The Daily: Veleno Bought Out; Hague Traded; Husso Re-Signs

The Detroit Red Wings were feeling good about the direction of their rebuild in 2018 when GM Ken Holland and his crew drafted Filip Zadina and Joe Veleno in the first round of the NHL draft.

Seven years later, Zadina is playing in Switzerland and Veleno is on waivers to allow the Seattle Kraken to buy out his contract. Jonatan Berggren is the only player from that draft class in the Detroit organization. Michael Rasmussen is the only player still in the NHL from the 2017 draft class.

The Kraken acquired Veleno from the Chicago Blackhawks in a deal to dump Andre Burakovsky’s salary.

Veleno’s buyout is $796,000 for this season and $296,000 for next season. Because Burakovsky’s salary was $5.5 million, the Kraken have a net cap reduction of $4.70 million this season and $5.2 million next season.

Veleno was traded for Burakovsky.#SeaKraken cleared the remaining 2 years of $5.5M Cap Hit for Burakovsky by taking a buyout cap hit of $796K in Year 1 and $296K in Year 2 for Veleno.

Net Cap Savings for SEA from trade/buyout:

Yr 1 $4.70M
Yr 2 $5.20Mhttps://t.co/Ms2390ATp6

— PuckPedia (@PuckPedia) June 29, 2025

The ugliness for Veleno is that the Kraken wouldn’t pay him his $2.276 million salary just to keep him as a role player.  The Red Wings never wanted to give him that salary, but felt forced into it because Veleno had arbitration rights coming off a 12-goal season.  They gave up on him last season and made the Blackhawks take that salary when they acquired Petr Mrazek before the trade deadline.

Now. Mrazek is in Anaheim. The Blackhawks gave Veleno a shot, but obviously didn’t like what they saw because it was reported they were going to buy out his deal if they hadn’t got the Kraken to take his contract.

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Red Wings Extra

Former Detroit goalie Ville Husso was a member of Detroit’s three-goalie system last season until traded to Anaheim. The Ducks re-signed Husso for two years at an average of $2.2 million per season. Petr Mrazek was dealt to Anaheim in the John Gibson deal. If the Ducks keep three goalies, two of them will be ex-Detroiters.

Hockey Now Network

Boston: Bruins enter the free agent-signing period, and possibly the NHL trade market, needing a top six scorer and a right-shot defenseman. Boston Bruins.

Colorado: Avs could jump harder into free agent market than in recent years. Colorado Avalanche. 

Pittsburgh: The Penguins netted a quality collection of prospects over the weekend, but they didn’t do anything to improve this season’s team. Dan Kingerski weighs in on where GM Kyle Dubas needs to go from here. Pittsburgh Penguins. 

Vegas: Golden Knights traded defenseman Nic Hague to the Nashville Predators for Jeremy Lauzon and Colton Sissons. The Red Wings reportedly were interested in Hague.  Vegas Golden Knights.