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2025-26 Canes Miscellaneous Thread

Guesses on what Nikishin signs? Bridge, 3 years? 8 years? It would likely benefit Boom to sign 3 at a modest rate, and if he really does become a solid all around top pairing guy, someone will back up the Brinks truck to his doorstep in 3 years. Tulsky would be a magician to get him signed to 8 years for less than 8m per.
 
TheBigKahuna said:
Guesses on what Nikishin signs? Bridge, 3 years? 8 years? It would likely benefit Boom to sign 3 at a modest rate, and if he really does become a solid all around top pairing guy, someone will back up the Brinks truck to his doorstep in 3 years. Tulsky would be a magician to get him signed to 8 years for less than 8m per.
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ET as well as his mentor love the long-term deals for young guys. Let’s hope this goes the way of the others 🤞
 
TheBigKahuna said:
Guesses on what Nikishin signs? Bridge, 3 years? 8 years? It would likely benefit Boom to sign 3 at a modest rate, and if he really does become a solid all around top pairing guy, someone will back up the Brinks truck to his doorstep in 3 years. Tulsky would be a magician to get him signed to 8 years for less than 8m per.
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His agent causes me to hedge on this one. I could see them wanting to avoid a long term commitment, even though I’m sure the team would be willing to go there. I’d guess he’ll either go to arbitration for a one year market deal or maybe sign a 3 year bridge and try to leverage that into a really big contract. If Carolina avoids either of those outcomes, it’s a big win for Tulsky. If not, then the Canes are so well leveraged that they can deal with it later if they have to.
 
Nikishin definitely isn't signing an 8 year contract after June 30th because the maximum contract length for re-signing with your current team drops to 7 years starting with the 2026-27 season (6 year limit for signing players who were on other teams or for offer sheets).

The teams have that additional carrot to wave as an incentive up to June 30th. Alex Tuch is only going to get 6 seasons as a UFA if he waits until July 1st. If another team REALLY wants Alex Tuch, and he is not going to sign with Buffalo, trading a (2nd round?) draft pick to allow for him to get an 8 year contract as part of a sign and trade happening before July 1st is more likely this coming offseason with the new CBA shrinking the maximum contract lengths starting July 1st.

Be it before or after June 30th, if Nikishin is going to commit to the max contract length, the number to the left of the 6 zeros on the AAV will be an 8 at a minimum. He's going to be the Canes highest AAV Dman if he signs for 7 or 8 seasons.

A 2 year bridge contract might look like $3 million and $5 million. 3 years might be $3 million, $5 million, $7 million. Those numbers might be conservative.

Even with just the 1 full season, Nikishin showed enough that we are not going to get away with the discounts Tulsky and crew seem to wrangle up. His entry level contract was rightfully built as if he was an NHL top 5 overall pick. His next contract will continue on at that level. He scored 11 goals in his first NHL season. He led the Canes Dmen at +18. 2nd in hits. 2nd in Blocked shots.

He's going to get paid, big time. The questions will be whether or not he and his agent are willing take their chances on a shorter term contract with hopes his play and the rising cap will eventually push him into the $9, $10, $11 million AAV range. That isn't without risks. He has had multiple concussions.... in the KHL and this big one in the playoffs a few weeks ago.

I trust the Canes front office will do the right thing for the Canes, no matter what that might be. I don't think 8 years $64 million would be enough to get Nikishin extended. Then again, every time I think that 'this player is going to take the Canes to some very uncomfortable and surprisingly high AAV', I am stunned that we got the player signed for far less money than I expected.
 
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Probably safest to just expect the bridge deal and hope to avoid arbitration. Then, you take your chances. At some point the Canes have to worry more about their window to compete and replacing that guy would be WAY more expensive than just paying him.
 
bagopux said:
All four ECF games are more or less sold out. There are resale tickets of course but fewer than I expected.
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I figured the market would be hot. Florida and Tampa being out makes a big difference in market confidence, regardless how we feel about the reality of that statement.
 
Another day of practice, no changes. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

They're taking tomorrow of though. With Slugs/Habs game 6 on Saturday, the earliest they could start is Monday but Tuesday is more likely.
 
andyt said:
With new minimum salaries coming in each of the next 4 seasons, some players are getting salary increases. William Carrier picks up an extra $600k over the remaining years of his contract. The Canes will absorb a $975k cap hit increase in total, more than any other team.

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Yeah, Carrier’s deal accounts for $600K out of the $975K increase for the Hurricanes. Only Boston, San Jose and Columbus avoid any impact.
 
andyt said:
Nikishin finished 7th in the Calder voting. Matthew Schaefer won it unanimously, Ivan Demidov and Beckett Sennecke were 2nd and 3rd. Dobes, Snuggerud and Wallstedt were 4-6. No votes for Bussi, which is surprising.


View: https://x.com/puckreportnhl/status/2054620254534303747?s=61
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Original thought … Schafer didn’t run away with the Calder as much as I thought he would. Then I looked at the voting totals. He had 198 first place votes to … looks again … 0 for Demidov. Which is absolutely accurate from where I sit, but still … NHL award voting can be VERY parochial.
 
StormChaserBH said:
Thought Bussi was ineligible for the award due to age anyway, so maybe not surprising
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It’s my understanding that Bussi was ineligible. I would have expected him to finish Top 3 otherwise, given voters’ normal weighting on goalie wins. 31 wins in 39 games is catnip to those guys
 
I don't know if this will work, but I am posting this with a gift article link to the Triangle Business Journal...


What the article doesn't address is whether any of this money is being spent on visitor locker room upgrades. As has been posted here before, the visitor situation at Lenovo Center was voted by players as the worst in the league.
 
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