The Florida Panthers lifted the Cup and the Oilers mourned their failure on Monday. The managers of these two teams are already in Vegas in anticipation of the NHL draft, the first round of which will be presented Friday evening. And just three days later the free agent market will open. You should not overdo the champagne…
For the draft itself, the stakes are not high for the Panthers and the Oilers. Florida holds just three picks, in the third, fifth and sixth rounds.
Edmonton has six, but only one in the first four rounds, and the first from just 64th. The Panthers won’t draft until 97th overall, unless they acquire a pick of course.
But the draft does not only involve the selection of prospects. The event constitutes an ideal meeting place for transactions in anticipation of the following season. However, it is difficult to see how the Panthers and the Oilers were able to take the necessary step back to take stock of their season.
The opening of the free agent market represents an even more perilous challenge, especially for the Panthers, who have a larger number of unrestricted free agents. Let’s hope the winners have recovered quickly from their hangover to make informed decisions about their future!
The Panthers’ most valuable free agent just scored 57 goals in the regular season. But it is not the most complex case. Reinhart wants to stay in Florida, he has stated this many times publicly, even after the Cup, and the Panthers will probably want to retain their 28-year-old forward.
Among the other forwards, Vladimir Tarasenko and Kyle Okposo were acquired at the trade deadline and are expendable. The others are supporting players.
The situation is more delicate in defense. Brandon Montour, 30, is a member of the Panthers’ top three. His offensive production dropped from 73 points to 33 points in 66 games last year, but his impact hasn’t diminished. He received 3.5 million this winter and will undoubtedly require a significant salary increase. If Oliver Ekman-Larsson and Dmitry Kulikov leave, the third pair will have to be rebuilt.
The Oilers don’t have as many major unrestricted free agents. Most are rental or supporting players: Corey Perry, Adam Henrique, Connor Brown, Mattias Janmark, Warren Foegle, Vincent Desharnais.
The vagueness persists within the team’s management. General manager Ken Holland, whose contract expires Monday, announced Thursday morning that he would not return to the team, according to tipster Darren Dreger.
Who will call the shots this weekend? This is obviously a bad time to announce a successor in one of the most critical periods of the season and the process cannot be done in two days, unless you have already planned for it.
Hired in May 2019, Holland, 68, will have been the first Oilers manager in two decades to give this organization an air of respectability. Edmonton has made the playoffs the last four seasons, reaching the final this year, the second round last year and the final four the season before.
Among his best moves, acquiring defender Mattias Ekholm for a late first-round pick (24th) in 2023 and a Class C prospect; the hiring of Zach Hyman, 54 goals in the regular season, top scorer in the playoffs and the hiring of coach Kris Knoblaugh after a disastrous start to the season. Evander Kane also brought depth to the striker without costing too much.
His worst? Bad contracts for goalkeeper Jack Campbell, five years at an annual salary of 5 million, demoted to the American League at the start of the season to stay there all year; eight years of contract for 9.25 million per year to Darnell Nurse, at best a third pair defenseman for two years; four years of contract for the robust Zack Kassian, at an annual salary of 3.2 million. Holland dealt his 29th overall pick to the Arizona Coyotes for the 32nd and added a 2025 second-round and 2024 third-round pick to get rid of him.
Overall, we can nevertheless speak of a success, obviously.
There is a huge gap in the value of a top 10 pick compared to a late first round pick. The success rate drops after the first three picks, there is another drop after the sixth, after the fifteenth, and a dramatic drop from the 25th, where the chosen prospects could easily have been in the second or even or third round on several lists.
Unsurprisingly, none of the top twelve 2024 picks have been traded so far. The 14th went from the Penguins to the Sharks for Erik Karlsson. But four of the final seven first-round picks have changed hands: Winnipeg (to Montreal for rental player Sean Monahan), Vancouver (to Calgary for rental player Elias Lindholm), Anaheim (to Edmonton for rental player Adam Henrique). rental) and Florida (in Philadelphia for Claude Giroux, rental player in 2022).
The phenomenon is even more marked in the second round. Starting at 52nd, eleven of the last fourteen picks have been traded. It sometimes gives rise to pearls, like Lane Hutson, with a choice obtained for Brett Kulak in 2022, but they are rare.
