Carolina Hurricanes, Mitch Marner and Other Free Agents

Carolina Hurricanes Look to Be Active This Offseason

Dave Pagnotta of the Fourth Period was on TSN 690 Radio in Montreal on Monday ahead of Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Final between the Carolina Hurricanes and Florida Panthers. Pagnotta was asked about the Hurricanes, what their off-season will look like, and whether they could be a player for Mitch Marner.

NHLRumors.com Transcriptions

Host: “Just back to Carolina here, Dave, for a second. Look, it’s a good team. They make the playoffs every year. They usually get out of the first round. They’ve gone to a couple of conference final appearances. It is ridiculous that the number might go to 0-15 or 0-16 (Hurricanes won, so 1-15). That’s nuts.

But what are they doing this offseason? We spend a lot of time talking about what the team in this city is going to do, and Toronto is going to do, and everywhere else. But can the Carolina Hurricanes, are they enticing, perhaps to a Mitch Marner, to a Matt Duchene, but I doubt Sam Bennett, but let’s just throw his name in the mix as well.

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Do the Carolina Hurricanes this offseason kind of go outside of their box and maybe not get the world’s greatest 200-foot player, but somebody that has a little bit of playoff jam?”

Dave Pagnotta: “These guys have almost $30 million in cap space.”

Host: “That’s a lot of money.”

Pagnotta: “Yeah, and at least up front, there’s no major free agent that they’ve got, not even a restricted free agent. On the back end, you’ve got (Brent) Burns and you’ve got (Dmitry) Orlov, you’ve got to decide what you want to do there on both of those guys. Burns, he’s 40 now, so you’re going to have some questions there. But that’s a lot of money. That’s $30 million bucks that they’ve got. It might be just a smidge under it.

They are going active. And they took big swings last year. They brought in (Jake) Guentzel. They took the big swing this year with (Mikko) Rantanen and didn’t work. They flipped them. I like the return. I like what they got. But with $30 million in cap space, there’s no doubt in my mind that they are going after Mitch Marner if he hits the open market. And with respect to Mitch, he’s not going to be, they’re not going to be on one. Certainly, he’s going to have the pick of the litter.

But with $30 million in cap space, depending on how aggressive they want to be, and that owner wants to win, that owner is itching to win, so to green light a lot of these moves, like he’s been in the thick of those discussions. He wants to do what he can to win, and now it’s a matter of finding those pieces that are going to put you over the top again.

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No doubt in my mind, they’re going to pursue Mitch Marner if he’s there July 1, but also like they’re going to add additional pieces on top of it, and that’s where those intangible, kind of playoff performers come into play for a team like this with the bulk of their roster intact going into next season, minus a little bit of shape shifting on defense that they’re going to have to do. Reshaping.

They have the potential of adding some pieces here to get them out of this little rut, this Conference Final rut that they’re in, and they’re going to be an interesting player this summer.”

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