- Dinamo Minsk has offered free agent Evgeny Kuznetsov a one-year KHL contract
- Kuznetsov spent the summer skating with Dinamo star Sam Anas in Virginia
- Read below for the reported terms and where Kuznetsov could land next
Evgeny Kuznetsov might be headed to Belarus.
The free agent center has a contract offer on the table from Dinamo Minsk, the KHL club that already employs his summer skating partner Sam Anas. Sport-Express reporter Arthur Khairullin says Minsk put a one-year deal in front of Kuznetsov worth about 35 million rubles (roughly $457,000) plus bonuses.
It lines up with how he has spent his offseason. Kuznetsov has been skating at Reston SkateQuest in Virginia with a mix of pros and juniors, and Anas has been out there with him.
The two even played on the same team in 3-on-3 summer-league action and posed for a photo afterward:
Anas gives Minsk a strong pitch. He just won the KHL’s Top Scorer Award with 89 points in 2025-26, tying Nikita Gusev’s single-season league record. Put him alongside Kuznetsov and Dinamo would have one of the scariest tandems in the KHL.
Kuznetsov, 34, is a free agent after two seasons back in Russia. He split last year between Metallurg Magnitogorsk and Salavat Yulaev, putting up 27 points in 34 regular-season games.
He saved his best for the playoffs. In the first round against Avtomobilist, he tied Game 6 with 4.5 seconds left in regulation.
Watch him force overtime with the building on its feet:
The tying goal set up more heroics. Kuznetsov fed Sheldon Rempal for the double-overtime winner that pushed Salavat Yulaev into the second round.
His future was already up in the air before Minsk called. Agent Shumi Babaev said back in May that Kuznetsov would not return to Salavat Yulaev, and that a jump to Switzerland’s National League was possible if no KHL club came calling.
Kuznetsov left the NHL in July 2024 after mutually terminating his deal with Carolina. He racked up 575 points in 743 games with the Capitals and Hurricanes and won a Stanley Cup in Washington in 2018. He was back around the game this spring, even grabbing a selfie with Gary Bettman at the Cup Final.
Minsk is betting that Anas makes the choice an easy one.
