They have been trying to trade AA for over 2 years now, there are either no takers or they need to add prospects who will most probably never play here anyway and Stan wont do it.
As far as not grudging the seabroke contract, how can't you. Best players need to be the best paid players, so a robin to batman cant be making 1.3 million more than batman. I know Keith should not go thru life ever being able to not afford whatever he wants, but whether you are a salesman doing more business than a higher paid salesman, a ditch digger who always has the shovel in your hand compared to the guy in the back hoe, or the checkout girl at Walmart that gets twice the shoppers out of the store happy, human nature will always set in. There should have never been an instance where Keith was not top paid, but that is what Bowman created for a guy that has been down hill since he signed his name.
It's not 100% cut-and-dried like that.
Keith's deal was signed under completely different CBA rules--when players tended to eschew high per-year cap dollars in exchange for long-terms stability and overall payment, and in addition, when their front-loaded contracts were getting down the pennies, they could take the option of retiring without leaving money on the table--before recapture was a thing.
Ergo, it's an apples-to-oranges comparison. You're looking at 72M over the course of 13 years--full NMC throughout, with a initial cap% of 9.75 and an initial raw salary of 8M back in 2011 for Keith.
Contrast to Seabrook, His deal is 55M over 8 years, with an initial cap% of 9.63, and an initial raw salary of 9M in 2017. His NMC turns limited in the last 2 years of his deal.
If Keith's deal was under the current CBA rules, chances are his actual cap hit would have been closer to 8M. Since the cap really has never gone down if he would have signed later, chances are it would be even higher (just like if Seabs signed earlier it would have been lower). Plus Seabs could be traded to a hockey graveyard the last 2 years of his deal--Keith? Not without his consent--barring a compliance buy-out of course.
To make a more direct comparison: Seabs previous deal was 29M in 2012: Basically 5 years, 5.9AAV, 9.76% in the 1st year, 7M raw salary, and from no clauses, to 3 years of a M-NTC, to a full NMC. If Seabs' was as-worth it as Keith, surely his deal signed around the same as Keith's within the same CBA rules would have been more lucrative especially given that the cap% is close enough to be the same.
But his current one, yeah. something on it should have been lessened: Cap dollars, time, or even the strength of his NMC. Something should have been less restrictive. Keith you can't really complain about because even for years like 2018 where he was a liability it's completely offset by him making a fraction of his worth--like in 2013. Can't really say that about Seabs' current deal.
