Ever notice that the start of the NHL playoffs coincides with the end of tax season?
Maybe it's no coincidence.
The result of free agency becoming the binding law of the land in hockey is that every year, there is a handful of wannabe big-ticket players on the verge of unrestricted status come July.
This means the postseason tournament that runs until the brink of summertime is their last time to audition for general managers looking to make a big financial splash.
Sometimes, they're unheralded players looking for a first life-changing score. Sometimes, they're established players angling for a lucrative change of scenery.
And sometimes, they're something in between.
The B/R hockey staff looked at the 2023 crop whose current teams are in the playoffs and came up with a list of eight for whom the number of zeroes on the next contract might hinge on how they perform over the next two months.
Tyler Bertuzzi, LW, Boston Bruins
Tyler Bertuzzi was by no means struggling.
The former second-round pick of the Detroit Red Wings signed a two-year deal worth $9.5 million in 2021 after playing three seasons and making better than $8 million.
But he was on a prolonged road to nowhere in the Motor City and, at 28, was already starting to age out of their long-term plans. So the trade that sent him to Boston on March 2 was a win-win for both sides, but maybe more so for the 6'1", 186-pound winger.
Getting a spot with the best team in hockey all but guarantees a long playoff run for the postseason newbie. But considering the Bruins already have eight players under contract for 2023-24 making the same or more than Bertuzzi does, it may be difficult for GM Don Sweeney to work yet another $5 million-plus deal into the team's salary structure.
Bertuzzi had two assists in his playoff debut on Monday night, and a long, productive stint from April to June, plus the leadership street cred it brings, could spike his asking price for other teams interested come July 1.
Michael Bunting, LW, Toronto Maple Leafs
We may have to put an asterisk alongside this one.
Twenty-seven-year-old winger Michael Bunting was a bargain signing for the Maple Leafs in 2021, inking a two-year worth just $1.9 million but rewarding the Toronto faithful with consecutive career-best 23-goal seasons.
Those are pretty prodigious numbers from a guy signed as a bottom-six forward and would have been good enough on their own to give him a nice bump this summer, not to mention what playoff production at anywhere near the same rate would have done.
Notice the past tense on that last sentence, though.
The Maple Leafs were not only routed in their postseason opener on Tuesday night, but Bunting was handed a three-game suspension for "an illegal check to the head and interference" against Lightning defenseman Erik Cernak.
The doomsday scenario in hockey-mad Toronto (and for Bunting's accountant) is that the team gets swept, and he's done for the season. Assuming anything less than a four-game exit, though, presumably means Bunting will have a chance to better the inglorious playoff stat line (one shot, 15 penalty minutes) he compiled in Game 1.
Stay tuned.