Reinhart is entering the final year of his contract, which has a cap hit of $6.5 million

Trade rumors are a constant thing, and sometimes they seem to follow around the same players at a particular time of year.

For whatever reason, over the past few months, that has been true of Florida Panthers forward Sam Reinhart.

The 27-year-old sniper has been the subject of trade rumors as free agency has gotten going, and it’s not the first time that has happened.

Reinhart’s name was among those that came up around the trade deadline, as did now-former Panthers defenseman Radko Gudas. Florida General Manager Bill Zito ultimately decided to keep the team together in lieu of shaking things up and making any moves.

As evidenced by the Panthers run to the Stanley Cup Final, Zito clearly made the right call.

Now here we are, nearly a week into the new league year, and once again Reinhart’s name is floating around in the rumor mill.

So what is it that makes Reinhart such a potentially hot commodity in the trade market?

Well for starters he’s entering the final year of his contract.

That’s always an attractive attribute because its low-risk flexibility but still a first crack and inside track if long-term is something you want to explore.

Reinhart’s $6.5 million cap hit is also pretty reasonable for a 27-year-old coming off consecutive 30-plus-goal campaigns.

Reinhart had an extremely streaky 2022-23 season, but even in an ‘off’ year, if you want to call it that, he still finished with 31 goals and 67 points in 82 games.

While yes, he has played a decent amount of time in Florida’s bottom six, in terms of point production and ice time, one must also consider that Reinhart has been on the Panthers top power play unit and has played a key role on it, so the two kind of even each other out.

Reinhart led Florida in power play goals in each of the past two seasons, recording 16 goals both years while primarily playing the bumper role.

Another likely reason he’s a trade target is that moving off his $6.5 million cap hit would give Florida some major cap flexibility, and teams know that.

Heading into a year where the salary cap is expected to rise, the Panthers are projected to have a lot of money to spend, based off the nine players, including two goalies, they have under contract through at least 2024-25.

What ultimately happens with Reinhart depends on what the future plans are for Zito and his staff, and whether they feel the loss of the versatile forward and his high-end production can be mitigated, either by the return in a potential trade, or perhaps elsewhere with the additional room under the cap.