Today, several teams around the league will place additional players on long-term injured reserve. The complicated calculations that are done to maximize LTIR relief and accruable cap space are different on the last day of training camp and the first day of the season, meaning in some cases it benefited a team to wait until today.
The players that receive the designation today will be out for a minimum of ten games and 24 days, meaning they are not available for their teams through the rest of October. Several prominent names are among them:
F Nicklas Backstrom (WSH)
F Andrew Shaw (CHI)
D Wyatt Kalynuk (CHI)
F Oskar Sundqvist (STL)
F Evgeni Malkin (PIT)
These designations have opened up some additional cap room, leading to recalls by each team. The Washington Capitals brought Connor McMichael and Beck Malenstyn up, the Chicago Blackhawks brought Mackenzie Entwistle and Philipp Kurashev back up, the St. Louis Blues recalled Klim Kostin and the Pittsburgh Penguins recalled Anthony Angello and Drew O’Connor (and signed Brian Boyle).
Other candidates, including Vegas Golden Knights forward Alex Tuch, Montreal Canadiens defenseman Shea Weber, New York Islanders defenseman Johnny Boychuk, Vancouver Canucks forwards Micheal Ferland and Brandon Sutter, and Toronto Maple Leafs forward Ilya Mikheyev will likely be placed on LTIR at some point in the coming days. We will update this list as teams make those moves official.