Performance Bonuses and Carryover Overage
Bruins just signed Bergeron to 1 year/2.5 with 2.5 performance bonus. Now I know that the bonus can go over the cap, however the cap hit would get rolled over to next year. But when does that activate? What’s the cutoff date for “ok, we’re rolling these over to next year” or “ok, Craig smith you’re gone, mike Reilly you’re gone, we are not rolling these over”.
Answer
The performance bonuses for this season are not officially factored in until after the regular season is completed. At that point, any performance bonuses earned are added to the final cap hit number for the season, and the amount that total is over $82.5M is the bonus carryover overage for next year. A GM may choose to create some space during the year so that when that end of season calculation happens, the bonuses earned do not put the total over the $82.5M cap.
