This past summer, for a little less than 24 hours, the New York Islanders seemed to be the favorites to land Artemi Panarin. It was rumored that the Islanders were going to offer him $12 million to $12.5 million a year to come to play for them.
For some reason, Panarin took roughly $1 million per year less ($11.6 million AAV), to play with the New York Rangers but what if he chose the Islanders?
According to Lou Lamoriello, the plan was always to retain Anders Lee. So we'd have to operate under the assumption that both Panarin and Lee would be on this roster so let's try to figure out how this would've worked before we go into what would've happened.