The Panthers helped turn Greer into a perfect playoff winger—now another team may pay for the finished product.
A.J. Greer spent most of his NHL career bouncing around the edges of rosters, fighting for ice time, signing cheap deals, and trying to prove he belonged. Now he’s suddenly one of the more awkward offseason decisions facing the Florida Panthers.
That’s what happens when a player explodes for a career year at exactly the wrong time for his team’s salary structure.
Greer put up 17 goals and 32 points in 78 games during the 2025-26 season, smashing every previous offensive benchmark of his career. But the raw numbers only tell part of the story. Florida leaned on him heavily during stretches where injuries ripped through the lineup, and instead of fading under bigger minutes, he actually thrived.
He averaged over 12 minutes a night, posted strong possession metrics across the board, and brought the kind of nasty physical edge coaches obsess over in playoff hockey. The Panthers were better with him on the ice. Period.
And now comes the part Florida probably didn’t want to deal with.
Greer is heading into unrestricted free agency on July 1 after finishing a two-year deal worth just $850,000 annually. That bargain is gone. Completely gone.
Nobody scoring 17 goals while throwing around 113 penalty minutes and driving play at a 57.1 percent goals-for rate signs for league minimum anymore. Especially not at age 29 when teams convince themselves they’re buying the best years of a player’s career.
That’s where the tension starts.
On one hand, Greer absolutely earned third-line money. Somewhere out there, a team is looking at his season and seeing a rugged middle-six winger who can chip in offense, forecheck like a maniac, and survive playoff hockey without getting pushed around. In today’s NHL, that player gets paid somewhere between $1.5 million and $2.5 million per season without much hesitation.
But Florida’s roster complicates everything.
When the Panthers are healthy, the forward group is crowded. Aleksander Barkov, Matthew Tkachuk, Sam Reinhart, Carter Verhaeghe, Sam Bennett, Eetu Luostarinen, Evan Rodrigues, Mackie Samoskevich — there are only so many spots available in the top nine.
That means Greer’s breakout may have come from opportunity more than permanent role elevation.
The Panthers know exactly what he is for them when the lineup is intact: probably a fourth-line winger who can move up temporarily when injuries hit. Useful? Absolutely. Important? Definitely. Worth paying third-line money for while already carrying major contracts everywhere else? That’s where Bill Zito has to make a cold business decision.
And honestly, Greer should probably test the market.
This is a player who has spent years signing contracts under $850K. He’s never had a real payday. Now he finally has a season on tape that agents can sell aggressively to teams needing depth scoring and toughness.
Players don’t always get multiple chances at that kind of leverage.
Florida would likely love to keep him around on a cheap two-year deal somewhere near $1 million annually, but there’s a decent chance another franchise simply values him more. All it takes is one GM believing Greer can permanently hold down a third-line role, and the Panthers probably get priced out fast.
That’s the uncomfortable reality for contenders with loaded rosters. Sometimes a player develops at exactly the moment you can no longer afford him.
Greer finally became the player teams always hoped he could be. The timing just may not work for Florida anymore.
