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NHL Notebook: Flyers tender massive $18 million offer sheet to Ducks’ Leo Carlsson
Photo credit: Gary A. Vasquez-Imagn Images
By Zach Laing
Jul 3, 2026, 17:00 EDTUpdated: Jul 3, 2026, 17:09 EDT
The month of July just got a whole lot more interesting, as the Philadelphia Flyers have tendered a five-year, $18 million AAV offer sheet to Anaheim Ducks centre Leo Carlsson.
It’s the second offer sheet issued since the start of free agency, with the New Jersey Devils tendering Utah Mammoth centre Barrett Hayton to a one-year, $4.775 million offer sheet.
The Carlsson one, however, has far larger implications, as the $18 million deal would significantly jam up the Ducks’ core if accepted. If the Ducks decline to match the Flyers’ offer sheet, they would receive Philadelphia’s first-round pick in each of the next four years.
Carlsson, 21, is coming off a breakout season, racking up 29 goals and 67 points in 70 games, adding four goals and 11 points in 12 playoff games against the Edmonton Oilers and Vegas Golden Knights. Last season was his final year on his entry-level contract.
How does the Leo Carlsson offer sheet impact the Anaheim Ducks’ salary cap?
While Anaheim has $35 million in cap space, the team has only nibbled around the edges of its roster since free agency opened, with the largest deal they’ve handed out being a two-year, $2.25-million AAV deal to defenceman Nick Jensen. They have much more work to be done, too. Winger Cutter Gauthier is a 10.2.c restricted free agent, meaning he’s ineligible for an offer sheet, but is due a significant raise coming out of his entry-level contract. AFP Analytics projects a long-term deal to account for roughly $8.8 million against the cap, with a short-term deal accounting for $6.3 million. Matching the offer sheet would leave them with $17.173 million in cap space, according to PuckPedia.
That matters, as Ducks general manager Pat Verbeek will have to factor in his team’s future health with Gauthier owed a raise now, and winger Beckett Sennecke being a restricted free agent after the 2027-28 season.
For the Flyers, the swing for Carlsson makes sense. It’s a massive dollar amount and significant capital, but Carlsson emerged as an elite centre last year, driving play at the rate of a first-line centre, according to Hockey Viz — something they’ve been starved of. While Christian Dvorak, Trevor Zegras, Noah Cates and Sean Couturier are all good players in their own right, they’re not where they should be on the depth chart. Carlsson would solve that, giving them an emerging talent who hasn’t peaked yet as an NHL player.
Why are teams hesitant to sign free agent winger Anthony Mantha?
General managers across the NHL may not be convinced of the breakout season Anthony Mantha had with the Pittsburgh Penguins last season. Despite scoring 33 goals and 64 points, the winger has remained without a home for next season heading into Friday afternoon.
Daily Faceoff LIVE’s Tyler Yaremchuk and Hutton talked about Mantha on Friday’s edition of the show.
Tyler Yaremchuk: There are still some really interesting free agents out there, Hutts. Let’s start with Anthony Mantha. I think that’s probably the most surprising. He’s number one on Matt Larkin’s board, he was a 30-goal scorer last year. I think there’s a part of this where, and I don’t have inside information on this, but did a guy who is coming off a 30-goal season, but the previous number of years has been banged up and inconsistent, is he trying to get paid like a 30-goal guy and every team is being like “Not so fast.”Carter Hutton: I think at his age and his inconsistency that we’ve seen in the past, it’s probably buyer beware. I guess if you’re Anthony Mantha you’re just sitting here waiting to kind of see where the dust settles, too, in a sense. There’s still going to be a lot of cap space for a lot of these teams, and even if he’s going to have to take a one-year deal, he can probably pull in a pretty good number, and then it’s off the books again to help support some players and some teams, and be a guy that can maybe be that second-line scorer. But I think teams are cautious when you talk about Anthony Mantha and his lack of ability to be consistent. But he is a big body, he can play anywhere on the wing, and I think he would add value to a lot of these teams that are in the middle, where maybe you’re not going to be a competing team so you don’t want to overpay him, but we can add him to just be around our players and help facilitate a little bit more offense.
Zach Laing is Oilersnation’s managing editor and The Nation Network’s news director. He can be followed on X at @zjlaing, or reached by email at zach.laing@bettercollective.com.
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