The Vancouver Canucks inked Sven Baertschi to a new two-year deal last week, which included a healthy raise from the $900,000 that he made last season.
According to News1130 this morning, the team has been going down its list of remaining restricted free agents, making decisions about qualifying offers.
The deadline to issue a qualifying offer is June 27, so that's still a week away. I imagine some of the action over draft weekend and the beginning of the free-agency interview period could influence whether or not qualifying offers are issued to the players on the bubble.
Here's what we know so far. Three players who spent last season with the Utica Comets have all been qualified:
News 1130 explicitly mentions that Pedan and Grenier have not yet accepted the qualifying offers. The deadline to do so is July 15, so there's still time.
No word on whether Pedan or Zalewski plan to do the same, or if they'll accept the qualifying offers that they have received.
On the NHL front, the intrigue kicks up a notch.
First, there's this:
The Canucks' Twitter feed did retweet this Father's Day post from Etem yesterday:
I quite liked what we saw from Etem towards the end of last season. Yes, the argument can be made that teams weren't exactly playing the Canucks tough defensively during the late stages of the year, but out of the seven goals that Etem scored last season, four of them came in Vancouver's last five games. For a guy whose commitment has been questioned at times, he played hard right to the end of the season. I'd like to see if he can build on that next year.
Last year, Etem signed his qualifying offer of $850,500, according to
Pat Leonard of the
New York Daily News.
The Linden Vey situation sounds even more ominous:
Vey got a raise last year, from $735,000 to an even $1 million, but cleared waivers, started the season in Utica and didn't get into an NHL game until December 18. He went from 75 games and 24 points in his first year with the Canucks to 41 games and 15 points in 2015-16, and ended the year on the injured list, missing the last four games with an upper-body injury.
Click here for a reminder of how qualifying offers are determined, thanks to a handy chart from the Tampa Bay Lightning website. In a nutshell, players earning less than $1 million a season must be offered a raise as part of their qualifying offer—the amount depends on how much they made last season. A player at $1 million or above—like Vey—needs to get an offer of the same value in order to be qualified.
If a player doesn't receive a qualifying offer by June 27, he'll become an unrestricted free agent on July 1. That doesn't necessarily mean that he can't re-sign with the Canucks. If he's willing and, presumably, if a better offer doesn't come along, the team could get a chance to re-sign the player for less money than the qualifying offer.
Given that Vey cleared waivers when he was sent down to Utica last October and really hasn't done anything to improve his hockey stock since then, this seems like a plausible outcome to me. I wouldn't be surprised to see Vey back at a reduced price next season, once again a tweener who will get a chance to play on the Canucks or get shuffled down to the farm, depending on how the rest of the roster plays out.
One other note—defenceman Philip Larsen is not currently a restricted free agent. Because he played in the KHL last year, he is officially "inactive" for the moment. According to
CapFriendly, Larsen's last deal, signed with Dallas in 2013, was a two-year contract with a cap hit of $1.025 million per season.
News1130 also spoke with Pierre-Luc Dubois this morning about his experience with the Canucks at the draft combine:
Dubois said the main line of questioning centred about whether he'd be able to take on the responsibilities of becoming an NHL centre:
Right now, Dubois seems like the most logical fit for the Canucks, based on how we think the top five picks will shake down. But lots can still change before Benning and director of amateur scouting Judd Brackett step up to the podium to make their selection on Friday.
Vancouver Canucks Blogger • 
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