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Archives for August 2022

Minor Transactions: 08/10/22

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As the hockey world watches a junior tournament and waits for Nazem Kadri to officially sign somewhere, there are plenty of minor moves being made to fill out rosters. While they won’t have much of an impact on the NHL, these are still important transactions to keep track of. We’ll do just that below:

  • Luke Johnson has signed an AHL contract with the San Jose Barracuda, after playing all of last season in the minor leagues. The 27-year-old forward last saw the NHL in 2020-21 and has 32 games at that level to his name. In 23 games with the Manitoba Moose last season, he scored just ten points.
  • Justin Ducharme has signed a one-year contract with the Texas Stars, meaning he’ll make the jump from the Laval Rocket organization. The 22-year-old undrafted forward had five goals in 19 games for Laval last season, while also racking up 25 points in 35 games with their ECHL affiliate.
  • Jake Gaudet is staying with the Cleveland Monsters, signing a new two-year AHL deal with the club. The undrafted forward managed just three goals and ten points in 40 games with them last season but was obviously good enough to earn another contract.
  • Free agent defenseman Derrick Pouliot has found a home for next season, signing an AHL contract with the San Jose Barracuda, the team confirms. The terms of the deal were not disclosed per club policy. The Barracuda serve as the AHL affiliate of the NHL’s San Jose Sharks. The deal will give the Barracuda a responsible defenseman and a veteran of not only 239 AHL games, but also 213 NHL games. The eighth-overall selection of the 2021 NHL draft by the Pittsburgh Penguins, Pouliot debuted for the Penguins in 2014-15 and helped the team win two Stanley Cups in 2016 and 2017. His largest sample of NHL action came between 2017 and 2019, where he played in 133 games over two seasons with the Vancouver Canucks. Most recently, Pouliot got into games with the Vegas Golden Knights and Seattle Kraken in 2021-22.

This page will continue to be updated with any further notable transactions. 

Andrew Hammond, Josh Brook, Cole Schneider Sign Professional Tryouts

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Three more players have settled this offseason, as Andrew Hammond, Josh Brook, and Cole Schneider have agreed to professional tryouts according to CapFriendly. Hammond will be attending training camp with the Florida Panthers, Brook with the Calgary Flames, and Schneider with the Nashville Predators.

As the summer continues, more and more players will be taking tryout offers, as they try to land NHL contracts that have at least call-up eligibility. For a goaltender like Hammond, an NHL at some point seems likely since he saw 11 games this season and has a history at the level. In four games for the Montreal Canadiens, he registered a .920 save percentage, though that was dragged down considerably by the .860 he put up in seven appearances for the New Jersey Devils.

For his career, he actually holds a .916, thanks to that incredible run with the Ottawa Senators in 2014-15, when he posted a 20-1-2 record and .941 save percentage to carry the team into the playoffs.

Brook meanwhile is the only one of the three without any NHL experience, though he is just 23 years old and was a second-round pick of the Canadiens in 2017. Last season he split just 12 games between the AHL and ECHL, making it difficult to see how he’ll land an NHL deal even with a strong camp. That doesn’t mean it’s out of the question down the road but for this year, a minor league deal still seems more likely.

Schneider, who last saw NHL action during the 2016-17 season, is an excellent minor league player and has been for a long time. In 71 games with the Milwaukee Admirals last season he scored 30 goals and 60 points but hasn’t been on an NHL contract since 2019. Perhaps he’ll be able to negotiate one, though a call-up for the Predators seems unlikely at this point in his career.

Bruins Notes: Langenbrunner, Front Office, Pastrnak

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The Boston Bruins have given Jamie Langenbrunner a new title, naming him Assistant General Manager – Player Personnel today. The front office executive has been with the team for the past seven years, first joining as a player development coordinator and working his way up. A name to keep in mind for future general manager searches, he has rather quickly made his way through the Bruins system, having only been named director of player development in 2020.

He wasn’t the only one to receive a promotion today though. Here are more notes from the front office announcements:

  • Dennis Bonvie and Ryan Nadeau have been named directors of pro and amateur scouting respectively, while Darren Yopyk is now assistant director of amateur scouting. Brett Harkins is the head college scout, while Parker MacKay is now an amateur and college scout. The team has also named three skating and skills consultants, reformed their medical department, and named a handful of analytics additions.
  • Not to be overlooked was general manager Don Sweeney’s press conference discussing the new contracts for David Krejci and Patrice Bergeron. In it, he was asked about a potential extension for David Pastrnak, and explained that there is an ongoing conversation with the star winger. Sweeney wouldn’t discuss details, though did mention that the Bruins are comfortable going into the season without an extension in place. Pastrnak, 26, is scheduled to be an unrestricted free agent next summer.

New Jersey Devils Sign Fabian Zetterlund

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The New Jersey Devils have signed restricted free agent forward Fabian Zetterlund to a one-year, two-way contract. The deal carries an NHL salary of $750K, an AHL salary of $125K, and a minor league guarantee of $175K. Zetterlund was not yet eligible for salary arbitration.

Zetterlund, 22, is poised to take on a bigger role with the Devils this season, after an outstanding minor league campaign that carried over into an excellent stretch at the end of the season in the NHL. Playing 11 games in April with the Devils, he managed to score eight points, after racking up 52 in 58 games for the Utica Comets.

Now, with four veteran forwards on expiring contracts, the path to full-time NHL playing time is right in front of him. Tomas Tatar, Andreas Johnsson, Miles Wood, and Erik Haula will all be unrestricted free agents at the end of the year, meaning opportunity is on the horizon for young forwards in the system.

Given that Zetterlund is no longer waiver-exempt, he likely has a leg up on some of his competition. If he can secure a roster spot in training camp, he could be with the big club all season. If not, he will also make an interesting waiver claim candidate for another team with space in the bottom six.

Florida Panthers Announce Coaching Staff

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After adding Paul Maurice as the team’s new head coach earlier this summer, the Florida Panthers have rounded out their staff. Myles Fee, Jamie Kompon, and Sylvain Lefebvre will serve as assistants, joining Tuomo Ruutu and goaltending coach Robb Tallas on Maurice’s staff. The team also announced that Geordie Kinnear will continue as head coach of the Charlotte Checkers.

Kompon’s addition was reported last month, as the veteran coach follows Maurice from Winnipeg to Florida. The long-time NHL coach has served in various roles with the St. Louis Blues, Los Angeles Kings, Chicago Blackhawks, and Winnipeg Jets, while also at one point sitting as the general manager and head coach of the Portland Winterhawks of the WHL.

Fee, meanwhile, has been a video coach with the Buffalo Sabres for the past two years, and previously served with the Checkers, New York Rangers, and Edmonton Oilers. He also happened to be the video coach for Team Europe at the 2016 World Cup, a group that had Maurice as an assistant under Ralph Krueger.

Lefebvre may actually be the most recognizable to hockey fans, given his long playing career that lasted nearly 1,000 games. He has been with the San Diego Gulls of the AHL for the last three seasons, and previously worked in the NHL with the Colorado Avalanche.

Winnipeg Jets Sign David Gustafsson

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The Winnipeg Jets have re-signed their final restricted free agent, inking David Gustafsson to a two-year contract. The deal includes an average annual value of $775K in the NHL and is a two-way deal in 2022-23 and a one-way deal in 2023-24.

Gustafsson, 22, did not have arbitration rights this offseason after playing just 28 NHL games to this point in his career. Only two of those came last season, when he spent most of the year in the minor leagues with the Manitoba Moose, racking up 15 goals and 30 points in 47 games.

The 2018 second-round pick is a mixture of size and defensive responsibility that could have him in line for a more regular role this season, especially given how little the Jets have done to add forward depth this summer. In fact, they haven’t really done anything to improve that group, other than to re-sign Mason Appleton after re-acquiring him at the deadline.

With only nine forwards signed to one-way deals, there should be a healthy competition for the last few spots. Gustafsson will have to show that he can be a valuable piece at both ends, and try to insert himself into the bottom-six plans.

Max Pacioretty To Undergo Surgery

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Max Pacioretty’s debut with the Hurricanes is going to have to wait a while.  The team announced today that the veteran winger is set to undergo surgery to repair a torn Achilles on Wednesday and will be out for six months.

The 33-year-old was acquired from Vegas last month along with defenseman Dylan Coghlan in exchange for future considerations in a trade that was solely done to free up cap space.  Pacioretty is coming off an injury-plagued year that saw him miss time due to four separate injuries but when he was in the lineup, he was quite productive, notching 19 goals and 18 assists in just 37 games.

His addition was expected to help offset some of their losses up front with Vincent Trocheck going to the Rangers in free agency while Nino Niederreiter landed with the Predators.  Instead, Carolina won’t have Pacioretty in their lineup until sometime in February which is close to the trade deadline.  He would have been a capable veteran to help youngsters Seth Jarvis, Jesperi Kotkaniemi, and Martin Necas but now, those three will have a little more pressure to produce on their shoulders as things stand.

In the short term, this news eliminates Carolina’s cap problems for most of the season.  When Necas signed earlier today, that put them more than $1MM over the $82.5MM Upper Limit of the salary cap and with defenseman Jake Gardiner cleared to return, they weren’t going to have the ability to put him on LTIR.  Now, Pacioretty will go there, allowing the Hurricanes to spend up to his $7MM AAV over the cap.  The fact that he’ll return later in the season will make it difficult for them to go out and acquire a replacement but at a minimum, they won’t have any compliance issues for the first few months and will be able to carry a full-sized roster without any concerns.

Of course, that’s only a small consolation as they’d much rather have Pacioretty, a player who has produced at nearly a point per game pace over the past three seasons with 154 points in 158 games.  But now, they’ll have to wait more than half of the season before their top offseason acquisition up front will be able to make his debut.  And with Pacioretty entering a contract year, missing 50 games or more won’t help his market value next summer when he goes in search of his next deal.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Snapshots: Larkin, Kolesar, Luypen

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After changing agents earlier this offseason, it felt like Dylan Larkin and the Red Wings would be able to work out a long-term contract extension to keep the captain with his hometown team.  However, it has yet to happen so far.  In his latest mailbag for The Athletic (subscription link), Max Bultman tried to peg where a new deal should fall for the 26-year-old, suggesting Mika Zibanejad and Evgeny Kuznetsov as viable comparables.  Those players took up a little more than 10% at the time their deals would sign which would peg Larkin’s price tag around the $8.6MM range.  That would certainly represent a sizable increase on his current $6.1MM AAV and it doesn’t hurt that Larkin is coming off a 69-point season, the second-most of his career.  There’s still plenty of time to get a deal done but it’s a bit surprising that an agreement isn’t yet in place.

Elsewhere around the hockey world:

  • Although he underwent offseason surgery after missing the final three games of the season due to a lower-body injury, Golden Knights winger Keegan Kolesar told reporters, including Ben Gotz of the Las Vegas Review-Journal (Twitter link) that he will be ready to return by training camp next month. The 25-year-old had 24 points in 77 games last season which helped him to earn a three-year, $4.2MM contract last week to avoid salary arbitration.  With Max Pacioretty and Mattias Janmark moving on this summer, Kolesar could be in line for a bit more playing time next season.
  • After signing his entry-level deal earlier this month, Blackhawks prospect Jalen Luypen is on the move in the WHL. Tri-City announced that they’ve acquired the 20-year-old from Edmonton in a swap that included multiple conditional draft picks that are likely dependent on where the forward plays next season.  Chicago could turn Luypen pro with AHL Rockford or send him back to junior for an overage year where he’d try to improve on the 64 points in the 66 games he played last season.

Poll: Who Will Win The Gold At The World Juniors?

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The 2022 World Junior Hockey Championship is far from a usual one.  The tournament usually runs just after Christmas but it had to be rescheduled for August and runs from today through the 20th.

This is often a tournament where we get to see many of the NHL’s top prospects in the same setting.  That isn’t exactly the case this time around with many teams asking their top youngsters not to participate with rookie camps a little more than a month away.  However, there are still plenty of quality prospects throughout the lineups for this summer event which will help bridge the gap between a slow month of NHL activity and the start of camps next month.

The United States come into the event as the defending Gold Medallists after beating Canada in the 2021 event.  They’ll have a whole new goalie tandem with Spencer Knight now in the NHL while Trevor Zegras was the leading scorer in that event and he is now in the NHL as well.  The Americans have four first-round picks on their roster while forward Thomas Bordeleau is someone with a bit of NHL experience after playing the last few weeks with San Jose last season.

Canada, the host team for the event, has seen quite a bit of turnover from the initial event in December as there are nine new faces on the roster.  However, they’ll be led by returnees Mason McTavish and Kent Johnson up front along with the expected first-overall pick in 2023, Connor Bedard.  In total, they have eight first-round picks on their roster.

Finland took home the bronze back in 2021 and they have seven returnees from that squad.  Topi Niemela leads the way defensively while Joakim Kemell and Brad Lambert, a pair of first-round picks last month, will help pace the attack.  While most of their team remains intact from December, one notable absentee is Penguins goalie prospect Joel Blomqvist who had a dominant year in Finland’s professional league and is getting ready for his next season with them.

Sweden is a team that could have plenty of firepower with five forwards picked in the first round headlined by Isak Rosen and Jonathan Lekkerimaki.  On the back end, Simon Edvinsson is poised to have a big tournament that could help propel him into a battle for a roster spot with the Red Wings in training camp while Jesper Wallstedt is a highly-touted goalie prospect.  Overall, all but three of their 25 players are NHL prospects.

Slovakia looked to have an opportunity to make an impression at this event but most of their NHL prospects, including Juraj Slafkovsky and Simon Nemec (the top two picks in the draft last month), are taking a pass on the recommendations of their NHL teams but they still have a trio of drafted players plus a projected top-ten 2023 pick in Dalibor Dvorsky.

Meanwhile, Czechia has a dozen NHL prospects on its roster headlined by the sixth pick last month in defenseman David Jiricek.  If their matchup today was any indication, both of those teams could be capable of pulling off an upset or two as the tournament progresses.

Switzerland, Germany, Austria, and Latvia round out the field, one that will remain intact for the 2023 event that begins in December as there will be no relegation or promotions from this event.

Who do you think will take home the gold?  Will it be one of the favorites, or will one of the lesser-known teams pull off some upsets and go all the way?  Make your prediction in the poll below.

App users, click here to vote.

Free Agent Profile: Sam Gagner

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The 2007 NHL Draft ended up bringing many superstars into the league, most namely Patrick Kane, Max Pacioretty, P.K. Subban, Ryan McDonagh, and others, but one forgotten name from that class is Sam Gagner. After a 15-year NHL career that’s included 967 games and 505 points, the journeyman forward finds himself without a team for the 2022-23 NHL season.

Gagner never quite reached his sixth-overall billing, hitting the 50-point mark only once, but he’s been nothing if not serviceable depth for a long time in this league. With a bit of a reduced role in Detroit last season, he actually produced his best offensive numbers since the mid-2010s. In a fourth-line role on a rebuilding team, Gagner still managed solid possession results all things considered, and there are certainly worse options to have in the faceoff circle in a pinch. It’s probably not a great bet to expect anything more than 10 goals and 25 points out of him, but on the league-minimum salary that he’ll undoubtedly cost, again, there are worse options.

33 years old now, Gagner presents a case for one of the more dependable, versatile options on the open market for low-risk veteran forwards. Whether anyone actually takes a swing on the former top-ten pick remains to be seen.

Stats

2021-22: 81 GP, 13 G, 18 A, 31 PTS, -4 rating, 32 PIMs, 132 shots, 13:37 ATOI
Career: 967 GP, 184 G, 321 A, 505 PTS, -133 rating, 427 PIMs, 1982 shots, 15:57 ATOI

Potential Suitors

The Winnipeg Jets jump out as a team with playoff aspirations that not only have ample cap space, but a clear roster need for depth forwards as well. While money won’t be a concern with accommodating Gagner, Winnipeg lacks forward depth with NHL experience at the bottom of the lineup. While Gagner may not be able to repeat last year’s production, he’s probably a safer bet to be an everyday NHL player than a player like Kristian Reichel or Morgan Barron.

Another Canadian team in a similar position, although maybe not with as much need, is the Ottawa Senators. Gagner could provide some competition at the bottom of the lineup for players like Parker Kelly, and he’d certainly provide more offensive upside than other veterans in the organization like Scott Sabourin and Jayce Hawryluk.

If Gagner does sign with a new team this offseason, it’ll be his seventh since entering the league.

Contract Projection

A player in Gagner’s position likely wouldn’t earn more than the $750K league minimum on a one-year deal. It’s also entirely possible that Gagner, similarly to players in years past like James Neal, has to settle for a professional tryout contract (PTO) to keep his NHL career (and dream of hitting 1,000 NHL games) alive.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images

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