Veteran free agent defensemen
James O’Brien of NBC Sports: If Dustin Byfuglien is healthy enough to return next season, he’ll have to sign a 35+ contract and teams may be reluctant to sign him to a multi-year deal. How much money will Byfuglien be looking for?
34-year old Mike Green is another defenseman who’ll be looking for a new deal.
37-year old Andy Greene could draw some interest in free agency. 33-year old Justin Braun and 39-year old Ron Hainsey are a couple of other defensive defensemen that will get some interest.
Other veteran defensemen include Dmitry Kulikov, Zach Bogosian, Kevin Shattenkirk, Jonathan Ericsson, Jay Bouwmeester, Deryk Engelland, Andrej Sekera, Michael Stone, Matt Irwin and Yannick Weber. Health may keep some from playing again, while some may not be classified as NHL defensemen any more.
Should the Canadiens trade Domi or extend him long-term?
Eric Engels of Sportnet: There has been some speculation that the Montreal Canadiens should consider trading pending RFA forward Max Domi. hasn’t been that the Canadiens are considering this.
The Canadiens have depth on the wing and down the middle they have Phillip Danault and youngsters Nick Suzuki, Jesperi Kotkaniemi and Ryan Poehling.
Domi will be looking for a raise from his two-year, $6.3 million deal.
The Canadiens will have to factor in decisions with their 2021 free agents in Danault, Brendan Gallagher, Tomas Tatar and Jeff Petry.
Domi said on a conference call last week that he hopes he can remain in Montreal long-term.
“All I can really tell you is that I want to be with Montreal,” the 25-year-old said. “I want to be here. I love playing in Montreal, I love my teammates, I love this team and I love this city. My hope is to play here for a long time and it’s never changed since the time I played my first game here. So that’s that.”
Canadiens GM Marc Bergevin said that Elliotte Friedman back in March that he didn’t think it would difficult to get Domi signed to a new contract. There haven’t been significant contract extension talks between the Canadiens and Domi.
“As of right now, no, there hasn’t been much discussed,” the Winnipeg native said. “There’s a lot of stuff that’s gone over my head and my agent takes care of a lot that stuff, but as far I’m concerned there hasn’t been much talk.”
