Offseason Checklist: Anaheim Ducks

The offseason has arrived for half of the league’s teams that weren’t playoff-bound plus those who were eliminated early in the postseason.  It’s time to examine what they will need to accomplish over the coming months.  Next up is a look at Anaheim.

The Ducks got off to a good start this season which had them in the thick of the playoff race for most of the year before slowing down late in the year which helped lead to a significant sale at the trade deadline.  GM Pat Verbeek now has a largely clean slate to work with as he enters his first summer at the helm but has some work to do.

Leverage Cap Space

At the moment, Anaheim has over $39MM in cap space with their most prominent restricted free agents being forwards Sonny Milano, Isac Lundestrom, and Sam Steel.  They’re all capable young players but none of them are going to break the bank and significantly cut into that spending room.  If Verbeek has the green light to go to the $82.5MM Upper Limit, he could be a big player in the summer spending around the league.

The big question is what is the best way to spend that money?  They could try to go for the quick fix and look to add several impact veterans which would help replace the exodus of veterans at the trade deadline.  At a time when many teams will have to show restraint in free agency, the Ducks could splurge.  That said, with what’s coming down the pipeline a year from now (more on that shortly), is that the best route for them to take?  And is the rebuild ready to be over or does more work need to be done?  If the answer is the latter, spending big now makes less sense.

If they’re not ready to spend big just yet, then leveraging that cap space in trade talks might be the better way for Anaheim to go.  They should be able to get some future assets in exchange for acquiring an above-market contract with the approach that Arizona has taken recently.  Those contracts will often be shorter in length compared to what they’d be…