They're not stupid: Flyers knew the deal with Pronger contract
Since the details of Chris Pronger's seven-year contract
extention came out last week, the Flyers have been widely
ridiculed around the hockey world. People have called the deal a
"blunder", a "mistake", "mind-boggling", and, quite simply,
"silly."  All of the criticism stems from one fact -- the
contract is an "over-35" deal, meaning that when Pronger likely
retires before the contract is up, the Flyers will still be on
the hook for his $4.985 million cap hit each year until the
contract expires in 2016/17. The over-35 rule in the NHL's
Collective Bargaining Agreement is, as James Mirtle mentioned in
his analysis of this deal, "... aimed at idiot proofing the
thing by protecting teams from (a) signing brutal deals and (b)
circumventing the cap with throwaway years at the end of
contracts."  The Flyers are doing both of those things. It's
hard to argue that this isn't a brutal deal if the Flyers have
Pronger's cap hit still haunting them two year