Agent Provocateur with Allan Walsh and Adam Wylde
Jul 8, 2026 · 52 min · 12 segments
On this episode of Agent Provocateur, Allan Walsh and Adam Wylde wrap up season FIVE! of the show by chatting about, the real summer of offer sheets, the exploding salary cap, the NHL continued stance…
Allan WalshHost
Adam WyldeHost
What you saw happening was the reaction to five plus years, really six years, of a flat cap.
Uh, we're out of the COVID flat cap that lasted several years after COVID, and now we have a situation where we know definitively that the cap is jumping 10 million a year for two years.
And I'll, I'll stick a caveat in that by saying the cap for the year after, '27, '28, is going to rise eventually by more than 10 million, and most teams are operating under that assumption.
There still are some good players out there, but the overall breadth of the market of good players being available anywhere near the prime of their careers, uh, i- is very few and far between.
So what do you have as a reaction to that? You've got, um, trades happening at a level we haven't seen in the last five, six years.
Which I, uh, I'm not, I'm not saying this, but we did a whole episode on this last year saying that it was coming, and the only thing wrong with my prediction is that I was one off-season, uh, off, and I said I b- I thought it was going to happen last year, last off-season.
There were a number of teams that called other teams and said, "We're gonna, um, uh, offer-- we're gonna write an offer sheet on a player, uh, a- and offer him a deal unless you trade him to us." Th- that was never reported, so people don't know about it.
In this situation, this year we've had two offer sheets already, and we may not be done, and I can tell you that other players have already been offered deals as Group II restricted free agents with other teams, and they either didn't sign it and ended up re-signing with their club, or it's still hanging out there.
Yeah, and, and that's the thing, right? People forget that, uh, an offer sheet means the player actually has to choose it too, right? They have to sign the contract.
And, and actually want to go, right? So, so that, sometimes, you know, it's, it's funny.
What you saw happening was the reaction to five plus years, really six years, of a flat cap.
Uh, we're out of the COVID flat cap that lasted several years after COVID, and now we have a situation where we know definitively that the cap is jumping 10 million a year for two years.
And I'll, I'll stick a caveat in that by saying the cap for the year after, '27, '28, is going to rise eventually by more than 10 million, and most teams are operating under that assumption.
There still are some good players out there, but the overall breadth of the market of good players being available anywhere near the prime of their careers, uh, i- is very few and far between.
So what do you have as a reaction to that? You've got, um, trades happening at a level we haven't seen in the last five, six years.
Which I, uh, I'm not, I'm not saying this, but we did a whole episode on this last year saying that it was coming, and the only thing wrong with my prediction is that I was one off-season, uh, off, and I said I b- I thought it was going to happen last year, last off-season.
There were a number of teams that called other teams and said, "We're gonna, um, uh, offer-- we're gonna write an offer sheet on a player, uh, a- and offer him a deal unless you trade him to us." Th- that was never reported, so people don't know about it.
In this situation, this year we've had two offer sheets already, and we may not be done, and I can tell you that other players have already been offered deals as Group II restricted free agents with other teams, and they either didn't sign it and ended up re-signing with their club, or it's still hanging out there.
Yeah, and, and that's the thing, right? People forget that, uh, an offer sheet means the player actually has to choose it too, right? They have to sign the contract.
And, and actually want to go, right? So, so that, sometimes, you know, it's, it's funny.
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