![]() ![]() It’s an unromantic reality of the contemporary NHL that filling out the bottom end of a club’s roster is as much about cap minutiae and marginal efficiency as it is about training camp performance. If he can even keep the competition close at training camp in September, his lower cap hit should give him the inside track to at least be the club’s fourth lefty defender on the NHL roster. And not just among defensemen.īy coming in at a lower cap hit than Rathbone ($925,000 plus performance bonuses) and Hunt ($800,000), Juolevi would now be the most economical third-pair left-side option for the Canucks’ consideration. In fact, the last time Hunt was recalled from the AHL in December 2016, he was the league’s leading scorer. The versatile defender hasn’t played in the AHL in five years. Hunt is an NHL-level player, without question. Rathbone shone in his late-season cameo for the Canucks, and brings a level of speed and offensive dynamism that Juolevi hasn’t approached in his 24 NHL-level appearances in this career. Juolevi is one of the contenders, but he’ll have to beat out Jack Rathbone and Brad Hunt. Behind Quinn Hughes and Oliver Ekman-Larsson, one of the most fascinating Canucks training camp battles is shaping up to take place along the left side of the club’s third pair. The competition is stiff on the left side of Vancouver’s defense. It might be a relatively marginal factor, but it matters. It’s perhaps paradoxical, but by signing at a lower NHL number, Juolevi has also enhanced his chances of making this team out of camp - and spending the majority of the season on the 23-man roster, if not necessarily in the lineup. ![]() That means that Juolevi is guaranteed $750,000 in pro-rated salary regardless of whether he spends the 2021-22 campaign in the NHL or in the American Hockey League. The deal is a one-way contract, sources confirmed to The Athletic. Instead, Juolevi opted to sign a league-minimum, one-year deal with the Vancouver Canucks, who drafted him fifth overall in 2016 and has stood by him through a variety of injuries and surgeries and false starts in his young professional career to this point. The risk that if he’d been sent to the minors, he would’ve earned a very low salary in his age-23 season. That qualifying offer, however, would’ve been a two-way deal, based on his lack of an NHL track record. Olli Juolevi was entitled to a higher NHL-level salary, if he’d only accepted his qualifying offer.
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