The Pittsburgh Penguins made a trade with the Minnesota Wild on Thursday, swapping minor league players. In this exchange, the Penguins acquired forward Maxim Cajkovic, a 23-year-old player who has primarily played in the ECHL with the Iowa Heartlanders during the 2023-24 season. Cajkovic, a native of Bratislava, Slovakia, has accumulated 18 points (12 goals, six assists) in 20 ECHL games and three points (one goal, two assists) in five American Hockey League contests with the Iowa Wild.
Cajkovic, a right-handed player drafted by the Tampa Bay Lightning in the third round of the 2019 NHL Draft, is currently in the final year of his three-year entry-level contract, which has a salary cap hit of $850,833. Despite being drafted, he has not yet played at the NHL level. The Wild had acquired Cajkovic in a trade with the Lightning in July.
In return, the Penguins sent defenseman Will Butcher to the Wild. Butcher, a 29-year-old player signed as a free agent by the Penguins in July, had suffered an undisclosed injury during the offseason. As a result, he missed all of training camp, the preseason, and the beginning of the regular season, initially designated to the “injured, non-roster” list. After recovering, Butcher cleared waivers on Nov. 29 and was assigned to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton.
In 14 AHL games, Butcher, a left-handed shot from Sun Prairie, Wisconsin, accumulated seven points (three goals, four assists). However, due to the AHL’s rules on the number of eligible “veteran” players in a team’s lineup, he had been a healthy scratch in recent weeks. Butcher is currently signed to a one-year, two-way contract with a salary cap hit of $775,000.
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