Last week, in his overview of the upcoming 2018 National Hockey League free agency crop, The Athletic’s Craig Custance shed some light on the ongoing negotiations between the Calgary Flames and pending unrestricted free agent Mikael Backlund.
In short? Don’t expect a deal in the immediate future because of some disagreements on what market comparables are for the Swedish centre.
From Custance (warning: it’s paywalled):
9. Mikael Backlund, Flames (center) – Unless something changed over the weekend, there haven’t been any significant discussions on this front since training camp, and, at that point, the two sides were fairly far apart annually on a contract extension.