This is the start of a new time. An important chapter in the history of the National Hockey League (NHL) could be written on July 1, 2025: the summer of hostile offers.
Hostile offers have long been a pile of the media, but the murmurs through the NHL are increasingly audible, impossible to ignore. They are no longer whispers, in fact: the vice-president of the Montreal Canadiens hockey operations, Jeff Gorton, said publicly expect an increase in this kind of offers, in his end-of-season Monday.
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This feeling is shared by the agents certified by the Association of Players, including the very influential Allain Roy, with whom TVA Sports has maintained.
“For a long time, it was a taboo. There was a gentlemen agreement Between the teams. Now I have the impression that we will see more. THE feeling Through the League, it is that we are going to live a summer like that, “predicts the Roy telephone, whose customer’s wage bill amounts to $ 391 million according to Puckpedia.
This paradigm shift, if it materializes, it would be major.
“In 25 years of career, only once, I went close to a hostile offer with one of my clients,” reveals Roy. That is to tell you how much things have not changed much. There, I think it will change a little.
“In the past, there is no one who even thought of making an offer to a second or third trio player.”
Conflicts had left scars. Kevin Lowe and Brian Burke had almost come to the blows in a barn in the wake of the hostile offer of Edmonton’s Oilers in Dustin Penner of the Anaheim Ducks in 2007.
“It had launched a war between the two,” recalls Roy, “and I think that, therefore, everyone was a little nervous. But there, it will burst a little. ”
Hostile offers could become an essential mechanism to speed up reconstructions.
“As we saw last summer with St. Louis, that makes a big difference,” says Roy, referring to the additions of Philip Broberg and Dylan Holloway who helped the blues to qualify for the series this season. You can cut the round corners a little and go get a player already established to help you.
“It can really shorten the path of a reconstruction.”
Look further than the SuperVedettes
The CEO of the Blues CEO, Doug Armstrong, to take advantage of the delicate situation of the oilers vis-à-vis the salary ceiling to tear them off Holloway and Broberg opened many leaders through the NHL last summer.
“I would have done it to my own mother if she was DG of the Oilers,” said Armstrong, a statement that had struck the imagination.
A hostile offer is not a declaration of war, but a tool. It was time for DGs to see them more pragmatic.
-“It is especially the fact that the blues did not target big names,” adds Allain Roy. In the past, there have been hostile offers to SuperVettes like Sergei Fedorov, for example. What was done last summer was much more accepted.
“Before, those who were targeted were mainly first trio players who produced many points. There, I think we will see players everywhere in the training [être ciblés].
“It’s been a long time since the collective agreement has been part of the collective agreement. Now there are many managing directors who understand that it is something that can be used to rebuild your team. ”
The ranks
It would be wrong to think that hostile offer is an effective strategy for attracting the biggest fish to the market. Most of the time, the offer will be equaled. It is in the case of second or third trio players, for example, that it becomes more interesting.
“Compensation for this kind of player is not as important as people think,” observes Roy.
The compensation scale offered to the teams that lose a player through a hostile offer changes each year. Here it is for 2024:
$ 1.51 million | No compensation
$ 1.51 million at $ 2.29 million | Choice of 3 and back
$ 2.29 million to $ 4.58 million | 2nd round choice
$ 4.58 million at $ 6.87 million | Choice of 1st and 3rd rounds
$ 6.87 million at $ 9.16 million | Choice of 1st, 2nd and 3rd rounds
$ 9.16 million at $ 11.45 million | Two 1st round choices, a 2nd round choice and a 3rd round choice
This compensation scale is established by the League according to the average salary of the players. The one that will be in force for 2025 should be revealed by the League a little before the draft.
“As the ceiling has rose 5%, it is reasonable to estimate that the compensation ladder will rise approximately 5%,” explains the founder of Puckpedia, Hart Levine, in an exchange of private messages.
And how does a hostile offer materialize, exactly? Who is the first to move: the agent or the DG?
“The media,” says Roy from Tac to Tac, laughing. The media will get out of rumors and it will be the starting point. Otherwise, it is usually the teams that move first, but there are agents who are more aggressive on this side. ”
