The Nashville Predators made their second significant re-signing of the off-season on June 16th while the Atlanta Thrashers made their first.

The Preds announced the re-signing of defenseman Ryan Suter to a four-year, $14 million contract whilst the Thrashers re-signed veteran backup goaltender Johan Hedberg to a two year deal.

Financial terms weren’t immediately available on Hedberg’s new contract but he said it was for "about the same" as the $1.15 million he made last season. As for Suter his new contract will count as $3.5 million per season against the Predators cap.

It’s not surprising the Predators retained 23-year-old Suter, whom they drafted seventh overall in the 2003 entry draft.

He’s gone on to become an integral part of the Predators defense corps in his first three NHL seasons, making steady improvement with each passing year and earning more ice time and responsibility as he does.

It was rumored that Suter, who was due to become a restricted free agent on July 1st, might become a target for an offer sheet this summer but Predators GM David Poile made it clear months ago that the young blueliner would be off the market by then.

The only bad sign in all this for Predators fans is this deal will take Suter up to age 27, when he’ll be eligible for unrestricted free agent status, and should he continue his development Suter could by that point be among the league’s top defensemen.

In which case, the Predators, a perennially budget-conscious franchise, might not be able to afford to retain him come 2012, unless the NHL can somehow negotiate another CBA that attempts yet again to corral rising salaries or improves the revenue sharing system to allow struggling clubs like the Predators to retain their best players.

For the immediate future Suter will be staying with the Predators, and Poile will turn his efforts now to re-signing RFA blueliner Shea Weber and UFA goaltender Dan Ellis.

Hedberg’s re-signing could be considered as the Thrashers making a save choice by sticking with the reliable backup to starter Kari Lehtonen.

Over the past two seasons the popular Hedberg has come through when called upon by the Thrashers whenever the injury-plagued Letonen has been sidelined or in need of a rest.

His stats for last season (14-15-3,3.46 GAA and .892 SP) aren’t particularly impressive until one remembers that the Thrashers team defense was among the worst in the league last season and on many nights their goaltenders, who combined faced nearly 2800 shots, were left to fend for themselves.

That Hedberg managed to win almost half of his games last season behind that porous defense is a noteworthy accomplishment.

It also suggests that management aren’t ready yet to elevate Ondrej Pavelec, who went 3-3-0 with a 3.11 GAA and a .905 save percentage in 7 games last season with the Thrashers.

Pavelec did have a strong performance this season with the Thrashers’ AHL affiliate in Chicago, where in his rookie professional season he backstopped the Wolves to the 2008 Calder Cup championship.

The young Czech netminder is only one year removed from Junior A hockey so management may be leery of rushing him too quickly, thus necessitating the need to keep Hedberg in the fold.

With the NHL trade deadline now past the next notable round of player movement won’t occur until June, 2008, and most of it will be free agents signing with new teams.

While the focus as always will be on unrestricted free agents, this summer the threat of offer sheets is now a very real one, thus hockey fans will be nervously watching the contract talks of their favorite restricted free agent players as July 1st approaches.

Many teams haven’t wasted time this season, locking up their best RFA players to lengthy, long-term contracts now rather than risk another club either setting the price or plucking them away.

As a result, the list of the top RFA players has shrunk considerably since the start of the season, but there still remains some quality talent who, if unsigned by July 1st, could be tempting targets for offer sheets. It’ll be interesting to see how many of the following are re-upped by the end of June:

Anaheim: Corey Perry.

Columbus: Pascal LeClaire.

Detroit: Valtteri Filppula

Edmonton: Tom Gilbert and Joni Pitkanen.

Florida: Jay Bouwmeester.

Minnesota: Pierre-Marc Bouchard.

Montreal: Andrei Kostitsyn.

Nashville: Martin Erat, Shea Weber and Ryan Suter.

Ottawa: Andrej Meszaros.

Philadelphia: Jeff Carter.

Pittsburgh: Marc-Andre Fleury.

San Jose: Ryane Clowe

Washington: Mike Green.

Scratch another significant name from this summer’s list of potential unrestricted free agents.

The Nashville Predators have today re-signed winger J.P. Dumont to a four-year, $16 million contract extension, which will translate into a $4 million per season hit against their salary cap.

Dumont is currently the Predators second-leading scorer this season with 45 points, only one behind linemate and team leader Jason Arnott, but he’s been on fire since December 29th, averaging a point per game.  He’s currently on pace for a career-best 71 points.

Since signing with the Predators in the summer of 2006 as an unrestricted free agent Dumont has proven to be a valuable addition to the club, one that GM David Poile in re-signing him today obviously didn’t wish to risk losing to free agency.

It also says something about Dumont in that he chose to pass over a significantly higher contract he surely would’ve received on this summer’s open market to remain with a Predators team that could be considered in the midst of a mini-rebuilding process.

He’s obviously happy in Nashville, meshing well with the team and playing the best hockey of his career (he had a 66-point performance in 82 games last season.

After dumping several prominent players during the 2007 off-season in cost-cutting moves Poile is now clearly focused on retaining his best players. There was concern as to whether or not the new Predators ownership would provide Poile with the necessary money to do so, but the Dumont signing is an obvious signal that the Predators won’t be dumping salaries again this year.

This also sends a positive signal to the Predators fan-base that, regardless of how the team fares in the standings this season, management’s focus this year is on retaining their best players.

With Dumont now re-signed, Poile’s focus will turn toward forward Martin Erat, defensemen Ryan Suter and Shea Weber and goaltender Dan Ellis, and the expectation should now be that all will be re-signed before this summer.