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Maple Leafs Sign Max Pacioretty To PTO

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The Maple Leafs have signed unrestricted free agent winger Max Pacioretty to a professional tryout, the team announced Wednesday.

It’s far from unexpected. David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period reported the Leafs were in discussions to sign Pacioretty late last month, and Darren Dreger of TSN said yesterday that coming to an agreement with Pacioretty was one of Toronto’s top priorities after resolving a stalemate with restricted free agent forward Nicholas Robertson.

Most expected Pacioretty’s eventual agreement with the Leafs to be a guaranteed contract instead of a PTO, but with Toronto tight to the salary cap, it’ll take some time to work out – likely into training camp. Pacioretty inking a PTO likely indicates he has a deal in place that will be signed once the Maple Leafs have the financial flexibility to do, a sentiment echoed by Chris Johnston of The Athletic and TSN. His agent, Octagon’s Allan Walsh, confirms this.

Pacioretty, 36 in November, will compete to land a job in the Leafs’ top nine as a depth scorer with loads of NHL experience – 902 games, to be exact. After recovering from a pair of Achilles tendon tears, Pacioretty struggled to reclaim his pre-injury form with just four goals in 47 games after working his way back to a regular NHL role with the Capitals last season.

But the 2007 first-round pick of the Canadiens is no stranger to bouncing back from serious injuries. Pacioretty won the Masterton Trophy in 2012 with Montreal, emerging as a top-line scoring threat that year after a C4 vertebrae fracture and Grade 2 concussion sustained on a hit from then-Bruins defenseman Zdeno Chára the year prior nearly ended his career.

Even as the dreaded aging curve declines his overall effectiveness, there’s a reasonable expectation for him to return to at least being a double-digit goal contributor in Toronto if he stays healthy. The Connecticut native shot just 4.2% last season, the second-worst in the league among forwards with at least 90 shots on goal. That’s an incredulous stat from a six-time 30-goal scorer with a career average shooting percentage north of 11%.

Given his age, Pacioretty is eligible to sign a bonus-laden 35+ contract. That will allow the Maple Leafs to keep his initial cap hit low, likely the league minimum $775K, while allowing him to earn more cash if he stays healthy and becomes a regular contributor. Any performance bonuses he earns that Toronto can’t fit under the cap will be applied to next season’s books as a bonus overage penalty.

Pacioretty is likely set to fill the role that Robertson did last season. After inking a one-year, $875K deal yesterday, Robertson is still on the trade block following his late June request. If the Leafs find a trade partner before opening night, Pacioretty and Bobby McMann will likely compete for left-wing duties on the second line with John Tavares and William Nylander, with the other dropping to third-line minutes.

Pacioretty has 330 goals and 668 points over his 16-year career, averaging 30 goals and 61 points per 82 games. Those are high benchmarks for an aging veteran who’s played just 91 games over the past three seasons, but a healthy season could at least result in ’Patches’ hovering around the 15-goal, 30-point territory.

League Notes: Deferred Compensation, Expansion, LTIR, Neck Guards, And More

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NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly sat with reporters yesterday as part of the NHL’s ongoing media tour in Vegas, including Michael Russo of The Athletic, answering various administrative-type questions.

Given its usage in a pair of max-term extensions handed out by the Hurricanes this summer, deferred compensation was a popular topic of discussion. It’s likely to be a topic of discussion during upcoming Collective Bargaining Agreement talks due to a “long-term big-picture fear” of teams being able to use deferred compensation for cap circumvention purposes, Daly said. But in the interim, it’s not a notable concern because of specific interpretations of the CBA the league shared with the Hurricanes and the NHLPA earlier this summer, ones he thinks “will continue to be binding until we renegotiate over it.”

Daly admitted deferred compensation, in general, isn’t something the league is in favor of, saying, “It throws out of whack some of the other checks and balances we have in the CBA, which forces interpretations in terms of how we allow it and what’s permissible and what’s not permissible.” He continued, saying, “The original deferred-comp rules were developed in a non-cap world as opposed to in the cap world, so they kind of were inherited, and so they probably need adjustment on some basis going forward.”

There’s plenty more from Daly and Russo:

  • When asked about expansion, Daly continued the NHL’s recent public position that the expansion process isn’t active. He did, however, hint that expansion south of the border will be a priority when talks do start up again in earnest. “We’re at 22 U.S. markets when the other professional sports leagues are basically at 30, 31 markets,” Daly said. “So that means there’s market availability, which I think helps.” Daly also said the league doesn’t have an “imminent” concern about talent dilution with a growing base of teams.
  • Daly said that most of the league’s general managers want the league to consider making “some kind of adjustment” to teams utilizing long-term injured reserve to carry playoff rosters that come in well above the regular-season salary cap. “Some of the [ways to address it] that have been kind of thrown around in the media wouldn’t necessarily be fair or the best way to approach it, I think, because of the way we do accrual accounting. So you can pick up an expensive contract at the end of its term and your cap only gets charged a certain amount. But all of a sudden if that $1MM, say, you assume becomes $5MM on Game 1 of the playoffs and you can’t play that player as a result, I’m not sure that’s a fair result because teams complied within the rules.“
  • Daly also hopes that neck guards will become mandatory in the NHL “on some basis” soon, following the lead of other North American junior and minor leagues in the wake of former NHLer Adam Johnson’s death from a skate laceration to the neck while playing in England last year. He said the league had already proposed a mandatory rule not approved by the NHLPA. Still, he added the league “clearly understand[s] where the union is coming from and some of the difficulties they have with their constituents.”
  • The league has yet to sign off on the final documents confirming their players’ participation in the 2026 Winter Olympics but expects to do so during the Global Series games between the Devils and the Sabres in Czechia next month. “Certainly, from the NHL’s perspective, I don’t see any real gating issues from finalizing those documents,” Daly said.

Flames Promote Kerry Huffman To Director Of Hockey Strategy

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The Calgary Flames are still making the final tweaks to their staff, including promoting NHL veteran Kerry Huffman to the position of Director Of Hockey Strategy, per Tony Androckitis of TheAHL.com. Androckitis adds that Huffman will also continue as a pro scout for Calgary – a role he took on last season.

Huffman has deep roots in North American pros, leading a career that’s taken him through a playing career, coaching career, and now a scouting career. It all kicked off when Huffman was selected 20th-overall in the 1986 NHL Draft by the Philadelphia Flyers, following a stout season with the OHL’s Guelph Storm. He’d make his AHL and NHL debuts in the following season, though 1987-88 marked his formal rookie season, with Huffman managing 23 points in 52 games. That performance was enough to settle Huffman into a second-pairing role that he’d continue in through 1992. He built a strong reputation as a stout, two-way defender, capable of joining the offense or throwing around the body – factors that made him a core piece of the infamous trade that sent Eric Lindros to Philadelphia, and Huffman, Peter Forsberg, Mike Ricci, Ron Hextall, and more to the Quebec Nordiques.

Huffman’s reliability continued through two seasons in Quebec, though he’d go on to play parts of three seasons with the Ottawa Senators – and make a four-game reunion in Philadelphia – before finishing his career with three seasons in the IHL. In total, he played through 10 NHL seasons and 401 games, recording 145 points and 361 penalty minutes.

Huffman retired in 1999, marking an end to his formal hockey involvement until he began working as an NHLPA certified player agent in 2012, and coaching AAA youth hockey in 2014. That quickly evolved. He was named an assistant coach and Director of Hockey Operations for the AHL’s Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Knights in 2015, and made a move to the Lehigh Valley Phantoms’ bench in 2016. He supported the Phantoms through five fruitful years- including multiple 100-point seasons – before making yet another career change in 2021, when he joined the Pittsburgh Penguins as a pro scout. He was promoted to Pittsburgh’s Director Of Professional Scouting in 2022, and moved to Calgary in 2023 – where he’ll now continue to take on new roles.

As pointed out by Androckitis, Huffman has been heavily involved in his team’s scouting and analytical departments, continuing to build on the stout hockey knowledge he flexed as a player. He’ll now get a chance to flex that knowledge, as Calgary becomes the fourth team to employ a Director Of Hockey Strategy – joining the Dallas Stars (Steve Greeley), Buffalo Sabres (Sam Ventura), and Seattle Kraken (Alexandra Mandrycky).

International Notes: Nogier, Masin, Kallionkieli

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After some notable international signings earlier today, there’s more to cover. One is former Jets defenseman Nelson Nogier, who’s sticking in Europe for the third straight season after signing a one-year deal with Germany’s Straubing Tigers yesterday.

Nogier, 28, was a fourth-round pick of Winnipeg in 2014. He logged brief action with the Jets in the 2016-17 and 2018-19 campaigns, amounting to 11 total games of NHL experience with no points, a -1 rating and 5 PIMs. The 6’3″, 207-lb right-shot defenseman spent most of his time with the AHL’s Manitoba Moose, where he posted 41 points in 242 games across six seasons with the organization.

After being traded to the Kings in a minor swap late in 2021-22, Nogier posted four points in 13 games for their AHL affiliate, the Ontario Reign, before reaching unrestricted free agency that summer. He immediately headed overseas, heading to Kazakhstan with Barys Astana of the Kontinental Hockey League. That’s where he spent the last two seasons, amassing 20 points and a -14 rating in 117 appearances. Late in the European transfer period, with regular seasons about to get underway, he’ll look to make an impact in Straubing alongside former NHLers Justin Braun, Taylor Leier, and others.

Some more overseas moves:

  • Former Lightning second-round pick Dominik Masin has signed in his native Czechia for the first time in his professional career, inking a three-year deal with HC Sparta Prague. Masin, now 28, logged 58 points in 273 appearances from the blue line for the Lightning’s AHL affiliate, the Syracuse Crunch, from 2016 to 2020. He never received a call-up, though, and headed overseas upon becoming a restricted free agent during the pandemic. The Lightning still held his signing rights up until February of last year. Masin spent parts of the last three years playing for Ilves in Finland, helping them to a third-place finish in Liiga in 2022.
  • Former Golden Knights prospect Marcus Kallionkieli is returning to Poland, inking a one-year deal with GKS Katowice. The 23-year-old winger has had quite the peculiar ride, plagued by injuries for much of his time under contract with Vegas. Last year, the final one of his entry-level contract, the organization loaned him to Poland’s STS Sanok before reassigning him to Finland’s Kiekko-Espoo and then placing him on unconditional waivers for mutual contract termination in February. A fifth-round pick in 2019, the Finnish-Brazilian national had two goals in six games with their AHL affiliate in Henderson in 2020-21 and one goal in five games with the ECHL’s Savannah Ghost Pirates during an injury-truncated 2022-23 campaign.

West Notes: Huberdeau, Pelletier, Blackhawks

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Jonathan Huberdeau’s tenure with the Flames has been wildly underwhelming, to say the least. The 31-year-old winger has been limited to 27 goals and 107 points in 160 games – decidedly fringe top-six production – since being acquired from the Panthers and signing an eight-year, $84MM extension.

The former Calder winner and once-elite playmaking winger is hoping a new offseason training regimen can help spur a rebound this season, he tells Aaron Vickers of NHL.com. “[I’m] really happy with the summer that I had,” he said. “It’s probably my best summer of training that I’ve had. I just have to translate that onto the ice. I skated more in the summer as well, so I feel better.”

“The confidence is back,” he continued. “I just have to relay that to here with the guys. And I think this year I want to bring fun to my game. That’s what we need to be. I think we’ve just got to make it fun as a team. You never know. We can cause some surprises.”

A resurgence in production will be difficult with a depleted Flames roster amid an aggressive retool, influenced in large part by Huberdeau’s struggles the past two seasons. He’ll likely be centered by Nazem Kadri, whose more palatable $7MM cap hit and strong showing in 2023-24 has made him the subject of trade rumors this summer, to begin the year.

Other notes out of the Western Conference:

  • The Flames have made some progress on a new deal for restricted free agent winger Jakob Pelletier, general manager Craig Conroy said today (via Danny Austin of the Calgary Sun). A report from TSN’s Salim Nadim Valji last week indicated there was still significant legwork to be done to reach an agreement, but Conroy is fully confident they’ll get a deal done before training camp begins next week. The 2019 first-rounder had shoulder surgery just before the beginning of last season, delaying his season debut until late January. He logged a goal and three points in 13 NHL games with the Flames and 12 points in 18 games with the AHL’s Calgary Wranglers.
  • The Blackhawks are amid the league’s most successful ongoing rebuild, opines Corey Pronman of The Athletic. They’re the most likely out of the league’s current bottom-feeders to be quality contenders with their current core of prospects and youngsters amassed, he says, also citing their ability to become a premier free-agent destination when they’re a bit closer to returning to playoff contention.

Kraken Extend Adam Larsson On Four-Year Deal

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Sep. 10: The Kraken made Larsson’s extension official as reported Tuesday morning.

Sep. 9: The Seattle Kraken are working on a deal to keep defenseman Adam Larsson in the Pacific Northwest for the next four years per reports from Frank Seravalli of Daily Faceoff. Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman included in a follow-up report that Larsson’s salary will be $5.25MM each season making it a four-year, $21MM extension.

The fourth-overall pick of the 2011 NHL Draft originally came to the Kraken organization during the 2021 Expansion Draft from the Edmonton Oilers. Seattle quickly signed Larsson to a four-year, $16MM contract and he has been with the organization ever since.

Larsson has excelled during his time with the Kraken as he’s garnered more responsibility in his career than at any point with the Oilers or New Jersey Devils. He’s only missed one regular season game (which came this past season) and has averaged 22:57 of ice time in 245 games with the young franchise. His consistency and availability alone would have earned him an extension in Seattle but Larsson has also chipped in adequately offensively with 20 goals and 76 points overall.

He led the team in blocked shots and hits during the 2021-22 and 2022-23 seasons while dropping to second and fourth this past year, respectively. The only major drawback to Larsson’s game is his possession quality which largely falls below a 50% CorsiFor%. Much of that can be attributed to the fact that he’s averaged a 55.4% Defensive Zone Start % in All Situations during his time with Seattle.

The $5.25MM salary over the next four years is just a notch below Evolving-Hockey’s prediction of a $5.5MM salary on a four-year pact. The deal will keep Larsson in place until the 2028-29 regular season and keep Seattle’s defensive core largely intact before Vince Dunn’s current contract ends after the 2027-28 campaign. There won’t be any problems on the right side of their defense for quite some time with the team adding Brandon Montour on a seven-year deal earlier in the offseason.

Not only have the Kraken ironed out their blue line for the next three to five years but the team has also taken a major potential trade chip off the market for next year’s trade deadline. Larsson would have been an ideal candidate to market at next year’s trade season if Seattle found themselves outside of contention.

International Notes: Team Canada, Cracknell, Day

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St. Louis Blues general manager Doug Armstrong will have his hands full for the first half of the 2024-25 NHL season. Armstrong recently took part in an interview with The Athletic’s Pierre LeBrun where the two spoke at length about Team Canada’s roster for the 4 Nations Faceoff in 2025 and the announcement that teams will need rosters in place by December 2nd, 2024.

The first six players of Canada’s roster were already announced on June 28th, 2024 as Sidney Crosby, Cale Makar, Nathan MacKinnon, Brad Marchand, Connor McDavid, and Brayden Point have already made the team. Canada ices the majority of players in the NHL (41.7% of opening night rosters in 2023-24) which makes Armstrong’s job in scouting that much more difficult in determining the next 17 players and three goaltenders in three months.

LeBrun adds that goaltending is the biggest question mark facing Team Canada as the team no longer has access to Carey Price, Martin Brodeur, or Roberto Luongo. Armstrong isn’t as worried about the goaltending situation for Canada as he said, “The only goalies to win a Stanley Cup over the last decade have been Russian or Canadian. So we’re in pretty good shape if you’re using that as a barometer“.

Other international notes:

  • Journeyman forward Adam Cracknell will take his talent overseas for the first time since the 2020-21 season as Slovakia’s HK Poprad announced a one-year contract for the veteran. Cracknell spent all last season with the AHL’s Henderson Silver Knights collecting 18 goals and 35 points in 53 games. He has 210 NHL games under his belt with the Blues, Columbus Blue Jackets, Vancouver Canucks, Edmonton Oilers, Dallas Stars, New York Rangers, and Anaheim Ducks but has not played in an NHL contest since the 2018-19 season.
  • Former top prospect Sean Day is heading overseas as HV71 of the SHL has announced a two-year deal for the defenseman. Day became the fourth player to be granted ’Exceptional Player Status’ by Hockey Canada behind John Tavares, Aaron Ekblad, and McDavid but floundered almost immediately upon joining the OHL’s Mississauga Steelheads in 2013-14. He was eventually drafted 81st overall by the Rangers in the 2016 NHL Draft and made his NHL debut with the Tampa Bay Lightning on December 28th, 2021.

Rangers Sign Adam Erne To PTO

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TSN’s Darren Dreger reports the New York Rangers are bringing in forward Adam Erne to training camp on a professional tryout agreement. Erne had difficulty finding recurring playing time with the Edmonton Oilers last year and will now try his luck at the bottom of the Rangers’ forward core.

Erne was considered a mid-first-round talent heading into the 2013 NHL Draft but ultimately fell to the second round at 33rd overall to the Tampa Bay Lightning. Erne debuted with the Lightning in the 2016-17 season, collecting three goals in 29 contests. Most of his success early on in his professional career came with the AHL’s Syracuse Crunch where Erne’s physicality and knack for goal-scoring made him an effective player in the NHL.

His “coming out party” came during the 2018-19 season when he scored seven goals and 20 points in 65 games. The Lightning iced one of the best teams in NHL history that season and Erne played an important role in the team’s bottom-six. Erne’s entry-level contract expired at the end of the season and with cap struggles beginning in Tampa Bay the team traded him to the Detroit Red Wings for a fourth-round pick in 2020.

Erne’s run in Detroit is the most successful stretch in his career. He had much larger access to ice time on a rebuilding Red Wings roster as he worked his way into the team’s middle-six. Erne skated in 241 games with Detroit scoring 27 goals and 62 points while earning a two-year, $4.2MM contract with the team from 2021-2023.

Almost a year ago today, Erne signed with the Oilers on a PTO and signed a one-year, league-minimum contract nearly a month later. He skated in 24 games for Edmonton throughout the 2023-24 regular season scoring one goal and two points overall. Much of his time was spent with the organization’s AHL affiliate in Bakersfield where he scored six goals and 12 points in 36 games.

The Rangers’ top three forward lines are effectively set heading into the 2024-25 NHL season but there could be some wiggle room on the bottom line. Erne will compete with Jimmy Vesey, Sam Carrick, and Matt Rempe for playing time on the team’s fourth line and will have nearly a month to prove his worth to the organization.

Jordie Benn Announces Retirement

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Veteran defenseman Jordie Benn has retired after a 17-year run in the pros, he told Paul Haysom of CHEK News.

Benn, 37, last played in the NHL for the Maple Leafs in the 2022-23 season. The older brother of Stars captain Jamie Benn closes the book on a 12-year, 607-game NHL résumé – an incredibly unlikely run.

Not only was Benn undrafted, he never played high-level juniors or collegiate hockey. The physical, stay-at-home defender spent parts of four seasons in Junior ’A’ for his hometown Victoria Grizzlies in the British Columbia Hockey League before turning pro in 2008, staying in British Columbia but jumping to the ECHL with the Victoria Salmon Kings.

Benn worked his way up the professional ranks over the next couple of seasons, landing an AHL contract with the Texas Stars for 2010-11 before inking his first NHL contract, a one-year entry-level pact, with Dallas for the 2011-12 campaign. That kicked off a six-year run for both Jordie and Jamie playing together in the Lone Star State.

The elder Benn spent most of 2011-12 back on the farm with Texas, but he did make his NHL debut with two assists in three games with the big club. Two years later, he was a regular in a depth role on the Dallas blue line, saying goodbye to the AHL entirely after splitting the lockout-shortened 2012-13 campaign between leagues.

While Benn mostly used his 6’2″, 201-lb frame to be a physical force and box out opponents, resulting in some decent possession numbers in his heyday, he wasn’t a complete non-factor offensively. He put up decent production on the Stars’ blue line in a low-scoring era, totaling 11 goals, 60 assists and 71 points with a +7 rating in 302 games there before he was traded to the Canadiens shortly before the 2017 deadline.

Benn remained an effective fringe top-four option in Montreal, posting 39 points and a +12 rating in 171 appearances in parts of three seasons while averaging 18:26 per game, slightly more than he averaged during his time in Dallas. Upon reaching unrestricted free agency in 2019, he inked a two-year, $4MM deal with the Canucks, returning as close to home as possible.

Unfortunately, it was in Vancouver his game began to decline, with his point-per-game production halving and his ice time slipping to exclusively bottom-pairing usage. He was traded to the Jets as a rental at the 2021 deadline and then spent 2021-22 with the Wild before landing in Toronto for 2022-23.

North of the border, Benn struggled with injuries, limited to a goal and an assist in 12 NHL appearances with a -1 rating. He was sent to the AHL’s Toronto Marlies for his first minor-league assignment in a decade, posting six points in 23 games there.

Upon reaching unrestricted free agency again last summer, Benn decided to try his luck overseas by inking a one-year deal with Sweden’s Brynäs IF. He ended up being a major get for the club, which relied heavily on his strong performance (22 points, +24 rating in 39 games) to win the second-tier HockeyAllsvenskan championship and gain promotion back to the Swedish Hockey League for 2024-25.

It’s a neat bookend for Benn, who opts to end his pro career on a high note. In his NHL minutes, he recorded a very respectable 26 goals, 111 assists, 137 points, and a +19 rating while averaging 17:28 per contest. He tended to have positive possession quality impacts at even strength over the course of his career, posting a 50.8 xG%, per Hockey Reference.

Benn is about to welcome his third child, he told Haysom, but hopes to work in a front-office role in some capacity when the time is right. All of us at PHR congratulate him on a lengthy run in the pros and wish him the best in his next chapter.

Image courtesy of USA Today Sports.

Flames Sign Tyson Barrie To PTO

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Sep. 10: The Flames made Barrie’s PTO official this morning.

Sep. 3: In a twist of circumstances, the Calgary Flames are now reportedly nearing a professional try-out agreement with veteran defender Tyson Barrie. The move was first reported by PuckPedia and verified by TSN’s Pierre LeBrun, who added that the team hopes this will result in more than just a league-minimum contract. Barrie was previously rumored to be headed to the Edmonton Oilers on a PTO, reuniting with the team after one year away. As pointed out by PuckPedia, Barrie maintains the ability to sign a free-agent contract with any team while on his PTO with Calgary.

Barrie will skate for his fourth Canadian franchise on this PTO – having previously played one year in Toronto and three in Edmonton. They were two stops along Barrie’s journeyman career, spanning 13 seasons and four franchises. He continues to be a productive defender, rivaling 40 points in nearly every season between 2013 and 2023 and boasting a career-high of 59 points set in 2018-19. But Barrie’s defensive consistency has completely fallen away, leaving him hard to trust even on a stout Nashville Predators blue line.

Luckily, Calgary has plenty of holes to patch on defense, after turning over Chris Tanev, Noah Hanifin, and Oliver Kylington last season. The Flames have brought in a heap of new faces to handle the change, adding Jake Bean, Daniil Miromanov, Kevin Bahl, Joel Hanley, and Brayden Pachal. Barrie boasts significantly more NHL experience and scoring upside than any of those options. That could be enough to win out a prominent role with a strong showing at training camp, especially amid competition a decade younger.

Any role on the Flames’ blue-line could come with major responsibility, as the team shops around top defenders MacKenzie Weegar and Rasmus Andersson ahead of training camp. The departure of either player would immediately vacate 20+ minutes a night on Barrie’s right-hand side – making this veteran PTO signing timely insurance. But as it stands, the long-term outcome of Barrie, who managed just 27 points in 65 games over two seasons with the Predators, is still uncertain.

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