Headlines

Go To MLB Trade Rumors
Go To Hoops Rumors

John Chayka

Poll: Which GM Will Be Fired Next?

at CDT | by 11 Comments

Despite missing the playoffs in each of the last four seasons, the Vancouver Canucks decided to extend GM Jim Benning today. The reasons for that are complicated—and obviously do not hinge entirely on his postseason record—just as they were when the Minnesota Wild made the decision to fire Paul Fenton just 14 months into his tenure with the team. The inner workings of an NHL front office are almost never made public (unless there is an intrepid reporter like Michael Russo of The Athletic who gets the incredible story), and it is hard to see why some decisions are made.

Still, even the most casual fan can see the seat of specific executives and coaches heating up. When the Edmonton Oilers decided to move on from Peter Chiarelli during another disappointing season, it didn’t come as much of a surprise. On the other hand, it was easy to see why the Carolina Hurricanes recently locked up Don Waddell after he interviewed for another job.

Looking around the league, who is next? Which GM will be let go, either this year or next summer?

It might be easy to look at the teams that have struggled recently, but many of them have replaced their top hockey operations executive over the last few seasons. The Oilers brought in Ken Holland to change the culture in Edmonton, while Steve Yzerman returned to the Detroit Red Wings to bring a new voice to a stagnant team. Florida has gone through quite a bit of turmoil in the front office since their ownership changed but Dale Tallon now seems to be entrenched as a veteran leader.

There are others though that may not be so lucky. The Ottawa Senators are heading in a new direction after shedding their previous core, but if the young talent doesn’t develop as hoped Pierre Dorion could be held responsible. John Chayka was the youngest GM in history when he took over the Arizona Coyotes in 2016, but they still haven’t made the playoffs under his watch and now have new ownership of their own. Jason Botterill was expected to have success in Buffalo after finding so much of it in Pittsburgh, but the Sabres haven’t been able to build a full roster around Jack Eichel despite some outstanding individual players.

Nothing is certain when it comes to front offices however. Cast your vote below and explain just why you think they’ll be the first to go!

[Mobile users click here to vote]

*We’ve used Kelly McCrimmon as the Vegas GM, though he won’t officially take that title from George McPhee until September

Pacific Notes: Heed, Coyotes, Gennaro

at CDT | by Leave a Comment

Defenseman Tim Heed is an impending unrestricted free agent that has received little media attention so far, and it sounds like he won’t be getting much more outside of his current market. The Athletic’s Kevin Kurz reports that Heed is expected to re-sign with the San Jose Sharks rather than test the market. Initially looking like the odd man out on San Jose’s blue line, the team has since traded Justin Braun and opted not to extend a qualifying offer to Joakim Ryan, opening up space for Heed’s return. The Sharks already have $66.7MM committed to just 15 players next season, with new contracts in store for RFA’s Timo Meier, Kevin Labanc, and Dylan Gambrell and decisions to make on UFA’s Joe Pavelski, Joe Thornton, and more. Heed would be an affordable addition who is already familiar with the team and can act as a capable bottom-pair defender. Kurz points out that the right-shot Heed would be an ideal replacement in old spot. After playing in a career-high 37 games last year, Heed has likely earned the trust of the San Jose staff to at least begin the year as a starter while a number of promising blue line prospects continue to develop.

  • The Arizona Coyotes have announced several changes to their front office, the most notable of which is poaching Scott Walker from the division rival Vancouver Canucks. Walker, a former OHL coach, spent the past four years as the Canucks’ Director of Player Development, but has now been hired by Arizona as Special Assistant to the General Manager. Internally, three other executives have been promoted: Jake Goldberg has been named Assistant to the General Manager; Phil McRae has been named the Director of North American Amateur Scouting; and Bryan Stewart has been named the Coyotes’ Director of Pro Scouting.
  • The ’Yotes’ AHL affiliate, the Tuscon Roadrunners, have re-signed forward Matteo Gennaro to a one-year contract. Gennaro, a former Winnipeg Jets prospect, just wrapped up his first pro season with Tuscon. The 22-year-old center was a force in his junior days in the WHL, but got off to a slow start to the next stage of his career with just 12 points in 58 games. However, Gennaro has always been considered a raw prospect and should continue to grow and round out at the pro level. The Roadrunners hope Gennaro can get closer to the 80-point seasons he put up at the end of his junior career, but they’ll settle for steady improvement in his sophomore season.

Arizona Coyotes To Target Scoring This Off-Season

at CDT | by 10 Comments

The Arizona Coyotes missed out on the postseason this year by a mere four points. While a success overall for the rebuilding club, the Coyotes struggled greatly on offense. The team’s 209 goals for were tied for third-worst in the NHL and their 16.3% power play success rate was sixth-worst. Behind stellar goaltending from Darcy Kuemper and strong team defense, the team largely got the job done, but they need to improve their scoring if they want to take the next step.

It’s thus no surprise that both Richard Morin of Arizona Republic and Craig Morgan of The Athletic write that Arizona will be looking to add a prominent scoring forward this summer. GM John Chayka would seem to agree:

I think to understand what we need to do to improve is pretty simple: We need to score more goals. I think anytime someone’s going through and trying to diagnose what you need to do to take that next step, that’s not the complicated part or complex part. I think what we need to understand and work through is, how do we score more goals? How do we create more offense, while maintaining that fundamental foundation of being a good stingy, defensive team.

Among the top options – albeit unlikely – for the Coyotes on the free agent market would be Columbus Blue Jackets stars Artemi Panarin and Matt Duchene, Buffalo Sabres’ standout Jeff Skinner, or any of the New York Islanders’ trio of Anders Lee, Jordan Eberle, and Brock Nelson. All of these forwards are prime talents, but may not be available to Arizona. Both Skinner and Lee are expected to re-sign with their current teams, as could Eberle or Nelson, while Panarin and Duchene are likely outside the Coyotes’ price range. More accessible free agent scorers could include Ryan Dzingel, Gustav Nyquist, Wayne Simmonds, or Brett Connolly, one or two of which would be a major boost to Arizona’s offense.

Morgan also adds that several cap-strapped teams could be forced to move talented forwards, leaving the Coyotes in places to scoop up valuable players at a discount. The Toronto Maple Leafs, Winnipeg Jets, and Tampa Bay Lightning are all in a tough spot, leaving the likes of Kasperi Kapanen, Andreas Johnsson, William Nylander, Nikolaj Ehlers, Mathieu Perreault, Ondrej Palat, J.T. Miller, or Alex Killorn possibly up for grabs.

Either by signing or trade, the Coyotes are likely to add a prominent forward or two and are expected to target wingers rather than centers. Arizona will be a team to watch this off-season as they target several of the aforementioned top names.

Arizona Coyotes Acquire Jordan Weal

at CDT | by 1 Comment

A day of minor trades continues with a somewhat more high-profile swap between the Philadelphia Flyers and Arizona Coyotes. The third deal of the day sees forward Jordan Weal heading to Arizona in exchange for a 2019 sixth-round pick and ECHL defenseman Jacob Graves, as first reported by Sportsnet’s Jeff Marek and later confirmed by the teams. Weal is an impending unrestricted free agent.

While it may seem strange that the Coyotes, just three points ahead of 30th-place Flyers in the league standings, are acquiring a rental player, one look at Arizona’s injury report will help to explain the move. The team has been without Christian Dvorak all season, lost Nick Schmaltz for the remainder of the year, have been missing Michael Grabner since early December, and today added Brad Richardson to the injured reserve. The team is sorely lacking in NHL-caliber forwards and found one in Weal for a relatively affordable price. Weal is likely to slide into a top-nine role for the Coyotes and could treat the opportunity as a tryout for a new contract, so as to avoid what might be a quiet off-season market for his services.

Weal, 26, is just two years removed from a season in which scored better than a point-per-game in the AHL for a half season and better than a half point-per-game with the Flyers for the other half. At 24, Weal hit the open market as a Group 6 UFA, but Philadelphia paid to keep him around with a two-year contract worth $1.75MM per year, despite having less than half a season of NHL experience. He has fallen short of expectations as a full-time player, recording 21 points in 69 games with the Flyers last season and just nine points through 28 games this year, serving as a frequent healthy scratch over both campaigns. Where Weal has excelled this season is at the face-off dot, with an impressive 59.7% mark. He has also been a strong possession player, holding a 54.8 Corsi For % that trailed only Claude Giroux and Travis Konecny among Flyers forwards. The scoring has simply been lacking from Weal, an issue that the struggling Flyers could not afford to let him work out. While Weal may seem like just another depth piece on a Coyotes team filled with similar players, GM John Chayka will likely take a look at him in a variety of situations to see whether or not he would be a long-term fit in Arizona. Don’t rule out the possibility that he could be traded again before the deadline – or waived – if he gets off to a poor start. Regardless, Weal certainly wasn’t going to be a fit moving forward in Philadelphia and new GM Chuck Fletcher will be happy to land a draft pick for a player he planned to let walk.

Arizona Coyotes’ Jakob Chychrun Returns To IR

at CDT | by Leave a Comment

The excitement surrounding young Arizona Coyotes defenseman Jakob Chychrun and his return to the lineup was short-lived. After missing 32 games last season with a knee injury and the beginning of this campaign due to off-season surgery, Chychrun finally got back into to the ’Yotes lineup on Tuesday night. He even celebrated his return by signing a six-year extension just hours before the game. However, Chychrun was held out of last night’s game, listed as day-to-day with an upper-body injury suffered in just his first game back. His bad luck got worse today, as CapFriendly reports that Chychrun has been placed on injured reserve with the upper-body condition and is set to miss even more time.

Chychrun, 20, was the 16th overall pick in 2016 and has shown a well-rounded arsenal of ability even in his limited 119 games over two plus seasons. However, the same concerns expressed when he signed his long-term, $26.7MM contract this week are now amplified even further. Chychrun would be far from the first NHL player to show incredible talent, but simply struggle to stay on the ice. Granted, an injured Chychrun can be placed on IR and does not affect the cap calculations of the Coyotes, a low-budget team anyway. However, if the composition of the team moving forward is built around a dependence on Chychrun’s availability, that could be trouble for GM John Chayka and company. There is also the possibility that reoccurring injuries begin to toll on the style and intensity of Chychrun’s game, especially since the young rearguard has shown a propensity for toughness and grit early on. There is substantial risk in Chycrhun’s new extension and yet another injury only exasperates it.

With Chychrun out, joining Alex Goligoski on the IR, as well as concerns over the availability of Jason Demers, who left last night’s game with a lower-body injury, the Arizona defensive corps is beat up right now. The team recalled Robbie Russo earlier this morning and fortunately still have Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Niklas Hjalmarsson at 100%. Still, the likes of Kevin Connauton, Jordan Oesterle, and Ilya Lyubushkin will be asked to step up while the team works its way back to full health on the blue line.

Coyotes Aiming To Be Proactive With Contract Extensions

at CDT | by Leave a Comment

The Coyotes have been particularly aggressive when it comes to handing out contract extensions in recent months.  Since April, the team has handed out five, the most recent of which coming earlier this week with defenseman Jakob Chychrun who signed a six-year deal upon his return to the lineup.  Speaking with reporters, including Matt Layman of Arizona Sports, GM John Chayka provided the rationale for this strategy:

“We’re getting some players in place now that we think are going to continue to develop and evolve and be elite players in the NHL. Now we can go about building out our roster. I think the easiest thing to do in this situation is to wait and play it out and see what happens, and then if a lot of these guys come along as we hope and expect, then ultimately the way the league’s structured, you have to start making some trade-offs.

“We want to try to avoid that scenario, especially with our key, core players moving forward in our mind. So trying to be proactive and trying to get ahead of that curve and if we can do that, accurately forecast, and hopefully we get some luck along the way, we can keep this group together for the long term.”

While Arizona has been a team that has typically been towards the bottom of the league in payroll spending (though not necessarily in terms of cap hit), that’s something that’s going to change in the very near future.  With those recent extensions, they already have over $60MM in salary commitments (and over $67MM on the salary cap) committed to just 15 players.  As a result, their player budget is going have to be higher than it has been in recent years.

In terms of players whose contracts are expiring this season, Chychrun was the last significant player they had to get locked up.  Young wingers Brendan Perlini and Lawson Crouse are set to become restricted free agents in July but both players are likely to receive short-term bridge deals instead of a long-term pact.

Looking ahead one year, center Clayton Keller is atop the list of players that will be on expiring contracts.  Given their recent approach, it’s fair to suggest that they’ll be very aggressive in pursuing a long-term extension with him which can be done as early as July 1, 2019.  Center Alex Galchenyuk will also be eligible to sign an extension at that time in advance of his UFA eligibility the following summer.

New deals for those two will put even more money on the books so it’s understandable that Chayka is hoping to get some contracts done that will eventually prove to be below-market deals by their expiration and is willing to take some risk to do so.  It’s clear that he believes that the core of this team is one that they can have long-term success with and if these extensions are any indication, the team is prepared to spend to keep it intact.  In doing so, they won’t be near the bottom of the league in spending much longer.

Arizona Coyotes Sign Jakob Chychrun To Six-Year Extension

at CDT | by 2 Comments

Young Arizona Coyotes defenseman Jakob Chychrun is getting ready to make his season debut tonight against the Detroit Red Wings and when he hits the ice, he’ll do so with the confidence of a brand new contract. Chychrun has signed a six-year extension, as first reported by The Athletic’s Craig Morgan and later confirmed by the team. Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman adds that the deal carries a $4.6MM cap hit, totaling $26.7MM over the six-year term.

The Coyotes’ willingness to commit this magnitude of years and dollars to a player that hasn’t played in an NHL game since April and has just 118 games under his belt speaks measures about what they see in him. Chychrun, 20, was the 16th overall pick in 2016, considered a steal by Arizona in the eyes of many. After a strong rookie campaign, Chychrun was limited to just 50 games last season by a nagging knee injury, the same ACL tear that has had him sidelined thus far in 2018-19. However, when healthy Chychrun has shown flashes of brilliance. A talented two-way defenseman, he has shown ample ability in all three zones with both a composed offensive game and gritty defensive game. Chychrun was able to earn over 20 minutes of ice time per game last year on a Coyotes team that featured established veteran defensemen like Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Alex Goligoski, Jason Demers, and Niklas Hjalmarsson. If health is not a continuing issue, Chychrun projects to be a top-four if not top-pair defender for Arizona.

Moving forward, the Coyotes have clearly designated Chychrun and Ekman-Larsson as the future of their blue line. Both are signed through 2024-25 with their recently-signed extensions – Ekman-Larsson inked his new deal this summer – at cap hits that could end up being well below their respective market values. Goligoski, Demers, and Hjalmarsson are all signed for two more years as well, giving Arizona a solid group for some time, with the likes of Pierre-Olivier Joseph and Filip Westerlund still on the way. The future is bright for the Coyotes defensively and they hope a healthy Chychrun can lead the charge.

Arizona Coyotes Could Be Early Players On Trade Market

at CDT | by Leave a Comment

The regular season is about to begin and with it comes the regular season trade market, which can be both a continuation of long-term team building or more reactionary measures to combat injuries or a slow start. One team that seems likely to be included in early trade conversations are the Arizona Coyotes. The ’Yotes have the pieces, the motivation, and most importantly, the roster crunch that should make them a prime candidate to acquire one of the first major pieces to hit the trade block.

Entering the 2018-19 season, Arizona is the only NHL team that is at the league’s 50-contract limit. A handful of other teams sit at 48 or 49 players signed, but the Coyotes are the only club right up against it. In fact, the Coyotes actually have 52 players under contract, according to CapFriendly. The contracts of recent first-round picks Barrett Hayton and Pierre-Olivier Joseph won’t count against the limit, once both are returned to their respective junior teams, but as of now Hayton remains on the roster. Presumably, Hayton must be returned to juniors. The fact that the Coyotes cannot even make such a simple roster decision exemplifies the inflexibility that the team struggles with. Solving this dilemma ahead of NHL Trade Deadline or college free agent rush later in the season will be a task on the forefront for GM John Chayka and company.

[RELATED: ARIZONA COYOTES ROSTER]

Fortunately, Arizona is set up well to make an “all-for-one”-type deal. The Coyotes have one of the youngest rosters in the league, specifically up front, where the depth of talent in 25-and-under forwards runs well into the minor league ranks. Regardless of who makes the Opening Night roster for Arizona, the team will have two or three well-regarded forward prospects playing for their AHL team in Tuscon seemingly for much of the year. It’s a simple fact of life that not every promising player can see substantial NHL minutes, but can the Coyotes really afford to be wasting talent?

Arizona has not qualified for the playoffs since they went by the name “Phoenix”. The team last saw postseason action in 2011-12, the third-longest drought in the league. The Coyotes have only made the playoffs three times total in the post-lockout salary cap era. Fans are clamoring for a change in fortunes and while the ’Yotes have been considered an up-and-coming team for years now, the rebuild simply hasn’t panned out. The administration has shown more of a willingness to make changes recently, investing in contender-caliber tandem of Antti Raanta and Darcy Kuemper, trading for veterans like Niklas Hjalmarsson, Jason Demers, and Derek Stepan and even signing sought-after hired gun Michael Grabner. The Coyotes are starting to build a roster that structurally looks more like a contender than the past few seasons, while maintaining a low salary cap hit. However, they need to get out from under this roster limit issue and an easy way of doing so would be to package several of their minor league forwards for a veteran name on the rumor mill.

Some may still want to take the slow, cautious approach and see the rebuild through, but after seven years without a playoff game and a Chayka administration that has seen too few top prospects pan out, the pressure is on in the desert. A slow start, even if it caused by an Alex Galchenyuk injury absence or adjusting to game speed for players like Jakob Chychrun, Christian Dvorak, and several new faces, could be enough to pull the trigger on such a deal. Considering all the variables in favor of making a trade, it would be no surprise to see the Coyotes active on the trade market early this season.

Oliver Ekman-Larsson Named Arizona Coyotes Captain

at CDT | by Leave a Comment

Though it had been expected since the day he signed his long-term extension with the team, Oliver Ekman-Larsson will finally have a new letter sewn onto his sweater this season. The Arizona Coyotes have officially named their star defenseman team captain, becoming just the fourth player to hold the honor since the franchise moved from Winnipeg. Keith Tkachuk, Teppo Numminen and Shane Doan now have company in the exclusive group. Coyotes GM John Chayka released a statement about his new captain:

Oliver is a tremendous player and person. On the ice, he leads by example and is one of the game’s premier defensemen. Off the ice, he is greatly admired and respected by his teammates, coaches and training staff and is also one of our most active players in the community. He is loyal, the consummate professional and a fierce competitor and I’m confident that he’ll be an excellent captain for the Coyotes for many years to come.

Ekman-Larsson will move into the role just as the Coyotes start to believe they can compete for a playoff spot, with an exciting young core headlined by star rookie Clayton Keller. Though now 27, the Swedish defenseman will be in Arizona for quite some time after signing an eight-year extension this offseason. That sort of stability is huge for a leadership role of this magnitude, and deserved by a player who has found success even while the team struggled at the bottom of the standings.

Scoring 14 goals in 2017-18 wasn’t a surprise for Ekman-Larsson, who is regularly near the top of the leaderboard in scoring among NHL defensemen and has posted five straight double digit goal seasons. His career high came in 2014-15 when he scored 23, and he already sits just six goals behind Numminen for the franchise lead. The biggest test now for Ekman-Larsson will be getting the Coyotes back to the playoffs, something he hasn’t experienced since his first full season in the league.

Arizona Coyotes Sign Christian Dvorak To Six-Year Extension

at CDT | by 5 Comments

The Arizona Coyotes have made it clear that Christian Dvorak is going to be a part of their plans for a long time, signing him today to a six-year contract extension. The deal kicks in for the 2019-20 season and will carry Dvorak to unrestricted free agents in the summer of 2025. The 22-year old forward is entering the final year of his entry-level contract, and was eligible to sign an extension on July 1st. CapFriendly reports that the deal will carry a $4.45MM cap hit, meaning the total extension is worth $26.7MM. Arizona GM John Chayka included a statement:

We are very pleased to sign Christian to a long-term contract. Christian is a highly skilled, reliable, two-way center who continues to improve each season. He will be a key player for us in the future and we are thrilled to have him with us for the next seven seasons.

Dvorak was originally selected 58th overall by the Coyotes in 2014, but returned to the OHL for two more seasons to round out his game at the junior level. In those years, paired mostly with Mitch Marner (and often either Max Domi or Matthew Tkachuk) Dvorak became a dominant offense player and recorded 230 points in just 125 regular season games. He added 35 points en route to an OHL Championship and Memorial Cup in 2015-16 as team captain, before jumping straight to the NHL the following season. While some doubted that Dvorak could produce goals and points away from Marner and the other talented players on the London Knights roster, he scored 15 goals and 33 points as a rookie on a bad Arizona team and performed better admirably in the role that he was given.

Unfortunately Dvorak failed to take another step forward offensively in 2017-18, scoring just 15 goals again and recording 37 points despite increased ice time. While he took substantial strides in his defensive and faceoff work, his upside in the offense zone was capped and his powerplay production was underwhelming even with ample opportunity. No longer a rookie, there were higher expectations of the young forward that he didn’t quite reach in the eyes of many. Apparently not in those of the front office though, as the team has signed him long before it was necessary in an attempt to get him under contract before a potential breakout. There’s little chance he could have demanded a contract of this value next summer given that he would not have been arbitration eligible, though it does buy out two of his unrestricted free agent years down the road for a reasonable price. The breakdown of the deal, provided by Craig Morgan of AZ Sports, indicates that he also has an eight team no-trade clause in those UFA seasons. The full salary breakdown is as follows:

  • 2019-20: $2.95MM salary + $300K signing bonus
  • 2020-21: $3.45MM salary
  • 2021-22: $5.075MM salary
  • 2022-23: $3.45MM salary
  • 2023-24: $5.725MM salary
  • 2024-25: $5.75MM salary

Those are big numbers for a player that still has yet to really have an offensive breakout, though they could look like a bargain down the road if he does. With the salary cap expected to continue to grow (though perhaps not at the same rate), a $4.45MM cap hit might become more than reasonable for a two-way center with Dvorak’s ability. Unfortunately right now it will be compared to some of his contemporaries who have produced at a much higher rate in recent years. CapFriendly’s tool indicates that Victor Rask and Rickard Rakell are the closes matches for the deal, given they each signed six-year extensions in 2016 at the age of 23 (the same age Dvorak will be when the deal kicks in). Rask and Rakell were each coming off 20+ goal and 40+ point seasons, thresholds that Dvorak has still yet to eclipse in his short career, and both come in at substantially lower cap hits ($4.0MM and $3.8MM respectively). Rakell has thrived after being moved to the wing with 67 goals over the first two years of the deal, and while Rask has actually taken steps backwards offensively in consecutive years his point production still sat right around where Dvorak was in 2017-18.

The interesting part of a deal like this for Arizona though, is that the team normally doesn’t really have to worry about cap problems. Even after assuming dead cap hits like Dave Bolland and Marian Hossa, the team still finds itself with more than $10MM in space and one of the lowest salary totals in the league. Giving Dvorak a little bit extra in order to keep him in the desert long-term may have been necessary, and something that the team was obviously willing to do. Other teams around the league will likely feel the effects worse than Arizona when it comes to re-signing their own restricted free agents.

Pro Hockey Rumors is not affiliated with National Hockey League, NHL or NHL.com

scroll to top