August 30: The Flames and Hanifin are putting the final touches on a new deal, TSN’s Darren Dreger reports (Twitter link).
August 25: Flames offseason acquisition Noah Hanifin is one of 14 remaining restricted free agents this summer. That’s not likely to be the case much longer as the defenseman told NHL.com’s Dan Rosen that he is “super close” to getting a deal done and has no worries that something won’t be in place by the time players report to camp on September 9th. Calgary GM Brad Treliving also expressed optimism to Rosen that a deal would be reached in the near future.
Hanifin indicated that he’s hoping to sign a contract that is at least five years in length which would seemingly take a short-term bridge deal off the table while Treliving declined to comment on what type of term they are discussing. The Flames opened up the salary cap space to give him a long-term pact after they bought out winger Troy Brouwer in their post-arbitration window and currently sit with a little over $7.5MM in room to work with per CapFriendly.
A five-year deal for the 21-year-old would take him to unrestricted free agency at its conclusion; although he’d still be below the usual UFA age of 27, he will have reached the seven years of service time mark to get there. With that in mind, it wouldn’t be surprising to see Calgary push for a contract that’s at least a little bit longer even though the AAV will be higher as a result.
Interestingly enough, one of the potential comparables for Hanifin is the player he was traded for in Dougie Hamilton who has a cap hit of $5.75MM. While Hamilton has the better offensive numbers, the Upper Limit has gone up since then which offsets that somewhat so an AAV around that range wouldn’t be too shocking for Hanifin when all is said and done.