NHL
In the flat cap era, the secondary free-agent market was a robust source of talent that clever NHL teams mined systematically to flesh out their depth.
Under general manager Bill Zito, of course, the Florida Panthers became the poster team for this strategy.
Year after year, Zito’s Panthers made a point of scooping up bought-out talent (Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Nate Schmidt, Alexander Wennberg) and aggressively targeting non-tendered restricted free agents (Anthony Duclair, Rasmus Asplund, Jesper Boqvist) in unrestricted free agency. These additions haven’t always been needle-moving difference-makers for the back-to-back Stanley Cup champions, but they’ve filled useful roles and deepened the Panthers’ lineup over the years.
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The Panthers, of course, aren’t the only team that’s benefited from trawling the secondary market for depth value. The Dallas Stars (Sam Steel), Washington Capitals (Dylan Strome), and Boston Bruins (Morgan Geekie) are among the teams that netted surplus value with clever, bargain-bin shopping in this aisle of the free-agent supermarket.
This year, the secondary market is mirroring the overall 2025 free-agent class. There were fewer buyouts in the first window this June than there regularly were during the flat cap era. With more cap space in the system, meanwhile, there were far fewer high-profile restricted free agents who didn’t receive qualifying offers by Monday’s deadline.
The result is that this 2025 secondary market class is a shallower group than we’ve seen in previous seasons. That’s likely to be a trend in the cap growth era.
There are still, however, some interesting names that will be headed to the open market on July 1. Here are 12 of the top secondary market options for NHL teams to consider in the free-agent frenzy.
The Philadelphia Flyers declined to tender 24-year-old forward Jakob Pelletier his qualifying offer ahead of Monday’s deadline. A skilled playmaker and 2019 first-round pick for the Calgary Flames, Pelletier crushed the QMJHL in the two years that followed his draft season and had a successful showing for Canada at the World Junior Championship in 2021. Then Pelletier turned professional and absolutely dominated the AHL level as a 20-year-old. At that point, he looked poised for future stardom.
Pelletier’s progress, however, has stalled over the past few seasons. Not only has Pelletier struggled to translate his production to the NHL level, but he’s been used sparingly at centre (his natural position).
There’s a real chance that Pelletier tops out as a tweener: a dynamic AHL scorer who lacks the speed to win in transition and on the perimeter at the NHL level, and lacks the size and gumption to produce in the dirty areas of the ice.
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Pelletier, however, is still young enough to have some developmental runway remaining. He’ll need to be more consistent and more willing to pay the price in front of the net to stick at the NHL level, but he remains a worthwhile, affordable gamble in unrestricted free agency based on his hockey IQ and connective playmaking ability alone.
Jones is a talented puck-moving, left-handed defender with actual bite to his game, despite being somewhat undersized. Just 24 years old, he dominates at the AHL level and has been serviceable in sheltered minutes across 115 NHL games with the New York Rangers.
Jones wasn’t tendered his qualifying offer Monday, so he’ll be headed to the open market in search of a new opportunity this week. He’s a worthwhile bet for a team that needs mobility on the back end.
Jones’ only real drawback is based on his profile. Jones is 5-foot-11 in a league that prizes size on the back end, and he isn’t dynamic enough offensively to be a first-unit power-play quarterback on a high-end team.
There just aren’t many left-handed defenders playing top-four minutes around the league who aren’t star offensive producers, and the exceptions — Samuel Girard and Matt Grzelcyk, for example — are standout defenders in a way that Jones hasn’t proven at the NHL level.
Kaliyev is a one-dimensional scoring winger with a rocket of a shot. He can beat goalies clean from a distance, which is a valuable skill, but the rest of his game can be frustrating. Kaliyev is a subpar skater, below-average defensively and doesn’t contribute much when he isn’t scoring. He profiles as a tweener: He isn’t talented enough to stick in an NHL team’s top six and doesn’t have the foot speed, defensive acumen, forechecking or physicality that teams look for in a bottom-six contributor.
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However, Kaliyev is young enough that he could still be worth taking a chance on. Injuries hindered him this past season, but he scored 14 goals with the Kings as a 20-year-old rookie, and 13 goals and 28 points in 56 games as a 21-year-old sophomore in 2022-23.
Perhaps Kaliyev could follow a similar path to Daniel Sprong, a similar one-dimensional sniper, who scored in the 18-20 goal range for two seasons for Seattle and Detroit. Those teams leaned on him as a heavily sheltered bottom-six scorer who could help on the power play.
At 38, Vlasic is no longer the shutdown beast he was in his prime. You’d have to go back to pre-pandemic times to find the last evidence of him playing competent top-four minutes. Making matters worse is that he’s dealt with injuries over the last couple of years.
With that said, perhaps there’s still a world where Vlasic can be a depth No. 7 defender. A fresh start on a non-lottery team could rejuvenate his game. He can still kill penalties and could also be a valuable leader and mentor for younger defensemen. And his next contract will likely be so cheap that if it doesn’t work out, you can always bury him in the minors without any salary-cap implications.
Traded as part of the Andre Burakovsky cap dump to the Seattle Kraken, and then bought out at a one-third rate due to his age, Veleno will hit the open market as a 6-foot-1, 201-pound center who is a very strong skater with decent defensive instincts.
Veleno only has 81 career points in over 300 career NHL games, and at this stage of his career, he’s unlikely to have even a middle-six offensive ceiling. Given his combination of size, athletic traits and positional versatility, however, Veleno could be an interesting, low-risk gamble for a center-needy team.
It’s wild how quickly Kurashev’s stock fell in Chicago. After scoring 54 points in 75 games riding shotgun with Connor Bedard in 2023-24, the Blackhawks decided to shift Kurashev to center and have him lead the second line to start this season.
The 2C experiment was a total failure. Kurashev looked a step behind at center; he couldn’t produce offensively away from Bedard, nor could he reliably defend. Chicago later tried reuniting Kurashev with Bedard, but that didn’t work either. The Blackhawks were outscored 34-14 and controlled only 41 percent of expected goals during Kurashev’s five-on-five shifts. By all accounts, this was a disastrous season.
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With all that said, Kurashev has shown enough flashes earlier in his career that a team could be willing to roll the dice on him as an inexpensive bottom-six winger.
Kostin is a big-bodied forward with real one-shot scoring skill. Despite his massive frame and deceptive finishing skill, Kostin has an inconsistent defensive motor and isn’t quite as physical and assertive as he could be given his frame.
In San Jose last season, Kostin battled through a lower-body injury that cost him much of the second half of the season. He wasn’t tendered a qualifying offer by the Sharks and will be able to test the open market.
Despite the fact that Kostin hasn’t managed to continue to develop after his promising stint with the Edmonton Oilers a few years ago, there aren’t too many 6-foot-4, 230-pound wingers who can shoot the way Kostin can. That makes him intriguing at a low dollar amount, at the very least.
Sheary has thrived as a complementary scorer for most of his career. The diminutive 5-8 winger possessed the speed, energy and intelligence to complement top-six players. Before arriving in Tampa Bay, he was a consistent bet to chip in with 15ish goals and 35-40 points, with nearly all of that production at even strength.
Sheary struggled after signing with the Lightning for 2023-24, scoring just 15 points in 57 games. He was waived to the AHL this past season, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s completely washed up. Sheary lit up the AHL with 61 points in 59 games — he scored 21 points more than the second-highest scoring Syracuse forward. He could be worth a cheap, one-year contract.
Bernard-Docker is a right-handed, defensive-minded third-pair defender. His defensive impact is legitimate and consistent, provided he’s used in sheltered minutes at five-on-five.
Bernard-Docker, who also has first-round draft pedigree, has the sort of profile teams are typically keen to bet heavily on. The issue, however, is that he’s not especially big, not an especially high-end skater, and while he’s a genuinely useful defender at even strength, he’s yet to really be tested or accomplished as a penalty-killing specialist. If Bernard-Docker had that penalty-killing element to his game, he’d profile as a classic third-pair defensive specialist.
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He’s a free dart throw for a down-lineup contributor for somebody, and could pay real dividends if he can diversify his defensive game in the right situation.
Yamamoto once looked like he’d be a long-term middle-six solution for the Oilers. He had a three-year stretch from 2019-20 to 2021-22 (his age 21-23 seasons), during which he scored 88 points in 160 games, translating to a 55 points per 82-game pace. Edmonton cut bait with him after a disappointing 2022-23 campaign, and he’s since bounced around, including this past season, where he spent most of the year in the AHL.
It’s clear Yamomoto’s early career production was inflated by playing with the Oilers’ stars, but he has enough tools to contribute as a bottom-six forward. The 26-year-old is small, but he has slick hands, a relentless compete level, wins a surprising number of board battles at his size and has decent two-way metrics. Overall, he’s a serviceable depth player who can hold his own playing up the lineup in a pinch.
Holmberg is just a good, solid fourth-line center.
The 26-year-old Swedish pivot has been a mainstay in Toronto’s bottom six across the past three seasons and has consistently had a solid defensive impact while pitching in only a little bit offensively in a classic fourth-line role. He’s also improved somewhat year-over-year in the faceoff circle.
Holmberg isn’t the most physical player, but he’s got prototypical size for a bottom-six center and is a strong skater. He’s also a reliable two-way presence, even if he’s not exactly a driver and has legitimate offensive limitations.
Teams in the market for a bargain-bin bottom-six center could do a lot worse than Holmberg, given how the market is shaping up for July 1.
At first glance, Nielsen seems an unusual inclusion for this list. He’s a 25-year-old career AHLer who hasn’t even produced at an elite level in the minors. However, we’ve watched him closely within the Canucks organization over the last few years and see the potential for him to be a diamond in the rough as a depth NHL forward.
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Nielsen is a relentless ball of energy. He’s fast and tenacious on the forecheck. He’s only 5-foot-10 but is built thick and is a physical wrecking ball. Nielsen regularly throws thunderous open-ice hits and probably has more offensive upside than he’s shown lately, too, as he was playing further down the lineup on a stacked Calder Cup-winning Abbotsford Canucks team. He has some similar qualities to Antoine Roussel, who carved out a similar against-all-odds NHL career.
The Canucks are overflowing with depth forwards vying for NHL roster spots, so Nielsen never got a big-league look. But it wouldn’t surprise us if he can develop into an identity fourth-liner.
(Photo of Jacob Bernard-Docker and Pontus Holmberg: Timothy T. Ludwig / Imagn Images)
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