The Philadelphia Flyers will us a compliance buyout on goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov, the team’s general manager Paul Holmgren announced Tuesday.
“I met with Ilya this morning and informed him that we are going to exercise a compliance buy out of his contract,” Holmgren said in a statement.
“This was a very difficult business decision to make for us and we want to thank Ilya for his time here and wish him all the best moving forward.”
Bryzgalov was set to earn an average of $5.66 million per season on a contract that would not expire until 2020.
The quirky Russian netminder struggled this year with a record of 19-17-3, a .900 save percentage and 2.79 goals-against average.
Forward Danny Briere was notified last week that his contract would be bought out by the Flyers.
The team has been looking for a way to clear salary cap space to make room for defenceman Mark Streit, who the team is currently working on signing to a multi-year extension.
The salary cap will drop to $64.3 million on July 5 – down from $70.2 million during the 2012-13 NHL season.
