Panthers free agency primer: Florida’s two All-Star forwards loom over all decisions

When free agency opens up at noon on Wednesday, the Florida Panthers will be thinking not only about how to get better for the 2022-23 NHL season, but also how to try to remain a Stanley Cup contender for a decade beyond then.

Their two All-Star forwards will be at the center of just about every decision.

Claude Giroux, whom the Panthers got in exchange for a first-round pick in March, is about to become an unrestricted free agent. Jonathan Huberdeau, who rewrote Florida’s franchise record book last year, will be one after next season.

The Panthers have Stanley Cup aspirations for next year after winning the Presidents’ Trophy last season and losing Giroux would, on paper, be a step backward. They also consider extending Huberdeau to be a top priority, knowing they can count on having one of the NHL’s best offenses if they can pair up Huberdeau and star center Aleksander Barkov for years to come.

These are the two pillars everything in the offseason hinges upon for general manager Bill Zito and his staff.

It starts with Claude Giroux

Florida wants to keep Giroux. He wants to stay. There is a way to make it happen, but it will take some serious compromises from both sides.

It makes sense to start with Giroux because he has the leverage in this situation: He played in his seventh NHL All-Star Game last season, scored 65 points in 75 games in the regular season and eight points in 10 games in the 2022 Stanley Cup playoffs, and is certainly one of the best players available on the open market; he’s still good enough to command a $5 million-plus annual salary and, at 34, in the age range where he might be searching one final long-term deal.

Right now, the Panthers can’t come close to offering him what other teams will, especially for next year, with less than $1 million in cap space currently available.

How can they get this done, then? They’ll have to make their own sacrifices, namely some of the other talent on the current roster.

The most straightforward path to clearing some cap space would have been to waive Patric Hornqvist. The 35-year-old right wing is still a valuable leader and one of the best fourth-line wingers in the league, but $5.3 million is a lot to pay any fourth-line forward, and Florida could have opened about $3.5 million in space for the 2022-23 season by buying him out and deferring about $1.8 million to next year, when the Panthers have a much more flexible cap situation.

They didn’t. Now a trade is the best option, only they’re far from the only team facing a brutal cap situation and it’s mostly only bad teams with flexibility. Those teams have less need for a player like Hornqvist, which means they’d probably want draft picks as compensation for taking on the salary, and Florida can’t deal away any of its next three first-round picks because of recent trades.

The Panthers can place winger Anthony Duclair on long-term injured reserve (LTIR) after his offseason Achilles tendon injury — meaning his $3 million salary won’t count against the cap until he returns, likely around midseason — and potentially open up more than $9 million in room, if they can deal Hornqvist without taking back any players.

There is some risk with using the LTIR loophole, though: If Duclair returns at any point in the regular season, Florida must make room for him under the salary cap, which would necessitate more moves ahead of the trade deadline next year.

Two other stars keep coming up in trade rumors, too: goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky and defenseman MacKenzie Weegar. Each of these, however, have major hang-ups: A Bobrovsky trade would likely require the Panthers to retain up to half of his $10 million salary and Florida would like to extend Weegar, who’s entering the last year of his deal.

Whatever Zito ultimately decides to do, he will probably have to do it quickly. Unless Giroux is willing to take a big pay cut or go to a non-contender, the versatile forward will have to make a decision relatively quickly, while teams still have cap space available.

There is, of course, the possibility Giroux could take a pay cut to stay with the Panthers. It would be a massive risk on his part, but Giroux could take a one-year deal with Florida for less money than he’s worth, with the knowledge the Panthers have a much more flexible cap situation after next year, and the trust they’d like to ink him to an extension once the calendar flips to 2023 and he’s eligible to sign one.

If not Giroux, then who?

The reason Giroux is such an important pivot point for this offseason is there’s really only one other high-profile name even worth mentioning for the Panthers: Evgeni Malkin.

It was only three years ago Florida was viewed as perhaps the favorite to land the seven-time All-Star when the Pittsburgh Penguins were exploring a possible trade. Now the 35-year-old center is about to become a free agent for the first time and there’s a chance he could wind up being an even cheaper alternative to Giroux because of his recent injury history.

Most importantly, the Panthers have a unique appeal to Malkin, in much the same way they have one with Giroux.

In Giroux’s case, the Canadian very much enjoyed his brief time in South Florida and now knows he’d like to return. In Malkin’s, the Russian has a home in Miami, which is part of why he’s long been linked to the Panthers. Throw in Florida’s lack of a state income tax and the Panthers’ status as one of the best teams in the league, and Zito and Co. have some real perks to offer championship-chasing veterans.

Filling out the Panthers’ roster

No matter whether it can lure a big-name free agent, Florida needs to find a way to replace three forwards and one defenseman — forwards Joe Thornton, Noel Acciari and Giroux, and defenseman Ben Chiarot are all about to be free agents — from the lineup it used in the final game of the Stanley Cup playoffs.

Marchment, 27, is high on the list of priorities to bring back and might be able to fit right into Duclair’s salary slot. If Florida wants to use its LTIR savings on a defenseman, Brett Kulak, 28, is probably the top available option for the money.

Barring a series of moves, the Panthers will have to fill out the roster with cheap alternatives, whether it’s by giving bigger roles to prospects like center Aleksi Heponiemi and left wing Grigori Denisenko or finding undervalued free agents.

In his two years with the Panthers, Zito has found a ton of success with the latter, particularly in his first offseason, when he signed Marchment for $700,000 and forward Carter Verhaeghe for $1 million per year, and claimed defenseman Gustav Forsling off waivers.

It ends with Jonathan Huberdeau

Once the dust has settled on free agency, Florida and Huberdeau will know exactly how much money the club can spend to keep the All-Star left wing in Sunrise.

Right now, the Panthers have plenty of room to give Huberdeau something in the range of the $10 million-per-year extension Barkov got last year, with more than $26 million in projected cap room available for next offseason. A multiyear deal or two could eat into this space and a desire to extend Weegar is a factor, too, and yet it shouldn’t preclude anything.

Like with the Giroux situation, both sides want to get a deal done, only there isn’t really anything holding up this one.