- Pierre LeBrun of ESPN: If a team signs Ryan O’Reilly to an offer sheet, the Avs will match it.
“We’re going to match that,” Sakic said, when asked about a possible offer sheet for the restricted free agent.
The minimum O’Reilly can get through arbitration is $5.525 million.
“He was a $5 million cap hit this year, so to me it’s still a raise,” Sakic said. “I mean, at the end of the day, you have to look at the whole contract. That’s beside the point; my first option would be to sign him long term and avoid arbitration. The whole idea, though, with arbitration is that if we don’t get to an agreement is have an arbitrator dictate what’s a right deal, whether that’s one or two years. From our standpoint, we want Ryan O’Reilly here.”
Both the Ducks and Blues have talked to the Senators about Jason Spezza and the Canucks about Ryan Kesler. Currently the asking price is too high for the Ducks and Blues. LeBrun guesses the Senators would like to get their 10th overall pick back from the Ducks, and the Ducks probably don’t want to part with it.
Joe Thornton has given no indication that he wants to leave San Jose, but he could change his mind at some point. Teams are calling the Sharks about Thornton. The Red Wings have held very preliminary talks with Sharks. I may be hard for the Red Wings to do anything as long as Stephen Weiss and this $4.9 million contract is on their books (four years left). Another obstacle could be that Thornton doesn’t want to go to Detroit.
- Hope Smoke: Darren Dreger: “I think you might some big names in Anaheim. Some powerful players” … “We know that Bob Murray and the Ducks are focused on bringing in another C. Names are consistent: Spezza and Kesler” … “There are some managers out there that believe a move with Ana can happen by next week” … “I don’t know if it’s as close to that, and I’d like to say that it’s for Kesler or Spezza but in the moment they don’t know” … “What they know, is that the price for those guys is going to be really high” … “The price for everyone now is going to be high. If we use Spezza as our example, Bryan Murray wants to maximize the asset there” … “As Bryan Murray pointed out yesterday he’s going to lose this deal because he’s going to be sending out the best player in the deal” … “Ottawa’s also open to options but they’re lofty. They’re premium assets. If it’s a one for one a player for player deal.” …” I’m told that the Sens in dealing with Stl and others, are looking for a top 6 young forward.” … “A guy in that $3-$4 m dollar range who has still room to develop & ultimately make his money down the road”