Adam Fantilli and Cutter Gauthier Are Still Unsigned With NHL Camps Days Away

NHL training camps open across the league over the next several days, and two of the most important young forwards in the sport are still without contracts. Columbus center Adam Fantilli and Anaheim winger Cutter Gauthier remain unsigned restricted free agents, and both are in the same structural position: no arbitration rights, no realistic offer-sheet threat, and no leverage beyond the willingness to sit out.

Blue Jackets general manager Don Waddell has publicly expressed confidence that Fantilli will be signed before camp, describing the situation as a normal difference of opinion rather than a standoff. More recent reporting suggests Fantilli will be in Columbus for camp and that the sides are negotiating primarily over price on what is expected to be a five-year structure. Anaheim's situation with Gauthier has been quieter and, by most accounts, further from resolution.

Why both sides are stuck

The market moved underneath these negotiations. Recent extensions for the tier of young forwards immediately above Fantilli and Gauthier, including the deals for Leo Carlsson and Macklin Celebrini, reset what a high-end young center or winger costs, and every agent representing a player in that neighborhood now has a comparable that did not exist a year ago.

The term question is doing most of the work in Columbus. Reporting indicates the Blue Jackets have pushed for a longer deal, beyond five years, while the Fantilli side has been reluctant to go that long. That is the classic young-player negotiation: the team wants to buy unrestricted free agent years at today's price, and the player wants to reach the open market while he is still in his prime. Reported salary figures have ranged widely and should be treated as speculation rather than as terms.

Neither player has the tool that usually breaks these deadlocks. Gauthier does not have the three years of NHL service required for offer-sheet eligibility, which removes any outside pressure on Anaheim entirely, and at this point in the calendar an offer sheet is not a live threat for Fantilli either. What remains is a war of attrition against a season that starts September 29.

Fantasy fallout

Fantasy hockey drafts are happening right now, and both players are being drafted as if the contracts are a formality. That is probably correct and is definitely not risk-free.

Fantilli is the more comfortable pick of the two. He is coming off a season with 24 goals and a career-high 59 points in 82 games, his general manager has publicly committed to getting it done, and the reporting points to him being in camp. The realistic downside is that he misses part of camp and starts the season a step behind, which costs a fantasy manager a slow October rather than a lost season.

Gauthier carries more genuine risk. The reporting has been less encouraging, the gap appears larger, and Anaheim has no clock forcing it to move. A winger who misses camp entirely and signs in mid-October is a player whose first month of production will not resemble his projection.

The practical adjustment is small but real: draft both roughly where their talent says, and make sure your bench can absorb a slow start from either. Do not reach a round early for either one on the assumption that the contract is done, because it is not.

The Verdexed model take

Verdexed's model treats missed training camp as a measurable production drag for forwards in the first ten to fifteen games of a season, larger for younger players who benefit most from systems work and line chemistry, and larger still in a year when the preseason has been shortened. This year the league capped the preseason at four games, which compresses the runway for everyone and disproportionately penalizes anyone who arrives late.

That produces a modest but specific downgrade to both players' October projections, and no change at all to their full-season projections in the scenario where they sign within the next two weeks. The model does not forecast a holdout that costs regular-season games for either player, because the historical base rate for restricted free agents without arbitration rights missing actual games is low. Players in this position almost always sign.

The scenario the model does take seriously is a signing that lands after camp has already broken. That is common, it is the outcome the reporting currently points toward for at least one of these two, and it is the one fantasy managers are systematically failing to price.

The betting angle

Columbus and Anaheim season win totals both carry an assumption that these players are in the lineup on opening night. That assumption is more solid for the Blue Jackets than for the Ducks, and Anaheim's number is the one that would move if Gauthier's situation extended into October.

There is no urgency to bet either total today. Both markets will still be available once these contracts resolve, and taking a position now means accepting an avoidable unknown for no better price.

What to watch

The first day of camp is the deadline that matters, not any date the teams have stated. A player who reports is a player who is signing. A player who is absent when the buses arrive is a player whose situation has become a real dispute, and the market will reprice quickly at that point.

Watch Columbus first. Waddell has been the most publicly confident executive in this pair of negotiations, and if Fantilli is not in camp, the entire reported framing of that talk needs to be reconsidered.