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Looking at the Kotkaniemi offer sheet through an Elias Pettersson lens |
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That offer sheet for Jesperi Kotkaniemi certainly spiced up a quiet offseason weekend, didn't it?
I covered the main points of the deal over at Forbes on Saturday:
And while the offer was unexpected, I can't say it was completely surprising. As Darren Dreger has pointed out again, there seemed to be a good deal of ill will in Kotkaniemi's camp when he was healthy scratched against Tampa Bay for what turned out to be the last two games of the playoffs.
Elliotte Friedman also had some juicy details in a new '31 Thoughts' podcast.
He said that negotations with the Canadiens on a new deal hadn't been going well — that Montreal was offering something in the neighbourhood of two years at $2.5 million. He also said — and this is fascinating — that when the Hurricanes talked with Kotkaniemi's people, they discussed the prospect of signing this high-value one-year contract as part of a package that would also include a multi-year extension at a somewhat lower average annual value.
That makes sense, given what we know about owner Tom Dundon's budget-conscious approach. Don't read too much into these actual numbers — they're mostly for illustrative purposes. But if the Hurricanes extend Kotkaniemi for, say, five years at $4 million or so beyond next season, then they'd actually be getting him for a total of six years at $26 million, or an average of $4.33 million a year.
What's his real value? It's certainly less than Pierre-Luc Dubois, who played three full seasons and put up 158 points before signing the two-year bridge deal with the $5 million cap hit. Kotkaniemi is coming out of his entry-level deal at a younger age — he just turned 21 in July. He has just 62 points in 171 regular-season NHL games and saw some time in the minors in his second season as well as getting those playoff healthy scratches. But he also scored some huge goals in the postseason and, while he wasn't quite as impactful as Nick Suzuki or Cole Caufield, he showed me more than I'd been expecting. I thought he demonstrated the ability to raise his game in key situations and that he was tracking toward being an effective NHL centre.
Of course, as Canucks fans, the main thing we care about is how this situation impacts Elias Pettersson.
As a rule, I don't give offer sheets much thought. They're rarely deployed — and even more rarely do they go unmatched. The last player that moved was Dustin Penner, from the Ducks to the Oilers in 2007.
As Elliotte pointed out, though, offer sheets can sometimes cause rifts that take years to come to the surface. If a team matches an offer sheet, it can't trade a player for a year. After Ryan O'Reilly signed the Calgary Flames' offer sheet in February of 2013, he lasted two and a half seasons in Colorado before he was traded to Buffalo. And after Shea Weber agreed to that 14-year offer sheet from the Philadelphia Flyers, he played three and a half more seasons in Nashville before being traded to Montreal.
In this case, it seems like there's a real possibility that the Canadiens might not match. Not only is that $6.1 million cap hit going to be difficult for Montreal to absorb this season, it'll also set his qualifying offer for years to come — and the Canadiens might not be offered the same terms on a multi-year extension as what Carolina is rumoured to have in its pocket.
If the Habs don't match, they'll get two 2022 draft picks as compensation — a first and a third. Friedman suggests that Marc Bergevin can use those assets to go shopping for a more experienced centre who might be an even better fit for his team, and carry a lower cap hit. Someone like, say, Christian Dvorak of Arizona, who's 25 and under contract for four more years at $4.45 million. It'd be a pretty tidy solution if Bill Armstrong is amenable.
Does this latest development make it more likely that Elias Pettersson might sign an offer sheet this summer before he's brought under contract? I don't think so. I don't think he has the same bad blood with the Canucks that Kotkaniemi has with Montreal, and we haven't heard any indication that negotiations have stalled or gotten contentious; both sides seem to be quite clear on where the challenges lie and how they can be overcome.
And does Kotkaniemi's $6.1 million shift the marketplace in terms of comparables? I don't think that's the case, either. One reason GMs tend to shy away from offer sheets is because they drive up market prices in general. But this one-year deal is clearly an outlier. I do think the market for defensemen may have upped the asking price for Quinn Hughes this summer, but I don't think this contract will have any material impact on Pettersson.
I'll change the subject for one other quick note before I sign off for today — scrolling through my Instagram on Saturday and seeing Alex Edler, Chris Tanev, Sam Gagner, Erik Gudbranson and their spouses hanging out together in Muskoka.
Considering Gagner was barely here for a year, during a pretty dark time in Canucks history, there's something quite touching about the fact that these couples remain tight enough to be spending time together in the offseason.
Tanev, of course, is back for a second season in Calgary this year, while Gagner returns for a third year in Detroit. Edler is on his way to L.A. and Gudbranson, after finishing out the contract he signed in Vancouver as a trade-deadline acquisition of the Nashville Predators, currently remains an unrestricted free agent.
Another former Vancouver defender, Jordie Benn, hooked on with a new team late last week, signing a one-year deal for $900,000 with Minnesota.
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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