Larkin buys into Red Wings future with 8-year contract

DETROIT --Dylan Larkin fought back tears. The center signed an eight-year, $69.6 million contract with the Detroit Red Wings on Wednesday, only to lose two of his teammates shortly afterward.

The Red Wings traded defenseman Filip Hronek to the Vancouver Canucks on Wednesday and forward Tyler Bertuzzi to the Boston Bruins on Thursday. The Bertuzzi trade was fresh when Larkin spoke to the media.
"It hurts," Larkin said. "He's one of my best friends."
Larkin choked up.
"Sorry," he said. "But it hurts."
The hope in Detroit is that short-term pain will lead to long-term gain.
The Larkin signing is great news for the Red Wings -- so great that coach Derek Lalonde said he jumped two inches into the air and pumped his fist because of its significance.
"I was absolutely ecstatic," Lalonde said.
Larkin, the Red Wings leading scorer with 57 points (22 goals, 35 assists) in 59 games, could have become an unrestricted free agent after the season.
Theoretically, on the open market, the 26-year-old could have landed an average annual value higher than $8.7 million, gone to a team in better position to contend for the Stanley Cup or both.
But the Red Wings were the only team that could give him an eight-year term, and he's committed for two main reasons:
One, he's the local kid who made good. He grew up in the Detroit area, and he rose from USA Hockey's National Team Development Program (in Ann Arbor, Michigan, at the time) to the University of Michigan to Grand Rapids of the American Hockey League to Detroit.
He was named captain of the Red Wings on Jan. 13, 2021, following Henrik Zetterberg, Nicklas Lidstrom and Steve Yzerman.
Larkin said he always dreamed of playing his whole career in Detroit.
"It's always where I wanted to be," Larkin said.
But two, and perhaps most important, Larkin thinks the Red Wings will be in position to win someday.
The Red Wings haven't made the Stanley Cup Playoffs since Larkin's rookie season of 2015-16. Yzerman has been the general manager since April 19, 2019.
Following their 5-4 overtime loss at home to the Seattle Kraken on Thursday, the Red Wings (28-24-9) are five points behind the New York Islanders for the second wild card into the playoffs from the Eastern Conference.
"I trust Steve," Larkin said. "Some of these questions … ultimately he's going to have to answer. I think he's going to have to hopefully pull through for us, and we're going to have to continue to pull through as well and continue to get better from within."
Asked if Yzerman had shared his plans with him, Larkin said: "Absolutely. We've had a lot of conversations. I think throughout this whole process, we've been in communication a lot -- a lot more than I expected in negotiating a contract. There was always understanding of what the plan is, and I believe in it."
The Hronek and Bertuzzi trades make sense in the big picture.
Hronek was the Red Wings' highest-scoring defenseman and has tied his NHL career highs for goals (nine) and points (38). But the 25-year-old could be a restricted free agent after next season. The return was a conditional first-round pick in the 2023 NHL Draft and a second-round pick in 2023.
Bertuzzi scored 30 goals last season. But he has battled injuries this season and has four goals in 29 games, and the 28-year-old could become an unrestricted free agent after the season. The return was a conditional first-round pick in the 2024 NHL Draft and a fourth-round pick in 2025.
Lalonde said each offer was probably the type "you simply can't refuse."
The Red Wings now have eight picks in the first two rounds of the next two drafts -- two firsts and three seconds in 2023, plus two firsts and a second in 2024.
"It could hopefully pay off for us in the long run and build a sustainable winner and [it's] not [about] just one playoff run this year," Larkin said. "It's for the future. We understand that."
The key is what the Red Wings do next, before the NHL Trade Deadline on Friday at 3 p.m. ET and beyond. How do they use their assets and salary cap space in the draft, the trade market and the free-agent market?
They still have a long way to go in the ultra-competitive Atlantic Division, let alone the League. But amid the growing pains, Larkin looks forward to a time when he will take less money to stay again -- to a time when the Red Wings will be in win-now mode.
"Yeah, we lost two important pieces, two guys that I know were loved by the fan base," Larkin said. "But there's hope. There's more guys coming, and I'm excited to be a part of it.
"I hope this isn't my last contract in my career or in Detroit, and I hope at the end of it I'm taking significant, significant pay cuts because we're adding guys at times like this. That's how I see it, and that's what I'm really hopeful for."