Florida Panthers
This one is a bit of a wild card. The Panthers don’t have a lot of past success to recruit top players. Not recent success anyways. Unless you’re talking about this past season where they were 2nd in a tough central division going 37-14-5. Maybe this is the start of a good run from Florida?
They have some good players, notably Alexander Barkov and Jonathan Huberdeau at forward and Aaron Ekblad on D with a promising goalie in Spencer Knight. They also have a future hall of fame coach in Joel Quenneville.
It maybe not be Miami but Miami is not a far drive being just about forty minutes away by car, maybe depending on traffic.
It’s got good weather, the team may be on the up and they is no pressure, especially compared to other cities and teams on this list, mostly Montreal and New York.
Does the recent success get Kuznetsov to not put Florida on his 15 team no trade list?
I tend to think no, and this team is probably the least likely on this list. But to leave them off completely is something I couldn’t quite do. When looking for teams that could take Kuznetsov I kept seeing this team as an option. I’m just not sure he would accept a trade here, yet.