Throughout June, theScore will be projecting contracts for the star-studded restricted free-agent class. In this edition, we project Patrik Laine and Kyle Connor's new deals.

The players

Laine and Connor became dynamic offensive weapons for the Winnipeg Jets while playing out their entry-level contracts. Between them, they've given the Jets five 30-goal seasons. Connor was selected 17th overall in the 2015 draft, while Laine was chosen second overall the following year.

Laine:

Laine has quickly evolved into one of the game's premier goal-scorers, but he's proven to be rather inconsistent. During the 2018-19 season, he scored 18 of his 30 goals during a 12-game stretch in November. He then found twine just four times at even strength over his final 58 contests and looked disengaged in more than a handful of those outings.

He silenced some of his critics with a stellar postseason performance, though the Jets were bounced by the St. Louis Blues in the first round.

Connor:

Connor has become an effective complement to Mark Scheifele and Blake Wheeler on the Jets' top line. He's smart, quick, blessed with soft hands, and has a nose for the net. His ceiling may not be as high as Laine's, but his floor and shift-to-shift consistency are significantly greater.

The team

As punishment for years of successful drafting, Jets general manager Kevin Cheveldayoff finds himself in a significant cap crunch this offseason. In addition to Laine and Connor, the Jets have a long list of pending free agents, and only $25.37 million in projected cap space, according to CapFriendly.

Trouba is a safe bet to be traded, but the Jets would probably like to re-sign at least a handful of the players listed above.

Obviously, Laine and Connor are top priorities, but the cap situation could affect how their contracts are constructed. Eight-year contracts, which require higher cap hits, seem to be out of the question.

The comparables

Here's a select list of wingers to sign extensions out of restricted free agency over the last few years:

CH% = Cap hit percentage, based on cap ceiling when the contract was signed

* - Nylander's cap hit in 2018-19 was prorated to $10.2 million because of time missed in negotiations

Nylander's deal will likely be viewed as the best comparison for Connor in negotiations. The Swede had 122 points in the two seasons before his new contract, while Connor had 123.

A comparison for Laine is tougher to find. He's never reached the 77 points Draisaitl accumulated in his contract year and doesn't offer the versatility of playing center like the Edmonton Oilers forward does. Tarasenko's deal, although outdated, is interesting. His contract year (37 goals, 73 points) is similar to Laine's 2017-18 season (44 goals, 70 points).

However, Laine's third-year slump creates an interesting debate. Should he be paid as the player he was in 2017-18 or 2018-19? That could be a point of contention during negotiations.

The projections

For Connor, a six-year deal seems to be the most likely scenario. It provides long-term stability but wouldn't break the bank for the Jets. At this term, a cap hit would likely fall somewhere between $6.5 million and $7.5 million.

Laine's contract is more difficult to predict. He and his agent may prefer a bridge deal so they can return to the negotiating table in two or three years. The cap hit could range from $5 million to $7 million. If Laine's camp wants to get a long-term pact done in the six-to-eight-year range, then his AAV could potentially fall between $7 million and $9 million.

Connor verdict: 6 years, $43 million ($7.167M AAV, 8.63 CH%)
Laine verdict: 7 years, $54.6 million ($7.8M AAV, 9.4 CH%)

Others in this series:

• Zach Werenski
• Charlie McAvoy
• Sebastian Aho
• Timo Meier
• Mikko Rantanen
• Brock Boeser
• Brayden Point (June 12)
• Matthew Tkachuk (June 13)
• Mitch Marner (June 14)

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Vancouver Canucks general manager Jim Benning might trade forward Loui Eriksson after the 33-year-old said he and Canucks coach Travis Green "don't really get on 100 percent."

"I am going to talk to Loui this week and get his thoughts on everything and why he made the comment he did, but (a trade) could be something that's real," Benning said, according to Kevin Woodley of NHL.com.

Eriksson, who has three years left on a six-year, $36-million contract, made the comments to Swedish website HockeySverige.se while playing for Sweden at the 2019 IIHF World Championship.

A trade for Edmonton Oilers forward Milan Lucic could be a good fit for both teams, TSN's Darren Dreger speculated on "Insider Trading."

"There could be a fit and if you look at it from Edmonton's perspective, the interest might come from their newly hired coach Dave Tippett, who had Loui Eriksson in Dallas for three years, so there is a familiarity there," Dreger said. "The Vancouver Canucks do see ​value in Milan Lucic, in that they have a younger team, they have some smallish players... Milan Lucic could add a little bit of bite."

Both Eriksson and Lucic come with a $6-million cap hit.

Eriksson notched 11 goals and 29 points in 81 games this season.

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Philadelphia Flyers general manager Chuck Fletcher has made teams aware that he is willing to trade his club's first-round draft pick.

"It's early. I've mentioned to teams that we're in play but there hasn't been a big push for the pick yet," Fletcher said at a press conference Monday. "If we keep it and stay at 11, we're going to get a good player ... It's certainly a good chip that if moved, it could help."

Fletcher, who replaced Ron Hextall as the Flyers GM on Dec. 3, has said he will be "very aggressive" this offseason in an attempt to improve the team.

However, management is still confident Philadelphia will get a quality player if it keeps its first-rounder.

"At number 11, somebody will fall to us. After the top two ... I think from three to 15 there will be a lot of the same names but teams will have them ordered differently and I think that bodes well for us," assistant GM Brent Flahr said Monday.

"The way we look at it, we will take the best player at 11. I think as we go in the draft, we have some young defensemen that are in the NHL right now, and a couple coming, but we probably like to add defensemen depth to our organization going forward, whether it's at 11 or the second or third round, we will see."

The Flyers have nine picks in total in June's draft.

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Billionaire businessman Alex Meruelo is in advanced talks to purchase a majority share of the Arizona Coyotes, sources told The Athletic's Craig Morgan.

The NHL Board of Governors is expected to vote on the matter at an upcoming meeting in Las Vegas on June 19. The sale would give Meruelo a substantial majority stake in the Coyotes, with current owner Andrew Barroway retaining a small minority share, Morgan adds.

Meruelo has construction, real estate, and other holdings across the U.S. He put in a bid to buy the NBA's Atlanta Hawks in 2011.

Barroway became the Coyotes' owner in 2015, buying control of the club for $305 million.

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The Boston Bruins were well-aware of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch accidentally anointing the Blues as Stanley Cup champions, and defenseman Brandon Carlo says his club used it as motivation.

"We saw it," he told WBZ after Boston forced Game 7 with a 5-1 win in Game 6 of the Cup Final. “(It) put a fire in us for sure. We don't like that kind of stuff. We don't want that to happen in Boston by any means. We're focused on the next shift and going from there, not focused on winning or losing. Just focused on the next shift and working our asses off."

On Sunday, mere hours before Game 6 and with St. Louis holding a 3-2 series lead, the Post-Dispatch prematurely published ads in its subscriber-only online edition congratulating the Blues on a Stanley Cup championship.

Fellow Boston blue-liner Torey Krug said Monday that the error was hard to miss "because it was everywhere," according to The Athletic's Fluto Shinzawa, who reported that printouts of the ads were made available for the players to read.

The newspaper apologized shortly after the mistake began circulating.

Boston has seen this before. The City of Vancouver reportedly planned a Stanley Cup victory parade before the Bruins defeated the Canucks in Game 7 back in 2011.

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The NHL's new champion will be crowned following a win-or-go-home affair Wednesday, and other than fans of the St. Louis Blues, nobody's complaining that this series is going the distance.

The Boston Bruins will have the luxury of home-ice advantage for the decisive contest, but that doesn't necessarily mean history is on their side.

Here's a look at some numerical nuggets pertaining to Stanley Cup Final Game 7s throughout history, to the 2019 playoffs, and how they relate to the two clubs involved this time around.

8 years later, can Boston do it again?

2011 - The last Game 7 in a Cup Final, in which the Bruins defeated the Vancouver Canucks 4-0.

5 - Current Bruins players who were part of that championship team (Brad Marchand, Patrice Bergeron, Zdeno Chara, David Krejci, and Tuukka Rask, although Rask didn't play a minute in the playoffs that year).

Home teams have an edge, but not recently

12-4 - The record of home teams in Stanley Cup Final Game 7s.

2 - Road wins in the last two Cup Final Game 7s. The Bruins won in Vancouver in the 2011 final; the Pittsburgh Penguins defeated the Detroit Red Wings at Joe Louis Arena in 2009.

A 1st time for everything

95 - Years the Bruins have existed.

0 - Stanley Cup Final Game 7s that the team has previously hosted.

Bruins have more Game 7 experience

15-12 - The Bruins' all-time record in playoff Game 7s, the most winner-take-all contests of any franchise and the most wins in those games in NHL history.

14-8 - Boston's record at home in those games.

9-8 - The Blues' all-time record in playoff Game 7s.

4-6 - St. Louis' record on the road in those games.

Chara on verge of history

13 - All-time Game 7s played in by Chara, who will set an NHL record when he plays in his 14th on Wednesday. The 42-year-old Bruins captain is currently tied with Patrick Roy and Scott Stevens for the most all time.

Going the distance ... again

2 - Years the Bruins have played multiple Game 7s in a single playoff run (they went the distance with Toronto in Round 1 this year). They also did so in 2011, becoming the first team in history to win three Game 7s in a single playoff run. The Los Angeles Kings later matched the mark in 2014.

All-time Game 7 trends

177 - All-time Game 7s in playoff history.

74 - Percent of those games won by the team that scored first (131-46). Those clubs have gone 11-5 in Stanley Cup Final Game 7s, and 3-2 in Game 7s during the 2019 playoffs.

58.7 - Percent of all-time Game 7s won by the home team. Home teams have gone 4-1 in 2019.

24.9 - Percent of all-time Game 7s that required overtime. Home teams have gone 23-21 in those games, and 2-1 in 2019.

Putting all the 2019 Game 7s in context

6 - Game 7s in these playoffs, including Wednesday's contest.

6 - Previous years in which at least six Game 7s were contested in the same postseason (seven in 1994, 2011, and 2014, and six in 1992, 2003, and 2009).

(Most figures provided by the NHL)

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Throughout June, theScore will be projecting contracts for the star-studded restricted free-agent class. In this edition, we project Brock Boeser's new deal.

The player

The Vancouver Canucks have collected the young core pieces they hope to build a successful team around, and now it's time to start paying them. The process begins with a new contract for sharpshooting winger Brock Boeser, the first of the club's building blocks to require a new deal.

Drafted 23rd overall by Vancouver in 2015, Boeser has already established himself as one of the league's premier shooters. Since his first full season, he sits 18th among all NHL skaters with 1.1 goals per 60 at five-on-five, ahead of some major names like Jamie Benn, Brad Marchand, Sean Monahan, and Mark Stone.

Boeser doesn't drive play for his linemates particularly well, but he's an elite finisher who's bound to earn a handsome payday even as a winger. The 22-year-old's resume already includes a runner-up finish in Calder Trophy voting and All-Star Game MVP honors, so he has lots to work with on his side of negotiations.

The team

As mentioned above, Boeser is a key component of the Canucks' promising young core alongside Elias Pettersson and Quinn Hughes. His upcoming contract will be crucial for Vancouver's long-term salary cap picture as all three players track to make big money down the road. General manager Jim Benning can get a head start this offseason by working out a reasonable deal for Boeser.

The Canucks are projected to have over $30 million in cap space for the 2019-20 season, according to CapFriendly. Though Boeser headlines Vancouver's list of players due for new contracts, he's not alone. Tyler Motte, Josh Leivo, Nikolay Goldobin, and Markus Granlund are all RFA forwards as well, while Ben Hutton and Derrick Pouliot are up for new deals on the blue line. Of those six players, only Goldobin enters the offseason without arbitration rights. Vancouver also has decisions to make on veteran UFA defensemen Alex Edler and Luke Schenn. Schenn joined the club in January and it seems the Canucks want to bring him back.

Boeser won't be the only player looking to get paid this summer, but he'll undoubtedly be priority No. 1.

The comparables

Here's a list of notable wingers to recently sign long-term contracts coming out of their ELCs:

CH% = Cap hit as a percentage of the cap ceiling when the contract was signed

* - In contract year
** - Nylander's cap hit in 2018-19 was prorated to $10.2 million based on time missed due to negotiations

Boeser missed time with injury this season but still put up 0.81 points per game over 69 contests, putting him on par with the comparables above. Working in Boeser's favor, though, is the increasing salary cap, projected at $83 million for next year. That increase could slide him ahead of all the players listed above in terms of AAV. He also outscored everybody on this list over the duration of their respective ELCs with 0.42 tallies per game, and there's no better stat than goals to build a case for a sizeable payday.

His new contract could also largely depend on which of his RFA contemporaries puts pen to paper first. Boeser is just one of numerous superstar wingers scheduled to secure a huge payday this summer along with Mitch Marner, Mikko Rantanen, Patrik Laine, Kyle Connor, and Matthew Tkachuk - all of whom will play a role in setting the market.

The projection

Boeser isn't as multidimensional as some of his RFA peers, but excelling at scoring goals at the sport's highest level is an outstanding way to earn a hefty paycheck. Given his prowess when it comes to lighting the lamp, a cap hit in the range of $7 million to $8 million would be reasonable for both sides.

From the Canucks' standpoint, there's little incentive to bridge Boeser. He's proven himself as a producer, and delaying a long-term commitment could backfire big time once it's time to pay Pettersson and Hughes two years from now.

Verdict: 7 years, $51.45 million ($7.35 million AAV)

Advanced Stats Courtesy: Natural Stat Trick

Others in this series:

• Zach Werenski
• Charlie McAvoy
• Sebastian Aho
• Timo Meier
• Mikko Rantanen
• Patrik Laine & Kyle Connor (June 11)
• Brayden Point (June 12)
• Matthew Tkachuk (June 13)
• Mitch Marner (June 14)

Copyright © 2019 Score Media Ventures Inc. All rights reserved. Certain content reproduced under license.