On the Tampa Bay Lightning …
Joe Smith of the Tampa Bay Times: The Lightning have now locked up Steven Stamkos, Victor Hedman and Alex Killorn to long-term deals. GM Steve Yzerman is trying to keep their core together as much as he can.
It’s going to get even trickier for Yzerman. They have about $8.5 million in cap space remaining for this season, with Nikita Kucherov, Vladislav Namestnikov and Nikita Nesterov still needing a new deals. Next year they’ll have Tyler Johnson, Jonathan Drouin and Ondrej Palat as RFAs.
Namestnikov has an arbitration date set for July 29th. Kucherov could get a deal in the $6 million range, but nothing appears imminent.
Valtteri Filppula is a strong candidate to be traded as he carries a $5 million cap hit for two more years. Other trade options could be Jason Garrison (two more years at $4.6 million) and Ben Bishop (one year left at $5.95 million).
Yzerman on their goaltending situation.
“Things are very quiet right now. We’re more than happy to go into the season with both goalies.”
On the New York Islanders …
Arthur Staple of Newsday: The Islanders weren’t able to re-sign Kyle Okposo, Frans Nielsen and Matt Martin, but they did sign Andrew Ladd to a big deal. GM Garth Snow hasn’t really been able to make big signings in the past, but with new ownership taking over, they want to change that and make it a place where free agents want to sign.
Co-owner Jon Ledecky said last week that they want to make John Tavares an Islanders for life and that he “is not going to be a free agent.” Tavares is scheduled to become an unrestricted free agent after the 2017-18 season.
Jamie Benn signed an eight-year contract extension with a cap hit of $9.5 million last week and could be a comparable for Tavares.