The Panthers have signed versatile forward Luke Kunin to a one-year deal, the team announced. It’s a one-way, league minimum contract, according to PuckPedia.
This will be the fifth NHL stop for Kunin, who began his career as the 15th overall pick in the 2016 draft by the Wild. He turned pro the next year after two collegiate seasons at Wisconsin and got his first taste of NHL action after making Minnesota’s opening night roster in 2017-18. Over his first three years in the NHL with the Wild, he developed rather quickly and recorded a 23-29–52 scoring line in 131 games – including an optimistic 31-point showing in 63 games in 2019-20.
Minnesota traded Kunin to Nashville in the 2020 offseason in exchange for Nick Bonino. The move brought both an ice time reduction and injury troubles. He recorded a career-high 0.50 points per game in his first year with the Preds, scoring 10 goals and 19 points in the COVID-shortened 2021 season, but was limited to 38 games with a lower-body injury. His production pace dropped to 22 points over a full 82-game schedule the following year before he was traded during the offseason again, this time to San Jose for John Leonard.
Kunin returned to a regular top-nine role with increased penalty-killing responsibility for the rebuilding Sharks, but ACL surgery ended his first season in the Bay Area after recording 13 points in 31 games.
Since returning for 2023-24, Kunin has taken on more of a pure checking role with significantly decreased offensive success. He posted identical 11-7–18 scoring lines in each of the last two seasons, along with an eye-popping cumulative -58 rating, although playing mostly on the league’s worst team during that time will obviously exaggerate poor defensive impacts. San Jose understandably wasn’t keen on re-signing him this summer and instead flipped him to the Blue Jackets at the trade deadline for a fourth-round pick. He went pointless with a -5 rating in 12 games for Columbus before reaching the open market for the first time this year.
As such, a spot in Florida’s opening night lineup is far from guaranteed. He was receiving NHL interest, but he enters the Panthers organization after a tough stretch and now must compete with names like Jonah Gadjovich, A.J. Greer, and Tomas Nosek – each of whom has proven effective fourth-line pieces on a Stanley Cup champion – for ice time.
The Panthers already have a projected cap exceedance of $3.725MM, but with star winger Matthew Tkachuk likely headed for adductor surgery soon, he’ll be LTIR-eligible and allow the Cats to be compliant to begin the season.
Real good pick up especially if injuries happen.
He’ll fit well there
Another hard nosed, Aggressive, Hard to play against guy, Good pick up by the champs!
just what the league needs more of, a Panther who can put the puck in the net and loves to play the body.
A steal at that price. Bad news for everyone in the Atlantic. He’s the prototypical Panthers player.
A steal? It’s August 22. If it was a steal he would have signed before this.
Zito just seems to make all the right moves.
This makes Rodrigues expendable.
I’m a Panthers fan saying this…. this might be cap manipulation… IE they sign a guy every team in the NHL would have signed for more than he got in late August? They sign him day after they learn they will have he space to do it? Sounds like they had a deal in place for weeks / months but didn’t sign it until Tkachuk had surgery…. again writing this as a guy who lives 5 minutes from the stadium and was literally in the mall next door last night lol
Why would it be cap manipulation. They can be up to 10% over during the off season. The team knew that Tkachuk was going on LTIR. Florida is now a go to destination and players will sign for less to be there especially when they know their game translates there. Let’s not create drama where there is none. Move on
because I think the deal was agreed to in June or early July.. but they didn’t sign it (purposely) until they knew Tkachuk was having surgery.