Detroit Hockey Now’s Kevin Allen profiles Red Wings prospect Max Plante today, reporting that the Wings had hoped to sign Plante to an entry-level contract last spring. Plante wanted to play at least one season with his brothers, Victor and Zam, at the University of Minnesota-Duluth, so he declined the offer:

Three Reasons Why Max Plante Will Play in the NHL

1. Slick passer, especially in traffic. Can thread a needle in a congested offensive zone. He’s not timid about going to the net.
2. His shot is underrated. Can pick the corner. Consistently finds the net with his shots. Highly competitive
3. High hockey IQ, smart player who understands his responsibilities whenever he’s on the ice.

What May Hold Him Back

If you watched Plante play for USA against NHL talent at the World Championships, it seemed like he will need adjustment time dealing with the size, strength and pace of the pro game.

Like his dad Derek Plante who played 450 NHL games, Max is below average size for NHL players. But Derek figured out how to cope, scoring 20 or more goals in three of his first four seasons for the Buffalo Sabres. Max will adapt as well.

Continued

DobberHockey’s Khurram Sher is the second person over the course of the past 24 hours to suggest that Red Wings center Marco Kasper should rebound from a difficult sophomore NHL season. EliteProspects’ Kareem Elshafey suggested that Kasper will take the same redemptive path on Monday:

In Detroit, Dylan Larkin has declared that he wants out. The center depth behind him is quite weak with Andrew Copp and JT Compher. Michael Rasmussen also split time between center and wing. That leaves the door open for 8^th overall pick in 2022: Marco Kasper. Some of you might be thinking ‘I remember that guy, I was open to him being a good player after his rookie season, but he crashed so hard that I have written him off’. Do not be so quick to underestimate him, because the underlying numbers say otherwise. 

As is the theme for this article, Kasper’s 5v5 on ice shooting percentage was only 5.9%. His shooting percentage was also on the low end (6.9%). The year before for example he was shooting at 13.1%. Only two of his 10 assists were secondary, meaning he will pick up more secondary assists. Kasper played in 81 games but only averaged 13:48 of time on ice. The year before he received 15:27. With Larkin likely on the move, Kasper’s ice time could shoot up to at least the 17:00 minute mark. Therefore, we could be looking at an increase (a) in ice time (b) in the secondary assist rate (c) in 5v5 shooting percentage (d) in personal shooting percentage and (e) in power play time. Midway through the season, he should be hitting the 200 games played mark as well. In other categories, Kasper also provided a solid 2.30 hits/game.

Continued; Kasper still has high-end potential in my opinion, perhaps becoming the Wings’ second-line center down the line. I believe that he possesses the skills, professionalism and discipline necessary to play a mature NHL game.

The Athletic’s Corey Pronman has taken on the gargantuan task of rating each and every NHL team’s prospect pools, and this season, the Red Wings have fallen a bit, dropping from having the 11th-best prospect pool to the 15th-best in Pronman’s rankings.

That’s in no small part because some of the Wings’ brightest prospects have “aged out” by reaching 23 or older, which is Pronman’s cutoff for being considered a prospect.

Pronman ranks the Wings’ 15 best prospects as well, and his rankings are a bit surprising, deeming Trey Augustine to be a back-up goaltender, and players like Marco Kasper and Axel Sandin Pellikka to be middle-of-the-lineup skaters:

Detroit Hockey Now’s Bob Duff wonders aloud whether the members of Detroit’s front office are, in his terms, “Dead men walking” as the Red Wings’ next GM or President of Hockey Operations may wish to “clean house” and install their own staff:

What we do know is that, for the time being, assistant GM Shawn Horcoff appears to be the man calling the shots in the hockey operations department. What also seems apparent is that owner Chris Ilitch is looking for systemic change within the club’s front office.

So where does that leave people like Lidstrom, director of amateur scouting Kris Draper, and player development director Dan Cleary?

Who knows? Are they dead men walking? Probably.

Even Horcoff’s sudden status as the interim man in charge offers him little in the way of job security. Whoever is ultimately hired as GM of the Red Wings will want to bring in his own management team.

That means even Detroit coach Todd McLellan and his staff are certainly wondering what the future holds for them.

Continued; my gut feeling remains that the next GM/President of Hockey Operations won’t be dumb enough to fire a franchise legend like Lidstrom, and I do believe that McLellan will be the Red Wings’ coach for at least one more season.

As far as Draper and Horcoff are concerned, their tenures with Detroit may be more tenuous as the new GM may want to revamp the amateur scouts and remainder of the front office.

Detroit Hockey Now’s Kevin Allen discusses the Red Wings’ salary cap situation heading into the 2026-2027 season, as well as the team’s cap outlook for the 2027 free agent period:

Even if they have to pay restricted free agent defenseman Simon Edvinsson an average annual salary of more than $9 million, the Red Wings could carry cap space of more than $10 million into the season. That figure could be as high as $18.7 million, depending on what they take back in salary in a Dylan Larkin trade.

This could help set up the team’s new director of hockey operations to have a bundle of cap space next summer.

As it stands now, the 2027 unrestricted free agent class could include Cale Makar, Nikita Kucherov and Quinn Hughes, plus Mark Stone, Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Erik Karlsson, Drake Batherson and Vince Dunn.

Obviously, Hughes could re-sign with Minnesota this week, and no one expects Cale Makar or Crosby to leave their current teams. Others will re-sign as well. But Detroit’s new management will be in a position to compete for whoever is left.

The Red Wings also have Alex DeBrincat ($7.75 million), Justin Faulk ($6.5 million), John Gibson ($6.4 million) Andrew Copp ($5.625 million), Mason Appleton ($2.9 million), Daniil Tarasov ($2 million) and Jacob Bryson ($850,000) coming off the books next summer. DeBrincat will be a highly sought after UFA if he doesn’t re-sign

That’s an additional $34 million Steve Yzerman’s replacement can use to shake up the roster.

Continued; this complements SI’s Laura Lambert’s discussion of the 9 restricted and unrestricted free agents on the Wings going into next summer, with Lambert weighing in on the RFAs:

The Detroit News’s Ted Kulfan posted a profile of Red Wings prospect Axel Sandin Pellikka today, discussing last March’s demotion to the AHL as a learning experience for the promising defenseman:

At 21 years old, it has to remembered Sandin-Pellikka is far from a finished product. There’s plenty to learn, especially being a young defenseman. He’s still learning the fact that good defense can lead to more offensive time.

“Very good defense builds good offense,” Sandin-Pellikka said. “If we’re good at defending, we’re going to have (offensive) zone time. There’s an old coach I had in Skelleftea (Sweden) who said offense wins games, but defense wins championships. That’s a good way to say it.”

Being a smaller defenseman (6-foot, 186 pounds) also can make things difficult, particularly around the net on the defensive end. But during last season, Wings coach Todd McLellan occasionally would single out former defenseman Dan Boyle, a longtime star who McLellan coached in San Jose.

The Red Wings posted a 12-minute video which follows JP Hurlbert, Victor Plante and Carter Bear from draft day (for Hurlbert and Plante) through Detroit’s 2026 Summer Development Camp:

EliteProspects’ Kareem Elshafey compiled a list of 10 1st-round draft picks who face pressure to perform well and/or “break out” this upcoming season, and it’s no surprise that Red Wings forwards Marco Kasper and Nate Danielson are on Elshafey’s list:

Marco Kasper & Nate Danielson, Cs, Detroit Red Wings

Coming out of the 2023 NHL Draft, Detroit had to have felt good about their future at the centre position with captain Dylan Larkin and a pair of highly drafted pivots in Marco Kasper and Nate Danielson. 

Fast forward three years, and that future has become much murkier. Two seasons ago, Kasper (who graduated prospect status a while ago but remains just 22 years old) looked the part with a rookie year that nearly finished with 20 goals. Last season was a considerable step back, though, and having back-to-back regressive years would be a real gut punch for Detroit. 

For Danielson, the question has never been about his ability to defend or stick as a centre; it’s about the offensive upside. He’s produced at a respectable rate in his AHL time, but the offence isn’t coming in inspiring ways. Lots of the plays he makes are successful when in structure or in straight lines, which only works up to a certain point. Any spontaneous action that requires him to deceive, manipulate, or create space in a non-predictable fashion is not easy for Danielson. A centre who is constantly conscious of the defensive side is still valuable. Still, if that comes with a clear trade-off of the creative aspect of his offence, it will lead to limitations in his game that may prevent him from justifying his top-ten selection. 

To top it all off, the Larkin trade request only elevates the pressure on the two young centres to potentially fill that void. But it’s too early to disregard either of them as foundational pieces, which is why they’re on this list going into the season. 

Continued; as the Red Wings attempt to build depth at center in what will presumably, eventually, be a post-Dylan Larkin world, Danielson’s got to at least step up and play like the player J.T. Compher was advertised to be in a dependable two-way center…

Kasper definitely has to step up regardless of where he plays on the ice. Kasper was very physically engaged during last season, but he struggled with the puck on his stick, and he struggled to win puck battles, and I’m hoping that his sophomore slump was due in no small part to an undisclosed knee injury…

We’ll find out when the puck drops on the upcoming season come October 2nd.

Updated at 12:00 PM: This morning, the Hockey Writers’ Tony Wolak discusses the Red Wings’ need to re-sign restricted free agent defenseman Simon Edvinsson, arguing that this summer’s shorter-term signings of restricted free agents has cost Detroit the ability to ink Edvinsson to an 8-year contract extension:

Chicago’s Bowen Byram topped the market with a six-year, $12.5 million AAV deal. Contracts signed by Pavel Mintyukov (five years, $7.4 million AAV) and Simon Nemec (five years, $7.25 million AAV) were also noteworthy.

For Mintyukov, Nemec, and others, five-year contracts are becoming an increasingly attractive option because they allow them to reach unrestricted free agency while they are still in their prime. Rather than giving up their entire 20s to one contract, players can maximize their earning potential by taking a shorter deal and negotiating another massive contract when the salary cap is considerably higher.

That creates a difficult decision for teams. They can pay a premium for long-term security now—provided the player is open to a max-term deal—or they can save money in the short term and potentially face a much more expensive negotiation later.

For Detroit, an eight-year contract would have bought the Red Wings cost certainty through Edvinsson’s prime years while potentially becoming increasingly valuable as the salary cap rises. But instead, Detroit has allowed the market to move.

And there is another complication: time is running out on the ability to offer Edvinsson an eight-year deal. Under the NHL’s new collective bargaining agreement, the maximum contract length is being reduced – Sept. 15 is effectively the final day for teams to secure an eight-year agreement before the seven-year maximum takes effect.

That makes the next month particularly important for the Red Wings. Unfortunately, though, Detroit doesn’t currently have a general manager.

Wolak continues, suggesting that the Wings would have to pay Edvinsson more than an estimated $8.5 million per season if they want to lock him up for 8 years–presuming that the team has a general manager to re-sign #77 before September 15th…

And, if you recall, I translated an article in which Edvinsson’s agent, Peter Werner, told Expressen’s Gunnar Nordstrom that “We don’t speculate about anything, we’re patiently waiting for the new general manager,” so the Edvinsson camp is in a holding pattern, too.

Update: Brian La Rose from Pro Hockey Rumors has weighed in as well:

Detroit Hockey Now’s Max Smith argues that the Red Wings might want to trade one of their prominent unrestricted free agents-to-be in Justin Faulk.

Smith suggests that, unlike Alex DeBrincat or John Gibson, the Wings have enough depth on defense to jettison Faulk and substitute a prospect into the lineup:

Acquired at the trade deadline, Faulk would’ve been one of Detroit’s top five goal-scorers last year if his totals came solely from his time in a Red Wings uniform, which would mean another hit to the team’s offense.

Faulk’s time in Detroit would be a blip on the radar after being acquired, which did cost the Red Wings their first round pick in the 2026 draft, but his acquisition was under a far different set of circumstances than the team finds itself in even now. However, with Axel Sandin-Pellikka waiting in the wings, the team could afford to move off his contract for a return more suited to the team’s future roster needs.

Right now the Red Wings roster is at the very least abundant with defenseman, including Jacob Bernard-Docker and William Wallinder. Not enough of them are clear, impact making right shots, but the Red Wings could move Faulk out of the room and move someone else up the lineup if another team is willing to provide a decent package to acquire him.

Continued; if anyone is truly expendable on the roster, to me, it’s Jacob Bernard-Docker, who’s played fairly well on the Wings’ third defensive pair.

Despite Faulk being 34 years of age, I don’t see the Wings trading his skills and leadership ability unless the team’s truly scuttled its 26-27 season and Faulk’s had a good season in Detroit.

If the Wings are struggling at the trade deadline, I could see Faulk being moved. Early or in the middle of the season, it’s much more likely that a prospect could replace JBD in the lineup.