I suppose the Islanders logo is a bit much, but Charles Wang and Garth Snow have both now voted Alexei Yashin off Long Island. Yashin had four years remaining on his ten-year contract, but the Islanders finally caved in and recognized that they could probably get a little more bang for their buck on the free-agent market, rather than pay the high salary for only 50-60 points a season.
There's no way Yashin will be able to command the money he was making on this old contract, rather making roughly half or just less-than-half, if you go by players who scored what he did last season. Yashin finished 149th in pool-type scoring last season (with 50 points) and if you were looking for similar players with the same numbers you'd look at Shawn Horcoff of the Oilers and Brendan Morrison of the Canucks. Both make around the $3.5 million mark and I would imagine that Yashin would look for between that and $4 million in his next deal.
I would wager that a team like the Los Angeles Kings may be a fit for both his play and his budget. Yashin may be a good match for their Russian winger, Alexander Frolov or their new phenom, Anze Kopitar. It's doubtful that Yashin would return to his Hart Trophy candidate-like year of 1998-'99. The Kings also have quite a bit of room left to possibly budget Yashin in as well.
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