General managers debate allowing 19-year-olds from CHL playing in AHL

MANALAPAN, Fla. -- The NHL general managers have spent several hours across the past two days of their meetings discussing and debating the merits of allowing 19-year-old players from the Canadian Hockey League playing in the American Hockey League.

The League is actively working with the CHL and the NHL Players' Association to draft language for a change in the NHL-CHL agreement to allow for at least one and potentially more 19-year-olds per NHL team to play for an AHL affiliate.

The change would go into effect next season.

The current NHL-CHL agreement prohibits teenagers from the Ontario Hockey League, Quebec Maritimes Junior Hockey League and the Western Hockey League who have been drafted by an NHL team from playing in the AHL.

"I think for us it's just about having a little more say in the development path of your players," San Jose Sharks GM Mike Grier said. "Everyone is different. Kids are ready at different ages, some physically mature or maybe they've done all they can do at the junior level, and they need another challenge but they're not quite ready for the NHL. For us, it's about having more of a say in that development and what we think would be good for the players."

Representatives from the CHL are expected to sit with the League and general managers Wednesday, the last of three days of meetings being held at Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa. 

NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly is working with the CHL and NHLPA on the change in the agreement between the NHL and the governing body of Canada's top three major junior hockey leagues, making sure it's ready when the new Collective Bargaining Agreement takes effect before next season.

The AHL does not have a specific rule prohibiting teenagers from playing in the league, which is why the change has to be made by the NHL and CHL in conjunction with the NHLPA.

NHL senior executive vice president of hockey operations Colin Campbell said the discussions among the GMs here have extended to how many 19-year-old CHL players per NHL team would be allowed to go to the AHL and does it get limited to only first-round picks or should any player be under consideration.

Campbell said the League has been discussing this change with the CHL for the past six months.

"I don't think anything was written in stone at the time," Campbell said. "They just want the teams to have more options to do more things with their players, not just junior or NHL. If that player had had a couple of 140-point seasons and it was time for him to move on, they wanted more options, more flexibility."

Columbus Blue Jackets GM Don Waddell said he doesn't think the change would lead to a surplus of 19 year olds leaving the CHL for the AHL largely for maturity reasons.

"I looked back at my last 10 years as a GM and I found maybe one guy that I would have brought out," Waddell said. "So, I don't think it's going to be a situation just because the rule changes if it does that there's going to be a surplus of players coming out. There's a lot of 18-year-old players turning 19 that are not ready for it. 

"The American league is a good league and it's a heavy league and all that. You've got to be careful if you're putting a young kid in an American league city. Usually if you bring a young kid to your NHL team, you have him with the family of one of the players. The American league is much different because it's younger guys, but that's pretty young to put a kid on his own without a lot of direction. You have to make sure the player is physically ready but also maturity too."

There are exceptions, of course, and Colorado Avalanche GM Chris MacFarland said he thinks they might have placed forward Calum Ritchie into the AHL when he was a 19-year-old instead of him playing his fourth season with Oshawa of the OHL in 2024-25.

Ritchie was traded to the New York Islanders on March 6, 2025. He had 80 points (28 goals, 52 assists) in 50 games for Oshawa in 2023-24, the season after the Avalanche selected him with the No. 27 pick in the 2023 NHL Draft.

"It would have been nice to at least have that as a potential discussion," MacFarland said. "I get the importance of it for the major junior teams. These are good players for their organizations, but from looking at it as a possible development tool for certain types of players, I think it would be a nice thing to have in the toolbox, whether it's a player that's physically ready or he's a player like a Calum Ritchie, very skilled, just to see what it looks like for his development. You want to do what's best for the player at every stage when you've drafted him and that's the impetus of the discussion."