Adam Fantilli Is Still Unsigned as Blue Jackets Camp Opens and Term Is the Holdup

Adam Fantilli remains unsigned as Columbus Blue Jackets training camp gets underway, leaving the team's top center absent while the rest of the roster begins the season's on-ice work. General manager Don Waddell said this week that he is still confident a resolution comes in the near future and indicated he would send a proposal to Fantilli's representation, but as of the start of camp there is no deal.

Fantilli became a restricted free agent when his entry-level contract expired after the 2025-26 season. He is coming off 59 points, 24 goals and 35 assists in all 82 games, his second straight full season, after a 31-goal, 54-point campaign the year before. He is the most important player in Columbus's forward group and he is not at camp.

What the disagreement is actually about

Reporting from around the league points to term rather than dollars as the primary obstacle. Columbus has reportedly pushed for a contract longer than five years, which would carry Fantilli deeper into his prime and buy the club years it would otherwise pay for on the open market. Fantilli's side has reportedly been resistant to going that long.

The context is the 2023 draft class. The two players selected ahead of Fantilli, Connor Bedard and Leo Carlsson, both signed deals that reset the top of the market for young centers, and both did so on five-year terms according to reports. A player in Fantilli's position has an obvious argument: match the structure his draft classmates got, reach free agency at the same age, and let the market decide the next contract.

His agent is Pat Brisson, who has negotiated a long list of these deals and is not in a hurry. That is worth factoring into any expectation that this ends in the next 48 hours simply because camp has started.

What it costs Columbus

Missing camp is not the same as missing games, and there is no indication that Fantilli will hold out into the regular season. The season opens in the final days of September, which gives both sides a real deadline and gives Waddell's public optimism some credibility.

Still, the Blue Jackets are not a team with the depth to absorb a slow start from their best center. Columbus has already had a complicated September in net, with the club signing a veteran goaltender and its incumbent starter dealing with a physical that did not go well, and the margin for error in a difficult division is small.

A center who misses two weeks of systems work and conditioning is a center who needs the first month of the season to get to full speed. That is a real cost even in the scenario where the contract gets done next week.

Fantasy fallout

Fantilli's draft price should not change much, but his October expectations should. A player arriving late to camp after a contract dispute is a player whose first ten games are likely to underperform his talent, and in leagues with weekly transactions that matters.

The better move for managers is to treat him as a buy-low target rather than a fade. If a league-mate drafted him and gets nervous after a slow two weeks, Fantilli is exactly the type of 24-goal, 59-point center worth acquiring at a discount. His underlying production has been consistent across two full seasons and there is nothing about a contract negotiation that changes what he does on the ice.

The secondary Columbus forwards get a small bump if the absence extends, since somebody has to take the top-line and power play minutes. That opportunity is worth a late-round speculative pick, not a real investment, because it evaporates the day Fantilli signs.

The betting angle

The Blue Jackets' season point total is the market to check. Columbus was already a team the market viewed as borderline for the playoffs, and a contract impasse involving its best center is the kind of story that nudges sentiment without necessarily moving the number.

The right posture is patience. If the deal gets done before the opener, the news has no lasting effect and any movement in the total is an overreaction worth betting against. If Fantilli's absence stretches into the regular season, the total becomes a genuine under candidate, because a team in Columbus's position cannot give away October games.

Game-level markets in the opening week are the other place to look, particularly the Blue Jackets' team totals. A lineup without its top center against a quality opponent is worth a full adjustment that books do not always make in the first week of a season.

The Verdexed model take

Verdexed's projections handle contract holdouts as a games-played question rather than a talent question, which keeps Fantilli's per-game output steady while widening the uncertainty on his season totals. The model's read is that the most likely outcome by a wide margin is a signed contract before the opener, followed by a slow first two weeks.

That produces a specific piece of advice: Fantilli's value in season-long formats is essentially unchanged, and his value in the first two weekly matchups of the season is meaningfully lower than his draft slot implies. Managers should plan to start someone else in week one and to have him in the lineup by November.

What to watch

Waddell's proposal is the next step, and a deal announced in the coming days would make all of this academic. The dates that matter are the start of preseason games and opening night, and the term of the eventual contract will say which side blinked.

For fantasy managers: hold, do not panic, and be the buyer if someone else does.