You may not agree with our rankings, but here is our initial Top 25 2017 NHL free agents list.
In creating this list we took into consideration factors such as players age, position, injury history, likelihood of signing with another team, etc.
Joe Thornton drops a bit because he’s 37-years old, and will likely re-sign with the Sharks before July 1st.
Also factoring into the rankings is how a player may be in 3-4+ years, and not just in 1 or 2 years. A player like Andrei Markov fall down the list a bit because of this. Most free agent deals for the top players are longer than 2 years, hence why we rank this way.
As the season goes on, there will likely be some signings, and we’ll adjust our list according. We’ll also likely adjust based on play of the pending unrestricted free agents.
Top 2017 NHL Free Agents
| RK | Player | Team | Pos. | Age | Clauses | Cap Hit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kevin Shattenkirk |  | D | 27 | $4,250,000 | |
| 2 | Ben Bishop |  | G | 30 | NMC | $5,950,000 |
| 3 | Alexander Radulov |  | RW | 30 | $5,750,000 | |
| 4 | Karl Alzner |  | D | 28 | M-NTC | $2,800,000 |
| 5 | T.J. Oshie | | RW | 29 | $4,175,000 | |
| 6 | Martin Hanzal |  | C | 29 | M-NTC | $3,100,000 |
| 7 | Joe Thornton |  | C | 37 | NMC | $6,750,000 |
| 8 | Dmitry Kulikov |  | D | 26 | $4,333,333 | |
| 9 | Michael Stone | | D | 26 | $4,000,000 | |
| 10 | Steve Mason |  | G | 28 | $4,100,000 | |
| 11 | Thomas Vanek |  | LW, RW | 32 | $2,600,000 | |
| 12 | Nick Bonino |  | C | 28 | $1,900,000 | |
| 13 | Patrick Sharp |  | LW, C | 34 | M-NTC, NMC | $5,900,000 |
| 14 | Kris Russell |  | D | 29 | $3,100,000 | |
| 15 | Chad Johnson |  | G | 30 | $1,700,000 | |
| 16 | Sam Gagner |  | C, RW | 27 | $650,000 | |
| 17 | Andrei Markov | | D | 37 | M-NTC | $5,750,000 |
| 18 | Scott Darling |  | G | 27 | $587,500 | |
| 19 | Justin Williams | | RW | 35 | $3,250,000 | |
| 20 | Ryan Miller |  | G | 36 | M-NTC | $6,000,000 |
| 21 | Radim Vrbata | | RW | 35 | $1,000,000 | |
| 22 | Patrik Berglund | | C, LW | 28 | M-NTC | $3,700,000 |
| 23 | Brian Elliott | | G | 31 | $2,500,000 | |
| 24 | Brian Boyle | | C, LW | 32 | $2,000,000 | |
| 25 | Michael Del Zotto | | D | 26 | $3,875,000 |
* Contract info and no-trade/no-movement clauses taken from Cap Friendly.