A Barkov deal in place or real close
George Richards of Florida Hockey Now: Contract extension talks between the Florida Panthers and Aleksander Barkov have been going well and it’s believed that he’s agreed to a new deal or that one is close.
There is no rush and Barkov is still back in Finland. He’ll be flying back to Florida soon to start getting ready for next season and a deal will likely be announced then.
The Panthers would prefer to make an announcement when he’s in town and not back in Finland through a Zoom.
Little room for the Jets but they could look for a cheap forward
Murat Ates of The Athletic: The Winnipeg Jets went into the offseason needing to improve their blue line, and they did so by adding Brenden Dillon and Nate Schmidt.
Bryan Little will be put on the LTIR when the regular season starts and they won’t be able to accrue cap space by moving players back and forth from the AHL.
There won’t be any big additions at the trade deadline as they made them by trading for Dillon and Schmidt this offseason.
The Jets could look to find a veteran forward that can kill penalties but on a $750,000 contract.
Where to put Dickinson and maximizing Canucks LTIR space
Harman Dayal of The Athletic: The Vancouver Canucks could use Jason Dickinson as their third-line center but his versatility could move him to the wing in their top six and J.T. Miller back to their third-line center.
If Dickinson is at center, their bottom six centers only come in at $3.775 million next year.
If the Canucks are looking to maximize Micheal Ferland‘s LTIR salary cap space, they’ll need to get as close to the $81.5 million ceiling as they can before the season starts. If maximized the Canucks have about $16 million to work with to re-sign Elias Pettersson and Quinn Hughes. This would obviously limit what they could add during the season or if there are injuries.