Vancouver Canucks lowball offer gets rejected by UFA goaltender

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Daniel Lucente
September 15, 2024 (2:18 PM)

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The Vancouver Canucks are in a desperate search for a healthy goaltender, and their latest offer to UFA goalie Kevin Lankinen was rejected for being too low.

The Canucks had been seeking some extra goalie depth with the health of Thatcher Demko still a bit in question. After trying to bring either Kevin Lankinen or Antti Raanta in on PTO deals, they've upped the ante. Via Rick Dhaliwal of CHEK and The Athletic on Twitter, the Vancouver organization has now offered Lankinen a one-year contract. There's a big caveat, however, as the deal is reportedly for under $1 million, and Lankinen isn't interested in that just yet.

He made $2 million last season with Nashville, so the Canucks' offer is quite the pay cut. Cap space is tight on the Vancouver team, with less than $200K available, per PuckPedia, and they're not keen on using LTIR. In order to fit this deal, they'd likely need to drop someone from their roster and potentially carry three goalies into the season if Demko can't play.

Lankinen's numbers with the Predators have been solid, as he has posted a 2.79 GAA and .912 SV% over 43 games in the past two seasons. Those stats make him a solid backup, which might explain why he's holding out for a better offer. But with most teams settled on their goalies, that bigger offer may not come anytime soon unless there's an injury.

Giving Lankinen a full deal suggests the Canucks are still concerned about the readiness of Demko to go after his knee injury from last spring's playoffs. They could have moved forward with Arturs Silovs and new third-stringer Jiri Patera for a few games if they felt confident Demko would be back in short order. Silovs had a very good playoff and could manage a few early starts, however, he too was recently injured.

The fact that they're pushing for a full-season deal would suggest Thatcher Demko's recovery could take a shade longer than expected. And with training camps around the corner, the Canucks need to decide whether to sweeten the pot or hope Kevin Lankinen has a change of heart and accepts what's currently on the table.

Source: Blades of Steel
Free Agent goaltender Kevin Lankinen rejects Vancouver Canucks offer

Source: Hockey-Reference
Kevin Lankinen Stats