FHN Florida Panthers Mailbag: Duclair, Maurice, the Cap & More

It has been a while since we opened up the old FHN Florida Panthers Mailbag and you all had a lot of questions on the ready.

First off, hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving.

Appreciate all the feedback as always.

As far as the Mailbag goes, there were a lot of questions regarding what the Panthers plan to do when Anthony Duclair comes back from his offseason Achilles tendon surgery.

First off, as I explain in the Mailbag, he is not expected back anytime soon. While he continues working every day, he has not skated yet so when that finally happens, we will have a better handle on the timeline for his anticipated return.

There were also a number of questions regarding the direction of the team under new coach Paul Maurice, some wondered whether letting Andrew Brunette go was a good idea.

Other questions involve looking ahead at the Panthers’ cap situation next year and much more.

OK, on to the Mailbag!

My question is what are our options when Duclair comes off LTIR? I know a lot of people seem to think we would trade Hornqvist but don’t know that there are a lot of takers for that out there with his salary without us also giving up some prospects and we’ve done so many trades the last few years that our draft capital and prospect pipeline is getting thin. — Bryan Geary

There are a couple of questions regarding Anthony Duclair and they are all very valid — and have been since the start of the season.

With the Panthers’ cap problems, we knew Florida would put Duclair on LTIR to start the season and basically kick this can down the road a bit.

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