NHL Mailbag: Which top 2026 UFAs could actually go to market?
The continued dog days of summer mean another DFO mailbag opportunity. Why not share the spotlight with our readers after nine months of hogging it to ourselves?
Let’s jump right in.
With Tyson Foerester presumably ready for opening puck drop this season. What projections do you have for the Flyers top 6 on Offense? Also, do you see Dvorak as a possibility to get any 2C opportunities or is he the teams 4C as some are penciling him in as? pic.twitter.com/1LTjAAMY1A
— Michael James Hickey (@TVproductionGUY) August 19, 2025If the Philadelphia Flyers do in fact get to start the season with a healthy Tyson Foerster, it will give new head coach Rick Tocchet a much easier time trying to balance out his lines. I am not going to pretend to get inside Tocchet’s mind before he coaches even a single preseason game with his new team, so these projections will be of my own accord entirely.
Foerster starts on the top line on the left side opposite sophomore Matvei Michkov. Newcomer Trevor Zegras will be the pivot, getting a crack to be the top dog down the middle that he was passed over from being with the Anaheim Ducks. The second line will be the “old guard” trio, if you will, with Owen Tippett, Sean Couturier and Travis Konecny, a line that was frequently used by former head coach John Tortorella.
As for Christian Dvorak, I don’t think we see him start in the top six, but I can certainly see him supplanting Couturier should the latter’s wheels fall off. I don’t think Noah Cates is a top-six center for a team with playoff aspirations; Dvorak will be the next man up down the middle should Couturier or Zegras falter.
Early view on goalie outlook for 2025 who is poised to break out (Wolf), bounce back (Kuemper), and fall off a cliff (Georgiev) this upcoming season.
— Esteban Verde (@imgoingreene) August 19, 2025Break out: I can fully see Dan Vladar shocking people with the Flyers. At 27 years old, Vladar is finally getting a fair crack at being a team’s starting goaltender. The Flyers are a team on the rise, but goaltending has sunk them the past few seasons; Vladar has a prime opportunity to change that. Much like Samuel Montembeault and Anthony Stolarz in recent years, Vladar seems to be right in the age range for goaltenders looking for their big break.
Bounce back: Low-hanging fruit here is Jeremy Swayman. After missing all of training camp due to a contract holdout with the Boston Bruins, Swayman never got off the ground in 2024-25. Much like the Bruins’ season, Swayman’s campaign became an unmitigated disaster – much more so because it directly followed him signing a mega contract extension. I don’t expect the Bruins to be world beaters in 2025-26, but Swayman will most surely return to form.
Fall off a cliff: John Gibson is my pick here, though he hasn’t exactly been in top form in recent years, albeit last year was a strong bounce-back. Detroit Red Wings GM Steve Yzerman was finally the one to pull Gibson out of Anaheim, but I just can’t foresee this particular move working out. The Wings have their fair share of problems defending as is and we just saw several years of a sample size watching Gibson play behind a team with similar flaws. Given his age, injury history and team in front of him, I can fully see Gibson’s game cratering this season.
What free agents do you realistically see hitting the market next offseason? I think its obvious McDavid, Eichel, and Kaprizov won't actually be available.
— flyguys30 (@Flyguys30) August 19, 2025Here’s the thing: I don’t think it’s a slam dunk that the likes of Jack Eichel and Kirill Kaprizov re-sign with the Vegas Golden Knights and Minnesota Wild, respectively.
Eventually something is going to have to give in Vegas. Yes, Eichel likely isn’t the guy the Knights eventually bring the hammer down on, but after signing Mitch Marner to a major contract with an AAV of $12 million, can they really afford to hand out a major deal to another forward? With the rising salary cap, there is reason to believe that Eichel’s AAV could soar past the $12.6 million benchmark the Colorado Avalanche set with Nathan MacKinnon, which has since been exceeded by the Toronto Maple Leafs’ Auston Matthews and Edmonton Oilers‘ Leon Draisaitl as fellow centers.
As for Kaprizov, he is poised to be the league’s highest-paid winger in 11 months’ time – but will Wild GM Bill Guerin be the guy to make him that? The Wild have already played hard ball with Marco Rossi this summer; not apples to apples in the least, but the precedent is there. Kaprizov has a chance to change the game from a free agency perspective for wingers in the largest way since Artemi Panarin signed with the New York Rangers six years ago.
With the cap set to explode in the coming years, Kaprizov may not want to turn that opportunity down.
Bringback90sjets on Instagram: “does team usa choose otter or helle as its starter in milan, or do they rotate both?“
I can understand why this question would be asked, but I think it’s Connor Hellebuyck and it isn’t even much of a debate. Now, does that mean he will finish the tournament? Not at all, especially given the length of the Olympic tournament compared to that of the 4 Nations Face-Off. But despite Hellebuyck’s shady playoff performances with the Winnipeg Jets in recent years, he (mostly) stepped up when it mattered for Team USA last February.
As for Jake Oettinger, he didn’t exactly have the playoffs of a lifetime with the Dallas Stars last spring, either. Just ask Peter Deboer.
Thedukeofscotland on Instagram asks: Will karlsson be flipped before the regular season, or will he be a deadline asset?
I definitely cannot see the Pittsburgh Penguins being able to move Karlsson before the start of the regular season. At a $10.5 million ticket, GM Kyle Dubas will (in all likelihood) needs to wait for interested teams to accrue cap space to fit Karlsson in later in the season. You also have to think that any team seriously looking at Karlsson will want to see how he performs to start the year.
Even if Karlsson does perform, I’d imagine Dubas may need to retain on the AAV to bring the former’s cap hit down somewhere in the $8 million range. Completely speculative, but how much fun would a return home to the Ottawa Senators be for the hockey world?
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