{"id":441415,"date":"2026-01-27T20:19:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-27T20:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/441415\/"},"modified":"2026-01-27T20:19:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-27T20:19:08","slug":"avalanche-sign-sam-malinski-to-four-year-extension-pro-hockey-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/441415\/","title":{"rendered":"Avalanche Sign Sam Malinski To Four-Year Extension \u2013 Pro Hockey Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Avalanche announced they\u2019ve signed defenseman\u00a0Sam Malinski<\/a>\u00a0to a four-year contract extension. It carries an average annual value of $4.75MM for a total commitment of $19MM, Sportsnet\u2019s Elliotte Friedman<\/a> reports. He was set to become an unrestricted free agent this summer.<\/p>\n

Malinski\u2019s deal is paid almost entirely in base salary aside from a $1MM signing bonus in 2029-30, the last year of the deal, per PuckPedia<\/a>. His salary breaks down as $5.5MM in 2026-27, $4.5MM in 2027-28 and 2028-29, and $3.5MM in 2028-29. He has a full no-trade clause from 2026-28 before downgrading to a 10-team no-trade list in 2028-29 and a six-team no-trade list in 2029-30.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>It\u2019s a big deal amid a big breakout for Malinski, who, at age 27, is in just his third professional season. Colorado signed the 5\u201911\u201d righty as an undrafted free agent out of Cornell in 2023. He spent his first year in the organization bouncing between the NHL and AHL before obtaining a more stable role as a bottom-pairing threat last season.<\/p>\n

This year, he\u2019s still operating as the Avs\u2019 third-pair righty behind\u00a0Cale Makar<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Brent Burns<\/a> (Josh Manson<\/a>\u00a0has shifted to his offside on the second pairing), but his results have been those of a top-four piece. With 24 points in 50 games, he\u2019s tied for 38th in the league in scoring among defenders, and his +26 rating is tied for sixth in the NHL. No one in the league has done more with less \u2013 among D-men at or above Malinski\u2019s production, they\u2019ve all averaged at least 19 minutes per game, while Malinski skates just 16:43 per contest.<\/p>\n

Colorado\u2019s multiple layers of starpower are impossible to ignore, but it\u2019s the immense success of players near the bottom of the lineup like Malinski this season that have the Avs cruising toward their fourth Presidents\u2019 Trophy in franchise history. Most frequently paired with\u00a0Samuel Girard<\/a>, they beat out both Makar\u2019s and Burns\u2019 pairings in expected goals against per 60 minutes at 2.24, per MoneyPuck<\/a>. They\u2019ve controlled 56.6% of them overall and have outscored 18-10 at 5-on-5.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s hard to overstate the uniqueness of Malinski\u2019s path to this point. Initially draft-eligible way back in 2016, he spent the following season with his high school team in Minnesota. Only in his DY+2 did he jump to junior hockey, spending most of the next two seasons in the Tier II North American Hockey League with Bismarck before enrolling at Cornell as a 21-year-old freshman. Players with such a delayed development curve are usually long shots to even get an NHL call-up, let alone become a stable contributor on a Stanley Cup favorite.<\/p>\n

Now, he cashes in throughout his prime while the Avs retain a potential succession policy to the 40-year-old Burns, who\u2019s been spectacular after inking a one-year deal last summer. With Makar and Girard set to become UFAs in 2027 and Manson in 2028, Malinski is now the team\u2019s second-longest signed defender behind\u00a0Devon Toews<\/a>, whose deal expires in 2031.<\/p>\n

Image courtesy of Jerome Miron-Imagn Images.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Avalanche announced they\u2019ve signed defenseman\u00a0Sam Malinski\u00a0to a four-year contract extension. It carries an average annual value of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":441416,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,7522,10232,575,229542,85,206],"class_list":{"0":"post-441415","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-colorado-avalanche","11":"tag-newsstand","12":"tag-nhl","13":"tag-sam-malinski","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-transactions"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441415","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=441415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441415\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/441416"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=441415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=441415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=441415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}