NHL free agency officially begins on Wednesday at noon ET, but it's already been an absolutely wild offseason in hockey.
With the salary cap rising by only $1 million from last season, teams have been forced into difficult decisions, such as:
The Minnesota Wild traded winger Kevin Fiala to the Los Angeles Kings, while the Tampa Bay Lightning traded veteran defenseman Ryan McDonagh to the Nashville Predators.
We've seen teams reach contract impasses with star players ahead of unrestricted free agency, like the Pittsburgh Penguins with Evgeni Malkin and the St. Louis Blues with David Perron.
Several teams didn't send qualifying offers to restricted free agents, making players like Washington Capitals goalie Ilya Samsonov and Chicago Blackhawks forwards Dylan Strome and Dominik Kubalik able to sign with any team.
The goalie carousel spun wildly, as Matt Murray (Toronto Maple Leafs), Ville Husso (Detroit Red Wings), Vitek Vanecek (New Jersey Devils) and Alexandar Georgiev (Colorado Avalanche) all found new homes. Meanwhile, Marc-Andre Fleury (Wild) opted to stay put.
Still, some potential free agents removed themselves from the market by re-signing with their teams: Filip Forsberg (Predators), Kris Letang (Penguins) and Valeri Nichushkin (Avalanche) among them.
The offseason chaos is just getting started. Here's a guide to all 32 NHL teams, their free agents and what they should be doing as free agency officially begins.
