Elias Petterson NHL trade talk The NHL announced [https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6103283/2025/01/31/nhl-salary-cap-rising/] on Friday that the league's salary cap upper limit would rise from $88 million to $95.5 million next season, jump to $104 million for 2026-27, and top out at $113.5 million for 2027-28. According to CapWages [https://capwages.com/teams/calgary_flames], the Calgary Flames have $16,399,167 in cap space for the remainder of the 2024-25 season. This includes subtracting Andrei Kuzmenko's ($5.5 million) and Jacob Pelletier's ($800,000) contracts and adding Joel Farabee [https://www.nhl.com/flyers/player/joel-farabee-8480797]'s ($5 million) and Morgan Frost [https://www.nhl.com/flyers/player/morgan-frost-8480028]'s ($2.1 million) contracts from Thursday night's blockbuster trade. The Flames' budget this season is $71,600,833, roughly $6 million over the current salary cap floor of $65 million. Only two NHL teams have more cap space in their budgets: the Anaheim Ducks ($17,118,333) and the Columbus Blue Jackets ($17,797,499). Heading into the 2025-26 season, the Flames currently have only eight forwards under contract ($40,650,000) and five defensemen ($14,987,500), and Dustin Wolf, who will be in the final year of his entry-level deal paying him $850,000. Ultimately, there will be some intriguing free agents from this year's team, including Matt Coronato, Connor Zary, Adam Klapka, Morgan Frost, and Kevin Bahl. Meanwhile, several key names on the Calgary Wranglers will need new contracts next season, including Sam Morton, Rory Kerins, Martin Frk, Dryden Hunt, Jeremie Poirier, and Yan Kuznetsov. However, Frank Seravalli [https://x.com/frank_seravalli]quickly pointed out that the NHL operates in USD, so by 2027-28, the new upper limit of the salary cap of $113.5 million could be almost $50 million more to Canadian-based franchises. Thankfully, Scotia Place [https://www.calgary.ca/major-projects/scotia-place.html] will be open for the 2027-28 season, helping the Flames generate more revenue, keep upcoming homegrown talent like Zayne Parekh and Henry Mews, and attract free agents like Cale Makar to Southern Alberta. Today's news about the NHL salary cap is the first time in years that the upper limit expanded by more than just a few million dollars and indicates how successful the NHL product has been coming out of the pandemic. Image [https://thehockeynews.com/.image/c_fit,h_600,w_600/MjEyMTg1MzcxNTIwMjgwMTky/thncgynews.png]
