PHR Mailbag

Topics in this edition of the PHR Mailbag include which of Seattle’s pending UFAs could be on the move, if some Chicago prospects could join the team this season, and more.  If your question doesn’t appear here, check back in our last two mailbag columns.

yeasties: The Kraken appear to be positioned well to be a deadline seller. Assuming they sputter out and become sellers, which of their pending UFAs do you think will be dealt and who will be kept and extended?

For those who aren’t too familiar with Seattle’s pending UFA list, it’s quite a big one, even after they moved Mason Marchment to Columbus on Friday before the roster freeze.  Up front, they have Jaden Schwartz, Jordan Eberle, and Eeli Tolvanen all set to hit the market in July.  They also have Jamie Oleksiak on the back end and since goaltender Matt Murray has been in the NHL all season, I’ll give him a mention here as well although I wouldn’t be shocked if he doesn’t get re-signed or traded by the early-March trade deadline.

Oleksiak is the one I’m most confident in saying will be moved.  His role on the depth chart has been reduced and it’s hard to imagine they’ll want to sign him to another multi-year deal around this price point.  On the other hand, teams want big defensemen with some snarl at the deadline and Oleksiak provides that.  Despite being in the midst of a down year, I expect they’ll get a strong market for his services.

Up front, I’d put Schwartz as the most likely to be dealt.  He has had some good moments when healthy (including this season) but he can’t stay healthy.  However, with salary retention, some contender will want him as a middle-six upgrade to bolster their offensive depth and maybe play on the power play.  On the flip side, I think Eberle stays.  Yes, he could go be a middle-six player somewhere but I think they’ll want to keep him around, assuming a reasonable extension could be worked out.

I could see Seattle taking a run at re-signing Tolvanen.  He isn’t having a great year so maybe they look to try to get him at a lower-market rate.  Failing that, he still has enough of a track record that there should be some teams that like him as more of a depth addition.

frozenaquatic: I hear a lot about prospect development with how bad the team I root for (the Rangers) is at it. I had heard that Tanner Glass and Jed Ortmeyer, two plugs, were in charge of “player development,” but saw some folks talking about how that just meant they were in charge of making sure prospects had proper housing and resources to financial management and things like that, and that they weren’t really coaches. I always hear the refrain that the “NHL isn’t a development league” in the sense that coaches aren’t expected to coddle young players (unless they’re in a full rebuild).

My question is: if a team has “bad player development,” is that more on the Department of Player Development, the scouts, the AHL coaches? Maybe even the skills coach? Let’s say, for instance, the Rangers wanted to get better at “player development” overall. Would that be an overhaul of the scouting department to look for different baseline skills in players? Or something else? I’m thinking of how Laf, Kakko, Kravtsov, Andersson, etc all panned out–is that just horrible scouting, terrible luck, or the mysterious player development?

In recent years, it feels like a lot of teams are adding Player Development coaches.  But most of the time, those are recently retired players.  It feels like these positions are created to give them a chance to see if a coaching position is something they might be interested in.  Meanwhile, they get to relay some pointers to the prospects and help them along.  From a starting point, that’s not a bad thing to have and it does allow those former players to slowly improve those coaching skills.  Ideally, you might want to have someone (or more) who can work on more specialized training for each player to maximize those efforts but Glass and Ortmeyer can certainly be part of a quality department.

As for where the blame might lie when it comes to a lack of proper player development, there’s plenty to go around.  The scouts may have misread the projectability of certain skills although I won’t critique them for the first two on that list as they were largely consensus picks at where they were selected.  Did the Player Development department work enough with the players?  I’d lump the skills coaches into that area in terms of coming up with the proper training regimens.  Then you have the coaching staffs at both the AHL and NHL levels.  Yes, the NHL is not a development league in theory but the reality is, a lot of development does happen at the top level.  Some of it also has to fall on the players.  Some train better than others over the offseason, some are more dedicated to the finer points of development.  I’m speaking generally here, not talking specifically about any of the players you listed.

There’s no simple fix or overhaul here.  Scouts can be evaluated based on their reports; did those players progress over time?  Keep the best ones and if there are some who haven’t been as strong, then you could look to make a change.  The same goes in the development department (more teams seem to be drifting toward adding more people rather than changing some) and with the coaching staffs although they have to balance winning and development at the same time.  In a perfect world, it’s probably a slow build over making a bunch of changes all at once.

Unclemike1526: Do you know when the KHL and SHL seasons end? Frondell will definitely be here after that and depending on whether the Hawks still have a shot at the Playoffs and could play more than 10 games and burn his 1st year of his ELC. Kantserov is not eligible for an ELC but hopefully comes over here and could help also. I doubt the Hawks will let Frondell play more than 10 games if they’re out of it entirely. They could use his size either on the wing or even at C. What do you think?

The KHL regular season ends on March 20th while the SHL ends on March 14th.  Also worth noting, last year, the KHL playoffs ended on May 21st and the SHL ended on May 1st.

Chicago has fallen off a bit since the callout for questions and are now hovering near the bottom of the league and don’t have Connor Bedard.  As things stand, I don’t think the playoffs are a realistic possibility.  However, there’s an outside shot that Anton Frondell could get in a game or two depending on how Djurgardens fares in the playoffs.  There probably won’t be more than ten games left by then so they’re not at risk of burning a year of his entry-level deal.

Roman Kantersov is actually eligible for an entry-level contract as he’s only 21.  It will just be a two-year pact instead of three.  But it might not matter anyway as Magnitogorsk is the top team in the league and likely heading for a long playoff run.  If they went out early enough, it’s possible they’d sign him and burn a year now.  They wouldn’t want to do that but that might be needed to convince him to sign, knowing he could exit the entry-level restrictions a year earlier.  I wouldn’t expect that to come into play but we’ll see what happens in the playoffs.

tucsontoro: Brian – we’re already hearing lots of chatter on who might be on the move. What do you consider the worst contracts in the league right now?

I don’t think the players on the worst contracts in the league are probably going to be on the move but let’s go over some of the bad ones.

Jonathan Huberdeau’s contract with Calgary has to be here.  Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t hate the trade for the Flames at the time it was made.  Getting what we thought was still a top-line winger and a strong defenseman wasn’t a bad return for Matthew Tkachuk.  Of course, Huberdeau is being paid like his best year with Florida while producing about half of the points, making it a well-above-market deal.  There’s a temptation to put Elias Pettersson here on the first year of his new contract but let’s let the season play out and see how he fares as the undisputed top player in Vancouver now.

On the back end, Darnell Nurse is being paid as an elite two-way defender.  He hasn’t been that.  Offensively, he’s more of a third option with them needing to pay to bring in Jake Walman to pick up some of the secondary slack since Nurse wasn’t producing.  Defensively, elite is not the word I would use.  He’s a serviceable top-four defender, sure, but not a number one like he’s being paid as.  On the lower end of the scale, Ryan Graves started the season in the minors after clearing waivers and is now a sixth or seventh option on most nights.  He still has three years left at $4.5MM and even if the Penguins retained the maximum 50%, there still wouldn’t be a trade market for him.

Now, since you referenced this question after mentioning chatter about players who could be on the move, I wanted to think of some bad contracts that could be dealt.  One that comes to mind is Barclay Goodrow.  He’s on an expiring deal at $3.64MM and is a fourth liner.  However, he’s the type of gritty role player some teams will covet and if there’s one with a lot of cap space, I could see him moving.  I’m also wondering about Patrik Laine ($8.7MM, pending UFA) in Montreal.  Since they’ve gone and added Alexandre Texier and Phillip Danault, is there a spot for him when the team is fully healthy?  If not, it wouldn’t shock me to see them try to move him with half retention to give him a chance to play down the stretch and help his case in free agency.  The return would be minimal but after blowing through their remaining room to add Danault, clearing half of Laine’s deal would give them some extra flexibility.

Emoney123: What’s the next move for Danny Briere? Seems Martone, Nesbitt, Luchanko, Bump, Barkey, and Bjarnason are a few years away and with only their own #1 pick this year, how does Briere keep the Flyers in the playoff hunt? Seen this before with big crash and burn late in the second half of the season. Rick Tocchet for Coach of the Year if the Flyers make playoffs?

Right now, the next move is likely patience.  At the moment, Philadelphia is right in the thick of the playoff race, one that no one seems to be making a push to run away with.  It’s great that they’re in it right now but will they still be in the hunt at the Olympic break?  I think that’s going to be the decision point for a lot of teams as to whether to buy, sell, or largely stand pat and the Flyers should be one of those.

If I’m being honest, I’m not sold on them being a viable playoff threat.  A bunch of overtime games have kept them in the mix which is fine but not necessarily sustainable over the course of a full season.  Accordingly, my inclination is that they largely hold or sell a bit, depending on if they can get Christian Dvorak signed to a contract extension or not in the new year.

That said, you asked me about a playoff scenario so there are two buying scenarios I can think of.  One I’ve written about in an older mailbag column and that’s one that sees them buying low on someone who could be around beyond the season.  In other words, another Trevor Zegras type of move where you’re hoping a change of scenery gets them going while knowing that a futures payment is justifiable given that the player isn’t a rental.  That’s still on the table.

The other one is where they’re a soft buyer and basically tell teams that they’ll take a contract off their hands.  With double retention off the table now, other buyers will need to move some bodies out to make the money work for other trades.  This is a good spot for GM Daniel Briere to tell teams that they can facilitate one of those moves by taking an expiring contract back.  Ideally, the player is a forward with a bit of offensive upside.  Frankly, the Laine scenario I mentioned above feels like something worthwhile doing in this instance, flipping a minor leaguer or futures in return.  It’s something that doesn’t jeopardize the future and sends a message to the players that they’re not giving up.  It’s not the route I’d probably go but if they’re buying, I think it’s going to be low-cost acquisitions that don’t jeopardize the future.

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Topics in this edition of the PHR Mailbag include San Jose’s rebuild, speculating about teams that could make a goalie move, and more.  If your question doesn’t appear here, check back in last weekend’s column.

Zakis: How does the Wild figure out 5-on-5 scoring?

A lot of it is just going to be patience.  They’ve been hovering around a shooting percentage of five at full strength this season.  That’s bound to improve on its own as even bad teams are closer to seven at the end of a year.

There are a couple of ways to improve scoring at five-on-five and neither of them are easy.  The first is upgrading their playmaking, especially down the middle.  GM Bill Guerin has been trying to do that for years without much success.  (He’s hardly the only one who has struggled in this regard either.)  That’s going to be tough to do in-season.

The other is play with more tempo and try to generate more odd-man rush chances.  The problem is that Minnesota isn’t particularly young and a lot of their veterans aren’t known as high-end skaters.  Beyond Kirill Kaprizov’s line, they’re built to play a little slower.  That might work in the playoffs when the checking and whistles are tighter but in the regular season, it’s bit trickier.  Ideally, prospects like Danila Yurov and Liam Ohgren playing their way into bigger roles would help but that, again, takes patience.  But in terms of short-term fixes, I don’t see a viable way for them to significantly change their fortunes on that front and that’s why they’re going to be viewed as more of a bubble team than a contender.

PyramidHeadcrab: It’s looking like Sharks fans are going to have to strap in for another rough season.

We know the Sharks have been building top-shelf assets (Celebrini, Askarov, Misa, Graf, et al), but how long do complete rebuilds like this typically last?

In watching their first few games, I am seeing a team that is completely disorganized, with players being consistently out of position – Celebrini making a tremendous play with no one in position to receive a pass, for instance. There’s the cliche of “veterans mentioning The Youth™” but experienced players like Klingberg, Kurashev, and Goodrow are consistently playing poorly.

At what point do you know if the plan is working, and when do the stars typically align for a team like this to turn the corner on being successful?

And as a brief addendum – the lack of a net-crashing power forward to kite attention from the opposing D is glaring; is there anyone in the Sharks system that could fill this role eventually? Are there any top prospects for the ’26 draft that could fit this bill?

There aren’t a lot of examples of the ‘burn it to the ground and build back slowly’ rebuild to compare to here.  These types of undertakings haven’t gained a lot of popularity until the last decade or so.  Sure, there have been rebuilds with an eye on them taking a few years but few have been to quite this extent.

The best option I can think of is the one that’s still ongoing in Utah.  I remember reading something a few years ago about how long he envisioned his rebuild being and it was something like eight or ten years for the full process to take place.  He mentioned last year in an interview with KSL Sports (video link) that competing for a playoff spot in the fifth season was a realistic target.

So, where are the Sharks in this?  While they’ve missed the postseason in six straight years, it was really only the 2023-24 season where they got serious about it.  Erik Karlsson went that offseason, Tomas Hertl at the deadline, and some youngsters (William Eklund and Fabian Zetterlund) got big minutes.  You could argue 2022-23 was the start when Timo Meier moved but that was done late in the year.  Basically, they’re around the halfway mark before that ‘playoffs in five years’ goal.  With the pieces they’re collecting, I think they’re on the right track and I could see them getting there at the back end of that timeframe.

As I’ve noted before, scouting is not my forte so I could be wrong on this but from what I have seen with some of their top prospects, I don’t really see someone who can be that type of player, at least consistently.  Looking at the top of this year’s class, Ethan Belchetz might fit the bill but as is always the case with power forward prospects, there’s a difference between being that type of player in junior versus being that type of player in the NHL.

At this point of the rebuild, the focus is asset acquisition and getting as many pieces in place as possible.  Once that first wave of prospects is established, then they could start to get a little pickier or use some later-round picks on more aggressive boom/bust selections to try to find a certain type of player that they lack in their system.  I’d say they’re getting closer to that part and it wouldn’t shock me to see them try to address that.

PyramidHeadcrab: I’m legitimately confused at how Barclay Goodrow hasn’t been bought out yet. The only way that makes sense is a) it’s a verbal promise to be like, “sorry for screwing you over”, or b) they REALLY want to keep those retention slots open.

But in that case, why not bury him in the A and just eat the contract? Like it’s a real head-scratcher for me.

I don’t think it’s the first option.  While San Jose is likely operating with some respect befitting a longer-term veteran, if they felt they had to get him off the roster, they’d probably do it.  There might be a bit of validity to Option B.  They only have one salary retention slot available to them.  That’s not just for this season but 2026-27 as well with Karlsson signed until then.  The other one doesn’t unlock until after the 2029-30 campaign.  Adding Goodrow – who is also signed through 2026-27 – to the mix means they’re out of retention options until July 2027.  That’s not ideal.  I’d be saving that one for the trade deadline, potentially for Alexander Wennberg to maximize the return for him.

When the Sharks orchestrated the waiver claim situation to ensure they got him around 15 months ago, they knew (or reasonably ought to have known) that his best on-ice days were behind him.  I don’t think they brought him in thinking that he’d give the bottom six a big boost (mind you, they were probably hoping he’d be at least a little better than this).  I suspect he was viewed as more of a character addition.  In essence, that cliched mentoring idea you mentioned in the initial question.

If they think they need a roster spot, he’s someone who would safely clear waivers if it came to that.  He’d still probably come back after the trade deadline when there isn’t a roster maximum though.  This could be something they look at in the summer though.  They wouldn’t save a ton of money on a buyout since a decent chunk of his salary is in a signing bonus but if he’s done all he can do for them, I could see them buying him out to give him a chance to try to catch on elsewhere, likely for the league minimum.  But for now, I expect he’ll stay up for the rest of the season.

frozenaquatic: Thanks again for putting these together! The last six Cup winners have had depth in common, running out four lines that grind down opponents. I know bottom sixes are deployed differently (and also are more easily shuffled–though the best bottom sixes have chemistry and identity), but they’re usually a combo of grit and timely tertiary scoring. In your view, who has the most effective 3rd line in the league to start 2025? What’s the worst 3rd line on a supposed contender? Would you say Taylor Hall’s 4th line is the best? Who has the weakest 4th line?

Speaking of how quickly lines can be shuffled, Hall now finds himself in the top six in Carolina so he’s technically out of the equation for now.  And best is in the eye of the beholder.  If you’re looking squarely at results, the answer could be one way.  If you’re looking at overall effectiveness (or maybe trying to quantify it using Expected Goals), it’s going to be a different answer.

Colorado’s third line is a bit of an odd mishmash of players but it seems to be working.  Ross Colton has been there for a while now while Jack Drury came in early last season.  They both have some defensive skills but their linemate, Victor Olofsson, is more of an offense-only player, making the trio a bit of an odd combination.  However, it has worked early on with a 64.5 Expected Goals Percentage, per MoneyPuck despite close to a 50/50 split in zone starts.  They’re not scoring much but they’re not getting scored on either.  That’s a quietly effective line.  On the flip side, Nashville’s third line of Michael Bunting, Erik Haula, and Jonathan Marchessault looks quite good on paper but is struggling considerably defensively with the lowest xGF% of any line with at least 45 minutes of time together so far.

Fourth lines are a lot harder to quantify as they often change from one game to the next between injuries and line shuffling.  As a result, there are very few who have played together enough to glean any sort of meaningful information from.  For context, if I use that 45 minutes played as a cutoff, it looks like there are only three lines that would even qualify.  That’s not enough to really be able to accurately answer that question this early in the season.

ljfranker: What are some goaltending changes you expect to see this season?

History suggests that we won’t see too many changes as goalies don’t move in-season anywhere near the extent that skaters do.  I doubt this year will be much of an exception.  But that’s not an exciting answer so I’ll give you a few things I could see happening, just that the odds of all of them happening are low.

Oilers: At some point, Connor Ingram works his way onto Edmonton’s roster, likely at the expense of Calvin Pickard.  I thought his acquisition from Utah was a great move, especially for the low, low price of absolutely nothing (future considerations) despite there being salary retention.  I think he can raise the floor of their goaltending and if all went well, push Stuart Skinner.  With the Oilers not having a lot of wiggle room to try to improve their roster, this is one thing I expect them to do.

Sabres: Their claiming of Colten Ellis came as a surprise given the depth that they have and that Devon Levi is still viewed as part of their long-term plans.  If they’re pleased with what Ellis is showing in practice, Alex Lyon could become expendable.  At $1.5MM per season through 2026-27, he’d be an affordable dart throw for a team to take, especially one that gets hit with a longer-term injury.

Bargain Hunters: While it’s early, the gamble Ottawa made going with Leevi Merilainen isn’t exactly confidence-inspiring and Mads Sogaard may have plateaued.  For a team with playoff aspirations, they can’t afford to stick that out if Merilainen keeps struggling while Linus Ullmark doesn’t typically carry a huge workload.  I think they’ll be looking around at options soon.  We’ve seen speculation of Calgary sniffing around the market and that they might not trust Devin Cooley to be a full-time NHL backup so they’ll probably keep doing that.  I also wonder about Florida.  If Daniil Tarasov winds up being more of a mediocre option, I could see them exploring what’s out there.  With the injuries they have, getting a more proven piece to stabilize the backup games could be crucial.

Breakaway: The 2026 draft is supposed deeper and has more high-end talent. Schaefer and Misa were considered the consensus top picks in 2025. If they were coming out this year, would they be the 2nd and 3rd picks or would they fall farther down? After those two, there was a gap in talent, where would the rest of the top five fall if they were coming out in 2026?

One of the challenges with an exercise like this is that what teams hold those draft picks ultimately does a lot to dictate who goes where.  What’s the player type they’re looking for?  It’s not always a case of Best Player Available (or teams have had some very different opinions on BPAs from the consensus top of the class).  But I’ll give it a shot.

Gavin McKenna goes first and there’s probably not much to explain there.  I do think Matthew Schaefer would go second and I’d say that without factoring in his start with the Islanders.  A young 18 for his draft class, he’s a high-ceiling all situations number one defender.  That will always go high.  Keaton Verhoeff could change that with a big year in college (especially as a righty) but failing that, Schaefer lands ahead of him.

For Michael Misa versus Ivar Stenberg, what’s the need?  If it’s a pure shooter (or a team really wants a center), it’s Misa.  If it’s a setup guy, it’s Stenberg.  I’d lean toward Misa myself so he’d be fourth.  I’d have Anton Frondell next at five, then Stenberg at six, assuming his development goes as planned this season.

Then we go back to centers with Caleb Desnoyers (fourth to Utah) and Ryan Roobroeck, draft-eligible this year.  Today, I’d give the nod to Desnoyers but with this season barely underway, that could easily change.

Brady Martin is the ultimate wild card.  Given his power forward style of play, it’s entirely plausible to me that a team could see this combined group and still pick him fifth.  I could also see him fall out of the top ten and it wouldn’t surprise me.  It all comes down to who has the picks and what their team needs are.  Chances are that he’d still sneak into the back of the top ten with that playoff-profile skillset.

Photo courtesy of ……….

Topics in this edition of the PHR Mailbag include what type of impact Jonathan Toews might have this season, if shorter-term contracts could become more prevalent moving forward, and more.  If your question doesn’t appear here, check back in last weekend’s mailbag.

Emoney123: What’s the next move for Briere? Collect 2026 draft picks; is there anyone on the roster worth a first-round pick? Flyers hold two first-round picks in 2027 and the new arena is to open in 2030; will the team be winning by then?

They’re running out of veterans to sell, at least not without cutting into the perceived longer-term core group of this roster.  Christian Dvorak won’t fetch a first-round pick but with 50% retention, they can get something for him.  Considering the strong interest in Rasmus Ristolainen in the past, he’s someone I think could move this time and with teams always looking to add players like him, maybe they get a first-rounder if they’re willing to eat half the contract.  Maybe there’s a smaller depth move in there as well but that might be it for pick accumulation.

I think they might be sniffing around buying as well.  Not necessarily in the traditional sense of adding rentals and veterans but looking to buy low on a distressed asset, something along the lines of the Trevor Zegras move.  At some point, you have to emerge from the rebuild with some players capable of making an impact now.  That’s the next step for the Flyers so if there’s a chance to take a flyer on a player or two who might not be fitting in where they are, perhaps they can make a low-key move to get someone who might improve with a change of scenery.  Those are typically more offseason deals but if you’re like me and think there’s going to be a more pronounced race to the bottom of the standings, some of those types of deals could materialize in-season.

I would hope Philadelphia is back to being a playoff team by 2030.  They’re already a few years into this rebuild; if they’re still rebuilding five years from now, it’s probably not going to be Briere at the helm and something will have gone rather wrong.  While it happens periodically, rebuilds aren’t supposed to typically last a decade and at this point, I don’t think the Flyers are in a position to be doing one for quite that long.

Cla23: What type of impact will Toews have in Winnipeg?  Do you think it will be a one-and-done?

I like the Jets landing Jonathan Toews as he’ll add some much-needed depth down the middle.  But I’m not overly optimistic that he’s going to be overly impactful, at least offensively.  He was starting to slow down in terms of production over his final two years in Chicago and while some of that could have been affected by his lingering illness, he’s also now 37, not 33 or 34 as he was in those seasons.  One will likely offset the other.

But Toews has always been well above average at the faceoff dot and while he might be a bit rusty, he should still be on the happy side of 50%.  Winnipeg has finished below 50% as a team in that regard for three straight seasons.  He could be a faceoff specialist for them and late in the season and in the playoffs, that can be a big deal.  I also expect he’ll still be good defensively, though probably not at the level he was when he last played.  That long of a layoff will make a difference.

If Toews can get through this season healthy, my guess is that it wouldn’t be a one-and-done unless he really struggles.  If he can still help a contender, he’ll probably want to do so.  But if he’s in and out of the lineup and banged up or the struggles from the illness return, then the safe assumption is that he’ll hang up his skates, knowing he gave it an honest effort to come back.

frozenaquatic: Most UFAs are 29, and the good ones sign for seven or eight years, bringing them to their age-36 or 37 season, at which point, it’s exceedingly rare (Marchand notwithstanding) for a player to get much more than a one or two-year deal. There’s a lot of smoke these days about players signing NBA-style three or four-year deals on their UFA. Will that make any sense? It’ll be really interesting to see what happens with Panarin given that he’s had an unconventional career, having started so late, and he’s going to be a UFA at 34. Assuming he has a solid year this year, what do you think Panarin’s next deal looks like?

Part of the reason we see NBA players sign shorter-term deals is simply because those are the maximum term lengths of a deal in most cases.  Beyond a small group of players (either designated rookie extensions or veteran re-signings with Bird rights) eligible for five-year deals, four is the maximum so many players opt for that.  (There are also considerations for contracts of a specific length that get them to a specific amount of service time, increasing their maximum cap percentage but I don’t want to get too much into the nitty gritty.)  But that’s why NBA contracts are typically shorter.

Could NHL players follow suit?  Some might in the short term, thinking that another big jump could be coming to the cap.  But UFA-eligible players in your scenario (becoming eligible around 29) would then be setting themselves up to try to get a bigger deal in their age-33 year or so.  That could be tricky.

For most UFA-eligible players, I think the move is either short-term (two years) if you’re trying to set up for a bigger deal when there’s a bigger spending environment or aim for long-term and max out on what you can get now.  But if you’re still in the back end of your RFA eligibility, then a three-year deal or four-year pact becomes a bit more defensible.

With Panarin specifically, there are two options.  A max-term deal is unlikely at his age and even short-term doesn’t make a lot of sense as he’s at the age where a decline could come quickly.  I could see a four-year agreement around $11MM per season, basically close to an extension at where he is now.  Alternatively, if the signing team is a little more cap-strapped, they could tack on a couple of cheaper years which might get the AAV more around the $9MM to $9.5MM territory.  That would buy some short-term flexibility for the signing team but that could be a rough contract on the books over those last couple of years.  It’s a deep UFA market but Panarin still finds himself in good shape, assuming he’s once again the offensive leader for the Rangers.

kodion: Why are teams not more proactive with expiring “superstar” contracts when they get NOTHING in return if deals don’t get done and the guy bails in FA?

They will never get true, or even fair, value if they move them out with a year or less to go and fanbases will beat on management relentlessly, almost regardless of the return, but that would seem to be a better business practice than running the risk of a no-return departure.

I know it’s not as simple as that but what am I missing?

While this isn’t always the case, if you’re a team with a superstar player (or even a high-end one) that’s on an expiring contract, you probably have hopes of making a long playoff run.  As you noted, teams generally aren’t going to get top value for their services.  So, what’s better – salvaging some value for the longer term and hurting your chances of winning now or going for it now with a core group you think can win at the expense of the future?  Most of the time, teams feel the answer will be the latter.

If I’m a general manager, I have a hard time selling to my owner that we need to move a fan favorite top-end piece to get some pieces that should help us later.  That’s going to cost potential playoff revenue and anger a big chunk of the fan base and the dressing room.  That’s probably not going to help my cause for staying as GM, especially if I’m throwing in the towel on being able to sign the player.  That’s why you don’t see it happen too often.

Objectively speaking, you make a very valid point.  In the long run, teams would probably be better off moving out top expiring contracts for some value if they don’t re-sign quickly because, after all, only one team can win the Stanley Cup every year.  But the fear of ‘what if this was our year and I just sunk it by trading a star player’ will almost always put an end to it actually happening.

UncleMike1526: Hypothetical question. Say the Blackhawks show a marked improvement this year and some of the young talent starts to shine. With a boatload of draft picks in a deep 26 draft, name some FA’s or trade targets they could chase for 2026? I know big-time FA’s probably won’t go to a declining team just like last year but with some improvement who should they be chasing? Thanks.

For starters, I don’t see this happening.  I don’t think GM Kyle Davidson does either.  This year will be about getting some prospects some reps so that they can see how close (or far) they are from getting back into the thick of things.

I’ve said before when this question came up that they’re not in a spot to be too choosy.  They need a talent influx to help propel them into the postseason picture.  It could be a center, a winger, or a defenseman.  (I think they’re set in goal for now.)  I don’t think it necessarily matters what the combo is, just that there are upgrades coming.

Objectively, they probably need a couple of wingers and a top-six center up front and at least one top-four defenseman.  Here is the list of pending UFAs, per PuckPedia.  The center and defenseman could be tricky to get if the top guys re-sign or pass on Chicago but there are wingers out there.  I think Alex Tuch would be a perfect fit to play with Connor Bedard, Martin Necas would up their skill, and even someone like Mason Marchment could give them some extra grit in the middle six with some offensive upside.  How realistic those options are remains to be seen but those are some fits I like.

As for trade targets, the same idea applies.  Don’t be picky; if there’s an impact player who can be around for a few years, try to get him.  It’s way too early to start hypothesizing 2026 offseason trades but if there’s a talent upgrade available, Davidson should be looking.  And that applies even if this hypothetical scenario isn’t in place.  Win or lose, next summer is when they should be starting to build back up talent-wise.

Duke II: You’re drafting a Dynasty Team and are looking for future scoring studs; you get three of these forwards + two defensemen. GO!

Lysell, Nikishin, Savoie, Perreault, Snuggerud, Lekkerimaki, Turcotte, Howard, Parekh, Ritchie, Brunicke, and Levshunov.

Forwards: I’ll start with Jimmy Snuggerud.  A strong producer in college, he looks to be well on his way to being a top-six NHL piece, probably relatively quickly even; it wouldn’t shock me if he’s a top-six regular by the end of the season.  I think Gabriel Perreault will get there as well, but not quite as fast.  For the third player, Calum Ritchie might be the safest pick but if you’re swinging for offense, I’d go with Isaac Howard.  If he can work his way into a top-six spot over time he has a chance of playing with Connor McDavid (assuming he re-signs) or Leon Draisaitl.  That would be a nice way to pick up some points.

Defense: Zayne Parekh has a chance to be one of the more impactful offensive defensemen in the NHL if everything goes according to plan.  Granted, his defensive game is part of why he slipped in the draft but if you have the floor of an offensive-minded player who could rack up power play points, that’s generally a good player to have in a pool.  Alexander Nikishin might have to bide his time a little bit in Carolina this season but long-term, there’s a clear path for him to become their go-to player offensively on the back end.  They’re generally a solid team offensively so he has a chance to put up some points with them.

Photo courtesy of Wendell Cruz-Imagn Images.

Topics in this edition of the PHR Mailbag include breaking down one of the new CBA rule changes, fitting the Hughes brothers on the same team, and more.  If your question doesn’t appear here, check back in next weekend’s column.

Gmm8811: I thought I saw somewhere that players that go on and clear waivers have to actually play at least one game with their AHL affiliate. Did I hear that correctly? Is that starting this year? Would you expand on that info, please? Do you foresee any drawbacks to that? Looking forward to the new season.

This isn’t actually a waiver-specific rule.  A player can clear waivers and not be sent down while remaining eligible to play for their team.  That doesn’t happen often but it does happen, especially around the trade deadline.

What the rule you’re mentioning speaks to is paper transactions.  Section 30 of the new CBA MOU adds a blurb to Section 13.12 of the CBA that basically says that a player who is sent to the minors needs to actually report to the minors and play in at least one game.  The exact rule is as follows:

A Player who has been Loaned to a minor league club, and was not credited with a day pursuant to (h) above for one (1) or more days since the Loan, must actually report to the club and play in one (1) or more games with such minor league club before he is eligible for Recall. Not withstanding the foregoing, a Goaltender on Loan who has played less than the required one (1) game may be Recalled if his NHL Club would otherwise have less than two Goaltenders available to dress in the Club’s next game.

This is one of the changes that the league and the NHLPA agreed would come into effect for the upcoming season.  As we saw in recent years, many teams would ‘paper’ a player to the minors on an off day, then recall him the following day to play in an NHL game.  The player never actually reported to the minors but didn’t receive his NHL salary for the day, giving the team a few thousand dollars extra in cap space.  This rule is designed to deter teams from doing this.  Now, if a team sends a player down to the minors (whether they cleared waivers or are waiver-exempt), they actually have to report to that team and play in a game before they can be brought back up.  Notably, there is a rewrite to another subsection in there that effectively says if an emergency recall situation presents itself (someone else gets hurt putting the team below the required minimum number of skaters), then the recently-assigned player can be recalled before actually playing in an AHL game.

I doubt this will actually change much, however.  Teams that need space are still going to churn their roster, it’s just going to involve multiple players now instead of one.  Player A gets sent down, Player B is recalled.  Player B gets sent down, Player A is recalled and so forth.  If waiver exemption is exhausted, then start with Player C and maybe Player D if needed (or re-waive Players A and B to give them another 30-day exemption window).  So now, the player who was getting papered will probably lose out on NHL money and ice time since the scheme, so to speak, will now require multiple players to pull off which will cause a different type of grumbling.  That’s the drawback that comes to mind.

It’ll stop Carolina from papering Jackson Blake down (something that probably happened 15 or more times last season despite the fact he played in 80 NHL games) but probably won’t change much else.

frozenaquatic: Hi! Thanks for doing these. Getting out the crystal ball: Are there any teams you think will underperform this year? Who is a shocking team that we could see having problems and dropping out of the playoffs?

For quick reference, I had a question last column about four teams missing and four teams making the playoffs, one set per division.  Rather than rehashing that out, you can read through my picks here.

Based on the four miss teams in there, the one that best fits this question would be Washington.  Montreal missing wouldn’t be too shocking, neither would Minnesota, and while Los Angeles would certainly be a surprise (and I don’t think they’re missing the playoffs), that wouldn’t be as shocking as a reigning Conference winner missing the postseason.

A lot went wrong for Washington in 2023-24 and just about everything went right last year.  They had several players have career years, the cheapest goalie tandem gave them above-average play, and some typical underachievers had some bounce-back efforts.  If some of those gains are lost, it’s plausible that they could be on the outside looking in.

In terms of an underperformer who still makes it, I’d pick Florida.  The way they struggled down the stretch without Matthew Tkachuk was telling and they’ll be without him for quite a while to start the year.  Between that and two long playoff runs, I could see them landing in a Wild Card spot which would be a bit of a disappointment for them.

Johnny Z: What would it take to get Kirill Kaprizov to be a Wing? Yes, I realize the Wings are not a contender, but getting KK would be a big step towards the prize.

Zakis: To piggyback off Johnny Z, what would realistic packages be for Kaprizov for any team in two scenarios: 1) Kaprizov doesn’t sign an extension.

2) He agrees to a sign and trade.

Notwithstanding the unlikelihood of Detroit happening, the situation of how this happens is important to actually answer this question.  Zakis provides two scenarios but I think it’s actually three.  Is it as a straight rental?  If not, Detroit one of the only teams he’d sign with (or one of the only teams offering the contract he wants)?  Or, is there a bidding war for his services in a sign-and-trade with eight to ten teams realistically in the mix?  All of those would yield different-looking returns.  Let’s try to hypothesize each one, using a Detroit-specific answer and a general one to cover Zakis’ follow-up query.

1) In a pure rental scenario, you’re probably looking at two key components.  One is a first-round pick, the other is a key youngster.  Now, this isn’t like the Brock Nelson trade where the young forward was a recent first-rounder (Calum Ritchie).  For someone at Kaprizov’s level and to win a bidding war as a rental (without an extension, more teams can get involved), that other piece is going to hurt.  My initial thought was Marco Kasper and if he’s a third center at the time of the trade, that still could be the case.  If Nate Danielson is having a big year and sees some NHL action, perhaps he’d fit as well.  Detroit shouldn’t need salary retention but if a different acquiring team does, add a second-round pick (or maybe a third, depending on when the deal happens) to the price.

2) If Kaprizov says there’s only one or two teams he’d sign an extension with, Detroit loses a lot of leverage.  They still could probably get the above with the extension balancing out the reduced leverage but there won’t be as much of an add as there should be.  Speculatively, the acquiring team would want to offset the money a bit.  For the Red Wings, that might be someone like J.T. Compher while in general, a top-six forward with a couple of years left fits.  Now, if you’re thinking that this feels really light, you’re right.  But history shows that if a player only has one destination in mind, it’s more of a fifty cents on the dollar type of return.  If you’re the acquiring team, this is the best-case scenario.

3) Now, if Kaprizov is willing to sign an extension with a bunch of teams, look out.  (This is Minnesota’s best-case scenario if they can’t re-sign him.)  Then, you’re looking at probably multiple core players, at least one first-rounder, and a top prospect.  Someone’s going to keep upping the ante and it’s going to hurt.  For the Red Wings, think along the lines of Lucas Raymond, Kasper, a first (or more), and someone like Trey Augustine.  Minnesota gets two core top-six players (Kasper should get there), cap flexibility as those two cost less than what Kaprizov will, and future assets to either keep or try to flip to add another replacement piece.

Now, having said all that, I still think Kaprizov eventually re-signs.  It might take slightly more than what they’ve offered or perhaps a shorter-term agreement compared to eight years but right now, I’d predict they get it done.

Schwa: Who’s an under-the-radar pick to surprise in camp and force their way onto a roster – PTO, long-time AHL, rookie??

PTO – I’ll go with Kevin Labanc here.  He’s coming off a season where he played pretty sparingly in Columbus and didn’t do a lot in limited minutes.  But he has shown top-six flashes in the past and the Hurricanes have had a knack for getting the most out of some of their back-of-roster pieces, even in limited roles.  There isn’t really a great spot for him (which would make him signing a bit of a surprise) but if he gets a deal, he might be able to contribute.

Long-Time AHL – I’m not sure how under the radar he is but Boston’s Matej Blumel is the first player I thought of when I saw this question.  He was a stellar performer in the minors the last three years with AHL Texas but barely got an NHL opportunity.  The Bruins gave him a one-way deal this summer, a sign they think he could do just that.  Alex Steeves, another Boston signing, could also fit the bill although he might have a bigger hill to climb.  I think he has more NHL upside than he got to show in several years with Toronto.

Rookie – Let’s go with Colorado’s Zakhar Bardakov.  A 2021 seventh-round pick in his third year of eligibility, he’s 24 and hasn’t seen the ice yet in North America.  However, he’s coming off his best performance with SKA St. Petersburg of the KHL and plays with some grit.  The Avs have built a deeper roster but there’s still room for some rookies to grab hold of a spot and Bardakov could step in and do just that.

pawtucket: There’s a lot of talk about the Hughes brothers wanting to play together. How, then, does a team (Devils?) tightrope the salary cap while having a $12MM Quinn, $8MM Jack, and $5MM Luke all needing to be signed around the same time (Quinn expires in two years, Jack in five, Luke maybe in five)?

First, I think you need to reset your number for Luke Hughes.  A five-year, $25MM offer isn’t going to get it done.  While that might be his desired term, the cost would still probably eclipse $7MM and if it’s a longer-term pact, an AAV above Jack’s will be needed.  For Quinn Hughes, that number might wind up a little light as well based on the increasing cap but it’s fair enough to use here.  I’m going to put Luke at $7.5MM and sort of split the difference between the two ranges earlier, meaning the trio would cost $27.5MM.

Short-term, that wouldn’t be hard for New Jersey to manage.  A top-line center and top defense pairing already costs more than $20MM on most teams and by the time 2027-28 rolls around, that shouldn’t be overly costly.  Dougie Hamilton will be on an expiring deal by then so he’d probably be movable, even if not for a great return.

But if they time up their contracts to be up when Jack’s deal expires in 2030, that could be a different story.  At that point, Quinn is still probably in that $12MM range (maybe $13MM), Jack Hughes could very well be at $13MM himself, and Luke could be touching double-digits as well.  (It’s so early in his career that this number could be quite light before long.)  Now you’re talking somewhere between probably $36MM and $40MM for three players.  By then, the league-wide cost for those three spots might be up around $30MM to $32MM so the gap is a bit higher but probably manageable.  It would come down to a team having enough expiring deals to offset those salaries or moving out some pieces to cover the difference but I don’t think it would be overly problematic to fit them in.

Photo courtesy of Nick Wosika-Imagn Images.