What could new Carolina Hurricanes GM Eric Tulsky do in the NHL Draft in Las Vegas?

If you’re an NHL fan and enjoy trade speculation, free agency scuttlebutt and contract chatter, this is your week.

If you’re a Carolina Hurricanes fan, you’re in the middle of all of it, with free agents galore and players to be signed and possibly one or two — yes, winger Martin Necas is the name everyone is mentioning the most — to be traded.

A week from today, the Canes might have a new look. They already have a new general manager, Eric Tulsky, who likely has his idea of how he wants the team to look.

Canes coach Rod Brind’Amour also has an idea of how he wants it to look — pretty much the same. He’s also wise enough to know that won’t be the case, noting everyone “understands the other side of it.”

That is, players looking to get paid what they’re worth and willing to change teams to get it as the NHL salary cap rises to $88 million for 2024-25.

Tulsky’s academic background is in physics and chemistry and his hockey background started with a heavy dose of analytics. That’s how he first latched on to the Hurricanes and proved his worth, but he was quick to quip last week that the team “didn’t hire ChatGPT” to be the new general manager.

It’s safe to say this already has been one of the busiest weeks of Tulsky’s hockey life. When his introductory press conference ended at PNC Arena, he was jokingly told being the GM and having to talk to the media in that kind of sterile setting might be one of the toughest, thankless parts of his new job.

His reply: Try dealing with agents every day.

“We’re trying to do everything at once,” he said. “We’re trying figure out what we can do. We will try every angle to get get better.”

That’s been his job this week leading up to leaving for Las Vegas for the NHL board of governors meeting and the NHL draft on Friday and Saturday at the Sphere in Las Vegas. Two days later, on July 1, NHL free agency begins.

The Hurricanes have the No. 27 pick in the first round of the 2024 draft and nine selections overall in the seven rounds, including three in the sixth round.

Tulsky, who heads up the team’s pro scouting, has Darren Yorke to continue to handle the amateur scouting and draft. Tulsky and Yorke have worked closed together for years as assistant general managers under former president and GM Don Waddell, and Yorke has Tulsky’s confidence in putting together the draft list.

“Under Darren’s leadership, the scouting group and the development staff have found and nurtured some outstanding prospects who can keep raising the bar for us,” Tulsky said.

The mock drafts are all over the board on possible Canes picks for Friday night in Vegas and the first round. NHL.com mentioned center Cole Beaudoin of Barrie in the Ontario Hockey League as a possibility. The Hockey News mock draft has another OHL center, Jett Luchanko of Guelph.

The New York Times mock draft has the Canes possibly eyeing another Russian, center Egor Surin of Lokomotiv Yaroslavl. So it goes.

It should also be noted Carolina traded away its first-round pick, No. 27, to Nashville in 2021 for a pair of second-round selections. With one pick, they took defenseman Scott Morrow.

The Canes made Bradly Nadeau their first-rounder a year ago — 30th overall — and the 5-10 forward, who played well on the college level last season at Maine, might have a chance to crack the Canes roster in a year or two.

Alexander Nikishin, a third-round pick by Carolina in 2020, has been in Russia’s KHL and at age 22 is generally considered one of the best defensemen not in the NHL.

Such players as winger Seth Jarvis and goalie Pyotr Kochetkov recently have been drafted by Carolina and developed into proven NHL players who should be an important part of the team’s future success. They followed forwards Andrei Svechnikov and Necas, the team’s first-round pick in 2017.

Necas, 25, has played the wing for the Canes and Brind’Amour. He’d like to play center. He might like to play center for another team and might soon get the opportunity to do it.

“Center is still open to me,” Necas said last season. “I know how to play there. But we have a lot of centermen. You never know what’s going to happen.”

There are several trade scenarios being bandied about in social media banter: Necas to Winnipeg for forward Nikolaj Ehlers; to Nashville in a deal that would include goalie Juuse Saros; or to Montreal for defenseman Mike Matheson.

There also has been talk of the potential of an offer sheet for Necas, a restricted free agent with arbitration rights. Necas would have to sign it to put it in play, agreeing to the contract terms. The team tendering the offer sheet would need to be able to provide the required compensation if Carolina did not match the offer and let Necas leave.

Before the NHL trade deadline last season, and his name in play, Necas said he tried not to pay attention to any social-media guesstimates about his future. He’s likely taking the same approach now.