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Minor Transactions: 10/13/22

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The NHL season is fully underway, and quite a few teams are skating in their first games of the season tonight. As exciting as the action is around the NHL tonight, there’s still plenty going on around the hockey world and we’ll keep track of all those transactions here.

  • The Montreal Canadiens were expected to assign 2021 first-round pick, Logan Mailloux, to his OHL club, the London Knights, when he recovered from injury. Today, the team did just that, sending Mailloux to the Knights. Mailloux hasn’t spent an extensive amount of time on the ice in the OHL, so this season will be important as he looks to establish himself as one of the Canadiens’ better options on what looks at the moment to be a crowded defensive pipeline.
  • The New York Rangers’ AHL affiliate, the Hartford Wolf Pack, have signed defenseman Ben Harpur to a PTO, per a team announcement. Harpur, 27, is a veteran of over 150 NHL games and joins the Wolf Pack after signing a PTO with the Columbus Blue Jackets, a deal that did not result in a contract offer. The Rangers recently lost physical depth defenseman Jarred Tinordi on waivers to the Chicago Blackhawks, so perhaps this PTO is a chance for Harpur to prove he can fill Tinordi’s vacated role on the Rangers’ organizational depth chart.

Forward Notes: Horvat, Larkin, Drouin

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Vancouver Canucks captain Bo Horvat has spent his entire NHL career with the franchise that drafted him, but as a pending UFA, his time in Vancouver could be coming to an end. Last month, we covered how Horvat had expressed a a desire to remain in Vancouver. Today that picture got a bit more cloudy. Speaking on CHEK’s Donnie and Dhali podcast, Horvat’s agent, Pat Morris, said that he believes “Bo is a number-one center,” a comment made in reaction to the use of Sean Couturier’s $7.75MM AAV deal as a comparable for the contract he’s seeking for Horvat. With the Canucks’ currently tight cap situation, it’s an open question as to whether Vancouver will be able to afford the sort of contract Horvat is seeking.

Morris’ belief that Horvat is a number-one center is telling as to how Horvat’s representation will approach contract negotiations going into their client’s potential unrestricted free agency this summer. The going rate for top-six centers in the NHL in their UFA years is around $8MM AAV, if not more, based on recent deals. We’ve seen centers such as Logan Couture, Tomas Hertl, Ryan Johansen, and Mathew Barzal all hit or surpass that number on their own long-term deals. Horvat scored 31 goals and 52 points last season and brings the sort of defensive value and leadership intangibles teams covet, so it’s not unreasonable that a deal in that wide $7MM-$9MM range is Horvat’s target. For the Canucks, though, it’s fair to wonder whether they’ll be able to afford that sort of contract. With the recent J.T. Miller extension and other players making significant dollars already on their books, it’s definitely possible that the Canucks simply won’t be able to offer Horvat the sort of deal he could receive from another club.

Now, for some other notes regarding forwards from across the NHL:

  • Horvat isn’t the only top-six center and team captain to be a pending unrestricted free agent. Detroit Red Wings captain Dylan Larkin is also set to become an unrestricted free agent this summer, and he too is reportedly seeking a major extension. Pierre LeBrun of TSN reports on TSN’s Insider Trading program that “the plan is” for Larkin’s representatives to introduce Barzal’s recent $9.15MM AAV deal as a contract comparable for Larkin’s next deal. Larkin scored 69 points in 71 games last season, and with another strong year he could fully cement himself as deserving of such a lucrative extension.
  • The Montreal Canadiens were without forward Jonathan Drouin for last night’s season-opening game against the Toronto Maple Leafs, but they may not be without him for much longer. On the Insider Trading program, TSN’s Darren Dreger reported that Drouin is at “90%” health and getting ready to return to action in the near future. The Canadiens are currently running Cole Caufield, Sean Monahan, Juraj Slafkovsky, and Rem Pitlick as their four left wingers, meaning it’s not immediately clear where Drouin fits into their lineup. But regardless of where he ultimately finds himself on the ice, getting him back to full health is undoubtedly good news for Montreal.

Patrik Laine Placed On Injured Reserve

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The Columbus Blue Jackets announced today that forward Patrik Laine has been placed on injured reserve due to an injury he suffered in last night’s season-opening contest against the Carolina Hurricanes.

Per the team, the injury Laine suffered is an elbow sprain and he is expected to miss three to four weeks as a result.

The Blue Jackets called up top prospect Kent Johnson earlier today, so perhaps he will get the first chance to fill Laine’s role as the right winger on the team’s first line alongside Johnny Gaudreau and Boone Jenner. Johnson is widely considered to be more of a playmaker than a sniper, so if coach Brad Larsen prefers a player more stylistically similar to Laine on that line, he could opt to bump preseason standout Yegor Chinakhov into that role.

The Blue Jackets aren’t expected to be among the NHL’s elite teams this season, but after an aggressive summer that saw them add Gaudreau and Erik Gudbranson as free agents, it’s likely that the team has designs on at least being in the mix for a playoff spot late in the season. To get there, the Blue Jackets will need to avoid falling behind in the standings in this early part of the year, a task now made even more difficult due to this Laine injury.

That being said, though, the Blue Jackets are certainly a team with enviable scoring depth. With talented youngsters such as Johnson, Chinakhov, and Kirill Marchenko, the Blue Jackets will have options to choose from as they ponder how to best compensate for Laine’s absence.

Evening Notes: Fairbrother, Jets Captains, Wouters

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The Montreal Canadiens’ AHL affiliate, the Laval Rocket, announced today that defenseman Gianni Fairbrother will be out for the entirety of the 2022-23 AHL season due to a knee injury. Fairbrother suffered that knee injury in a preseason contest against the Belleville Senators, and now faces a long road to recovery just as his season was about to begin.

Fairbrother, 22, was a third-round pick of the Canadiens at the 2019 draft, getting selected 77th overall. Fairbrother made a name for himself in his draft season as one of the more physical, intimidating defensemen in the WHL. The hard-hitting Fairbrother signed a three-year entry-level deal with the Canadiens last year and played in 25 games for the Rocket, scoring seven points to go along with 46 penalty minutes. This is unfortunate news for Fairbrother, but the hope will be that he can respond well to his recovery process and return in the fall of 2023 ready to have a competitive preseason and training camp.

Now, for some other notes from across the NHL:

  • After announcing that Blake Wheeler would no longer serve as the team’s captain last month, the Winnipeg Jets have settled on a leadership core for the 2022-23 season. As reported by TSN’s John Lu, Mark Scheifele, Adam Lowry, and Josh Morrissey were all named alternate captains for the Jets. Both Morrissey and Scheifele were alternate captains last season, while this year will mark the first year where Lowry will wear a letter since he was the captain of the WHL’s Swift Current Broncos in 2013.
  • Another team announced some captaincy news today. The Abbotsford Canucks, the AHL affiliate of the Vancouver Canucks, announced that forward Chase Wouters has been named the first captain in the team’s history. While Wouters might strike some as an odd choice due to his age, (he’ll turn 23 in February) he actually has extensive leadership experience. Wouters was the captain of the WHL’s Saskatoon Blades from 2018-19 to 2020-21. In that time frame, the Blades had more wins than losses in each year Wouters wore the “C,” so the Canucks will hope that his leadership can bring similar to success to their AHL affiliate.

Toronto Maple Leafs Sign Fraser Minten

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While the Toronto Maple Leafs organization is undoubtedly now devoting its full focus to the 2022-23 NHL season, that hasn’t stopped them from looking ahead to their future. Today, the Maple Leafs announced that they’ve signed prospect forward Fraser Minten to a three-year entry-level deal. The terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Minten, 18, was the Maple Leafs’ top draft pick at the 2022 draft in Montreal, getting selected 38th overall after Toronto traded out of the first round as part of the Petr Mrazek trade with the Chicago Blackhawks.

Minten is a WHL product who spent his draft season with the Kamloops Blazers. On a strong Blazers team, Minten scored 55 points in 67 regular-season games and added 16 points in 17 playoff games. Minten brings solid size and strength to the center position, and has drawn praise for his shooting ability.

Since Minten will play 2022-23 with the Blazers, the Maple Leafs’ choice to sign him to this entry-level deal isn’t motivated by any desire to improve their roster in the short or medium term. Instead, signing Minten to this deal gives GM Kyle Dubas and the Maple Leafs organization a chance to demonstrate their commitment to Minten’s development and reward him for his performances in rookie camp and the preseason.

With this deal in hand, Minten will head back to the Blazers once he recovers from an injury he suffered during training camp. In Kamloops, Minten will in all likelihood be asked to shoulder an even greater role as the Blazers look to build towards another deep run in the WHL playoffs.

Vancouver Canucks Acquire Riley Stillman

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We have a trade to announce. Per a team release, the Vancouver Canucks are trading center Jason Dickinson and a 2024 second-round pick to the Chicago Blackhawks for defenseman Riley Stillman. The Canucks have also announced the deal.

From both the Canucks’ side of the trade and the Blackhawks’, the deal makes a lot of sense. From Chicago’s point of view, this swap fits their overarching organizational vision. The Blackhawks are undergoing a full-scale rebuild, and this whole past offseason they proved they would leave no stone unturned in their quest to accumulate as many draft picks and prospects as possible.

At a time when the value of cap space is at an absolute premium, the Blackhawks, by acquiring Dickinson, (who has a $2.65MM cap hit for the next two seasons) have cashed in some of their cap space in order to land a valuable draft pick from another club.

Additionally, the acquisition of Dickinson fits in with some of their other additions from this offseason, in the sense that he is a player whose value has declined from previous seasons and has room to rebound. In the summer of 2021, the Canucks thought highly enough of Dickinson to surrender a third-round pick for his services, and now after just one season he’s relegated to being a negative-value asset in a cap-shedding trade.

While Dickinson’s lone season in Vancouver was admittedly a poor one, the Blackhawks are now hoping that he will respond well to greater opportunity on their team and rehabilitate his value enough to possibly be flipped for even more draft picks either at this trade deadline season or this summer.

Dickinson, 27, was a 2013 first-round pick and has at times shown the ability to be a quality defensive center. But in Vancouver his offense almost completely dried up, meaning improving Dickinson’s play offensively will likely be the first priority for head coach Luke Richardson and his staff.

From Vancouver’s perspective, this deal seems less about acquiring Stillman and more about clearing Dickinson’s contract off their books. Just a few hours ago, we covered how 22-year-old Swedish import Nils Aman was in pole position to seize the Canucks’ fourth-line center role, a development that, prior to this trade, would have left Dickinson either without a regular spot in the lineup or perhaps even on waivers and headed to AHL Abbotsford. Now, the Canucks’ roster decision-making process will be a lot simpler.

While clearing Dickinson’s deal off the cap-strapped Canucks’ books was likely the main purpose of this trade, acquiring Stillman is not without its usefulness as well. Today we learned that Tyler Myers would be out with an injury for the start of the regular season, so perhaps Stillman was acquired in part to help the team make up for his absence.

Stillman, 24, played 52 games last season in Chicago and scored 12 points. The former Oshawa General is a defense-first, physical defenseman who saw some time on the Blackhawks’ penalty kill as well. While it’s unlikely that he’ll climb the Canucks’ competitive defensive depth chart, he’ll be a useful reinforcement as Vancouver looks to pick up where they left off under Bruce Boudreau last year.

Pictures courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

Minor Transactions: 10/07/22

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The NHL regular season began today, and while the world’s top league is just getting going, there are teams in minor/overseas leagues that are still making tweaks to their rosters. We’ll recap all of today’s minor league/foreign league moves here.

  • Former Toronto Maple Leafs prospect Andrew Nielsen, signed a contract with the ECHL’s Utah Grizzlies today, per the league’s official transactions page. Nielsen, 25, was the 65th overall pick of the 2015 draft and played 36 games last season with the Grizzlies, scoring 27 points. The defenseman has extensive experience in the AHL and should be a major addition to the Grizzlies’ blueline.
  • The Coachella Valley Firebirds signed Nick Pastujov and Hugo Roy to contracts in late September, and now it seems that they won’t be with the Firebirds to start their seasons. The ECHL’s Kansas City Mavericks announced today that both Pastujov and Roy have been reassigned to their club, meaning both players will likely begin the year in Kansas City and hope to play well enough to earn a call-up to Dan Bylsma’s Firebirds squad.
  • The Idaho Steelheads made a big move today, signing three-time ECHL defenseman of the year Matthew Register to a one-year contract. Register spent last season with the Cardiff Devils of the EIHL, the United Kingdom’s top professional league, and will re-enter the ECHL as a defenseman capable of putting up elite production.
  • Kevin Lohan, the captain of the ECHL’s Orlando Solar Bears, announced his retirement today via a letter posted to the team’s website. Lohan spent the past four seasons with the Solar Bears and earned his first AHL recalls this past season, skating in games for both the Syracuse Crunch and Ontario Reign.
  • The ECHL’s Greenville Swamp Rabbits made two signings today, adding forwards Jake Elmer and Carter Souch. Elmer, scored 32 points in 50 ECHL games last season and should bolster their offensive attack. Souch is perhaps the more intriguing name here as he will be making his professional debut after an impressive finish to his WHL career. Souch scored 71 points in 68 regular-season games for the Edmonton Oil Kings and also scored 21 points in 19 playoff games, helping lead Edmonton to a WHL championship. He’ll look to begin a climb up the North American pro hockey ladder in Greenville.

Snapshots: Phillips, Aman, Janmark

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The Chicago Blackhawks’ 2022-23 season is unlikely going to be one where the team is focused intensely on winning games, but instead one where player development is the main goal. To that end, the lack of established talent on the Blackhawks’ roster means that younger players might have more of an opportunity to see NHL time in Chicago than they would have on other teams. One of the players who might benefit from that opportunity is Isaak Phillips, a 2020 fifth-round pick who was just called up by Chicago for their final preseason game.

The Blackhawks’ new coach Luke Richardson said, as relayed by The Athletic’s Mark Lazerus, that he thinks that Phillips will ultimately begin the season with the AHL’s Rockford IceHogs and play as a top-pairing shutdown defenseman there. The 21-year-old Phillips played in four NHL games last season and this call-up suggests Phillips could be near the front of the line for a regular-season recall should the Blackhawks end up needing another defenseman on their roster.

Now, for some other notes from across the NHL:

  • The Colorado Avalanche drafted Swedish forward Nils Aman in the sixth round of the 2020 draft, but didn’t sign him to an entry-level deal, letting his rights expire. The Vancouver Canucks scooped him up in June on an entry-level deal, and now it’s beginning to look like that was a savvy move on the part of GM Patrik Allvin and his front office. Thomas Drance and Rick Dhaliwal of The Athletic report (subscription link) that there is “increasing industry buzz” that Aman has done enough to cement himself as the Canucks’ opening-night fourth-line center. If that ends up being the route the team chooses to go, it will be a major step forward for the 22-year-old, as he has no experience in North American pro hockey. Aman spent the last two seasons as a full-time player for Leksands in the SHL, scoring 14 points in a limited role.
  • Veteran forward Mattias Janmark was waived by the Edmonton Oilers today, and while he’s just one of the several notable NHLers to hit waivers today, he may be one of the few who actually get claimed by another team. Sportsnet’s Ken Wiebe speculates that the Winnipeg Jets could be a team that possibly files a claim for Janmark. Wiebe notes that Jets are currently trying to figure out who will play in their bottom six, and since Janmark has a connection with new coach Rick Bowness, (Janmark played for Bowness as a member of the Dallas Stars) it’s possible that the Jets attempt to add him to their roster. Janmark signed a one-year, $1.25MM deal with the Oilers this summer and had 25 points in 67 games last season.

West Notes: Milano, Robertson, Hague

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Forward Sonny Milano turned some heads when he signed a PTO with the Calgary Flames this fall, in part because many believed that the former Anaheim Duck would receive a full NHL contract offer from a team. Last season Milano set career highs in production, scoring 14 goals and 34 points in 66 games, but that contract offer never materialized.

Milano was recently released from his PTO after an underwhelming preseason, but that may not mean the end of his NHL journey. Per Thomas Drance and Rick Dhaliwal of The Athletic, (subscription link) the Vancouver Canucks invited Milano to their training camp before he ultimately chose to go to Calgary, and they “still like” Milano as a player. But given the complex roster and cap situation that the Canucks’ front office will need to manage in the coming days, Drance and Dhaliwal do state that the team isn’t able to acquire Milano at this moment. The bottom line, though, is that despite how rapidly his stock seemed to decline over the course of this summer and preseason, there still are teams who believe Milano can contribute in the NHL.

Now, for some other notes from the Western Conference:

  • One of the biggest contract sagas of this offseason reached its conclusion this week, as Dallas Stars forward Jason Robertson signed a four-year contract to remain in victory green. In order to get there, it seems some compromise was required. Today, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet speculated on the 32 Thoughts Podcast that Robertson’s camp had been eyeing an AAV “in the tens” on any max-term deal. Due a $9.3MM qualifying offer after his new contract expires, Robertson seems to have set himself up nicely to break into that range once this current deal expires.
  • While Robertson’s contract saga came to an end earlier this week, the contract standoff between the Vegas Golden Knights and restricted free agent defenseman Nicolas Hague is still ongoing. Per Friedman on 32 Thoughts, the Golden Knights’ desire to maximize the cap benefits they gain from long-term injured reserve is not considered to be a barrier to getting Hague’s deal done. The 23-year-old former Mississauga Steelhead had a breakout season of sorts in 2021-22, seeing time with Alex Pietrangelo on the team’s top pairing, and it looks like the main obstacle to getting a deal done is based more on value disagreements than anything related to the Golden Knights’ cap management.

Minor Transactions: 10/06/22

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The NHL regular season begins tomorrow with the San Jose Sharks taking on the Nashville Predators. Many teams are still making their final roster preparations, and as the roster picture in the NHL becomes more clear, teams across the hockey world are also making moves. Here we’ll recap the day’s notable transactions from minor leagues or overseas leagues.

  • The ECHL’s South Carolina Stingrays announced today that they’ve signed three young players who have either recently turned pro or are set to make their professional debuts this season. The players are as follows: forwards Anthony Del Gaizo and Sean Gulka, and defenseman Kylor Wall. Del Gaizo, 24, is the brother of Nashville Predators prospect Marc Del Gaizo and is also an NCAA champion and former USHL Player of the Year. Gulka, 22, is an import from the WHL’s Victoria Royals, and Wall, 25, got a taste of professional action last year for the Fort Wayne Komets.
  • Forward Michael Pelech, the older brother of New York Islanders star defenseman Adam Pelech, signed a contract with the ECHL’s Atlanta Gladiators. Pelech, 33, is a minor league veteran with over 800 games of ECHL experience under his belt. Pelech played for the Gladiators last season and notched 36 points in 46 games.
  • The ECHL’s Orlando Solar Bears announced today that they’ve signed forward Tristin Langan to a one-year deal. Langan, 23, scored the second-most points of any WHL player in 2018-19, scoring 53 goals and 113 points for the Moose Jaw Warriors. Langan has proven to be an elite ECHL scorer with 147 points in 168 career games at that level. Langan has spent his entire ECHL career with the Solar Bears and will return there hoping to earn a chance with an AHL club.
  • After spending two games with Slovakian club Nove Zamsky Mikron HC and scoring one goal, veteran forward Jay Dickman has decided to head back to North America. The forward signed a one-year deal with the ECHL’s Wichita Thunder, the team he spent the last two seasons with. Dickman, 29, scored 58 points in 65 games last season and should definitely help the Thunder’s offensive attack as they look to rebound after a difficult 2021-22 season.

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