers), shouldn’t be all that busy here in the few weeks leading up to training camp. Bobby Clarke in Philly, Ken Holland in Detroit, Pierre Lacroix in Colorado, and even Mark Barnett in Phoenix — they’re just four of the bosses who don’t figure to be doing much in the way of acquiring talent — simply because they’re either right around the cap figure ($39 million in salary, and another $2 million in benefits), or they are already well over that figure.

Two other GMs, Larry Pleau in St. Louis and John Ferguson in Toronto, won’t be buyers. In fact, the Leafs are more likely sellers, perhaps forced to buy out the likes of Owen Nolan and/or Eddie Belfour. Any team over the cap figure will have to unload guys eventually, either via trades or buyouts.

Also, just because the likes of Nashville and Atlanta and the Islanders also have substantial cap room available, thus positioning them all to be buyers, there is no absolute mandate for them to spend. The new CBA will have a salary floor, forcing all clubs to shell out somewhere around $21 million, but not every club has to spend to the cap. In Boston, O’Connell assured the Globe that the Bruins will spend to the cap — but that’s no surprise, because the Bruins in recent years have pegged their payroll around the $45 million mark.  If they spend to the cap, they could be saving around $6 million, relative to what they paid when last in business in ‘03-‘04.

No player can be offered more than $7.8 million per year in the first year of the new CBA.  That figure is derived from the “cap within a cap” believed to exist in the new deal — a mandate that no club can spend more than 20 percent of  the total salary cap figure ($39 million, net of medical and pension benefits, etc). In many ways, the player who is offered the max deal is essentially the club’s franchise player, although, as far as we know, there are no particular added advantages or disadvantages to being awarded the “max” deal and becoming a quasi-franchise guy.

No doubt, most every club with a $7.8 million player will be spending up to the top end of the overall cap figure.  For sake of example here, let’s assume the Bruins tie up Joe Thornton at $7.8 million. The truth is, with so few players already signed, and O’Connell in need of signing many more, that $7.8 million takes up one over every five dollars O’Connell can spend. Guess what? If that’s what it takes to make Thornton happy, don’t look for O’Connell to race headlong into the UFA market with a $4 million offer here, and a $5 million off there. Not with some 20 signings necessary to complete a roster.

Boston’s case is only worth mentioning here because similar scenarios will play out across the Original 30. Yes, a good number of teams have considerable cap room. But not all will spend it.  ON top of that, the cap figure is relatively small, at least to start — in part because no one knows if business can get back to where it was prior to the start of the lockout.

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