{"id":809339,"date":"2026-07-19T02:10:14","date_gmt":"2026-07-19T02:10:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/809339\/"},"modified":"2026-07-19T02:10:14","modified_gmt":"2026-07-19T02:10:14","slug":"free-agent-profile-john-klingberg-pro-hockey-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/809339\/","title":{"rendered":"Free Agent Profile: John Klingberg \u2013 Pro Hockey Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"

If Klingberg and his representation were willing to lower their asking price by $1MM, he would still be under contract with the Dallas Stars. Throughout the 2021-22 campaign, before he would ultimately become an unrestricted free agent, the Stars offered Klingberg an eight-year, $56MM extension. Klingberg\u2019s agent at the time, Peter Wallen, stood firm in his preference for an eight-year, $64MM extension. Having the benefit of hindsight, no extension ever materialized with Dallas, and Klingberg ultimately moved on from Wallen after the negotiations.<\/p>\n

Since then, Klingberg has been playing out his career on one-year contracts. No longer having the security of what could have been a healthy extension with the Stars, Klingberg\u2019s career was almost finished prematurely. Early into his one-year contract with the Toronto Maple Leafs for the 2023-24 season, Klingberg suffered a serious hip injury that cost him most of the season, and put his career into question.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Eventually, through hard work and determination, Klingberg made it back to the NHL the following season, signing with the Edmonton Oilers in mid-January of the 2024-25 campaign. He finished on a strong note with the Oilers, especially in the postseason, but didn\u2019t remain with the team.<\/p>\n

Last season, Klingberg took advantage of the San Jose Sharks\u2019 desperate need for defensemen, signing a one-year, $4MM pact with a full no-trade clause through the first half of the year, and a 14-team no-trade list through the deadline season. Klingberg has still been negatively impacted by injuries since, but not to the same degree as he was with the Maple Leafs. On a resurgent Sharks team, Klingberg finished second on the team in scoring among defensemen.<\/p>\n

There are still reasonable questions as to how Klingberg\u2019s body will hold up through another full season. Realistically, he\u2019ll likely never reach the 70-game threshold again, but he won\u2019t look out of place in a team\u2019s top four when he is healthy. There are concerns for his play on the defensive side of the puck, so any team that signs Klingberg will have to pair him with a defensive-minded partner.<\/p>\n

Stats<\/p>\n

2025-26:\u00a056 GP, 10 G, 17 A, 27 PTS, -13, 24 PIMS, 79 shots, 20:28 ATOI, 55.0 CF%
Career:\u00a0700 GP, 92 G, 351 A, 443 PTS, -53, 287 PIMS, 1,341 shots, 22:25 ATOI, 56.6 CF%<\/p>\n

Potential Suitors<\/p>\n

Unfortunately for Klingberg, there aren\u2019t many teams with a significant need for a right-handed blueliner a few weeks after the opening of free agency. To this point, if any teams had significant needs, those areas have already been addressed.<\/p>\n

As far as the most obvious fit, a return to Orange County makes a lot of sense. The Ducks lost John Carlson<\/a>, Jacob Trouba<\/a>, and Radko Gudas<\/a> in the last few weeks, and are in a position to use some untested options to fill in those gaps. The team signed Nick Jensen<\/a> on the opening day of free agency, but they could still use a bit more depth on the right side of the blue line.<\/p>\n

Carlson\u2019s new team, the Tampa Bay Lightning, also makes sense for Klingberg to some degree. Tampa Bay arguably has the best left side of a defensive corps in the league, but they don\u2019t have a ton of strength behind Carlson on the right side. Given how impacted the defensive corps was by injuries last season, the Lightning could use some additional depth on defense to play it safe.<\/p>\n

Lastly, returning to the Maple Leafs also seems like a reasonable option. Obviously, there\u2019s no guarantee that Toronto will get a full season from veteran Chris Tanev<\/a> after his groin injury last season, and Klingberg looks like the best available option if they want to move those minutes elsewhere.<\/p>\n

Projected Contract<\/p>\n

Heading into the offseason, AFP Analytics projected<\/a> Klingberg to land a two-year, $10.3MM ($5.15MM AAV) on the free agent market. His $4MM salary in 2025-26 was 4.1% of the cap, and a $5.15MM salary in 2026-27 would have been approximately 5%, decreasing to 4.5% in 2027-28. That doesn\u2019t seem too unreasonable given he had a far healthier season than he has had in recent years, but obviously, that contract didn\u2019t materialize.<\/p>\n

Given that he\u2019s still struggling with some injuries, Klingberg is likely due for another one-year deal in the $2.5MM to $3.5MM range, with an added kicker in the form of games played bonuses. At the very least, that should open his options up to competitive teams, as teams like the Ducks and the Lightning could fit that in comfortably.<\/p>\n

Photo courtesy of David Gonzales-Imagn Images.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If Klingberg and his representation were willing to lower their asking price by $1MM, he would still be…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":809340,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[231142,64,63,9850,575,11477,85],"class_list":["post-809339","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-2026-free-agency","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-john-klingberg","tag-nhl","tag-pro-hockey-rumors-originals","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/809339","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=809339"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/809339\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/809340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=809339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=809339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=809339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}