The past few weeks have been an absolute rollercoaster ride for the Anaheim Ducks, and after making some moves to acquire assets for young players in Mason McTavish and Olen Zellweger, the team saw Jacob Trouba depart in free agency as well.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t to be the biggest situation in Anaheim this off-season, as they’ve now got five days to match the five-year, $18 million AAV offer sheet signed by rising superstar Leo Carlsson. That move sent shockwaves across the entire National Hockey League, and while the obvious move for the Ducks is to match the deal with Carlsson, who is shaping up as a great 1C of the future, there’s ramifications either way on the Ducks side of things.
One of those potential outcomes would see another young player get offer sheeted by a rival team, but despite that threat, the Ducks have fought off rival teams and now signed a key piece of their team long-term.
Pavel Mintyukov Locks in Long-Term With the Anaheim Ducks
GettyPavel Mintyukov of the Anaheim Ducks.
Even as late as Sunday afternoon, there was chatter around young defenseman Pavel Mintyukov, with Frank Seravalli reporting that the Ducks were informed that an offer sheet for the rising star was pending.
To lose a player via offer sheet or to have to make a call on their future not once, but twice in less than a week for the Ducks would have been a brutal outcome, but according to both Seravalli and Elliotte Friedman, the threat of the offer sheet made both parties come to their senses, as a long-term deal has been agreed upon.
It will be in the Brandt Clarke range, which is 5 x $7.4M
It’s unclear exactly what the offer sheet deal was, with both the Carolina Hurricanes and Montreal Canadiens reportedly being interested in the 22-year-old former No. 10 overall pick, but for now, the Ducks have managed to fight off interest as they retain their defenseman on a deal that’s reportedly five-years, $7.2 million AAV.
Pavel Mintyukov Remains the Ducks Future on the Blue Line
Given how Anaheim were reeling on the back of the Leo Carlsson news, it made sense for a rival team to swoop in with an offer sheet on Mintyukov, and while there may have been interest, Seravalli notes that Mintyukov’s preference was always to be a Duck.
This comes on the back of another promising season at the NHL level for Mintyukov, with the 6-foot-1, 210 pound blue liner posting 8 goals and 22 points in 73 games played. To live up to the deal he’s now signed, there will need to be much more production moving forward, but in a potentially much greater role, the belief is that he can be a good, if not great top-four defenseman for a long time to come in Anaheim.
After so much drama in Anaheim over the past three days, this puts to rest at least one of their major issue and sures up the left side of their defense for years to come, and now, all of their attention will be turned to Carlsson and how they can best sort that situation out.
Ducks Fight off Offer Sheet; Sign Defenseman to a Long-Term Deal