SI:AM | The NHL’s Top Free Agent Target Found an Unexpected Home

Plus, someone already posted a low number at St. Andrews.

Good morning, I’m Dan Gartland. The first day NHL free agency was a lot more active than the NBA’s.

In today’s SI:AM:

🏒 Top NHL free agent has a new team

💉 10 unvaxxed Royals

🏎️ Where Are They Now: Michael Schumacher

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He really wanted to get out of Calgary

When the NHL’s free agency period opened yesterday, the consensus best player available was Johnny Gaudreau. After finishing tied for second in the league with 115 points this season, Gaudreau, 28, turned down an extension offer from the Flames and hit the open market.

The South Jersey native was believed to favor a destination close to home. ESPN’s Emily Kaplan reported yesterday morning that the Flyers were “​​Gaudreau’s top choice” but he was also being pursued by the Devils and Islanders. In the end, he wound up signing with the Blue Jackets. I guess Columbus is closer to New Jersey than Calgary.

The deal is for seven years at $9.75 million per year ($68.25 million in total), and Gaudreau reportedly turned down bigger offers to go to Columbus. The Flames’ last offer was for eight years at $10.5 million annually, according to The Athletic’s Pierre LeBrun. The Flyers, who would have needed to clear cap space to sign Gaudreau, never made an offer, general manager Chuck Fletcher told reporters. The Islanders also had something of a cap crunch and “couldn’t create the cap room to get more seriously involved,” LeBrun reported, while the Devils’ offer was for seven years and an annual salary “in the nines.”

Signing Gaudreau gives the Blue Jackets a major offensive boost. They finished sixth in the eight-team Metropolitan Division this season, scoring 262 goals (14th most in the league). Jakob Voracek was their leading scorer with 62 points.

Gaudreau signed the biggest contract of the day, but there were several more big-money deals struck:

• Mikhail Sergachev, Anthony Cirelli and Erik Černák: The Lightning re-signed three key restricted free agents to eight-year contracts. Sergachev’s is the richest, worth $68 million.
• Robert Thomas (eight years, $65 million with the Blues): St. Louis retained its 23-year-old center on the biggest contract in franchise history.
• Jack Campbell (five years, $25 million with the Oilers): Edmonton hopes the former Maple Leafs goaltender will be an improvement over Mike Smith, who faltered in the Western Conference Final against the Avalanche.
• Claude Giroux (three years, $19.5 million with the Senators): At 34, Giroux isn’t the same sort of star he was earlier in his career with the Flyers, but this is a good pickup for an Ottawa team that has been down in the dumps for years.
• Darcy Kuemper (five years, $26.25 million with the Capitals): A five-year deal is a little risky for a 32-year-old, but Washington lands a Stanley Cup-winning goalie.
• Andre Burakovsky (five years, $27.5 million with the Kraken): The scoring winger finds a new home with Seattle after lifting the Cup with the Avs.

Less than 24 hours after the start of free agency, most of the top targets have already signed. Some of the biggest names we’re still waiting on are Nazem Kadri, John Klingberg and Dylan Strome.

The best of Sports Illustrated

For today’s Daily Cover, Brandon Sneed caught up with Mighty Ducks star Shaun Weiss, who struggled with addiction but is now two years sober.

The 10 Royals who can’t make the trip to Toronto because they refuse to get the COVID-19 vaccine are showing how little they care about their team, Stephanie Apstein writes. … Michael Rosenberg toured a $5.4 million apartment that overlooks the 18th hole at St. Andrews’ Old Course. … “Where Are They Now?” is a more complex question with former F1 driver Michael Schumacher, as Jon Wertheim writes. … Jeremy Woo gives his early impressions of the top NBA draft picks playing in the Summer League. … Michael Pina tries to make sense of R.J. Barrett’s situation with the Knicks, who have yet to offer him a contract extension.

Around the sports world

Trade discussions between the Knicks and Jazz about Donovan Mitchell are reportedly heating up. … The Blue Jays fired manager Charlie Montoyo after an underwhelming first half of the season. … The Big 12’s new commissioner isn’t ruling out the possibility of letting Texas and Oklahoma leave the conference early. … The NFL is trying to get flag football added to the program at the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles. … Yankees pitcher Luis Severino will undergo an MRI after leaving last night’s game with a shoulder injury.

The top five...

… things I saw last night/this morning:

5. The Sharks’ goalies playing 3-on-3 in full gear.

4. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. hitting a home run on a pitch way out of the strike zone, just like his dad used to do.

3. Shohei Ohtani throwing a pitch 101 mph.

2. This sliding stop and strong throw by Pirates rookie Oneil Cruz.

1. Cameron Young’s first-round 64 at St. Andrews.

SIQ

On this day in 1934, The New York Times ran an article about Babe Ruth’s 700th home run, which he hit the day before in Detroit. The story contains a paragraph about Ruth’s efforts to reclaim the milestone baseball. How much money did a local kid receive in exchange for giving the ball back to the Yankees?

• $20
• $40
• $50
• $100

Yesterday’s SIQ: Where was the first World Cup held in July 1930?

Answer: Uruguay. The matches were all held in the capital city of Montevideo.

FIFA settled on holding the inaugural tournament in 1930, choosing Uruguay, which won the previous two Olympic tournaments and was celebrating the 100th anniversary of its constitution, as the host. Holding the tournament in South America was a hurdle for European teams. Initially, no European countries agreed to compete but four ended up making the trip after Uruguay agreed to help pay the travel costs. Belgium, France, Romania and Yugoslavia made the journey, all traveling on the same ship (along with three referees and FIFA president Jules Rimet, who packed the trophy in his suitcase) for 15 days across the Atlantic Ocean.

Of the teams that made the transatlantic trek, only Yugoslavia advanced out of the group stage. The host country defeated Argentina in the final.

From the Vault: July 14, 1975

Tony Triolo/Sports Illustrated

You couldn’t have scripted a better Wimbledon men’s singles final in 1975. On one side, you had top-seeded Jimmy Connors, the defending champion. On the other, Arthur Ashe, who had long dreamed of winning the tournament but boasted just a pair of semifinal appearances in ’68 and ’69. It was the first all-American final at Wimbledon since ’47.

Oh, and Ashe was a defendant in two lawsuits filed by Connors.

Just days before the start of Wimbledon, Connors sued Ashe for libel. The dispute can be traced back to the feud between the two men over Connors’s decision to eschew the newly formed ATP in favor of playing World Team Tennis events. Connors also declined to play for the United States in the annual Davis Cup competition. When WTT sued the ATP for $10 million in 1974, Connors joined the suit. In response, Ashe wrote a sternly worded letter, calling Connors “unpatriotic,” among other things. Connors responded by filing the libel suit.

At the end of the fortnight, Ashe and Connors had their day in court. I mean, on the court. Here’s how Joe Jares described the scene for SI:

“As the litigants battled toward each other through the two halves of the draw, speculation dwelled on the legal aspects. Would the umpire wear a robe and powdered wig? Would Ashe be served a summons during the break after the odd game? Would they refuse to shake hands after the final point?

“None of that happened. What did happen was a good old-fashioned tennis upset, one that did not require the ghost of Blackstone to heighten the drama. Connors came to the finals after blasting his way through six matches, including the annihilation of Roscoe Tanner in the semifinals, and his performances had drawn deserved rave reviews. But Ashe played magnificently on the big day, jumping into a comfortable lead, holding off Connors' expected recovery and winning his first Wimbledon title 6-1, 6-1, 5-7, 6-4. The ~£10,000 first prize boosted his 1975 earnings to $200,161—enough even for a legal defense fund.”

Ashe was not only the first Black man to win Wimbledon, he was the first to even appear in the final. The win was the last of his three major championships. And as for the lawsuit, Connors dropped it after losing to Ashe. Another loss in a court of law would have been embarrassing.

Check out more of SI’s archives and historic images at vault.si.com.

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