The Montreal Canadiens offer sheet Sebastian Aho

With all the talk and buzz around it, it’s now official. The Montreal Canadiens have sent a five-year offer sheet to Sebastian Aho.

For the first time in years, the NHL has an offer sheet, and it falls through exactly what’s been talked about all day. The Montreal Canadiens announced that they’ve sent an offer sheet to restricted free agent Sebastian Aho who is currently part of the Carolina Hurricanes.

Pierre Lebrun got things started letting the hockey world know the Habs were one of three teams interested in offer sheeting Aho. Then more word came from it where Montreal was then willing to trade for the centre if an offer sheet didn’t work. Now we know for a fact that Marc Bergevin has done what no other general manager has wanted to do, he offer sheeted another team’s star.

The offer sheet is a five-year deal worth $8.454 million per. It’s about a $2.5 million increase from the original deal the Hurricanes offered Aho with one less year. Aho’s camp rejected that initial offer from Carolina and responded back with a five-year $9.5 million deal which has yet to be acted upon.

If Aho chooses to sign it, which is important to bring up, the Montreal Canadiens would only have to give up a first, second, and third in compensation. It’s right under the second threshold as if it did go to $8.5 million, the Habs would have to throw in an extra first-round pick.

This is incredible and crazy news for Montreal and the rest of the league. Aho now has seven days to decide as to whether he wants to sign the offer sheet or not and the Carolina Hurricanes can choose to match the deal. The Hurricanes said that they would match any offer but time will tell as to whether this happens or not.

If Aho signs, the Montreal Canadiens centre depth gets a ridiculous boost in the right direction. Not only are they improved at 5v5 but their power play will be one to fight with.

The salary structure of the deal is what is the most interesting. There are low salaries with a lot of signing bonuses, in particular, Aho would be getting $21 million in the first year of the deal.

Carolina would be foolish not to match this offer sheet. If so, the Montreal Canadiens can offer sheet someone else but it’s crazy to have this occur. Kudos to Marc Bergevin for having the gull to pull this off. Now we wait.