- Patrik Laine is still unsigned five weeks into NHL free agency
- A source told the Montreal Gazette that teams may wait until camps open to confirm he still wants to play in the NHL
- Read below for the five clubs linked to Laine and the bonus-heavy contract available to him
Patrik Laine has been a free agent for five weeks and nobody has signed him.
Part of the holdup has nothing to do with his shot. Herb Zurkowsky of the Montreal Gazette reported that clubs want proof the 28-year-old still wants to play in the NHL at all.
Zurkowsky asked why a former 44-goal scorer was still on the board in August, and a source spelled out what teams are waiting on.
“According to a source, it’s unlikely any team will sign a player like Laine until the summer’s over, players are about to report and a team can confirm his health and, perhaps more importantly, that he is motivated to continue playing in the NHL as opposed to returning to Finland, where much of the pressure might be removed.”
Suitors have been circling since July 1. New York, Minnesota, Tampa Bay and Toronto all got connected early, and Philadelphia joined more recently.
The Rangers are the fit that keeps coming back around. They finished 23rd in the league with 235 non-shootout goals last season, and Pavel Dorofeyev and Oliver Bjorkstrand were already brought in this summer to fix that.
Toronto would be the fun one. Laine on a line with Auston Matthews would reunite the top two picks of the 2016 draft, ten years after the Maple Leafs took Matthews one spot ahead of him.
Money is not the obstacle here. Laine has played more than 400 games and spent at least 100 days on injured reserve last season, which lets him sign a one-year deal stuffed with bonuses. Zurkowsky laid out the shape of it: a $1 million base, a matching games-played bonus, and up to $1.5 million more tied to goals and points.
Health is the obstacle. Laine had surgery in late October to repair a core muscle injury and played five games all season.
A year earlier he looked like a different player. He scored 20 goals in 52 games for Montreal, and 15 of those came on the power play.
Take a look at what that power play looked like with him parked in the circle:
NHL Network dug into his market back in July and floated Long Island as a landing spot:
Defense is the other thing scaring teams off. Laine carries a career goal differential of minus-75, and he is not the guy a coach sends out to protect a one-goal lead.
He has company on the shelf. Vladimir Tarasenko has been sitting unsigned since July 1 as well.
Training camps open in about six weeks. Zurkowsky’s source expects Laine to make his call right up against that date, and Finland is one of the answers on the table.
