That salary thing again

So, as this guy does a terrible job of explaining, there's another thing we have to consider when we look at the return of our injured: cap space. Let's do a quick recap on how injured reserve works.

If a player is placed on regular injured reserve (IR), it is just like he has been suspended. His body doesn't count against the 23-man roster size cap, but his salary still counts fully against the cap. From a cap perspective, it's no different than if he's just inactive, like Erik Christensen currently is and forever should be. Once put on IR, a player must be out for 7 days (regardless of the number of games played in that time).

For longer-term injuries, a player can be placed on long-term injured reserve (LTIR). On LTIR, a player must miss at least 24 days and at least 10 of his club's games. The only other difference between IR and LTIR is that on LTIR, there is a cap consideration. But it's not as simple as the player just not counting against the cap (is it ever simple?). Because Wolski, Rupp, and Staal are all on LTIR, let's take a look at how it works.