- Despite being the only member of the team without a new contract heading into training camp, there’s little chance forward Luke Evangelista is moving on from the Nashville Predators. Speaking with Alex Daugherty of The Tennessean, General Manager Barry Trotz said that trading Evangelista is “not even a thought.” Over the last two years, playing full-time in Nashville, Evangelista scored 26 goals and 71 points in 148 contests.
[SOURCE LINK]
Predators Rumors
Predators Sign Scott Harrington, Isaac Ratcliffe To PTOs
The Predators are bringing in defenseman Scott Harrington and winger Isaac Ratcliffe into training camp on professional tryouts, reports Brooks Bratten of NHL.com. Both are likely angling for contracts with their AHL affiliate in Milwaukee for the upcoming season.
Harrington, 32, has over 250 games of NHL experience but hasn’t played in the league since the 2022-23 season, which he split between the Sharks and Ducks. He spent last season on an AHL contract with the Springfield Thunderbirds, the Blues’ affiliate, and made 49 appearances. While historically more of a two-way defender, the offense wasn’t there for Harrington, who only contributed a goal and five points with a -5 rating. The year before, he had four assists in 14 games with Switzerland’s ZSC Lions – the only overseas experience of the lefty’s lengthy professional career.
There’s little downside for the Predators in adding an experienced rearguard to their depth ranks, but the likelihood of him landing an NHL contract – let alone a call-up – isn’t all that high. The team already has 15 defenders signed to contracts for the upcoming campaign, and redundant veteran names like Andreas Englund, Kevin Gravel, and Jordan Oesterle to fill veteran injury replacement roles with more recent NHL experience.
Ratcliffe, 26, only has 10 games of NHL experience back in 2021-22 with the Flyers. He scored a goal and three assists during that call-up. A 2017 second-round pick, Nashville initially acquired him for future considerations midway through the 2022-23 campaign but left him stashed with Milwaukee for the balance of the campaign. He’s spent the last two years on AHL deals, hopping to the independent Chicago Wolves in 2023-24 before returning to Milwaukee for last year. The 6’6″ forward was injury-limited to just 13 games, scoring a goal and two assists. His PTO will serve as an AHL tryout as well, much like Harrington’s, in an effort to extend his playing career.
Evening Notes: Evangelista, Canadiens Rookies, Cootes
Negotiations between winger Luke Evangelista and the Nashville Predators have begun to stall per David Pagnotta of The Fourth Period, who reports that yearly salary is what’s created the wedge. Evangelista is one of the top unsigned restricted free agents after players like Connor Zary and Marco Rossi both found new deals. The 23-year-old Evangelista posted an impressive 10 goals and 32 points in 68 games last season. It was a suitable encore to the 16 goals and 39 points he posted in 80 games of the 2023-24 season.
A pair of successful scoring seasons would surely make the player’s camp confident in earning a hardy salary. Columbus Blue Jackets forward Cole Sillinger recently signed a two-year, $4.5MM contract extension, while New Jersey Devils forward Dawson Mercer recently signed a three-year, $12MM contract. Those could be the boundaries for a short-term, bridge contract for Evangelista, who has certainly proved he can stick in Nashville’s top nine. Should contract talks continue to stall, the Predators could opt for a one-year, sub-$1MM contract and kick negotiations back to next summer.
Other notes from around the league:
- The Montreal Canadiens have assigned a group of rookies back to their respective leagues after rookie camp came to a close. In turn, Montreal assigned defensemen Carlos Handel to the QMJHL’s Halifax Mooseheads, Andrew MacNiel to the OHL’s Kitchener Rangers, and Bryce Pickford to the WHL’s Medicine Hat Tigers. Goaltenders Arseny Radkov and Mikus Vecvanags will return to Russia and Latvia, respectively. The team has also returned a handful of rookie camp invites. All of the moves come as expected, though it rings as exciting news for fans of Medicine Hat and Halifax, as their top defenders return for another season.
- Top Vancouver Canucks prospect Braeden Cootes was absent from the team’s final rookie camp scrimmage on Sunday, per Thomas Drance of The Athletic. Drance later added that Cootes was held out for precautionary reasons and will still attend training camp next week. That will keep the reigning 15th overall pick on track to take his first crack at breaking into the NHL. Cootes had a strong season with the WHL’s Seattle Thunderbirds last year. He dominated the middle of the ice with quick plays all year long, working up to 63 points and 60 games in total. Cootes seems most likely set for a return to Seattle next season, though a strong training camp could earn him the chance at sticking in the pros for nine games.
Tanner Molendyk Injury Reportedly "Not Serious"
- Nashville Predators prospect Tanner Molendyk was the subject of an injury scare Thursday after taking a hit during one of the team’s rookie tournament practices in Tampa. At the time, The Tennessean’s Alex Daugherty reported that Molendyk’s absence from the rest of practice appeared precautionary, and today Daugherty confirmed that Molendyk indeed avoided major damage. Daugherty said today that Molendyk’s injury “isn’t serious,” and that while he may not return to the ice in Tampa, “he will be fine” for the team’s main training camp next week. The 2023 first-round pick is set to begin his pro career and was recently ranked by EliteProspects as the club’s fourth-best prospect.
Nicolas Hague Had Verbal Agreement With Knights Before Trade
In a recent interview with Danny Webster of the Las Vegas Review-Journal, Nashville Predators defenseman Nicolas Hague spoke about the end of his tenure with the Vegas Golden Knights. According to Hague, it doesn’t sound like he was given a particularly warm goodbye from the only organization he had ever known.
As it turns out, Vegas pivoted away from their purported verbal agreement with Hague, needing to open the necessary cap space to acquire Mitch Marner from the Toronto Maple Leafs in a sign-and-trade. The day before the trade was made for Marner, the Golden Knights traded Hague to the Predators for Jeremy Lauzon, Colton Sissons, and a 2027 third-round pick. Hague subsequently signed a four-year, $22MM extension in Nashville.
Predators' Tanner Molendyk Leaves Practice Early
- In an unfortunate incident at the Nashville Predators’ rookie camp, prospect defenseman Tanner Molendyk left the ice and didn’t return partway through practice. Alex Daugherty of The Tennessean reported that Molendyk ran into the open stanchion after delivering a hit and left after spending some time on the bench. Daugherty cautioned that Molendyk’s departure from practice is likely precautionary, but it’s a situation worth monitoring since Molendyk is one of Nashville’s top prospects.
[SOURCE LINK]
Salary Cap Deep Dive: Nashville Predators
Navigating the salary cap is one of the most important tasks for a front office. Teams that can avoid total cap chaos by walking the tightrope of inking players to deals that match their value (or compensate for future value without breaking the bank) remain successful. Those who don’t often see struggles and front office changes.
PHR will look at every NHL team and give a thorough look at their cap situation for the 2025-26 season. This will focus more on players who are regulars on the roster versus those who may find themselves shuttling between the AHL and NHL. All cap figures are courtesy of PuckPedia. We’re currently covering the Central Division, next up are the Predators.
Nashville Predators
Current Cap Hit: $86,158,961 (below the $95.5MM Upper Limit)
Entry-Level Contracts
F Zachary L’Heureux (one year, $863.3K)
F Fedor Svechkov (one year, $925K)
F Matthew Wood (two years, $950K)
Potential Bonuses
Svechkov: $212.5K
Wood: $500K
Total: $712.5K
Wood signed late last season after finishing up his college campaign and held his own in limited action. Assuming he remains in his bottom-six role to start this year, it seems unlikely he’ll hit either of his ‘A’ bonuses and that would have him safely on the path to a bridge deal. Svechkov came up in late November and never looked back although his production was rather limited. It seems likely he’ll get a bigger opportunity this season which could give him an outside chance at his ‘A’ bonus. But barring a huge uptick in production, he’s also likely heading for a bridge deal, one that should push past the $2MM mark if he remains a regular this season.
L’Heureux spent most of the season with the Predators where he brought plenty of physicality but not a ton of production to the table, understandable given his limited role. Like the others, the offense simply isn’t there to justify a long-term deal so he’s also heading for a bridge deal, one that again should come in around $2MM if this season is a repeat of last.
Signed Through 2025-26, Non-Entry-Level
G Justus Annunen ($837.5K, RFA)
D Justin Barron ($1.15MM, RFA)
D Nick Blankenburg ($775K, UFA)
F Michael Bunting ($4.5MM, UFA)
D Andreas Englund ($775K, UFA)
F Erik Haula ($3.15MM, UFA)
F Michael McCarron ($900K, UFA)
D Jordan Oesterle ($775K, UFA)
F Cole Smith ($1MM, UFA)
D Spencer Stastney ($825K, RFA)
Bunting was brought in near the trade deadline with GM Barry Trotz opting for a player-for-player swap instead of being a straight seller. He hasn’t had the same type of success offensively since leaving Toronto and will need to push that point total more toward the mid-40s if he wants any sort of notable raise. Otherwise, another contract in this range seems likely. Haula came over from New Jersey this summer following a tough year although he’s averaged 40 points over the previous three seasons. If he gets back to that range, he should be able to get a raise and another multi-year pact, even at 35, which he’ll be in March. If this winds up being a repeat of last season, he might still be able to get two years but it’d be surprising to see him match let alone beat this price tag.
Smith saw his point total drop by nearly half last season despite nearly identical playing time. Still, he’s a big part of their penalty kill and throws the body around. A late-bloomer (he wasn’t a regular until 27), Smith has enough of a track record now that he could conceivably double his current price tag even with the limited output. McCarron hasn’t lived up to his draft billing but has settled in as a serviceable bottom-six checking center who is above-average at the faceoff dot and plays with an edge. Those elements will be appealing which could plausibly allow him to push past $2MM next summer.
Barron was acquired from Montreal midseason in another player-for-player swap, this time with veteran Alexandre Carrier going the other way. While the change of scenery allowed Barron to play a much bigger role, he didn’t do a whole lot with it. Still, he’s likely to push past the 200-game mark this coming season and will have arbitration eligibility this time around with a $1.2MM qualifying offer. Doubling that might be tough but he could come close.
The other four blueliners are all in a similar boat. They’ve been fringe third-pairing defenders in recent years while also seeing time in the minors. Two or three will make the team and if one stands out, he could push past $1MM next summer. The rest will likely stay at the league minimum salary which jumps to $850K in 2026-27. Notably, Stastney will need to play in at least 29 NHL games this season to retain his RFA rights. Otherwise, he’ll become a Group Six unrestricted free agent.
Annunen played a little better after coming over in an early-season trade from Colorado but his numbers were still below average. Just 25 with a fairly limited track record at the top level, it’s not a situation where Nashville should be looking to give up on him but he hasn’t shown enough to earn a long-term pact either. He has one RFA-eligible year left after this and the prudent move for both sides might be another two-year deal, one that would push the price to around $1.5MM, giving him a bit of stability while allowing the team a bit more time to evaluate his longer-term fit as the second-string option. If he bounces back with more of an NHL-average year, the cost could come closer to $2MM on that deal.
Signed Through 2026-27
D Nicklaus Perbix ($2.75MM, UFA)
F Ryan O’Reilly ($4.5MM, UFA)
As was the case with most of their veterans last season, O’Reilly underachieved offensively but he was still a two-way contributor. Between that and his contract, he was highly sought after at the trade deadline but nothing materialized. Even with the drop in production, this is a more than acceptable price tag for O’Reilly for now but at 34 with a lot of miles on him, that could change. Assuming he stays in this range a little longer, he could still beat this on a short-term deal two years from now.
Perbix comes over from Tampa Bay where he saw his playing time drop by more than two minutes a game last season. However, he has shown himself to be a capable third-pairing option, with some underlying numbers suggesting he could be capable of more. This contract suggested teams weren’t willing to bank on that just yet but if he can latch on to a bigger role, his next deal could land closer to the $3.75MM mark. If not, this is a reasonable floor for a third-pairing right-shot piece.
Signed Through 2027-28
D Roman Josi ($9.059MM, UFA)
F Steven Stamkos ($8MM, UFA)
Stamkos leaving the Lightning last summer was quite a surprise for many but his performance last season suggests Tampa Bay was wise to hold firm to their number which was lower than what Stamkos wanted. While 53 points is still respectable, that’s not worthy of an $8MM price tag and at 35, there is some concern that the decline will continue. If so, this could be a troublesome contract before long while a rebound would only delay those concerns a little longer.
When healthy, Josi remains a legitimate all-situations number one defenseman. And this price tag for that type of role is a team-friendly one. However, Josi missed a big chunk of last season with what was eventually labelled as Postural Tachycardia Syndrome and while the team announced that he is recovering well and should be ready to start this season, it’s something that doesn’t have a cure, only treatments. Now 35, a decline in performance should be coming at some point soon and there could be some lingering concern from his diagnosis. With that in mind, it wouldn’t be surprising to see the team try to manage Josi’s minutes a bit more moving forward, perhaps not having him in that high-end number one role.
Predators And Evangelista Focused On Bridge Deal
Predators winger Luke Evangelista is one of the few remaining restricted free agents with training camps on the horizon. Nick Kieser of Lower Broad Hockey relays that the two sides are focused on a bridge deal with the sides discussing contracts between one and three years but that there is still a gap to work through with more talks scheduled for this week. The 23-year-old notched 10 goals along with 22 assists in 68 games last season and has 86 points in 172 career appearances with Nashville. A short-term pact should carry a price tag in the $3MM range, one that they can easily afford with more than $9MM in cap room, per PuckPedia. Kieser added that there has not been any talk about trading Evangelista so far.
Predators Sign Dylan Gambrell To PTO
Several teams have added players on professional tryout (PTO) agreements in recent days and many more will do so before training camps open up. It appears the Predators have joined the list as Daily Faceoff’s Anthony DiMarco reports (Twitter link) that forward Dylan Gambrell has inked a PTO agreement with Nashville.
The 29-year-old isn’t too far removed from playing a regular role in the NHL. Between 2019-20 and 2022-23, Gambrell played in at least 49 games per season while splitting time between San Jose and Ottawa. 2020-21 saw him log more than 16 minutes a night of playing time but beyond that, he largely played on the fourth line. In 233 NHL games between the two teams, he has 17 goals and 23 assists along with a 46.1% faceoff rate.
However, Gambrell has been limited to just AHL action over the past two seasons. In 2023-24, he picked up 14 goals and 22 assists 66 games with Toronto’s farm team while playing on a one-way contract. He wasn’t able to secure that last summer, instead inking a two-way deal with Columbus. With the AHL’s Monsters, he picked up 13 goals and 12 assists in 54 appearances.
Gambrell has enough professional experience to qualify for veteran status at the AHL level; teams can only dress five skaters with 320 games of experience which has made it a challenge for some capable veterans to find a home at that level for the upcoming season. At this point, it’s unlikely that Gambrell would be able to command a one-way deal from the Predators but a solid showing in training camp could be enough to earn him another two-way agreement and a spot with AHL Milwaukee for the upcoming season.
Tyson Barrie Announces Retirement
Amid his participation in yesterday’s Avalanche alumni game, defenseman Tyson Barrie confirmed to Nathan Rudolph of the DNVR Avalanche podcast that he’s retired.
A third-round pick of the Avalanche in 2009, Barrie was a highly intriguing offensive option out of the WHL’s Kelowna Rockets and quickly looked like he could be something of a steal. He led the league in assists by a defenseman in his post-draft year and was named the WHL’s top defenseman as a result, but concerns about the righty’s size and defensive acumen meant he returned for a fourth and final season of junior hockey before making the jump to the pro ranks in 2011-12. Even then, he spent most of that year in the minors and only received 10 NHL games.
He slowly worked his way up the Avs’ depth chart, seeing less and less AHL time each season before earning his final recall in November 2013, early in his age-22 season. While he checked in as a fringe top-four option at even strength, he overtook Erik Johnson as Colorado’s top power-play quarterback and ended up recording a 13-25–38 scoring line in 64 games over the balance of the campaign. Those 0.59 points per game placed him inside the top-15 among NHL rearguards that year.
The 2014-15 campaign marked Barrie’s true coming of age. He broke the 50-point plateau – the first of four times he’d end up doing so in his career – while serving as Colorado’s de facto No. 1 option for a good portion of the season with Johnson injured. He would continue averaging north of 21 minutes per game for the remainder of his Colorado tenure, twice earning fringe votes for year-end All-Star honors.
Colorado didn’t have a ton of team success during Barrie’s six-year run as a full-timer there, though, only making the playoffs three times and winning a round once. His struggles away from the puck played a significant role in that. Only once, his final season in Denver, did Barrie manage to record a positive expected rating based on shot quality generated and allowed when he was on the ice at even strength. He posted a negative actual plus/minus rating in his last four years for Colorado, including a league-worst -34 mark in the Avs’ disastrous 22-win season in 2016-17.
Entering the 2019-20 season, Barrie was a pending unrestricted free agent and had been made redundant with Cale Makar’s emergence in the preceding postseason. That kicked off the latter journeyman phase of his career, beginning with a July 1 blockbuster that sent him to the Maple Leafs in exchange for Nazem Kadri. It didn’t work out all that well for Barrie or Toronto. He was no longer his club’s top power play option, sitting behind Morgan Rielly on the Leafs’ power play pyramid, and his offensive output declined to a more pedestrian 5-34–39 scoring line in 70 games as a result.
With Barrie’s point production his only real calling card, the fit in Toronto obviously wasn’t going to be a long-term one. They let him become a free agent during the COVID-laced 2020 offseason, and he proceeded to land a one-year, $3.75MM “prove-it” deal with the Oilers.
Barrie was plopped onto a top power-play unit in Edmonton with the two-headed monster of Leon Draisaitl and Connor McDavid – the league’s two leading scorers in the shortened 2021 season – and responded with the best campaign of his career. He recorded 48 points in the truncated 56-game schedule, leading the NHL in scoring among defenders. His defensive deficiencies remained quite visible, though. He only managed a +5 rating compared to regular partner Darnell Nurse’s +27 mark, and as Edmonton was swept in the first round of the playoffs, Barrie became the first defenseman in league history to lead the position in scoring while not receiving a single Norris Trophy vote.
While Barrie remained a fine puck-mover for the Oilers, his production never quite found that gear again. His minutes began to drop back below the 20-minute mark, and at the 2023 deadline, he was sent to the Predators in the deal that landed Edmonton two-way dynamo Mattias Ekholm.
Nashville marked the last real turning point in Barrie’s career, and it wasn’t for the better. While he was still quite effective for the Preds down the stretch after the trade, recording 12 points in 24 games, that didn’t last very long. In 2023-24 – the final year of a three-year, $13.5MM extension he signed with Edmonton – Barrie tumbled down Nashville’s depth chart and ended up becoming a routine healthy scratch by the time the season ended. As such, he was limited to just one goal and 15 points in 41 games and only drew into the Preds’ playoff lineup once in their first-round loss to the Canucks.
Ahead of his age-33 season and with his value at an all-time low, Barrie ended up needing to settle for a professional tryout with the Flames to participate in an NHL training camp last fall. He did convert that into a $1.25MM contract in early October, but the fit wasn’t quite what Calgary hoped for. He only logged 13 appearances for the club and even ended up on waivers and cleared, seeing his first AHL action in over a decade with the Calgary Wranglers.
Barrie was a free agent this summer, and there was no reported interest in him on the open market. He hangs up his skates with 822 games played in 14 seasons, 23rd among his rather stacked draft class. He scored 110 goals and added 398 assists for 508 points, 10th in the league among defensemen since he debuted back in the 2011-12 season. He averaged just over 21 minutes per night for his career and made $47.85MM in estimated total earnings, per PuckPedia.
All of us at PHR congratulate Barrie on his fine career and wish him the best in his next steps.
Image courtesy of Sergei Belski-Imagn Images.