Morning Rumors: Draft Lottery, Sabres, Panthers, Flyers, Oilers, Kovalchuk and the Devils
  • Elliotte Friedman: The NHL is looking into altering their draft lottery process. Under the current system, any team in the lottery could ‘win’ the lottery and select first overall, as well as not being able fall back more than one draft slot. There are talks of altering the systems so that teams could drop to the fourth or possibly the six slot. Odds of winning the lottery are 25 percent for the worst team to 0.5 percent for the 14th seed. This could be altered too. They are also looking at the possibility of looking at a team over a five year span.The NHL may get rid of having ‘lists’ for shooters taking part in the shootout.Illegal testing of draft prospects could be $250,000.

    Sabres GM Tim Murray will look to start contract extension talks with Tyler Ennis and Marcus Foligno to see if they are interested in signing on long-term.

    Murray said there were no offers that were remotely close for Tyler Myers or Christian Ehrhoff at the deadline. Cap recapture on Ehrhoff’s deal are a concern and affects trade scenarios.

    Five years ago the Panthers asked the Flyers for Claude Giroux when the Flyers inquired about Jay Bouwmeester. The Flyers obviously said no. The Kings asked the Flyers for Sean Couturier when they were shopping Jonathan Bernier.

    Oilers owner Daryl Katz is thought to be the driving force behind the Oilers draft Nail Yakupov over Ryan Murray.

    Friedman asked Ilya Kovalchuk at the Olympics if he would return to the NHL, Kovalchuk laughed and said he has three years left on his KHL deal and we’ll see.

  • Mike Harrington: “No shock the NHL is worried about tanking for top picks, given what’s gone on in the NBA and the charade #Sabres pulled in October.” … “@JeremyWGR et al — charade was starting season w/4 teen-agers, first team in NHL to play a single game in 18 years. Trading UFAs is fine. The Sabres have traded their UFAs and have bad NHL players now. Fair enough. Starting 4 teen-agers was an open tank. That’s my point.”
  • Randy Miller of NJ.com: Devils Martin Brodeur said back when he, Zach Parise and Ryan Suter were unrestricted free agent in 2012, Parise was “pretty close” to remaining with the Devils and luring Suter. Brodeur signed a two-year $9 million deal with the Devils, Parise and Suter signed with the Wild.

    “Listen, I was on the phone with Zach while I was doing my thing two years ago,” Brodeur said. “We were in the same boat. We’d talk and he’d ask me, ‘Are you going to come back?’ We had a lot of conversations. I was supposed to get on the phone with Suter. I never got to the phone with him, but we were talking about it.”

    “Zach was pretty close to coming back here,” Brodeur said. “It’s not something that he wanted at no cost getting out of New Jersey, like other guys when they hit free agency you knew it was all over for them. He and Suter were pretty close, and anywhere they were going to go, it was a package deal probably.”