Predators Have Shown Interest In Mitch Marner
The Maple Leafs haven’t yet given any indication of whether they’ll ask winger Mitch Marner to waive his no-move clause after another first-round playoff exit. However, that hasn’t stopped the Predators from indicating they’d be one of the teams calling if he hits the trade market, per David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period.
It would be quite a swing from Nashville general manager Barry Trotz as he enters his second offseason at the helm. The longtime coach knocked it out of the park in free agency last summer, landing first-line forwards Gustav Nyquist and Ryan O’Reilly for less than $5MM per season on two-year and four-year deals, respectively. Replacing John Hynes with Andrew Brunette behind the bench also worked out quite well – the latter is a Jack Adams Award finalist this year after guiding the Preds to a 99-point season, their most in five years.
Pagnotta recently posited a Marner for Juuse Saros swap with both star players entering the final season of their contracts, but it’s unclear whether Toronto has shown any interest in the 2022 Vezina Trophy finalist. Without any real indication that Maple Leafs GM Brad Treliving is even looking to move on from Marner, it’s impossible to tell for certain what he’d desire in return for his star playmaker.
The Leafs and Preds have been infrequent trade partners, only swapping minor-league or depth players a handful of times over the past few years. Their last major swap came near the 2015 trade deadline, with Toronto sending Cody Franson and Mike Santorelli to Nashville in exchange for Olli Jokinen, Brendan Leipsic and a 2015 first-round pick. The Leafs ended up trading down from that pick, 24th overall, which the Flyers happily used to select Travis Konecny. Then-co-interim GMs Kyle Dubas and Mark Hunter didn’t select any impact NHLers with the picks they acquired, although they did swap one of the picks acquired from Philly for a second-round choice they used to select serviceable defenseman, Travis Dermott.
Marner’s prospective trade value will be influenced by two factors: how many teams he’s willing to waive his no-move clause for (if at all) and if his camp is given permission to work on an extension with the acquiring club. He carries a $10.9MM cap hit next season as he enters the final year of the six-year, $65.4MM deal he signed weeks before the 2019-20 season got underway. Evolving Hockey projects Marner to land an eight-year extension with an $11.7MM cap hit should he sign soon after becoming eligible on July 1.
Toronto would be losing its most dynamic playmaker and one of its better penalty-killers should they move on from Marner, but they would free up considerable cap space to address their lack of puck-moving defensemen and inconsistency in goal. Any roster player they acquire in exchange for Marner is likely to cost a few million dollars less, allowing them to be more aggressive players on this summer’s free-agent market if they make a decision on trading him before the draft.
The Predators, meanwhile, would gain arguably the best player to suit up for them in franchise history outside of two years’ worth of past-his-prime Paul Kariya and 17 games’ worth of Peter Forsberg. Outside of their top line of O’Reilly, Nyquist and Filip Forsberg, center Thomas Novak was the only other Nashville forward to produce over half a point per game. Their top offensive threats are quickly aging, too, with O’Reilly and Nyquist well into their 30s. In a couple of years, a still sub-30 Marner could lead an incredibly deep core of wingers supplemented by Forsberg and top prospects Joakim Kemell and Matthew Wood.
Wild Announce Multiple Front Office Moves
The Wild have promoted Mat Sells, Michael Murray and Chris Kelleher to assistant general manager roles, GM Bill Guerin announced Wednesday. The team also promoted Matt Hendricks to GM of their AHL affiliate, the Iowa Wild.
The moves come after Guerin manned the Wild’s front office without a supplementary staff for most of the 2023-24 season. Director of team operations Andrew Heydt, who’d worked closely with various Wild GMs since assuming the role in 2014, mutually parted ways with the team in December after filing an internal complaint against Guerin alleging verbal abuse, The Athletic’s Michael Russo reported. An investigation concluded Guerin had not committed a firable offense and thus remained with the team, Russo said.
Kelleher’s promotion is the most notable. He’s been with the club for nearly two decades and will serve under Guerin as the director of player personnel for Team USA at the 2025 4 Nations Face-Off and the 2026 Winter Olympics. The 49-year-old joined the Wild full-time as a pro scout in 2009 and was eventually promoted to their director of professional scouting ahead of the 2019-10 campaign. He was again promoted to director of player personnel two summers ago, making this his third internal promotion in the past six years.
In his AGM role, Kelleher will maintain his scouting and personnel responsibilities. The team said he’ll also support Guerin more closely with trade deadline and free agency prep.
Sells will hold a more technical role, similar to his duties as Minnesota’s director of analytics for the past five seasons. According to the team, he’ll be responsible for “salary cap management, player contract research and negotiations, analytics and hockey strategy and Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) compliance.” Sells, who’s also served as their vice president of hockey strategy for the past three seasons, did not have NHL front-office experience before joining the Wild.
Murray previously served as Iowa’s GM and Minnesota’s director of hockey operations, the former of which is being immediately assumed by Hendricks. Like Sells, the Wild are Murray’s first NHL front-office home. The former Dartmouth College forward joined the Wild as a special assistant to the GM in 2020-21 before being named the GM of Iowa the following season. His AGM responsibilities will revolve around assisting Guerin with day-to-day transactions.
Hendricks steps into his first GM role just five years after wrapping up his 11-year, 607-game NHL career. The former Capitals and Oilers fourth-line fixture also had a brief stop with the Wild in his final season, posting two assists in 22 games there before being traded to the Jets and retiring in the summer of 2019. A Minnesota native, Hendricks returned to his home state in a front-office role immediately after retiring, now logging five years of service as their assistant director of player development under former Wild defenseman Brad Bombardir.
Jets To Explore Trading Nikolaj Ehlers
The Jets could find themselves with a much different-looking top-six forward group next season. They’re likely to make winger Nikolaj Ehlers available for trade in the weeks leading up to the 2024 NHL Draft in Las Vegas, The Athletic’s Murat Ates reports.
Ehlers, 28, has one year left on his contract at a $6MM cap hit. He can block a trade to 10 teams with his modified no-trade clause.
Signed to a seven-year, $42MM extension back in 2017, Ehlers has been a Winnipeg fixture for nearly a decade. The Danish winger has 201 goals and 457 points in 605 games since breaking into the league in 2015-16, good enough for sixth all-time in scoring in Jets/Thrashers franchise history. His career +92 rating is the franchise record.
Ehlers played in all 82 games this season, his first healthy season since the pandemic, but his 0.74 points per game were his lowest since the 2018-19 season. He was pushed down the lineup with offseason trade pickup Gabriel Vilardi making a home for himself on the top line alongside Mark Scheifele, and midseason acquisitions Sean Monahan and Tyler Toffoli reduced the amount of available ice time. As a result, Ehlers averaged under 16 minutes per game for the second straight season.
Despite the slight offensive decline, Ehlers remained a consistently positive possession force. His shot-attempt share at even strength has been above the Jets’ team average in all nine of his NHL seasons, including a 54.4 CF% mark this season (5.2% higher than Winnipeg’s CF% without Ehlers on the ice). He also posted a career-high +11.1 expected rating based on shot quality when he was on the ice.
In a supplementary article today, Ates listed the Hurricanes, Penguins, Red Wings, Sabres, Senators and NHL Utah as speculative trade matches. Working with someone on a sign-and-trade after July 1 would allow them to get a much better return – after all, Ehlers is slated for unrestricted free agency upon his current deal’s expiry in 2025, and there’s no guarantee he’d stay with a new team for more than one season.
One stat that may damage his value is his playoff performance. He’s made 37 postseason appearances across six campaigns but has only managed four goals and 14 points, half of his career regular-season points per game rate. His last playoff goal came in the first round of the 2021 playoffs against the Oilers. He was limited to two assists and a -4 rating in five games against the Avalanche in this year’s first-round elimination.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports.
Kris Letang, John Ludvig, Matt Nieto Undergo Surgeries
Three Penguins have gone under the knife in recent weeks, general manager Kyle Dubas announced Wednesday. Defenseman John Ludvig and winger Matt Nieto could miss the beginning of the 2024-25 season after undergoing successful extensor tendon and MCL surgeries, respectively. Star defenseman Kris Letang also underwent surgery to repair a fractured finger on his left hand on Friday but isn’t expected to miss out on any training camp action with an eight-week recovery timeline.
Ludvig had his left wrist surgery done back on April 24, the team said. His recovery window is four to six months, meaning he may be ready for training camp but could also miss the first few weeks of the regular season. Nieto will miss a more significant portion of next season, undergoing reconstructive MCL surgery on his left knee at the beginning of this month. He has a six-to-seven-month recovery timeline, putting his return to game action well into November or December 2024.
Today’s news offers some clarity into Dubas’ open-ended comments at his end-of-season media availability last month. The GM said Letang was searching for a second opinion on an undisclosed injury that he played through down the stretch, putting some speculative doubt into his availability at the beginning of next season.
A finger fracture falls firmly in the best-case scenario category for the 37-year-old, who should begin training camp ready to go as he enters Year 3 of his six-year, $36.6MM extension. He played in all 82 games last season for the second time in his 13-season NHL career, finishing just behind Erik Karlsson in Penguins defense scoring with 10 goals and 51 points.
Nieto is undergoing his second knee surgery in 2024. In January, he had laparoscopic surgery on his right knee, which was initially expected to sideline him for six to eight weeks but ended up costing him the rest of the season.
Dubas said last month that Nieto was also seeking a second opinion on whether surgery or rehab was required for his MCL injury. He obviously opted to go with the former. He sustained the initial right knee injury in late November, ending his 2023-24 season after just one goal and four points in 22 games. The 31-year-old inked a two-year, $1.8MM deal with Pittsburgh shortly after free agency opened last summer. Upon returning to the lineup next season, he likely won’t factor into anything more than a fourth-line role.
Ludvig’s rookie year was also stunted by injuries, namely a concussion sustained in his NHL debut that kept him out for nearly a month. After being claimed off waivers from the Panthers during training camp, the 23-year-old had three goals, five points and a -12 rating in 33 contests in a third-pairing role. He’s under contract next season at a $775K cap hit but will become eligible to sign an extension on July 1.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports.
Kraken Linked To Todd McLellan
Add Todd McLellan‘s name to the list of coaching candidates for the Kraken this summer. He and internal promotion options Dan Bylsma and Jay Leach are the current favorites to be named the franchise’s second head coach, Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman said on Wednesday’s “32 Thoughts” podcast.
McLellan is on the market after the Kings fired him midseason. He’s also been linked to the Maple Leafs’ coaching vacancy and is considered one of two finalists alongside ex-Blues coach Craig Berube.
Seattle fired Dave Hakstol late last month after he served behind the bench for the team’s first three NHL seasons. The Kraken signed Hakstol to a two-year extension last summer that was set to kick in for 2024-25 after winning their first-ever playoff series, but they fell back out of the postseason picture this year with a 34-35-15 record.
If he lands the role, McLellan will stay in the Pacific Division as he has for his entire head coaching career. Over three stops with the Sharks, Oilers and Kings, McLellan has accumulated a 598-412-134 record in 1,144 regular-season games, good for a .581 points percentage. He’s won just one playoff series since his days in San Jose, though, a first-round victory with Edmonton over the Sharks in 2017.
The Kraken can offer him a squad similar to what he had in Los Angeles. They don’t have the high-ceiling firepower of an Anže Kopitar, Kevin Fiala or Adrian Kempe, but they do have solid scoring depth spread out across all four lines and a largely stout defense group in front of sometimes dominant but inconsistent goaltending from year to year. Seattle hopes the younger Joey Daccord, who took over as their starter this season with a .916 SV% in 50 appearances, can erase that last statement.
McLellan did good work in L.A. to guide them out of a rebuild after coaching a contender in San Jose and failing to get Edmonton to the playoffs consistently in the early days of the Leon Draisaitl/Connor McDavid era. The Kings have finished third in the Pacific in all three seasons since the pandemic, although this year was aided by interim Jim Hiller taking over past the halfway point. He had L.A. off to a torrid start this season, posting a 16-4-3 record through their first 23 games, but a 4-8-6 skid between Christmas and the All-Star break cost him his job.
Leach, whose name has been bandied about for some other vacancies this summer, has been with the Kraken as an assistant since their inception. Bylsma, who won the Stanley Cup as a head coach with the Penguins in 2009, has been the head coach of AHL Coachella Valley since they began play in 2022-23, leading them to a 94-32-18 record in their first two seasons.
Jets Not Expected To Re-Sign Brenden Dillon
The Jets are expected to let defenseman Brenden Dillon reach unrestricted free agency in July, the Winnipeg Sun’s Scott Billeck reports Wednesday.
Dillon didn’t have any extension talks with Winnipeg in-season, per Billeck. He also hasn’t heard from the Jets front office since their season ended over two weeks ago at the hands of the Avalanche in a disappointing first-round loss. He didn’t play in the final two games of the series after sustaining a hand laceration after the end of Game 3.
The 33-year-old left-shot landed with Winnipeg via trade nearly three years ago. He signed a four-year, $15.6MM contract extension with the Capitals before the 2020-21 season after they picked him up from the Sharks at the prior season’s trade deadline, but lasted only one season in Washington before they flipped him to the Jets for a pair of second-round picks.
Dillon has consistently logged top-four minutes in Manitoba, averaging 19:04 per game over 238 appearances since the trade. He missed just eight games in his three-year tenure, mostly due to COVID and a three-game suspension this year.
That consistency and solid defensive work made him a reasonably valuable asset for general manager Kevin Cheveldayoff at his $3.9MM cap hit. Not only did he stay healthy, he was incredibly consistent season-to-season for Winnipeg, recording between 20 and 23 points every season with a combined +38 rating.
Dillon is perhaps coming off his best season in the NHL, posting career-highs in goals (8), plus/minus (+20) and hits (241). His topped-out physicality did result in more trips to the penalty box (92 PIMs, up from the 60-70 range the past few years). He also controlled a decent 47.4% of expected goals when on the ice at even strength, considering he saw the least advantageous usage of his career, starting nearly 60% of his in-zone shifts in the defensive end.
Since breaking into the league as an undrafted free-agent pickup by the Stars in 2011-12, he’s made 892 appearances for Dallas, San Jose, Washington and Winnipeg. He’s totaled 37 goals, 159 assists, 196 points and 858 PIMs in parts of 13 seasons.
He likely wouldn’t have cost much to re-sign. His age lowers his value, and while he’s still a solid top-four contributor, he doesn’t stand out among an otherwise deep class of UFA defensemen. Evolving Hockey projects he’ll land a two-year deal with a $2.975MM cap hit on the open market, nearly a $1MM decrease from his current cap hit.
That could indicate Cheveldayoff anticipates needing to shell out to keep Dylan DeMelo around. DeMelo, a right-shot, was half of Winnipeg’s top pairing this season alongside Josh Morrissey and had a career year in 2023-24, posting 31 points and a +46 rating while averaging 21 minutes per game for the first time in his nine NHL seasons. On a mid-term deal, he’d likely receive close to $5MM annually on the open market, which will eat up a solid chunk of their $13.35MM in available cap space next season. With a new deal needed for restricted free agent Cole Perfetti coming off his entry-level contract and extending trade-deadline pickup Sean Monahan likely a priority, there’s some viable reasoning for Winnipeg to let Dillon, its oldest pending UFA defenseman, head to market.
Ducks Make Multiple Front Office Moves
The Ducks will have a new face at the helm of their AHL affiliate in San Diego next season. Rick Paterson is being promoted to the role of AHL general manager after serving as Anaheim’s director of professional scouting on and off since 2005. Assistant general manager Rob DiMaio, who’d also managed San Diego since joining the club in 2022, won’t be back with the team next season for personal reasons.
While Paterson will replace DiMaio’s duties in San Diego, he isn’t taking over his AGM title under Ducks GM Pat Verbeek. That role is going to Mike Stapleton, who’s been with the Ducks as a scout since 2014 and served as their director of player personnel the last two seasons.
Part of their responsibilities in their new roles will be helping Verbeek and head coach Greg Cronin replace some vacancies on his bench. The Ducks also announced Tuesday that they’re not renewing the contracts of assistant coaches Newell Brown and Craig Johnson.
The promotion continues Paterson’s lengthy run of front office work. The 66-year-old played over 400 games for the Blackhawks in the 1980s, but his first off-ice work came with the Penguins immediately after retiring in 1988. He was an assistant coach during their back-to-back Stanley Cup wins in 1991 and 1992 before being reassigned to their minor league affiliate, the IHL’s Cleveland Lumberjacks, in 1993. Paterson served as their head coach for four seasons before heading to the Lightning.
As he’s been in Anaheim, Paterson was a jack of all trades for the Bolts from 1997 to 2005. He began as an assistant coach, briefly serving as interim head coach in 1998, before transitioning to a scouting role in 1999. He got his third Stanley Cup ring in Tampa in 2004 as their director of professional scouting and landed his fourth and most recent with the Ducks in 2007.
Stapleton is much newer to the front office game, landing his first off-ice role in junior hockey as an assistant coach of the NAHL’s Traverse City North Stars in 2005. His 697-game NHL career ended after the 2000-01 season, but he played a few seasons in Europe before hanging up the skates in 2004. He bounced around other coaching roles in the OHL and AHL before landing with the Ducks as a pro scout.
DiMaio exits as AGM after only two seasons in SoCal, a role he got after 14 seasons with the Blues as a scout and, later, their director of player personnel.
Brown, 62, ends his third stint with the Ducks after three seasons. He was an assistant coach under Randy Carlyle when Anaheim won their Stanley Cup in ’07, part of his second tenure with the club that spanned from 2005-06 to 2009-10. His first chance in Anaheim was a two-year run as an assistant in 1998-99 and 1999-00, his second NHL job after serving on the Blackhawks’ bench for two seasons prior. He’s also spent time with the Blue Jackets, Canucks and Coyotes, all in assistant coaching roles. If he doesn’t land a role on an NHL bench next season, it’ll be his first year out of the league since 1995-96.
Johnson joined the Ducks a year after Brown, only serving as an assistant the last two seasons. He’d been an assistant coach with the AHL’s Ontario Reign, the primary affiliate of the Kings, for two seasons before heading down the freeway to Anaheim. Brent Thompson, who only joined the Ducks last summer, is the only returning assistant next season.
Offseason Checklist: Calgary Flames
The offseason has arrived for three-quarters of the NHL for teams that either missed the playoffs or were eliminated in the first round. Accordingly, it’s now time to examine what they will need to accomplish over the coming months. Next up is a look at Calgary.
Gone are the inconsistent yet high-ceiling Flames teams led by Johnny Gaudreau. After another underwhelming campaign, this time under first-year head coach Ryan Huska, Calgary failed to make the postseason in back-to-back years since 2013 and 2014. With rookie general manager Craig Conroy entering his second season at the helm, he has some work to do to continue his aggressive retooling of the club over the past few months and steer them back toward playoff contention in the coming years.
Make A Goaltending Decision
Is Dustin Wolf ready?
That’s likely the question that makes Conroy lose the most sleep this summer. His star goaltending prospect’s ascension from being selected 214th overall in 2019 is well-documented. After three incredible seasons with AHL Stockton and Calgary, compiling a 2.29 GAA, .926 SV% and 11 shutouts in 141 appearances, it’s clear the California native is ready for a longer look.
He got a longer look this year, though, and failed to truly confirm he’s ready for NHL duties. His numbers, while better than the older Daniel Vladař‘s, were unimpressive, posting a .893 SV% in 15 starts and two relief appearances. It wasn’t due to poor team defense, either – his -10.1 goals saved above expected were nearly on par with Vladař’s -12.5, per MoneyPuck.
While he’s likely suited for a backup role, especially if Vladař is his only competition, that’s likely not the question Conroy grapples with. Starter Jacob Markström nearly ended up with the Devils at this year’s trade deadline in a rather public saga that involved him waiving his no-move clause only for a deal not to get done. The Devils, who didn’t make any longer-term moves to shore up their crease, will likely re-engage this summer. Even if it’s not New Jersey, Markström could still waive his NMC for someone else after expressing frustration with the way things played out prior to the deadline.
That would leave Wolf and Vladař, the latter of whom will be an unrestricted free agent in 2025, as the Flames’ goaltending tandem next season unless a goalie is added in return for Markström. It’s hard to imagine Wolf not getting the majority of the starts in that scenario, especially after Vladař’s poor showing this season, something Calgary should be cautious of rushing him into.
Solve The Huberdeau Enigma
A constant of the last two seasons in Calgary has been highly underwhelming play from winger Jonathan Huberdeau. After being acquired from the Panthers in the Matthew Tkachuk trade and signed to an eight-year, $84MM extension that kicked in this season, the NHL’s assist leader just two years ago has managed just 27 goals, 80 assists and 107 points in 160 games as a Flame. In his final season in Florida, the Canadian winger lit up the league with 85 assists and 115 points in just 80 games.
The dropoff has confused many. Most of his underlying metrics haven’t changed to explain the lack of production. A coaching change from Darryl Sutter in 2022-23 to Huska this season did nothing.
An NHL team is just that – a team, not an individual player. But at such a steep cap hit of $10.5MM through the end of the decade with a no-move clause, it’s worth having an organizational discussion about how Huska can implement systems that help Huberdeau get back to the point-per-game plateau. Whether it’s solely a systems change that unlocks Huberdeau or if Calgary makes some coaching staff alterations or targeted player acquisitions remains to be seen, but if they want to get back to playoff contention in the next few seasons, they simply need more out of him.
Reconstruct The Defense
Calgary got rid of half their blue-line regulars via trade this season, unloading Noah Hanifin, Chris Tanev and Nikita Zadorov for a considerable combined haul. All were on expiring contracts.
While Conroy’s work was solid, making the trades was only half the battle. With depth defenders Dennis Gilbert, Oliver Kylington and Jordan Oesterle needing new contracts to avoid unrestricted free agency in July, he has some decisions to make about how much money he wants to invest in reshaping the Flames’ blue line next year.
Daniil Miromanov looked good after being picked up from the Golden Knights in the Hanifin deal, posting seven points in 20 games down the stretch as he logged over 21 minutes per game. He’s penciled in to replace one of the departed defenders, joining Rasmus Andersson and MacKenzie Weegar. That leaves Joel Hanley, Nikita Okhotyuk, Brayden Pachal, Ilya Solovyov, and any UFAs they choose to re-sign to compete for around four spots. It’s not the most inspiring group. Is it smart to make a play for a big name in free agency this summer? There is no shortage of intriguing names.
Don’t Strike Out On Draft Day
The Flames have done just okay in the past few seasons to acquire some high-ceiling talent without having top-10 picks, namely 2021 first-rounder Matthew Coronato. However, they’ll have a much better chance of landing a true impact prospect late next month, holding the ninth overall pick at the 2024 draft in Vegas.
If Kelowna Rockets winger Tij Iginla is still available, he’ll almost certainly be a Flame. The son of all-time Flames great Jarome, who’s now back with the team in a front-office role, is tabbed to go somewhere between sixth and 15th overall by most public rankings but is likely to go near the higher end of that range with nine goals in 11 WHL playoff games. He may not be available by the time Calgary picks.
A backup plan should involve a high-ceiling pick, either at forward or defense. Calgary’s prospect pool is fine – a number of names there likely have NHL futures – but it lacks any true blue-chip players outside of Coronato, who lit up the AHL for more than a point per game in his first professional season.
Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.
Jets Expected To Interview Craig Berube
The Jets are now the fourth team to display interest in Craig Berube for their head coaching vacancy this offseason. He’s set to interview virtually with the team today, Daily Faceoff’s Frank Seravalli reports.
All indications point toward Berube heading north of the border, with the Jets and Maple Leafs as the finalists for his services. He and Todd McLellan are the reported finalists to replace Sheldon Keefe in Toronto, while associate coach Scott Arniel, per Seravalli, is a candidate for an internal promotion in Winnipeg after Rick Bowness announced his retirement earlier this month.
Berube’s other documented suitors have been the Devils and Senators, the latter of whom already filled their vacancy by signing Travis Green to a four-year deal. Meanwhile, New Jersey has reportedly tabbed Keefe and former Oilers head coach Jay Woodcroft as their preferred options behind the bench.
Hiring Berube would make him the Jets’ third permanent head coach since 2014. Paul Maurice held the role over parts of nine seasons before resigning in 2021. Then-assistant Dave Lowry, now with the Kraken, stepped in for Maurice for the remainder of the 2021-22 season before the team hired Bowness the following offseason.
If it wasn’t already, it’s clear the 2019 Stanley Cup champion is the highest-valued coaching candidate on the market. He was fired by the Blues early in the 2023-24 season after posting a 13-14-1 record, ending his tenure in St. Louis with a 206-132-44 record in 382 games across parts of six seasons. Before St. Louis, his only previous head coaching experience had come in a two-year stint with the Flyers, posting a 75-58-28 record across the 2013-14 and 2014-15 seasons.
Blue Jackets Considering Marc Bergevin For General Manager Vacancy
Former Canadiens general manager Marc Bergevin is on the Blue Jackets’ radar in their search for a new general manager, according to The Fourth Period’s Dennis Bernstein.
Bergevin, 58, has been in NHL front offices for nearly two decades after ending his 1,191-game NHL career in 2004. After spending seven years with the Blackhawks in scouting, coaching and front-office roles, he was tabbed as the GM and executive vice president of hockey operations of the Canadiens ahead of the 2012-13 campaign.
He spent over nine seasons with Montreal, presiding over one of the most unexpected Stanley Cup Final appearances in recent memory in 2021. The wheels came off the Canadiens immediately, though, and he was fired in late November 2021 after a 6-15-2 start to the following campaign. Head coach Dominique Ducharme followed suit, paving the way for Martin St. Louis to land his first role as an NHL head coach.
In the last few months of his tenure with Montreal, Bergevin was criticized heavily for his decision to draft defenseman Logan Mailloux with the team’s 2021 first-round pick. Mailloux had played in Sweden during his draft year due to the Ontario Hockey League suspending operations during the COVID-19 pandemic. During that time, he was charged with defamation and criminal photography for “sending explicit pictures of a sexual act without the consent of his partner.”
Mailloux stated before the 2021 draft that he didn’t want to be selected, wanting to focus on personal growth. Without a formal NHL draft renunciation process in place, though, the Canadiens selected him anyway. The NHL initially barred Mailloux from playing in the league after being drafted, but the ban was lifted before this season after a meeting with league commissioner Gary Bettman. He spent most of the season on assignment to AHL Laval but made his NHL debut in Montreal’s final game.
Many of Bergevin’s biggest signings as Canadiens GM regarding total value haven’t panned out. The largest of them all, Carey Price‘s eight-year, $84MM extension signed in 2017, was worth it for his two electric playoff appearances in 2020 and 2021, but through no fault of Bergevin’s remains on Montreal’s books longer than they’d like with him unable to play again due to knee injuries. Two deals signed less than a week apart in 2020 – a six-year, $39MM deal for Brendan Gallagher and a seven-year, $38.5MM deal for Josh Anderson – have saddled current Canadiens GM Kent Hughes with some pricey cap hits for injury-prone players that have struggled to meet expectations since signing.
Since being fired by the Habs, Bergevin has worked with the Kings as a senior advisor to GM Rob Blake.
Columbus remains on the hunt for a GM after firing longtime manager Jarmo Kekäläinen in February. He also drew recent criticism for his offseason hiring of Mike Babcock as head coach, who’d been criticized multiple times by his former players for improper treatment and alleged verbal abuse since being fired by the Maple Leafs in 2019. Babcock never coached a game for Columbus, resigning as head coach at the beginning of training camp after the NHL and NHLPA opened an investigation into further allegations of improper behavior.
There haven’t been any other known candidates for the Blue Jackets’ GM vacancy. The search is being led by interim GM and president of hockey operations John Davidson.