Brent Burns signed a one-year contract with the Colorado Avalanche as he gears up for a 22nd career NHL season.
The teamannounced the 40-year-old defenseman's signing on Wednesday evening but didn't reveal an average annual value. Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman reports the contract has a $1-million base salary with the potential to earn another $3 million in games-played bonuses. Burns was a UFA after finishing an eight-year contract with an $8-million cap hit.
This past season with the Carolina Hurricanes, Burns recorded six goals and 23 assists for 29 points in 82 games. He can extend the fourth-longest ironman streak in NHL history, which stands at 925 straight games.
In 1,497 career regular-season NHL games, Burns has 261 goals and 649 assists for 910 points. He's added another 24 goals and 80 points in 135 playoff games, making the Stanley Cup final with the San Jose Sharks in 2015-16.
Burns won the Norris Trophy as the defenseman of the year in 2016-17 after putting up 76 points, and he was the 2014-15 recipient of the NHL Foundation Player Award.
At 6-foot-5 and 228 pounds, Burns has continued to log many minutes of ice time per game, with 20:57 this past season and a career average of 22:22. He ranked second on the Hurricanes in blocked shots, with 98, and he ranks 19th in the NHL in total blocked shots since his first season in 2006-07, with 1,785.
The Avalanche are Burns' fourth NHL team. Before the Hurricanes and 11 seasons with the Sharks, Burns' first seven campaigns came with the Minnesota Wild, which drafted him 20th overall in 2003.
As a right-shot blueliner, Burns could slot behind Cale Makar and Josh Manson the Avalanche's depth chart. On the left side, Colorado has Devon Toews, Samuel Girard and Sam Malinski. They lost Ryan Lindgren in free agency to the Seattle Kraken, and Erik Johnson and Tucker Poolman became UFAs as well.
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