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Archives for July 2024

Stars Re-Sign Matt Duchene

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3:49 PM: The Stars have announced the signing.

9:28 AM: UFA center Matt Duchene won’t test the market. He’s returning to the Stars on a one-year deal worth roughly $3MM, per Chris Johnston of The Athletic.

It’s a great deal for Dallas, who gets Duchene on a solid discount and reserves cap space for later in the day. Assuming a $3MM cap hit, they still have nearly $15MM in space with nine open roster spots. It isn’t enough to keep deadline pickup Chris Tanev around, though – the veteran blue-liner landed with the Maple Leafs on a six-year deal after they acquired his signing rights via trade during the draft.

The deal could be identical to the one-year, $3MM pact that landed him in Dallas as a free agent last summer. Duchene was a surprise addition to the market after having the final three seasons of his seven-year, $56MM deal with the Predators bought out.

It’s hardly an unexpected outcome. Reporting over the last month indicated strong mutual interest in an extension, and Duchene was public about his willingness to take a discount.

A considerable discount it is for the 33-year-old, who had 25 goals and 65 points in 80 games for Dallas last year. He was the No. 5 free agent on our Top 50 list.

Duchene will be relied upon heavily to help replace the offense lost by Joe Pavelski’s expected retirement. It’s a solid bet that he’ll keep up his previous level of production – it’s roughly in line with his averages over the past three years.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Maple Leafs Sign Joseph Woll To Three-Year Extension

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07/01: The Leafs have made Woll’s three-year extension official. The deal will carry a formal cap hit of $3.66MM, giving the deal a total value just shy of $11MM. Woll becomes Toronto’s first goalie under contract this summer.

06/24: The Toronto Maple Leafs are reportedly closing in on a three-year contract extension with goaltender Joseph Woll (as per Kevin Weekes of ESPN). The extension can’t be formally announced until Woll is eligible for an extension after July 1st, but Weekes indicates that the contract is expected to fall in the range of $ 3.5MM – $4MM annually. The 25-year-old has one year left on his current deal that will pay him $775K next season and will be a restricted free agent on July 1st, 2025. If Weekes’ report is true, the Maple Leafs would be wasting no time in locking up their potential goaltender of the future.

Woll has shown himself to be capable during his brief time in the NHL, compiling a 22-13-1 record with a .915 save percentage in parts of three NHL seasons. He stepped into the net for Toronto in Game 4 of the first round of this year’s playoffs and led the Maple Leafs to victories in Games 5 and Game 6 to force a seventh and deciding game.

Therein lies the risk in signing Woll to an extension, the Dardenne Prairie, Missouri native, while capable, hasn’t been able to stay healthy and that is certainly a cause for concern with any young goaltender.  Toronto management surely considered the risk and reward when it comes to Woll’s health and is hoping that the youngster is just scratching the surface of his potential.

Toronto is in the market for another goaltender as they are likely to let Ilya Samsonov walk into free agency and with Woll’s services secured for the next handful of seasons, they will need a capable goaltender to supplant Woll should he run into injury troubles once again.

Panthers Re-Sign Dmitry Kulikov To Four-Year Extension

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The Florida Panthers have re-signed defenseman Dmitry Kulikov to a four-year, $4.6MM contract extension, per Bob McKenzie of TSN (Twitter link). The deal carries an annual cap hit of $1.15MM.

Kulikov had a storybook return to the Panthers organization this season. He scored just one goal and 20 points in 76 games, adding 63 penalty minutes, and a +15.  He didn’t add any scoring in the postseason, though he still appeared in 22 of the team’s 24 postseason games. And still, Kulikov concluded the year by lifting the Stanley Cup with the club that drafted him 15 years ago.

Florida was Kulikov’s home for the first seven years of his career, stepping into the NHL immediately after being drafted 14th overall in the 2009 NHL Draft. He was drafted following a QMJHL championship-winning season with the Drummondville Voltigeurs and carried his impactful lineup role into the pros, scoring 16 points in 68 games as a rookie. Kulikov found a stout role as a defensive defender early in his career that he hasn’t let go of since, even as he’s gone on to play 948 career games with eight different clubs.

That consistent impact is beginning to slow down as Kulikov approaches 34, with his role now much more centered around the bottom pairing. But it’s a role that he nonetheless serves well, and one that he’ll return to with Florida next season – especially following the departure of Oliver Ekman-Larsson, who has chosen to test free agency.

Oilers Re-Sign Connor Brown

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9:07 a.m.: Edmonton has confirmed that Brown is sticking around at his reported one-year, $1MM price tag.

8:10 a.m.: The Edmonton Oilers have re-signed winger Connor Brown to a one-year, $1MM extension, per PuckPedia (Twitter link). The deal comes as a slight guaranteed raise from Brown’s one-year, $775K contract last season, though that deal carried $3.225MM in performance bonuses which he met.

Brown’s one-year deal last summer put him in a spot to succeed Klim Kostin’s bruting role next to Connor McDavid. Kostin fit the bill to good effect, with 11 goals and 21 points in 57 games last season. Brown wasn’t able to do the same, going through the first 54 games of the season with just five assists. It wasn’t until game 55 that Brown scored his first goal of the year – and he heated up when he finally broke the curse with four goals and seven points in his final 17 games of the season. Brown concluded his year with just 12 points in 71 games – adding two goals and six points in 17 postseason games.

Despite the abysmal scoring, Brown has earned a raise on his next deal with the Oilers, with the team likely hoping that Brown can be much more productive with the monkey off his back. With Brown signed, Edmonton now sits with $12.933MM in cap space to fill five forward spots and two defense spots.

Capitals Re-Sign Ethen Frank, Chase Priskie, Mitchell Gibson

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July 1, 9:01 a.m.: Washington has made both of these depth extensions official, also inking RFA goalie Mitchell Gibson to a one-year, two-way deal ($775K NHL/$100K AHL). Gibson, 25, was a fourth-round pick of the Caps in 2018. Last year was his first pro season after a four-year career at Harvard. He played mostly with the ECHL’s South Carolina Stingrays, recording a .899 SV%, 2.56 GAA and three shutouts in 42 games.

June 30, 8:14 p.m.: Just hours after issuing a qualifying offer to Ethen Frank, the Capitals have reached an agreement on a new contract with him.  PuckPedia reports (Twitter link) that they’ve re-signed the forward to a two-year contract.  The NHL portion is the minimum of $775K in both years while the AHL salary is $250K next season before converting to a one-way agreement for 2025-26.

Meanwhile, PuckPedia adds (Twitter link) that the Caps have also re-signed pending UFA blueliner Chase Priskie to a one-year, two-way agreement.  The deal pays $775K in the NHL and $400K in the minors.

Frank only has two full professional seasons under his belt after a five-year NCAA career.  In his rookie campaign, the 26-year-old put up a strong 30 goals and 19 assists in 57 games with AHL Hershey.

This past season, he followed it up with a similarly strong showing, notching 29 goals and 18 assists in 64 regular season games.  Despite that, he didn’t receive a recall from Washington during the season.  Frank finished up on a high note, collecting 10 goals and seven assists in 18 postseason appearances, helping the Bears take home the Calder Cup.

As for Priskie, the 28-year-old has four career NHL appearances under his belt from 2021-22 with Florida but has played exclusively in the minors since then.  This season, he had eight goals and 26 assists in 69 games with Hershey before adding 14 more points in 20 playoff contests.  He’s in line to play a big role for them again next season.

Panthers, Sam Reinhart Agree To Eight-Year Deal

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8:33 a.m.: Florida has made Reinhart’s extension official.

6:56 a.m.: The Panthers managed to get top pending UFA right winger Sam Reinhart signed to a max-term, eight-year extension before last night’s midnight ET deadline, per multiple reports (including Pierre LeBrun of TSN and The Athletic). As such, last year’s 57-goal man is off the market and will stay with the defending Stanley Cup champions through the 2031-32 season. The deal will carry an annual cap hit of $8.625MM, per Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman.

They ran close to the deadline, but Florida has found a way to sign Reinhart to the maximum extension after a career-defining year on the team’s top line. Reinhart chased history, with his 57 goals the most scored by any Panther in the club’s history, save for Pavel Bure. Reinhart added 37 assists, bringing his scoring up to a career-high 94 points in 82 games. The totals trump his previous career-high of 82 points – set during his first year with the Panthers in 2021-22. But it wasn’t just all offense, as Reinhart also finished fourth in Selke Trophy voting – the first behind finalists Aleksander Barkov, Jordan Staal, and Auston Matthews.

Reinhart achieved his scoring on the back of fantastic shooting any time he came close to the slot. That made him all the more dangerous when he had extra space on the power play, with Reinhart scoring a league-leading 27 goals on the man advantage this year. He kept things hot in the postseason, too, with nine goals and 15 points in 22 games – one more goal and assist than he managed in 21 playoff games last year.

Florida acquired Reinhart’s rights in July of 2021, trading away the rights to goaltender Devon Levi and the first-round selection used on Jiri Kulich. The deal, most notably, freed Reinhart from a middling Sabres team. Reinhart had found success in Buffalo, scoring 20 goals in five of his six seasons with the Sabres and flirting with the 50-point mark. But with little support around him, Reinhart was tasked with the duties of play-driving and even taking faceoffs, pulling him away from the high-tempo offense he clearly prefers.

That role has changed with the Panthers, who have been much more content to let Reinhart play a shoot-first game from the wing. That’s certainly helped along by Florida’s much-improved center depth, headlined by the incredibly quick and always-responsible Barkov. The change has clearly inspired something within Reinhart, who’s posted 121 goals and 243 points across 242 games with the Panthers.

Reinhart now receives the contract of a lineup staple, though surprisingly avoiding the illustrious $9MM figure that many top players are seeking. Only 11 players have scored 50 or more goals in the last five seasons. Of them, Chris Kreider is the only other player not making at least $9MM. He instead carries a very team-friendly $6.5MM cap hit through the next three seasons. Florida couldn’t get so lucky to sign Reinhart to that kind of deal, but they’ll come close by keeping him under $8.75MM.

With a new deal in place, Reinhart is destined for a starring role in Florida for as long as he can hold onto it. Meanwhile, the team will now enter the open market with $10.892MM in cap space. They still need to re-sign restricted free agents Anton Lundell and Josh Mahura – and will still sit three forwards and one defender shy after those deals. That could set them up for a few meager additions on the open market, though strained cap space could have Florida instead looking to promote players like Mackie Samoskevich, Rasmus Asplund, or Michael Benning.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Hurricanes, Jaccob Slavin In Agreement On Eight-Year Extension

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July 1: Slavin’s extension today will be an eight-year deal with a cap hit of $6.43MM, Daily Faceoff’s Frank Seravalli reports.

June 14: A large slate of pending free agents still plagues Hurricanes interim general manager Eric Tulsky’s to-do list over the next few weeks, but as previously reported, it’s not the organization’s only top priority. The team has all but agreed to terms on an extension for defenseman Jaccob Slavin, which should be announced promptly when he becomes eligible to sign on July 1, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet said on Friday’s “32 Thoughts” podcast.

Slavin, 30, is entering the final season of a bargain-bin seven-year, $5.3MM AAV extension inked back in 2017.

It’s no surprise to see Carolina aggressively try to retain arguably their most consistent blue liner of the past decade amid an offseason of change that could see them lose both members of their second pairing, Brett Pesce and Brady Skjei, to unrestricted free agency. They’ve been discussing the framework of a deal for at least the past few weeks, per The Fourth Period’s David Pagnotta. The 6’3″ Colorado native would have been one of the top targets available on the UFA market in 2025 if he remained unsigned.

Slavin, who has finished top 20 in Norris Trophy voting for seven years in a row, has spent his entire career in Raleigh since being drafted by the Canes in the fourth round in 2012. Not only does getting an extension out of the way early quell any rumors of the franchise cornerstone leaving next summer, but it also provides them with an increased deal of cost certainty as the salary cap increases in 2025 and beyond.

It’s a stark contrast to their situation this summer, where nine everyday players are still pending free agents. They still have nearly $24MM in cap space to burn after inking defenseman Jalen Chatfield to an extension, which will likely all be used up as they navigate losing and replacing some top-of-the-lineup skaters.

The extension comes after a bit of an odd platform year for Slavin. After years of being the club’s de facto top-pairing anchor by ice time, head coach Rod Brind’Amour rolled three pairings almost equally at even strength after offseason signing Dmitry Orlov gave them five arguably top-pairing talents on the roster. With Orlov also taking away some special teams usage from Slavin, his ice time dipped to 20:56 per game, the lowest of his career.

That didn’t stop his offensive production from rebounding from last season’s disappointing figures, though. Slavin recorded 31 assists and 37 points, the second-most in a single season in his career. The Canes also controlled more than 60% of shot attempts with Slavin on the ice at even strength for the second year in a row.

Slavin served as part of Carolina’s leadership group last season along with Jordan Martinook and captain Jordan Staal. He and Chatfield will be the only defenders under contract for the 2025-26 season as the Canes look to build out their defense of the future.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Lightning Sign Jake Guentzel To Seven-Year Contract

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The Lightning have taken our No. 1-ranked UFA off the board. After acquiring his signing rights from the Hurricanes yesterday, they’ve locked in left winger Jake Guentzel on a seven-year, $63MM deal ($9MM cap hit), per a team announcement.

Pierre LeBrun of TSN and The Athletic has the full breakdown of the deal:

2024-25: $1MM base salary, $12.26MM signing bonus, no-move clause
2025-26: $1MM base salary, $8.95MM signing bonus, NMC
2026-27: $3.96MM base salary, $4MM signing bonus, NMC
2027-28: $1MM base salary, $6.96MM signing bonus, NMC
2028-29: $1MM base salary, $6.96MM signing bonus, 10-team trade list
2029-30: $1MM base salary, $6.96MM signing bonus, 10-team trade list
2030-31: $1MM base salary, $6.96MM signing bonus, 10-team trade list

While many had questioned Guentzel’s value after spending nearly all of his eight-year NHL career stapled to Sidney Crosby’s wing in Pittsburgh, a trade deadline deal to Carolina proved beyond a reasonable doubt that he’s a top-flight first-line talent in his own right. The 29-year-old has averaged more than a point per game over the last six seasons, totaling 189 goals, 221 assists and 410 points in 398 games since his breakout 40-goal campaign with the Penguins in 2018-19.

Carolina acquired Guentzel at the trade deadline, hoping to get him signed to an extension as he hurtled toward free agency, but it wasn’t in the cards. Guentzel’s initial ask was a reported eight-year, $64MM deal ($8MM AAV), something the Hurricanes weren’t willing to meet until too late in the process, LeBrun said last week. He was excellent down the stretch while alternating between Carolina’s top two forward lines, ending the year with eight goals and 17 assists for 25 points in 17 games with a +16 rating. Playing mostly alongside Sebastian Aho in the playoffs, Guentzel continued his reputation as a strong playoff performer with four goals and five assists in 11 contests.

A third-round pick of the Penguins in 2013, Guentzel played a key role in the second of the Penguins’ back-to-back Stanley Cup championships in 2017. He led the league in playoff goal-scoring as a rookie, lighting the lamp 13 times in 25 games – five of which were game-winners.

It’s clear that Lightning GM Julien BriseBois is banking on Guentzel being a more expensive yet more sustainable long-term replacement for Steven Stamkos. Their longtime captain is expected to find a new home on the open market today after failing to come to terms on an extension.

In Tampa, Guentzel could form one of the most terrifying top lines in the league alongside Nikita Kucherov and Brayden Point. Kucherov is coming off a 100-assist, 144-point campaign that won him the second Art Ross Trophy of his career, while Point has hovered around the 50-goal mark for the past two seasons.

The Lightning have $7.5MM in projected cap space remaining for 2024-25 after the Guentzel signing, per CapFriendly. They still have six open roster spots, including newly acquired RFA defenseman J.J. Moser.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Jonathan Marchessault To Hit Open Market

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It appears the Jonathan Marchessault era in Vegas is over. The Golden Knights’ 2023 Conn Smythe Trophy winner didn’t agree to an extension as of last night and is set to find a new home in free agency today, Pierre LeBrun of TSN and The Athletic reports.

Getting a Marchessault extension done in Vegas was always going to be a difficult proposition without a significant cap-clearing move, something that hasn’t happened to date. He’s likely to command upward of $6MM annually on the open market, a figure that would have swallowed up all of the Golden Knights’ remaining space, even with goaltender Robin Lehner’s $5MM cap hit projected to remain on long-term injured reserve next season.

Among the teams expected to express interest in the 33-year-old today include the Devils, reports The Fourth Period’s David Pagnotta. They’re on the hunt for a top-six winger, especially after parting ways with prospect Alexander Holtz via trade to the Golden Knights and with Dawson Mercer and Ondřej Palát coming off underwhelming seasons.

Both Vegas and Marchessault were intent on a reunion, but today’s news isn’t the most surprising. LeBrun had indicated last week that Marchessault was preparing to move on from Sin City without an agreement in close reach.

The Québec native immediately becomes one of the most attractive goal-scoring options on the market and will almost certainly have a new home within hours. He’s coming off a career-high 42 goals for Vegas while also playing in all 82 games for the second time in his career. He added 27 assists for 69 points, six short of his career-high of 75 set with the Knights back in 2017-18. Some regression should be expected, though, as he shot 4.2% higher than his career average of 11.6% last year.

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