It appeared as if both the Minnesota Wild and Filip Gustavsson would take it to August 4th to settle their contract in arbitration.
Both sides were far apart in contract negotiations, but they have now settled things.
They have agreed to terms on a three-year deal worth $11.25 million total. The new contract carries a cap hit of $3.75 million, and will take Gustavsson to unrestricted free agency in 2026. He will also submit a five-team no-trade list ahead of the 2025-26 season.
The New Deal Allows Filip Gustavsson to Continue His Success
While Gustavsson was operating in a 1A/1B role with veteran netminder Marc-André Fleury, Gustavsson finished at the top of many goaltending categories and even got All-Star team consideration, given that he had a .931 save percentage in 39 games, which placed second to only the Boston Bruins’ Linus Ullmark, and stopped 24.2 goals above expected.
Those that have watched his development closely will notice that he was due to make it to the big league. He was one of the better goalie prospects since he was drafted 55th overall by the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 2016 NHL Entry Draft. A season like this wasn’t expected, but he always had the potential to be a starting goalie in the NHL. Considering that it takes longer for goalies to make it to the league, his best season to date was right on the money.
Filip Gustavsson Set to Start in 2024?
He’ll undoubtedly be the Wild’s full time starter next season as he will see an uptick in games played. It seemed unlikely when he got involved in a one-for-one swap with the Wild sending Cam Talbot to the Ottawa Senators, though Talbot posted rather disappointing numbers with Ottawa in 2022-23.
It’s even better that the contract is settled inside the team and not by a neutral third party, or arbitrator. The Wild are very tight on cap space, with nearly $14.75 million in dead cap penalties in total for this year and next year because of the Ryan Suter and Zach Parise buyouts, which has been detrimental to their roster construction. Unfortunately, it still is the case as they have $1.64 million left in cap space and still need to sign RFA defenseman Calen Addison. They may need to clear out more cap space in trading one of their guys, though they don’t have a lot of tradable assets and they may not be able to carry a full 23-man roster because of the dead cap penalties, though that depends on the injury situation.
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