NHL Rumors: Why Hasn’t the Top Remaining Free Agent, Jack Roslovic, Signed Yet?

Jack Roslovic is still looking for a contract for next season

NHL Network: Mike Johnson and Stu Grimson talking about the top remaining unrestricted free agents, including Jack Roslovic.

** NHLRumors.com transcription

Tony Luftman: “Notable remaining UFAs. I’m going right at Jack Roslovic, because Johnny (Mike Johnson)…”

Grimson: “Fascinating.”

Luftman: “Yes, take it away.”

Johnson: “And uncomfortable.”

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Luftman: “Yes.”

Johnson: “And I don’t mean to be flip or, Jack Roslovic had a good year last year by his standards. By sort of the NHL crop of UFA standards, there weren’t a ton of high-scoring, 20-plus goal scorers available in the UFA market this year.

Roslvoic was one of them. Put up a 22 spot (goals). And yes, I know it was front-loaded, but hey, nobody gets 20 goals by getting one every four games, Tony. I taught you that many years ago, right? You get them in spurts. Some come early, some come late. Point is, you got 22.

And this summer, 22 goals and 40 points would have been worth $5 million for four or five years. And yet, here’s Roslovic well into August, and the money is, has been spent in many ways, but maybe more important than that, for him is the roster spots have been allocated. You look at whose contracts they begin out and who’s going to play where.

And he’s a guy to me, you know people are saying, ‘Why is he not signed? Why wouldn’t he be signed?’

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Well, one you think, Well, how much money does he want? That’s the first thing. The other thing is, he’s a classic tweener. Clearly a top, a middle-six winger, not going to help you a ton if he’s not scoring. He’s not going to put on the fourth line in check or be physical. He’s got to kind of score.

But teams are now looking at him saying, ‘How much better is he than the guys we have available to us?’ Probably not better than the veterans. And how much opportunity do we want to give to the younger players to maybe do what he did and get 17 goals and then grow into something more known commodity.

It’s a tricky situation, and I’m not sure how it plays out for him. He might need an injury in camp, or some underperforming young players, where teams realize that guy, our prospect, he can’t quite do it yet. Who’s out there? Roslovic’s out there. We can go get him.”

Grimson: “And there’s a good bit of time. But between now and the start of camp, you know, a lot of things could fall into place for Roslovic.

But really surprising to me Johnny, because you know, ours is a league where guys that have demonstrated, you know, that raw promise, he has had a couple of 22-goal seasons to his credit. But when you demonstrate that kind of promise at an earlier stage in your career, there’s always a handful of clubs out there that are willing to take a bet on you.

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The bet on Roslovic really is what he’s been is relatively streaking for most of the five-ish years that he’s been a part of the an NHL roster. Years where he just, you know, he’s not showing you the kind of, fulfilling the kind of promise that he showed us at an earlier stage of his career. So a little bit surprised by that. There’s always, you know, a handful of teams that are willing to take a crack at a player like that. Figure they’ve got kind of the elixir, the remedy, to really, the fit, to really make it allow him to shine.

And two, with the cap going up, and the kind of space, and, you know, financial outlay there is within the marketplace right now, a little bit surprised that somebody is not willing to, again, take a crack at a Roslovic and integrate them into your roster.

I do get it in this respect, why pay a UFA premium? Because there’s a premium that comes with a player like that.”

Johnson: “Not anymore, though.”

Grimson: “Well…”

Johnson: “Not in August, there’s no premium. On July 1st, yes.”

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Grimson: “That moment has come and gone, no question about it. But the decision around, you know, July one through, say, July 7, was, why pay a premium on a UFA in that role when you’ve probably got, this is your point, an RFA that can substantially fill that spot and doesn’t come with that same kind of premium.

One last quick point, there are some players that specifically thrive in Carolina. Fast, straight-line players. Roslovic can play like that. And I wonder if other teams look and say, ‘we don’t play quite that way. Are we quite as good of a fit?”

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