Matt Cooke placed on waivers by Wild; buyout coming?

The NHL’s buyout period began on Wednesday at 5 p.m. ET and runs until 5 p.m. ET June 30th. One player who won’t be getting bought out? Vincent Lecavalier of the Philadelphia Flyers. One who likely will be is Matt Cooke of the Minnesota Wild.

Via TSN’s Ryan Rishaug and Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman, Cooke has been placed on waivers with the intention of buying out the final year of his contract, which he is owed $3 million.

As War on Ice’s contract tool shows, if Cooke clears waivers, he’ll be paid $1 million in each of the next two seasons. The Wild will then have a $500,000 cap hit next season and a $1 million cap hit in 2016-17 on their books due to the buyout.

Cooke has spent the last two seasons in Minnesota, with the 2014-15 campaign being one to forget. He limited to only 29 regular games due to injury and will turn 37 in September.

According to Mike Russo of the Star Tribune, Wild GM Chuck Fletcher had been shopping Cooke with the draft approaching next week.

UPDATE: The Wild confirmed the news late Thursday afternoon. "In order to give our team more salary cap flexibility for the upcoming season we needed to make this difficult decision,” said Fletcher. “We thank Matt for his time with the Wild and wish him the best going forward.

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Sean Leahy is the associate editor for Puck Daddy on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at puckdaddyblog@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Sean_Leahy

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