Articles in NHL Teams

from Ian Mendes of The Athletic,

For the past several weeks, Alex DeBrincat’s camp has been steadfastly quiet as rumours swirled around his future in Ottawa.

But on Monday evening, DeBrincat’s agent Jeff Jackson wanted to address a storyline that is gaining traction.

After a headline in Postmedia stated, “Alex DeBrincat’s contract demands holding up trade from Ottawa Senators,” Jackson called the report “entirely false and without merit” in a text message to The Athletic.

Jackson wanted to clarify the circumstances around his client, which he believes has been mischaracterized in recent media reports.

“As far as I have been advised, there has been no agreement of any kind on an actual trade involving Alex and I would require that before entering into an actual negotiation,” wrote Jackson. “We are waiting patiently for that to happen.”

And when it comes to the notion that DeBrincat and his agent are acting as a barrier to the sniper’s own trade out of Ottawa, Jackson was very pointed in his assessment of the situation.

“Agents and players don’t make trades … that’s the GM’s job,” wrote Jackson.

DeBrincat does not hold a no-trade clause in his contract, so technically the Senators are free to send him to any club in the NHL — without requiring DeBrincat’s approval.

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from Nick Barden of The Hockey News,

It appears as though contract negotiations between William Nylander and the Maple Leafs aren't going as everyone would have hoped.

According to TSN hockey insider, Chris Johnston, on the Chris Johnston Show, the negotiations between both sides aren't "going well."

"There were a lot of discussions down at the draft in Nashville between the team (Toronto) and his agent," Johnston said. "And they just see the world differently at this point in time."

Johnston goes on to report that Nylander believes he's a $10 million dollar player, while the Maple Leafs are trying to get him at a lower number.

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from Justin Bourne of Sportsnet,

While this year's UFA group may not have had the biggest names, some moves certainly will pay off.

Here's a look at each UFA -- as we start setting our sights on 2023-24.

Klim Kostin, C, Detroit
Contract: Two years, $2 million AAV

I love this bet for the Red Wings, who are a team looking to turn some talented young players into a legitimate playoff team. He’s just 24 and can be the type of useful bottom-six contributor that can thrive in today’s NHL where physical players need to be able to play a bit, too.

D Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Florida
Contract: One year, $2.25 million AAV

I love one-year bets on talented people who’ve fallen off for one reason or another, particularly guys who aren’t “old” (he’s just 31) and are incentivized to re-convince people they can play. You want to be the team to get that prove-it bounce-back year -- like when Kevin Shattenkirk struggled at the end of a long deal at nearly $6.7 million per, got a one-year $1.75-million deal from Tampa, and was excellent en route to winning a Cup, before cashing back in for nearly $4 million a year on a three-year deal in Anaheim.

RW, Ryan Reaves, Toronto
Contract: Three years, $1.35 million AAV

'Toronto is a contender': Reaves explains the decision to choose Maple Leafs in free agencyPlay VideoPlayMuteCurrent Time 0:00/Duration 0:33Loaded: 29.28% Fullscreen

Like Brad Treliving, I too really like the idea of the Leafs having Reaves on a hit-to-hurt forechecking fourth line 2023-24 -- there’s no doubt he’s a useful guy in that spot (he’s played a ton of playoff hockey over the past decade for a reason). But you just cannot fall in love with that idea to the point where you give a fourth-line guy three years of term (on an over-35 deal so you’re stuck with it regardless), all while overpaying him along the way.

read on

from Eric Stephens of The Athletic,

Within a space of three hours on Saturday, the Ducks were both lauded and lambasted for their free-agent signings of Radko Gudas and Alex Killorn. Some teams make contract terms public now. Most don’t, but they get revealed anyway, and that keeps interest flowing among fans. And it also encourages instant praise and criticism.

How the Ducks’ deals for over-30 veterans Gudas (three years, $12 million) and Killorn (four years, $25 million) age over the next few seasons will either confirm or refute the narratives. Pat Verbeek doesn’t seem to be concerned with narratives. The big picture is always kept in mind, but the Ducks’ general manager is thinking about the impact of those additions right now.

These two, with whom Verbeek has had long associations, have experienced success. Killorn is a two-time Stanley Cup winner who has been to the Cup Final two other times and has played 140 playoff games. More recently, Gudas played a prime role in Florida’s run to the Cup Final last month and was part of the club a year earlier that had a franchise-record 122 points and was the Presidents’ Trophy winner.

As the Ducks try to resurface from the bottom of the league, Gudas and Killorn won’t be tasked with being the main pilots in an ascent. But they’ll be counted on for their knowledge of navigating those turbulent waters.

“Certainly, they have an understanding of what winning’s all about,” Verbeek said. “Not accepting anything. Not accepting losing. And so that standard of compete, that standard of work ethic every day that comes to practice will be shown to all our young guys.

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At a time when other Canadian teams — Calgary. primarily — are having trouble getting players to stay. and when there is a widespread belief that tax differences between Canada and certain U.S. states is creating a problem for Canada’s seven clubs, being able to lure players like Bertuzzi away from American clubs is a useful process.

It might be a short marriage. But Leafs aren’t looking for love. Just a Cup.

-Damien Cox at the Toronto Star where you can read more on the signing of Bertuzzi.

from John Romano of the Tampa Bay Times,

Remember this:

The Lightning did not become great until they got tough. Until they got smart. The Lightning did not go on their three-year stretch of near-total domination until they learned that preventing goals was the difference between a season ending too soon and having a floating victory parade.

That’s what this weekend’s comings and goings were all about.

The Lightning sacrificed continuity, popularity and goal scoring in the hope of getting just a little bit harder. Maybe it wasn’t the optimal set of moves, but it was probably the best they could hope for considering their contentious relationship with the salary cap.

Saying goodbye to Alex Killorn and Pat Maroon is heartbreaking. No sense arguing that. Maroon, while not a major cog on the ice, was a fan favorite for his passion and wit. Killorn, on the other hand, was a vital part of the Lightning roster. He not only played an important role on the ice, but he was adored in the community and respected in the locker room.

The only thing worse than losing Killorn would have been giving him the four-year, $25 million contract he got from Anaheim on Saturday.

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from Luke Fox of Sportsnet,

Down in the count Sunday, Treliving knocked one deep by signing Tyler Bertuzzi — the best UFA available following the initial 24 hours of madness — for significantly less term than the power forward and agent Todd Reynolds were hunting on the open market.

The 28-year-old, top-six winger signed a one-year pact for $5.5 million and should have no issue eating the minutes and potting the goals lost by Michael Bunting, who joined Carolina for four years at $4.5 million per.

Bolstered by the deep pockets in Toronto, Treliving was allowed to hand Bertuzzi $4.725 million of his salary upfront and threw in a no-movement clause for good measure.

While Bertuzzi preferred term in the wake of multiple injuries and an expiring bridge deal — and told both former teams, the Detroit Red Wings and Boston Bruins as much — the one-year bet with a contender is a smart play.

The Sudbury native and Guelph Storm graduate returns to Ontario to play in front of a large media market and fanbase that can boost one’s profile to financial gain. (Ask Zach Hyman or Luke Schenn or Jack Campbell or Ilya Mikheyev or Justin Holl or…)

read on

$5.5M

from Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic,

In our conversations since the regular season ended, Predators general manager Barry Trotz routinely would mention that while he wouldn’t be spending gigantic dollars this offseason with his team in transition, he was hoping to address the culture piece of it.

He wasn’t kidding.

Enter Ryan O’Reilly and Luke Schenn, character and leadership oozing out of their pores.

“It was really important,” Trotz told The Athletic over the phone Sunday.

Important because as an organization, the Predators are going to continue to integrate their top picks and prospects between the NHL and AHL levels, and Trotz wanted to ensure those young players were exposed to veteran leadership that had the right impact.

Obviously captain Roman Josi is a big part of that, but adding ROR and Schenn was critical in that game plan, too.

“I needed some character people so that as these young players filter in, they had the backbone, the good leaders, the mentors, and good players that they could lean on and grow with,” Trotz said.

Ryan Johansen and Matt Duchene were valuable members of the Predators. They did a lot for the franchise.

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"When your kid is involved in sport, they're busy working out, they're busy playing junior hockey, then they're in college hockey, then you're in pro hockey," Babcock said. "It's, I don't know, seven years? You don't see them as much as you'd like to see them. Suddenly, I'm renting a house in Saskatoon 20 feet from the rink and he's living in the basement and you're working together every day while he takes his MBA.

"That's something I would never give back. I've said it a number of times -- the last three-and-a-half years has have been a gift from God to me. It's been absolutely spectacular. Getting involved in college sports and getting involved with my son has brought the joy for the game back for me, and I'm excited about being involved."

-Mike Babcock, head coach of the Columbus Blue Jackets. Jeff Svoboda of BlueJackets.com has more.

Magnus Hellberg is signed through the 2023.24 season, and his contract carries an average annual value of $785,000 at the NHL level.

from Steve Simmons of the Toronto Sun,

- Ryan Reaves is great in the room — which would be fine if the Maple Leafs were trying to win the dressing room Stanley Cup.

Instead, the Leafs want the real one, and Reaves, the first free agent signing of the Brad Treliving era, may not be of much help at all in that area....

- The Boston Bruins are thinning out, with the belief that centres Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci won’t be returning next season and Tyler Bertuzzi and Taylor Hall, who combined for 10 playoff goals, look to be gone, along with defenceman Dmitry Orlov. The Tampa Bay Lightning are thinning out — with Alex Killorn the latest to leave the Bolts after Ondrej Palat, Yanni Gourde, Ryan McDonough, Blake Coleman, Tyler Johnson, Barclay Goodrow, and Jan Ruutta went before him. All of which should benefit the Leafs. The time is right for the Leafs to take a big swing at winning, to be bold instead of conservative.

- This is how you win as an NHL general manager. You don’t act emotionally. You don’t fall in love with your players. You develop a hard edge about decision-making. You do what needs to be done. Kelly McCrimmon traded away original Vegas pickup Reilly Smith in order to keep free agent Ivan Barbashev with the Stanley Cup champions just days after celebrating the Stanley Cup. It was pure business. Not easy to do. Just necessary.

- In the Carolina Hurricanes draft meetings, GM Don Waddell made a joke when the scouts were discussing Felix Unger Sorum, who was later picked by Carolina. Waddell asked if Oscar Madison was next on the list. No one in the draft room, clearly not Odd Couple fans, knew what he was talking about. Kids.

- With signings of Corey Perry, Foligno, and the deal for Taylor Hall, the Blackhawks are apparently surrounding Bedard with the 2015 NHL all-star team.

more

from Eric Duhatschek of The Athletic.

So on a day when NHL teams went bargain hunting almost from the opening bell, you were waiting and wondering to see if any team might revert to the old free-agent strategy of wildly overpaying for a veteran player, whose best years are, in all probability, behind them. Yes, finally! It took almost two hours for it to happen but it finally did. The Ducks gave the 33-year-old Killorn a four-year contract, with a $6.25 million AAV, after coming off a career-high season in which he scored 27 goals and 64 points. Of course, he scored those points playing in the top six of a Tampa Bay Lightning team that included the likes of Brayden Point, Nikita Kucherov and Steven Stamkos. He’s not going to have that luxury in Anaheim.

The current GM in Anaheim, Pat Verbeek, worked alongside Steve Yzerman for years in Tampa Bay and was with the Lightning as the assistant GM and player personnel director when Killorn broke into the league. So, a lot of familiarity between the player and the manager....

Contract grade: F
Fit grade: C-

more ($) plus Shanya Goldman with her opinion too...

from Larry Brooks of the New York Post,

There are two distinct counting categories that confront NHL general managers. One is the cap. The other is the calendar.

Chris Drury appears to have done a rather fine job at tackling the first element on the Rangers’ coupon-clipping foray into the opening of the free agent market. The second, well, that is an age-old question to which the answer won’t be known for months.

In a young man’s league that trends younger by the day, the Blueshirts have become an Outpost for Old Men — at least up front following Saturday’s activity that included signing five forwards. The commonality shared by Blake Wheeler, Nick Bonino, Tyler Pitlick, Riley Nash and Alex Belzile is they are 31 or older with all but Belzile at least age 33.

Adding these forwards to a roster featuring Mika Zibanejad (30), Chris Kreider (32), Artemi Panarin (32 at the end of October), Vincent Trocheck (30 on July 11), Barclay Goodrow (30) and Jimmy Vesey (30) indicates that the organization should probably adopt a grey jersey as an alternate sweater.

Chances are the Rangers will open in Buffalo on Oct. 12 with a roster including only three forwards younger than 30: Filip Chytil (24 on Sept. 5), Alexis Lafreniere (22 on Oct. 11), Kaapo Kakko (22). See why even if they have outgrown the “Kid” moniker, it applies here?

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from Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Sun,

Alex DeBrincat is learning the hard way that the grass isn’t always greener on the other side of the fence.

After refusing to sign an eight-year deal with the Ottawa Senators, the 25-year-old, two-time 40-goal scorer and his Toronto-based agent, Jeff Jackson, are learning that DeBrincat can’t get that kind of contract anywhere else in the National Hockey League.

While the Senators have tried to deal DeBrincat for the past three weeks and found some trades they considered to be close, those talks got shut down because Jackson was unable to get the kind of term of contract he wanted after being given permission to speak to those teams.

General manager Pierre Dorion confirmed Saturday, the day NHL free agency opened, he had given Jackson permission to talk contract with more than one team in an attempt to facilitate a trade, but those trades fell through because DeBrincat’s camp didn’t like the term they were being offered.

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SCOTTSDALE, ARIZONA - Arizona Coyotes General Manager Bill Armstrong announced today that the Coyotes have signed center Nick Bjugstad to a two-year contract. Per club policy, terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

"We are very pleased to have Nick re-join the Coyotes," said Armstrong. "He is a reliable two-way center, a good leader, and a great teammate. We look forward to having him back on our roster again this season."