All 5 RFAs qualified, Kaberle deal in the works

On Monday afternoon, the Hurricanes tendered qualifying offers to all five of their restricted free agents. (N & O story, via the penalty killer).

Eric Staal, Erik Cole, Justin Williams, Mike Commodore, and Chad LaRose were all given qualifying sheets with a standard 10% increase. These are not, of course, contract offers. These are merely the formal avenue the club must take to assert their intention to retain the player. Any non-qualified player would become an unrestricted free agent, and could go to the highest bidder. This way, Carolina will be given the right to match or better any offer, and would be awarded compensation if they are outbid.

For example, Eric Staal's qualifying sheet is for slightly less than $1.037M. In all likelihood, he will be signed to a deal that will pay him $3.5M/year or more. Erik Cole and Justin Williams should each expect to be signed for around $2M, and Mike Commodore should see something like $1M.

Chad LaRose, whose qualifying offer is for $495k, probably won't see anything more than that. To be honest, I really like the guy, but I'm a tiny bit surprised that he was qualified.

According to the article, Jim Rutherford said the same thing about these five that he said about coach Peter Laviolette. "We will match any offer". This is a no-brainer for Staalsy and Colesy. I'm glad to hear him make that kind of commitment to the "new" guys Viva, Commy and Sharpie.

The same article suggests that defenseman Frantisek Kaberle, who scored the Cup clinching goal, will be signed today. Apparently, they're dotting all the eyes and crossing all the tees. This is good news, as I had a feeling he would be shipped off to some place like Buffalo. Especially in light of the well publicized fact that Darth Regier isn't going to make a reasonable offer to Jay McKee.

The free agent market opens on July 1.