Sportsnet 590 The Fan: Frank Seravalli when asked about Sam Reinhart re-signing with the Florida Panthers, and what role the state/province tax plays.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Nick Kypreos: “Just in terms of where agents go, in whether it’s (Mitch) Marner, or (Sam) Reinhart, how much will play in to state tax, cost of living, does eight and a half (million) make it a lot of sense for Reinhart to stay in Florida compared to maybe 10 (million) in Toronto. Like, is there a lot of talk going on about checks and balances in that, in that avenue?
Seravalli: “Kyper, I know it’s a big talking point. I know that people spend a lot of time focusing on it and I’m not saying that it’s not a real thing. Of course it is when you ultimately get to what the net amount of money is that’s going in your pocket.
But if it were really that simple, and if you were really to take a look at it and say, ‘Hey, Sam Reinhart, we’ll give you, in Florida, eight years times nine and a half million dollars,’ by the way, I think that’s already been on the table and it’s been there for months. He hasn’t signed it, and he’s looking for north of that is my understanding.
Even though the equivalent of that in Toronto or somewhere else would actually be north of $12 million a year. It’s just not that simple.
So I do think it matters. I also think at the same time, in some ways, part of its overblown. I think when you get to talking, and both of you guys will understand when I say this, when you get to talking about fit, and, and overall dollars and I think in fact, a great example of this is Filip Hronek, who signed that big $58 million deal in Vancouver last week.
One of the big things is, you get into that sphere of money and you’re talking about that much, a little bit here or there isn’t going to really change your life. And it’s easy for us kind of mere mortals to say that because, you know, if someone said ‘hey, will, you leave 2 million bucks on the table.’ I mean, that’s, that’s life changing money for sure, but when you get paid that much, I tend to think that guys probably don’t want to mess with happy
And especially if you’re a guy like Sam Reinhart and you have a chance to go to a third straight Stanley Cup Final next year. Maybe that’s a differentiator or maybe you look at it and you say, I already won here, we might win again, and that’d be great but I’m going to take the extra $5 million or $6 million somewhere else because that means something to me. Everyone’s in a different spot.”
