The last of the arbitration worthy players, defenseman Tyson Barrie, actually made it to the hearing process, but on Sunday afternoon, it was announced that the two sides had come to an agreement, not long before the arbitrator made their ruling. Barrie was the only player to make it to the process, which may or may not have helped the process, as the two sides came to a 4-year, $22 million deal.Barrie, 25, is coming off another great season, albeit not his best, but still a pretty good outing in the 2016 season. In 78 games, he finished with 13 goals and 49 points, ranking 14th among all blueliners in scoring.
His career-high in points came in the 2015 season, where he picked up 53 points for the Avalanche and I think Barrie could lift his game back up to that level for the 2017 season, as I have him currently projected in the 55-point range, which should mean he'll be a top end pick, thanks to the onus on blueliners this pool has had in the last few years.
There was a lot of chatter about Barrie being held out there as trade bait, because of his potential cap hit and the $5.5 million per season does take a significant chunk out of what the Avalanche had to work with, as they now feature a projected 23-man lineup, in colour below, that only has about $630,000 left in cap space. At this point, it would be somewhat silly for the Avalanche to start dealing a top two defenseman like Barrie, since they have it all fitting into place today, but he would be the easiest to move, given his upside and his age, because a team would certainly welcome a deal like this one under their roof.
| Forwards | Cap | Defense | Cap | Goalies | Cap |
| Nathan MacKinnon | 6.300 | Erik Johnson | 6.000 | Semyon Varlamov | 5.900 |
| Matt Duchene | 6.000 | Tyson Barrie | 5.500 | ||
| Gabriel Landeskog | 5.500 | Francois Beauchemin | 4.500 | ||
| Jarome Iginla | 5.333 | ||||
| Carl Soderberg | 4.750 | ||||
| Joe Colborne | 2.500 | ||||
| Blake Comeau | 2.400 | ||||
| Mikhail Grigorenko | 1.300 | ||||
| John Mitchell | 1.800 | Fedor Tyutin | 2.000 | Calvin Pickard | 1.000 |
| Cody McLeod | 1.333 | Eric Gelinas | 1.575 | ||
| Rocco Grimaldi | 0.925 | Nikita Zadorov | 0.894 | ||
| J.T. Compher | 0.925 | Patrick Wiercioch | 0.800 | ||
| Mikko Rantanen | 0.894 | ||||
| Andreas Martinsen | 0.640 | ||||
| A.J. Greer | 0.742 | Chris Bigras | 0.874 | Spencer Martin | 0.925 |
| Julien Nantel | 0.680 | Duncan Siemens | 0.874 | Jeremy Smith | 0.600 |
| Troy Bourke | 0.632 | Sergei Boikov | 0.682 | ||
| Reid Petryk | 0.623 | Mason Geertsen | 0.650 | ||
| Trent Vogelhuber | 0.613 | Cody Corbett | 0.617 | ||
| Jim O'Brien | 0.600 | Ryan Stanton | 0.600 | ||
| Mike Sislo | 0.600 | Mat Clark | 0.600 | ||
| Samuel Henley | 0.587 | Joe Whitney | 0.600 | ||
| Turner Elson | 0.575 |
Pool worthy, non-pool roster players, assumed roster fill-ins, injured/retired cap hits, in the system
The Arizona Coyotes locked up their top pick in the 2016 entry draft, the 16th overall pick, defenseman Jakob Chychrun, signing him to his 3-year entry level deal on Saturday. The deal is thought to be worth the maximum amount in salary, but the bonus structure is still unknown, unlikely that he'll see bonuses like the top five picks in the draft.
On Friday, the Toronto Maple Leafs came to terms with their last restricted free agent, defenseman Martin Marincin, signing him to a quick, 2-year, $2.5 million deal. The Leafs acquired the defenseman from the Oilers back in June 2015 and has been sitting on the fringe for the Leafs ever since.
It was a big day for restricted free agent defensemen on Thursday and the last RFA for the Minnesota Wild put pen to paper, as Matt Dumba signed a 2-year, $5.1 million deal to cap it all off.
The St. Louis Blues may not have many spots up for grabs at this year's training camp, but that won't stop them from adding to the competition. The Blues signed their 2nd round draft pick from June's draft, forward Jordan Kyrou, to his entry-level deal, which will be of the 3-year variety with the ability to slide for a couple years, if needed.
The injury confirmation that we were looking for from the Detroit Red Wings came down, not too long after the signings for their 2017 season had completed. The team's management confirmed that they don't expect either Johan Franzen or Joe Vitale to play this season, as both are dealing with serious concussion issues and they will be headed for the Long Term Injured Reserve, once the season gets started.
Last year, we didn't really see key training camp invites until the middle of August and really, we might not see them until then this year, as I wouldn't necessarily consider Maxim Lapierre as a key camp invite, but it's something in these slow news days. The New York Rangers have offered the 31-year old pest a shot at their camp in September and you could certainly argue that the Rangers have spots available to fill on their roster or at least question marks that they'll need to turn into periods.
The Arizona Coyotes' Summer has had a full plate of action thus far and a couple more key signings on Thursday afternoon nearly rounds out all the list of important things to get done in the off-season.
There was one other pool worthy signing on Wednesday, which didn't make the publishing cut-off yesterday, as the Nashville Predators locked up forward Calle Jarnkrok to a 6-year deal, worth $12 million. The $2 million cap hit certainly has some potential to be a bargain, as his scoring totals continue to trend upward.
The salary cap crunch has become real with the Detroit Red Wings and they now have a number to work towards, as they have re-signed goaltender Petr Mrazek to a 2-year, $8 million deal, putting another $4 million against their cap hit for the coming season and putting them over the ceiling for the time being.
Mike Hoffman will now have the security of four more seasons with the Ottawa Senators, as they have avoided salary arbitration on Wednesday morning. The deal has been reported to be worth $20.75 million in total, working out to a very reasonable $5.2 million cap hit per season, which has the possibility of being a bargain, compared to his upside.
The Tampa Bay Lightning have secured another key fixture of their franchise, as they had come to terms with Vladislav Namestnikov on Tuesday night, agreeing to a new 2-year, $3.875 million deal.
Peter Holland was also supposed to have his arbitration hearing today between himself and the Maple Leafs, but the two sides were able to come together before the nastiness began, agreeing to a bridge deal, 1-year at $1.3 million.
It's nothing new to avoid arbitration these days and the Philadelphia Flyers did so with one of their key forwards, Brayden Schenn, as the two sides agreed upon a new 4-year deal on Monday morning.
On Monday morning, it was announced that unrestricted free agent forward Kris Versteeg has signed in Switzerland, becoming the second pool worthy player from the 2016 season to do so in this off-season, the first being goaltender Jonas Hiller. 