Colorado Avalanche Acquire Rights to Carl Soderberg

by

The Boston Bruins have dealt the rights to pending free agent Carl Soderberg to the Colorado Avalanche for a 6th round pick, according to ESPN’s Pierre LeBrun.

Carl Soderberg
(Sergei Belski-USA TODAY Sports)
On Thursday, the six-day period opened where pending free agents are allowed to discuss deals with other teams and it was speculated earlier on Thursday that Soderberg and/or his agent were quite busy, with LeBrun reporting that there were seven to eight teams expressing interest in Soderberg.

Perhaps the Avalanche felt they’ve got a good chance with the 29-year-old center to move a late draft pick to gain negotiating rights to talk with Soderberg, who LeBrun, earlier in the day, said was hoping to get around $5 million a year on a new contract.

With Colorado’s negotiations with Ryan O’Reilly going poorly, the team may have decided that they need a depth guy with scoring upside like Soderberg. They’ll also have extra space under the cap to outbid other teams on Soderberg, since this move makes it look like a foregone conclusion that they will trade O’Reilly before the start of the season.

They’re currently sitting with $13,399,406 of available cap space, according to General Fanager. That’s with three UFAs and three RFAs on the roster who have not or will not re-sign. They’ve got wiggle room as they start to fill out their 23-man roster.

UPDATE:
The Avalanche were indeed one of the teams who reached out to Soderberg’s agent today, per LeBrun.

RELATED: 2015 NHL Draft Guide: The Next Ones

[catlist categorypage=”yes” numberposts=3 excludeposts=this]