Julien BriseBois is known for the laser focus and discipline in his decision-making as general manager of the Tampa Bay Lightning, and it’s a large part of what helps the Lightning remain a perennial contender.
Even BriseBois has his limits, though, and he had to break one of his own fundamental unwritten rules this past week at the NHL trade deadline.
BriseBois typically likes to avoid placing all of his eggs in one basket by acquiring players with term remaining on their deals. But on Friday, he handed the Los Angeles Kings a second-round pick for a player on an expiring contract. Why?
“There’s only one Corey Perry,” he told reporters.
And because there’s only one Perry, there always seems to be a top NHL team with a need for the 40-year-old winger. Perry has gone from the Dallas Stars to the Montreal Canadiens to the Lightning to the Chicago Blackhawks to the Edmonton Oilers and now back to the Lightning while appearing in five of the past six Stanley Cup Finals.
He’s got a real shot to extend that streak after landing back with a Lightning team that’s led the way in the Atlantic Division for most of the season.
On the surface, Perry is an unlikely candidate to be in that kind of demand. He’s the second-oldest skater in the entire league, trailing only 41-year-old Brent Burns of the Colorado Avalanche, and he’s also one of the slowest. Among the areas where the NHL’s Edge data lists him below the 50th percentile are maximum skating speed, skating distance and speed bursts above 18, 20 and 22 miles per hour.
Still, amid those considerable headwinds, Perry finds a way to get the job done. He’s a difference-maker.
“I don’t think it’s a coincidence that he’s been to five Finals in six years,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said. “That doesn’t just happen. He’s a catalyst for a lot of runs he’s been on. I think you see an opportunity to bring him back, (you do it). He transcends time.”
What does that look like behind the scenes?
According to a front-office member from one of Perry’s recent stops, he’s “instant culture.” A player who holds teammates accountable and improves a team’s circumstances both in the dressing room and on the bench. An uber competitor who is “the most mentally tough human in the league.”
Plus, Perry remains incredibly effective around the opponent’s net, consistently working his way to the hardest areas of the ice with an ability to finish on chances once he gets there. He scored in back-to-back games following Friday’s trade back to Tampa Bay, bringing his season total to 13 goals in 52 games.
“That’s a guy you want on your team,” Lightning forward Brandon Hagel said. “That’s a guy that’s going to push everyone to that next level. And that’s a guy you want to win for. Really, really happy that was the guy that we went with.”
Local grandfather Corey Perry still has it. pic.twitter.com/Rjvs8YP7cg
— dom 📈 (@domluszczyszyn) March 6, 2026
Perry found himself with a decision to make when the Lightning expressed interest in him last week. BriseBois pivoted in his direction after considering other targets who would have come with much higher acquisition costs and more perceived risk. The familiarity from his 2021-2023 stint with the Lightning was a plus on both sides of the ledger.
“He has this ability to bring guys into the fight,” BriseBois said. “He knows when and how to raise the temperature on the ice. He knows when to calm things down, when that’s what’s needed, and that’s priceless if you want to go on a long playoff run.”
Perry waived his no-trade clause to facilitate the deal after giving some consideration to remaining in Los Angeles and perhaps even signing an extension with the Kings. His wife Blakeny and 8-year-old son Griffin stayed back in California while he quickly packed up to join the Lightning for a weekend back-to-back against the host Toronto Maple Leafs and Buffalo Sabres.
“We were kind of going back and forth on whether to stay, whether to leave,” Perry said. “We had a bunch of discussions, my wife and I, and then obviously with my little guy — he’s got his school, he’s got baseball, hockey, lacrosse. He’s got all kinds of stuff going on. It’s tough leaving them, but at the end of the day, you have a chance to win a Stanley Cup. That’s what the end goal is.”
You can’t blame him for allowing that to become an all-encompassing pursuit by this point.
Perry won a Stanley Cup with the Anaheim Ducks in 2007, his second NHL season, before improbably ending up on the losing end of the championship series in 2020, 2021, 2022, 2024 and 2025.
The first two of those defeats came against Tampa Bay in COVID-19-era Cups — while playing for the Stars and Canadiens, respectively — before he joined the Lightning in free agency just in time for them to fall short of a threepeat by losing to Colorado. In the past two years, Perry’s Oilers fell to the Florida Panthers in consecutive Finals.
“When you lose five of the last six, there’s some hunger still in there,” he said.
Perry now sits fourth all-time in NHL history with 237 career playoff games on his resume — behind only Chris Chelios (266), Nicklas Lidström (263) and Patrick Roy (247). He’s fond of saying that he plans on playing hockey professionally until they cut his skates off.
Beyond his strong leadership qualities and ability to produce offense from the bottom six, what’s allowed Perry to remain such an attractive commodity into his 21st season is a love for the game that’s never waned or wavered.
For example, the Lightning gave Perry the option to sit out Saturday’s visit to Scotiabank Arena after travel delays kept him from arriving at the team hotel in Toronto until 6 a.m., only to have him insist on dressing and then score in the first period of a 5-2 win over the Leafs.
“He’s just built the right way,” Cooper said.
For yet another team with Stanley Cup aspirations, he’s viewed as an X-factor capable of helping a really good roster blossom into a great one this spring.
“(With) Corey, I think at the end of the day, it’s passion — passion for the game,” BriseBois said. “I don’t know that any player is as passionate as Corey Perry about hockey. He loves the game. He loves to compete. He loves to muck it up. He loves the challenge of doing the hard things and the rewards that come with that.
“So I would say it’s not so much a skill set as a mindset. That’s what separates him from the other players. That’s why he’s still playing at a really high level at this age.”