Rumor: Former NHL captain is about to be bought out.

NHL captain about to hit the market.

HockeyFeed
HockeyFeed
Published 4 years ago
Rumor: Former NHL captain is about to be bought out.
Dirk Shadd/Tampa Bay Times/Zuma

It has been several days now since the Columbus Blue Jackets did the unthinkable and swept the Tampa Bay Lightning, heavy favorites to win the 2019 Stanley Cup Championship, in just 4 games. It may be some time still before we can truly look back and appreciate the historic moment but for Lightning fans it may be even longer still before they can let go of the sense of loss the feel for what was once so promising a season.

Although the Lightning were dominant in the regular season and had one of the best regular season campaigns in history, a performance like the one they had in the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs will necessitate change at some level within the organization. Head coach John Cooper signed a brand new extension with the team this year so he is unlikely to be the scapegoat and general manager Julien Brisebois only just took over the reigns of the organization. That leaves really only one area in which to make significant changes and it is perhaps the most important area in which to do so, the Tampa Bay Lightning's main roster.

A number of Lightning players are on expiring contracts and it remains to be seen which ones will be back next season and how much they will cost the Lightning in order to do so, but there are other candidates for change as well.  In a report earlier this week for the New York Post, New York Rangers insider Larry Brooks included a very interesting comment regarding the future of former New York Rangers captain, and current Tampa Bay Lightning forward, Ryan Callahan. It was almost a throw away comment at the end of his report but it is one that could have a significant impact on the Lightning moving forward. 

From Brooks:

Ryan Callahan will likely be a buyout.

Callahan has seen his play time fall of a cliff as of late and there was perhaps no bigger indication of how far he has fallen than the Lightning's opening round series against the Blue Jackets. In spite of the fact that the team desperately needed to right the ship at several times during this series, Callahan would only see 2 games of action in the 2019 Stanley Cup Playoffs. One of those was a direct result of the suspension to Lightning forward Nikita Kucherov though so that can hardly count as a situation in which Cooper actually wanted to use Callahan.

Without the buyout Callahan would cost the Lightning $5.8 million against the cap next season, and with players like Brayden Point in line for some big money deals, it makes a ton of sense that Brisebois and the Lightning would look to a buyout here. 

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