The Anaheim Ducks and defenceman Pavel Mintyukov have come to terms on a 5 year deal, worth a reported $36M which will keep him under team control through 2030-31.
While the club has yet to officially confirm the value of the deal, sources close to the team indicate that it will come at an AAV of $7.2M per season. Originally drafted 10th overall in the 2022 NHL Entry Draft, Mintyukov made his NHL debut in the 2023-24 season.
Across 204 career games, he’s amassed 17G and 52A and has seen time on the team’s second power play unit as the 22 year old’s game continues to progress. Mintyukov became a restricted free agent this summer, and it became evident that Anaheim’s front office wasn’t keen on seeing the same scenario as Leo Carlsson play out with one of their young blueliners.
Carlsson was signed to a 5 year, $90M offer sheet by the Philadelphia Flyers on Friday which will make him the NHL’s highest paid player next season. Whether that will be as a member of the Ducks or Flyers remains to be seen.
Ducks general manager Pat Verbeek is widely regarded as a “tough” negotiator in NHL circles, and has seen very public back and forth exchanges between his young players agents and the club drag into training camp. Mason McTavish, Trevor Zebras, and Jamie Drysdale are just some of the names who have been through this rigorous process in recent years. But it wasn’t until this summer that those hardline tactics finally backfired on the club.
Mintyukov is a solid, offensive minded blueliner who has upside to spare, making him an attractive target for an offer sheet by another club. However it would appear as though Verbeek and co. may have been spooked into getting a deal done (and one at a higher AAV than perhaps some would have expected) so as not to face the same predicament Edmonton did when they ultimately lost Dylan Holloway and Philip Broberg to offer sheets a few summers prior.
Photo: Jenn G. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.