Not to kill anyone's buzz over Johnny Hockey, but there are real world consequences. (Note: All salaries and salary cap numbers according to capfriendly.com.)
Jarmo insists that he still intends to sign Laine. And every report says that the Jackets have $3MM in cap space. Obviously, salaries will have to be moved. Except....
Actually, the Jackets have $3,166,667 in cap space. Buyout that's with Boone, Texas and Tarasov on injured reserve and accounting for $6,325,000 in cap hit. Sending Tarasov to Cleveland only clears $1,050,000. That leaves the Jackets $2,275,000 above the cap. Someone has to go. The quick answer is to find takers for Jake Bean ($2,333,333) and Mathieu Olivier ($750,000). This doesn't allow for signing Laine, it only makes the Jackets cap compliant. If Laine is to get an $8MM cap hit, you have few choices to get to compliance. 1) Trade Jake Voracek for futures. That clears $8.25MM instantly. It's also not likely. 2) Trade Gus Nyquist ($5.5MM), Eric Robinson $1.6MM), Justin Danforth ($975,000) and one or two other low salary guys. Doing so barely allows enough cap space to sign Laine at an $8MM cap hit. But if he insists on more, the Jackets will either have to trade away a core player or tell Laine they just can't do it.