Florida Panthers Playing a Wait-and-See Game with Aleksander Barkov
Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet joined Sirius XM NHL Network Radio Morning Skate with Gord Stellick and Scott Laughlin. Friedman was asked about the Florida Panthers and Aleksander Barkov, and what is the latest behind his LTIR status.
NHLRumors.com Transcriptions
Scott Laughlin: “So when it comes to Barkov and the Panthers. So from what we understand, and you can tell us more about it, so if they shut him down for the entire season, regular season and playoffs, they can reap the benefits of $10 million bucks, right? And if they only shut him down for the regular season, bring it back for the playoffs. It’s 3.8 that they get, that they could play with and go out there and get somebody.”
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Elliotte Friedman: “Yes, but it’s not that simple. Basically, to make it simple, it’s like, declare or not declare, right? So if you don’t declare, it doesn’t matter what the timeline is, you only get the 3.8. And I’ll tell you what’s interesting about that is that when this first came out, Scotty, someone said to me that they were wondering, could they get a whole bunch of players making under 3.8 that adds up to 10. And the NHL apparently has indicated that that’s not the case. You get 3.8, and you can fill it up with three different players if you want to, but you only get 3.8.
So people were already looking for loopholes, and the NHL was already looking at it. So basically, and, if you saw Barkov the other night, yeah, he made sure to go up on stage without the crutches, and when he went and visited the Heat, like he basically said five, six months. So I think we have to prepare for the possibility here that the Panthers and Barkov are going to wait to see if he can make a miracle comeback.”
NHLRumors.com Note: The Florida Panthers will continue to operate just $3.8 million over the salary cap. There is a belief that when it comes to Aleksander Barkov, he will return for the players from his torn ACL and MCL. However, GM Bill Zito is still weighing all his options and will not declare him ineligible for the season until he knows Barkov won’t be playing that year. Currently, the Panthers will explore internal options to replace Barkov while keeping an eye on the trade market.
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