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Good morning to everyone except teams that don’t put the dollar value in their contract announcements. We’re two full days into free agency, which means most (but not all) of the big names are spoken for. Let’s figure out who’s won the week, and who still has work to do…
NHL bylaws mandate that every sportswriter has to file some variation of a winners and losers piece within 48 hours of the first free-agent signing. You’ve probably already read a few dozen by now, hopefully including this one from Shayna. And if so, you’re aware that there’s some consensus forming. The Panthers won big, the Kings overpaid for mediocre defense, the Canadiens have generally impressed and the Oilers are playing with fire by not addressing the goaltending. Yep, all of those sound right, count me in.
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But what about the teams where I might deviate from the pack? Here are three takes I’ve formed that seem to be outliers. If any of them turn out to be right, I get 100 percent of the credit and can bring it up for the next year. If they’re wrong, we will never speak of this again.
• I’m not sure keeping the band together was the right move in Vancouver: I understand the sense of relief Canucks fans are feeling right now, as what seemed like a pending roster implosion has been avoided with an extension for Thatcher Demko and a surprise return by Brock Boeser. But is that a good thing, given how far this team plummeted last year? Demko didn’t come cheap, and Boeser’s term nudges his deal toward the high-risk zone. And of course, they chose not to move Elias Pettersson before his no-movement clause kicks in. I get it — Quinn Hughes is the franchise and has two years left, so now may not feel like the time for a rebuild. But it’s also not the time to settle into mediocrity, and I worry that may be what they’ve just signed up for in a situation that called for some boldness instead.
• I don’t get what the Blackhawks are doing: We were warned they could be quiet. Kyle Davidson has explained why it’s not the time for big swings, and many of their fans seem OK with that. And yes, of course it’s true there was no single player available who’d single-handedly make them contenders. But at some point, you’ve got to get better. Is it easy? No, but it can be done in a smart way, as the Canadiens seem to be showing us by turning their stockpile of picks and prospects into good young players who’ll help them immediately. At this point, I’m not sure I see a plan in Chicago other than being bad for as long as possible and then hoping every top prospect hits at once. That’s not how it works, but this feels like a team that’s afraid to even try to take a step.
• I’m not completely convinced Vegas is the right fit for Mitch Marner: I wish him all the best, or at least half of me does. And from a purely hockey perspective, the Knights are a great fit: a legitimate contender that needed help on the wing. I just can’t shake the feeling that in Toronto, Marner was treated as kind of a god — his words, not mine — and it somehow still wasn’t enough. Now he’s headed to arguably the most cutthroat team in the league, one that’s found and exploited a market inefficiency by showing next to no loyalty, even to beloved players. If it works, it will work great, and Marner will be glad he made the choice he did. But if it doesn’t, how long before the Knights are looking for the next shiny new toy? And if so, will Marner get the sort of respect he seems to desperately crave from a team that was more than happy to say a “sorry it’s just business” goodbye to local legends like Marc-Andre Fleury or Jonathan Marchessault?
More than you might think, although the star power is getting decidedly thin. There are still plenty of names left on CJ’s big board, although that’s partly because he originally had half the league listed. Here are five of the biggest names still in play.
Nikolaj Ehlers, LW, Jets: Generally considered the best player to actually get to market, and by far the best one left. He’d always planned to take a few days to make up his mind, but we’d expect a decision coming any time now. Could this be where the Blue Jackets go all in?
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Dmitry Orlov, D, Hurricanes: Two years ago, he bet on himself with a two-year deal in Carolina that was timed to end just as the cap skyrocketed. It felt foolproof, but the fit with the Hurricanes never quite clicked, and it will be interesting to see how long anyone is willing to go on the 33-year-old.
Victor Olofsson, LW, Golden Knights: He can score. The knock on him is that he often can’t do much else. But as time ticks away and his price presumably comes down, somebody will roll the dice.
Jeff Skinner, LW, Oilers: It should have worked in Edmonton, but it very much did not. Now it’s time for yet another fresh start for a guy who once scored 40 goals and is just two years removed from scoring 35.
Alexandar Georgiev, G, Sharks: The goalie market is awfully thin, with James Reimer and Ilya Samsonov being the other “big” names. With Georgiev, the question might be whether he gets any offers at all, coming off a terrible season split between Colorado and San Jose. Remember, this is a guy who led the league in wins in 2022-23 and 2023-24, and he’s only 28. This is the time of year when desperate GMs tell themselves, “I can fix him.”
⭐ Meet the new boss in Dallas, same as the old boss (from 2011 to 2013), as the Stars have handed the reins back to Glen Gulutzan.
🥇 It’s official: The NHL is finally heading back to the Olympics.
🛞 RIP to Red Wings legend Alex Delvecchio, who passed away this week at the age of 93. He played 24 seasons, all of them with the Red Wings, and his 1,550 games trailed only Gordie Howe on the all-time list when he retired in 1974.
🐐For some of us, the biggest news of free agency day came at the very end, when Bob McKenzie announced his retirement after nearly five decades in hockey media. The Athletic put together a tribute, including my story of how you’d never have heard of me if it weren’t for McKenzie. Rest easy, Bobby Margarita.
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• Trivia time💡: Who is the only player to spend their entire career with one team while playing more games than Delvecchio’s 1,550?
The short answer: Probably not, so don’t get your hopes up. Remember, teams can float offer sheets all they want, but a player has to actually sign one. That usually doesn’t happen until they feel like they have no other choice, or at least until they’ve worked hard at finding common ground with their current team. Those dual offer sheets the Blues hit the Oilers with last summer ultimately worked, but they didn’t come until mid-August.
That said, watch the Bowen Byram situation in Buffalo, where a little-known rule could make life very difficult for the Sabres. According to the CBA, any team that matches an offer sheet can not trade that player for one full year. With Byram just two years away from UFA status, what do the Sabres do if he signs a one-year offer sheet somewhere? Kevyn Adams has already vowed to match any offer, but that would mean Byram could play out the season and then force the Sabres to do it all over again next summer, when he’d be one year away from hitting the unrestricted market at the age of 26. If Byram doesn’t want to stick around, the Sabres need to either change his mind or move him before an offer sheet lands on Adams’ desk — and that could happen at literally any moment.
We believe that in hockey, as in life, there are no dumb questions. So if you have something you’ve always wondered about the sport, ask away by emailing us at redlight@theathletic.com.
Why after nearly every goal are viewers immediately taken to the scored-against team’s bench so we can see the coach’s reaction? Are we to expect some sort of anger sign or even meltdown? These are coaches at the sport’s highest level. If they were prone to such emotional reactions to a goal against, they’d still be at some lower level of coaching.
Anyway, I find it annoying and weird that the camera isn’t instead panning the bench of the team that scored. – Elliot P.
Oh Elliot, I could tell you some stories about the good old days. I can assure you that coaches like Mike Keenan, John Brophy, Jacques Demers, Pat Burns and many others were absolutely prone to “emotional reactions,” as you politely call them. Tempter tantrums, some might say. And it was pretty great.
These days? Thanks to replay review, coaches don’t do anything but stare at their little iPads, hoping for some nitpicky detail they can turn into a get-out-of-jail-free card. So we get to stare at the top of their heads. Riveting stuff, truly.
I have no idea why modern TV producers haven’t figured this out and still keep cutting to bench shots as if coaches might do something. But I swear to you, I am this close to doing a “Name the coach by his bald spot” summer quiz, in hopes that some TV guy somewhere will find it and realize how ridiculous they’re being.
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• Your trivia answer…
While Gordie Howe (with Detroit) and Patrick Marleau (with San Jose) played more games with a single team than Delvecchio did, both also played for other teams. The only player to outlast Delvecchio while only playing for one franchise is another Red Wing: Nicklas Lidstrom. Shane Doan fell just 10 games short, while yet another Wing, Steve Yzerman, also cracked the 1,500-game mark.
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(Top photo of Brock Boeser and Thatcher Demko: Derek Cain / Getty Images)
Sean McIndoe has been a senior NHL writer with The Athletic since 2018. He launched Down Goes Brown in 2008 and has been writing about hockey ever since, with stops including Grantland, Sportsnet and Vice Sports. His book, “The Down Goes Brown History of the NHL,” is available in book stores now. Follow Sean on Twitter @DownGoesBrown
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