Whopping 27 NHL players officially placed on waivers today
A clear sign that the NHL regular season is just around the corner is when teams start placing players on waivers, and today nearly 30 players were waived.
NHL waivers allow teams to move players between the NHL and the American Hockey League (AHL) or release them from their contracts. When a player is placed on waivers other NHL teams have 24 hours to claim that player. If claimed the player joins the new team with their current contract intact. If no team claims them they can be assigned to the AHL or loaned to another league without the risk of losing them to another team.
Waivers help protect veteran players from being sent to the minors without a chance to return to the NHL. Most players have to go through waivers after reaching a certain number of games or years of service. Younger players on entry level contracts usually don't need to go through waivers giving teams more flexibility to develop their talent without losing them.
Teams also use waivers to manage their salary cap and rosters. For example they may send a high salary player to the minors to free up cap space. Waivers are often part of the balancing act for teams as they finalize rosters after trades, injuries or cap management decisions. The risk is that they might lose a good player for nothing if another team claims them.
The waiver deadline happens right before the start of the regular season, as teams finalize their rosters after training camp or free up salary cap space. Today, nine teams placed nearly 30 players on waivers.
It will be interesting to see which players get picked up by other NHL teams and which end up in the minors. One thing's for sure is that October is here, and the NHL regular season is just a few days away. Fans can hardly wait!
