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Greg WyshynskiJan 25, 2025, 04:13 PM ET
- Greg Wyshynski is ESPN’s senior NHL writer.
Carolina Hurricanes GM Eric Tulsky said his team has the desire and the financial flexibility to give newly acquired star winger Mikko Rantanen the massive new contract he’s seeking ahead of unrestricted free agency this offseason.
That is, if he wants to remain with the Hurricanes.
Carolina stunned the NHL on Friday night by acquiring Rantanen from the Colorado Avalanche in a three-way deal that also saw them pick up Chicago Blackhawks winger Taylor Hall. Rantanen is sixth in the NHL this season with 64 points in 49 games, including 25 goals. Since the 2021-22 season, he is fifth among NHL players with 365 points in 286 games, including back-to-back 100-point seasons.
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But the 28-year-old is an unrestricted free agent this summer, and his contract demands created a significant impasse with the Avalanche, with whom he has played for 10 seasons. The Hurricanes are hoping they can meet Rantanen’s asking price and convince him to commit to the franchise long term.
“At this point it’s more of a recruiting pitch than a negotiation in my mind,” said Tulsky on Saturday.
Carolina has been a playoff team in all six seasons of Rod Brind’Amour’s head coaching tenure, including two trips to the Eastern Conference Final. The team boasts a few players from Rantanen’s native Finland, including friend and star center Sebastian Aho. Tulsky hopes the franchise’s virtues – and a contract to his liking – will be enough to retain him.
“[Rantanen] is an incredible player. If he gets to free agency, I’m sure there will be teams that will pay him a lot of money, and so our job in the next weeks and months is to make it so he wants to be here,” he said. “He has the right as a free agent to decide where to sign and it may not come down to the money for him. It may come down to where he wants to be. So our goal is to make him want to be here and then offer enough money that he doesn’t have to think twice about it.”
The Avalanche picked up Carolina forwards Martin Necas and Jack Drury, as well as a second-round pick in this year’s draft and a fourth-rounder in 2026. Chicago acquired its own 2025 third-rounder from Carolina for Hall, the rights to Swedish forward Nils Juntorp and 50% retention on Rantanen’s $9.25 million salary cap hit.
Colorado GM Chris MacFarland called the trade a “tough business decision.” Rantanen was a popular star and a clutch performer with 101 points in 81 career playoff games. That included 25 points in 20 games when the Avalanche won the Stanley Cup in 2022.
Rantanen was seeking a contract in the neighborhood of the eight-year extension Leon Draisaitl signed with the Edmonton Oilers in September. That deal carries an average annual value of $14 million. Both Rantanen and Draisaitl are represented by agent Andy Scott.
This is the second straight season the Hurricanes have traded for a star scoring winger with an expiring contract. Last year, it was Pittsburgh Penguins winger Jake Guentzel. Efforts to re-sign him failed as he landed with the Tampa Bay Lightning instead.
Tulsky, who is in his first season as Hurricanes general manager, said the conditions are more favorable to make a run at keeping Rantanen than they were for retaining Guentzel.
Last season, the Hurricanes didn’t have the cap flexibility to sign Guentzel and the other players they wanted on the roster. This offseason, Tulsky estimates the team could have between $35-$40 million in cap space. The Hurricanes will be the only team able to give Rantanen an 8-year contract, per NHL CBA rules.
“Our team situation is totally different right now,” he said. “We don’t feel nearly as constrained.”
The Avalanche and Hurricanes had been discussing Rantanen since last summer. Tulsky said the last 6-8 weeks saw them table “serious offers” for the winger. The Hurricanes were pushing hard to complete the trade in the last two weeks.
Those talks with Colorado were happening at the same time Carolina was discussing trades with other teams. Sources told ESPN that the Hurricanes and Vancouver Canucks had engaged in negotiations about forwards Elias Pettersson and J.T. Miller.
Tulsky said that in the last week there was a desire for all parties to “get their best offers on the table” so the Hurricanes could decide which player to pursue.
“Everybody had multiple offers. It was sort of time for everyone to figure out what they wanted to do and this deal got done,” he said. “It was a complicated dance.”
