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If Moved, Marchessault Would Prefer To Remain In No-Tax State

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While there has been some speculation that Predators winger Jonathan Marchessault might be open to a trade after an underwhelming first year with Nashville, Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman suggests it might not be quite that simple.  In the latest 32 Thoughts podcast (audio link), he relayed that the list of teams Marchessault might actually be willing to go to is rather small.  Having played exclusively in no-tax states, there’s a sense that Marchessault would prefer not to take a big hit to his bottom line in pay with a move while preferring to go to a legitimate contender, a combination that not a lot of teams can offer.  That said, Marchessault can only control things to a certain point as he only has a 15-team no-trade clause in his deal, one that has four years remaining on it at a $5.5MM cap charge.

  • The Predators have signed AHL head coach Karl Taylor to a contract extension, reports David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period (Twitter link). Taylor helped lead Milwaukee to the Central Division regular season title for the second straight year and a top-two finish for the fourth straight season so the extension should come as little surprise.  Taylor has been running Nashville’s farm team for the last seven seasons and has not yet had a chance to work at the NHL level.

Marchessault Open To Trade? Ylonen Officially Signs In Sweden

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Jonathan Marchessault’s first season in Nashville didn’t exactly go as planned.  Like many Predators who underachieved, his offensive numbers dipped, with his goal total being cut in half from 42 to 21 while his 56 points were his lowest since the pandemic-shortened 2020-21 campaign.  With things not going well this year, Daily Faceoff’s Frank Seravalli reports that the belief is that the 34-year-old is open to moving on.  He’d be an intriguing addition for teams looking to add some firepower up front but the fact he has four years left on his contract (even at a reasonable $5.5MM price tag) could scare some suitors off, while Marchessault can also partially control his fate with a 15-team no-trade clause.

  • As expected, Predators pending RFA Jesse Ylonen has officially signed with SHL Djurgarden, per a team release. He was linked to landing a deal in Sweden last week.  The 25-year-old was on Montreal’s roster full-time last season but he played exclusively in the minors this year, splitting time between farm teams in Tampa Bay and Nashville.  Between the two squads, Ylonen put 12 goals and 23 assists in 66 games.  Ylonen has two years of team control remaining but with arbitration eligibility.  Considering the term of this agreement is two years, the likeliest outcome is that the Preds simply non-tender Ylonen next month.

Fedor Svechkov Enjoying AHL Playoff Run

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  • In an interview with Dave Kallmann of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Nashville Predators prospect Fedor Svechkov spoke about transitioning back to AHL hockey for the Milwaukee Admirals’ pursuit of the Calder Cup. Svechkov, the team’s first-line center, is second on Milwaukee in postseason scoring with two goals and five points in five games. When pressed on re-joining the Admirals roster, Svechkov said, “It was so easy because I knew almost all the guys, and I’ve been here last year, start of this year, and I know the coaches, know all the stuff. And it was pretty easy, like I just came back to my family.“

    [SOURCE LINK]

Viktor Norringer Makes College Commitment

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  • Predators prospect Viktor Norringer has decided where he’ll play college hockey as he announced on his Instagram page that he has made a verbal commitment to Boston University. The 18-year-old was a fourth-round pick last year, going 127th overall.  Norringer had a dominant showing in Frolunda’s junior system this season, tallying 24 goals and 33 assists in just 39 games.  It’s expected that Norringer will debut at BU in 2026-27 so for next season, he could remain at home or look to play in the USHL.

Predators Want To Select One Or Two Goaltenders In Draft

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  • Passing along a statement from their Director of Scouting, Alex Daugherty of The Tennessean, reiterated that the Nashville Predators want to select one or two goaltenders during this summer’s draft. The news is surprising, given that Nashville relatively recently extended starting netminder Juuse Saros to an eight-year extension and traded heir-apparent Yaroslav Askarov to the San Jose Sharks. Although some netminders could be taken in the first round, any of them would be a reach for the Predators with the fifth overall selection.

    [SOURCE LINK]

Predators Retaining Andrew Brunette

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Don’t add the Predators to the list of teams making a coaching change this offseason. General manager Barry Trotz told reporters today, including Alex Daugherty of the Tennessean, that head coach Andrew Brunette will be back behind the bench for a third season in 2025-26.

This was the default and expected outcome. Pierre LeBrun of TSN and The Athletic reported back in March that Brunette is under contract with Nashville through 2026-27 plus an additional option year, and that a change likely would have been made midseason if one was happening.

A runner-up for the Jack Adams Award for Coach of the Year in his first two seasons as a head man, the wheels came off for Brunette and the Predators in 2024-25. While the longtime NHL winger guided the Panthers to a Presidents’ Trophy in 2022 as their interim head coach and then helped Nashville to a 47-win season last year, Brunette’s Preds had the third-worst record in the league and the second-worst record in franchise history this year.

The regression was also against the expectations Trotz set for this year with his gargantuan spending spree in free agency last offseason. But the two have a long-standing relationship dating back to Brunette’s playing days under Trotz as a coach in the mid-1990s with the Predators and the AHL’s Portland Pirates, and the latter made a long-term commitment when he brought him in as Nashville’s head coach a year ago.

Trotz’s overall vision for the club hasn’t wavered despite the team’s plunging record, something he made clear today during his media availability. He’ll continue trying to retool the roster via trades to push Nashville back into wild-card contention next season, although expect free agency to be quiet (via the team’s Brooks Bratten). It would make sense that his original pick for coach, when he assumed his GM post, would be given the benefit of the doubt in that case.

Predators’ Barry Trotz Needs To Have A Much Better Summer

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Nashville Predators general manager Barry Trotz had an illustrious career behind the bench as a head coach, winning a Stanley Cup in 2018 with the Washington Capitals and accumulating many other accolades. He was also the first and longest-tenured coach in the Predators’ history.

But his short time in Nashville as a GM has been eventful, to say the least. Trotz had orchestrated a significant roster turnover that resulted in one of the worst teams in the NHL this season, despite major free agent signings less than a year ago. Given all that has gone on and the direction of the Predators, it is fair to wonder if he is on the hot seat.

Trotz started his reign in Nashville by moving out considerable salaries in Matt Duchene and Ryan Johansen, who both made $8MM annually on long-term deals signed by the previous management regime led by longtime GM David Poile. Johansen was traded to Colorado, with Nashville retaining half of his cap hit ($4MM) while Duchene was bought out, resulting in a cap charge for the next season of $6.55MM.

Trotz used the cap space to retool his roster in the summer of 2023, signing Ryan O’Reilly to a four-year deal worth $18MM and inking Gustav Nyquist and Luke Schenn to multi-year deals in free agency. The initial results were solid as the Predators made the playoffs in Trotz’s first year at the helm and were bounced in the first round. Overall, it was a good albeit unspectacular first year of work as a GM for Trotz, but that is where things began to go off the rails.

If you looked strictly at the trades Nashville made with the Pittsburgh Penguins over the past year, it would be enough to question the Predators’ direction. But there were signings and moves outside those that have already aged poorly, which may hurt the team for years. Trotz traded Cody Glass to the Penguins last August, along with a third and sixth-round draft pick, for Jordan Frasca, a prospect who might not even be an AHLer at this point.

The move was a salary dump after the Predators’ shopping spree on July 1 that saw them sign Steven Stamkos, Brady Skjei and Jonathan Marchessault to lucrative long-term deals. Glass was owed one more year on his contract at $2.5MM. The Penguins were happy to take that on and flipped him at the NHL Trade Deadline to New Jersey for another third-round pick and two prospects. The trade tree must make one wonder what exactly Trotz thought last August.

Of course, the Philip Tomasino trade to Pittsburgh for a fourth-round pick looks like a massive win for the Penguins. Tomasino didn’t light up the score sheet, but he seems like a solid top-nine piece for the Penguins’ retool. The 23-year-old was the Predators’ 2019 first-round pick (24th overall) and had a terrific rookie season in Nashville, posting 11 goals and 21 assists in 76 games in 2021-22. However, after two uneven seasons, Trotz opted to move on and sent Tomasino to the Penguins. After arriving in Pittsburgh, the Mississauga, Ontario native tallied 11 goals and 12 assists in 50 games. He doesn’t look like a superstar, but he should be a promising young player for the Pens.

Finally, there is the trade deadline acquisition of Michael Bunting from Pittsburgh. The Predators moved Thomas Novak and Luke Schenn for Bunting and a fourth-round pick. The trade was puzzling at first, but then a day later, Pittsburgh flipped Schenn out for a second and fourth-round pick, and it became clear what their motive was. They added a younger (possibly more effective) player in Novak and a second-round pick, which was icing on the cake.

These trades with Pittsburgh show Trotz’s inexperience as a GM and indicate he should probably block Kyle Dubas’ phone number before this summer. The player evaluation from the Nashville side has got to be troublesome for fans as they struggle to comprehend that series of moves. But that wasn’t all that went wrong in Trotz’s second year on the job.

The aforementioned free agent spending spree on July 1, 2024, made a lot of waves around the NHL. Nashville handed Stamkos a four-year deal for $8MM per season, Skjei got $7MM annually on a seven-year contract, and Marchessault received a $5.5MM AAV for five seasons. None of those moves in a vacuum were terrible signings, although paying three players on the wrong side of 30 a total of $20.5MM annually is hard to digest. The thought process made sense, given that Nashville has a lot of draft pick capital, but the free agent signings failed to gel in Nashville, and the result was one of the worst seasons in franchise history.

Trotz hasn’t been without his solid moves. He hasn’t been afraid to undo prior mistakes or move on from players he’s acquired if they aren’t working in Nashville. That ability to adjust on the fly and course correct will come in handy and could be the tool that helps Trotz pivot if next season goes off the rails like last year did.

Now, much of Trotz’s future will depend on the upcoming season. If Stamkos, Skjei and Marchessault can find their respective games and lead Nashville back to contention, all will be forgotten, and Trotz will continue as Predators GM. Still, if they have a year like the previous one, and Trotz makes moves similar to the transactions over the last 12 months, Nashville may have to pivot and reimagine their roster under new management.

Photo by Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODAY Sports

Predators Sign Oasiz Wiesblatt To AHL Contract

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  • The AHL’s Milwaukee Admirals, affiliated with the NHL’s Nashville Predators, have inked a forward to a rare three-year AHL contract beginning in the 2025-26 AHL season. Oasiz Wiesblatt, brother of Ozzy Wiesblatt, is joining the club from the WHL’s Medicine Hat Tigers. The younger Wiesblatt recently finished his fourth full major junior season as captain of the Tigers, scoring 36 goals and 103 points in 66 games.

    [SOURCE LINK]

Offseason Checklist: Nashville Predators

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The offseason has arrived for half of the league’s teams that aren’t taking part in the playoffs.  Accordingly, it’s now time to examine what they will need to accomplish over the coming months.  Next up is a look at Nashville.

After a strong showing in the second half last season to make the playoffs, Predators GM Barry Trotz was a big spender in free agency, handing out long-term deals to forwards Steven Stamkos and Jonathan Marchessault along with blueliner Brady Skjei.  Accordingly, expectations were quite high heading into 2024-25.  Instead, the team struggled mightily, becoming one of the worst teams in the NHL.  As a result, it could be a busy summer for Nashville once again.

Add Scoring Help

For a team that added two quality offensive threats in Stamkos and Marchessault that’s run by a coach whose teams were pretty high scoring in his two years behind a bench, offense was not supposed to be a problem for the Predators this season.  Instead, they went from being in the top ten in goals scored in 2023-24 to finishing second-last league-wide in that department with a drop-off in tallies of 44 or more than half a goal per game.

Assuming that Andrew Brunette is back behind the bench next season, he’ll be tasked with trying to turn things around on that front.  Objectively, there’s cause for optimism that some of the veterans should be poised to rebound; can they all have down years a second year in a row or will at least some of them bounce back?

But relying on internal improvement probably isn’t going to be enough to turn their fortunes around.  They’re going to have to look outside the organization to add someone.  More specifically, they need to add an impact center.

Ryan O’Reilly had a decent season overall but he certainly is not a true number one center.  They hoped that Thomas Novak would take on a bigger part of the scoring load.  Instead, he struggled and was shipped to Pittsburgh with Michael Bunting coming the other way.  A full season with Bunting will help offensively but the move further exacerbated how weak the center spot is.  Fedor Svechkov has some potential and could help in that regard down the road but counting on him to be a full-time top-six middleman next season would be asking for a lot.

It’s something that’s generally much easier said than done given that many other teams will be looking to add an impact center this summer, either through trade or free agency.  But the Predators certainly need to do just that unless they’re convinced that Stamkos can be a full-time middleman moving forward after spending considerable time on the wing the last two seasons.

Bring In An Impact Defenseman

When you think about the rosters the Predators have had over the years, they’ve been fortunate to have a steady supply of high-quality blueliners.  They had enough of them that they were able to move some out to fill other holes on the roster.  Unfortunately for them, that is no longer the case.

Roman Josi remains the mainstay on the back end and while he’s coming off a down year offensively like many others, he has three years left on his contract and there’s little reason to think he’s going anywhere.  Skjei had some ups and downs in his first year with Nashville but he is certainly a legitimate top-four defenseman and will be around for the long haul as he’s signed through 2031.  That’s a good start defensively.

The problem is that things go downhill from there.  Alexandre Carrier was a top-four regular but was moved to Montreal for Justin Barron, a youngster who has shown flashes of top-four skill but his consistency has been an issue.  Jeremy Lauzon was hurt for most of the year and is probably best suited for the third pairing.  Adam Wilsby and Nick Blankenburg showed some flashes but neither is a lock to be a top-four guy down the road while Marc Del Gaizo, Spencer Stastney, Jordan Oesterle, and Andreas Englund are more depth pieces.

Is it possible that one player from that group can emerge as a legitimate top-four down the road?  Sure.  But even if that happens, they’re still missing one impact blueliner at a minimum.  Long-term, prospects Tanner Molendyk and Ryan Ufko have shown some upside but they’re probably not NHL-ready yet; Molendyk has yet to play professionally.  There is a real need to add at least one top-four piece this summer.

It’s worth noting that Nashville is well-positioned to try to add impact players in the coming months.  They have over $17MM in cap room, per PuckPedia, giving them ample space to try to add multiple impact players for the second straight year.  They also have three first-round picks at their disposal and while they could use all three to really bolster their future depth, at least one of those could be dangled to add a key blueliner or fill the opening down the middle.

Re-Sign Evangelista

Almost all of Nashville’s roster is already under contract for next season, making their list of free agents about as small as can be.  A pair of depth players (Del Gaizo and Jakub Vrana) are pending UFAs while there’s only one full-timer who is slated to become a restricted free agent, winger Luke Evangelista.

The 23-year-old’s entry-level contract is coming to an end and it’s fair to say that Nashville got strong value on it with a cap hit just below $800K.  His first full season was in 2023-24 when he had 16 goals and 23 assists in 80 games and followed that up with 10 tallies and 22 helpers in 68 outings this season while logging a little under 14 minutes per game in both years.  In terms of secondary production from the middle six, he did relatively well all things considered.

Evangelista has four RFA-eligible seasons remaining which gives Trotz some options.  Given that he’s more of a role player at this point, a long-term contract seems unlikely although considering Nashville gave Colton Sissons a seven-year deal while being a role player, it can’t entirely be ruled out either.  More likely is that Trotz opts for a bridge contract between one and three years, ensuring he’ll still be a restricted free agent at its expiry where they could then determine if the time is right to sign him long-term.  With how he fared over his first couple of seasons, a two-year deal could land around $2.25MM while a three-year pact could run closer to $2.6MM with the extra year being an arbitration-eligible year.

Make Some Room

This was a stated goal by Trotz as the season went on and we saw the idea of it in the Carrier-for-Barron swap although they also gave up on Juuso Parssinen and Philip Tomasino.  It runs counterintuitive to the idea of adding impact veterans but both things can be done this summer.

Up front, Svechkov is ready for full-time duty after spending some time with AHL Milwaukee.  Matthew Wood showed some promise in a late-season stint and has the size and physicality to play the gritty game they’re looking for from their bottom six.  Ozzy Wiesblatt had a solid year with the Admirals and could be ready to make the jump as well.  If they want more offense, Joakim Kemell could get into the mix.  To make room, someone like Michael McCarron could be expendable while Sissons will be entering the final year of his deal and should have some trade interest from teams looking to add to their bottom six.  One or two moves like that would allow for a youngster or two to stick will still leaving room to add either via the trade market or free agency.

On the back end, there’s some work that needs to be done to open up a spot for an impact addition at a minimum, more if Ufko or Molendyk make a push for a top-six spot.  Beyond Josi and Skjei, Wilsby is the only other one signed beyond next season so there is some flexibility on that front.  Englund and Oesterle have been on waivers multiple times before and could land there or they could look to flip one for a late-round pick if there’s enough trade interest.  They’ve compiled some depth when it comes to depth defenders but some of that needs to be cashed in if they want to make room for upgrades.

Photo courtesy of Steve Roberts-Imagn Images.

Bridgestone Arena Announces Major Renovations

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  • Bridgestone Arena, home of the Nashville Predators, is getting a major makeover (Article Link). The arena announced a $1B renovation set to take place over the next 15 to 20 years that “aims to increase seating capacity, introduce new seating options, and create various fan communal areas.” The project will begin after the 2026-27 NHL season and will start with replacing the outer concrete of the building with glass walls facing Broadway.

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