Report: Canucks to sign Gagner, Del Zotto, Burmistrov, and Nilsson

It’s not even 9am but it seems the Canucks will be very busy this morning.

Bob McKenzie from TSN has reported that the Canucks will likely be signing forwards Sam Gagner and Alex Burmistrov, defenceman Michael Del Zotto and goaltender Anders Nilsson.

All three are not surprising as there have been rumours of them all committing to the Canucks for a few days now.

Shortly after this, Elliotte Friedman from Sportsnet tweeted out their expected dollars and terms:

The Nilsson signing makes sense and was something that I talked about yesterday here.

Del Zotto appears to be a player that they would use in limited minutes at 5v5 play but use as a powerplay quarterback. In a vacuum, him being a target makes sense.

Gagner had a great season in Columbus as a fourth line centre who was used heavily on the powerplay.  He was effective in that role and helped make the Blue Jackets PP one of the best in the league. We will have to see how the Canucks use him, but there would likely be a bigger even strength role for Gagner.

For Burmistrov, he would be a skilled depth player who is looking for another chance to prove himself. The term will be short and the cap hit is very palatable.

These additions seem like good bets at this moment, and the terms/dollar values are not killer. The three skaters are good puck movers who can play with pace, which is something the Canucks have mentioned as being a target.

The only concern is pushing players like Brock Boeser, Jake Virtanen and Nikolay Goldobin to the AHL to start the year. This isn’t a bad thing, as they could benefit from an expanded role down there. Injuries happen and they will all likely get a chance at some point.