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2025-26 NHL Miscellaneous Thread

A. Makar will be getting an $11.4 million pay raise, so ... yeah

B. Colorado mostly has that roster locked up for the next two seasons, which is good because it's going to be 2030 before they have any Cap flexibility.

C. Not sure what else they were supposed to do, but the Avs had better be darned sure about this defense core. Because they're stuck with them.
 
NoMich said:
Please tell me that the old man is returning to their defense.
Click to expand...
Burnsie? Yeah. They signed him to another one year deal ... $850K with $2.15 mil in bonuses.

Problem being, with Brett Kulak and Josh Manson playing with Burns in that Top 6, half of Colorado's D can't really skate. And with Toews getting up there at 32, it's an OLD group that will be prone to injuries and wearing down. In other words, they've set themselves up for exactly what happened to them in last season's playoffs and locked in so much salary that they're really stuck with that group. Burns will drop off next year but that's when Makar's monster money kicks in. It's an old D and they're kind of stuck with it until 2028 or so, barring some fancy footwork by Sakic.
 
Makar is a fantastic talent and probably the best at his position today, and I agree with JB, not sure what else they were supposed to do with his next contract, but boy oh boy, moving forward it is going to be tough sledding with an ageing roster that for the most part is one of the older groups overall in the league...maybe one more year next season as a contender and then the drop off probably hits hard after that.
 
All teams are going to have to pay these elite superstars what will look like crazy dollars with the skyrocketing salary cap. Its going to get nuttier and nuttier over the next 5 years. If you don't pay your stars these huge bucks, someone else will be more than willing to.

For the Canes this gets back to some of the points we've talked about many times:

1) We don't really have a truly elite superstar. We have a bunch of really really good players. The one superstar (maybe not elite though) we traded for didn't want to be here. Probably dodged a bullet there.

2) By locking up all of our younger talent long term, we avoid having to face any of these guys breaking out and being able to demand huge salaries while in their prime (ie Blake, Stankoven, Jarvis, Svech).

If we had Cale Makar, we would have signed him to that contract too. At SOME point you would think that we will end up with some generational type player that comes up through our system. Not helping that of course is actually being a team that makes the playoffs every season. I'm perfectly fine staying in this lane at least 3-4 more seasons.

Who will end up being that first 8 digit AAV player for the Canes? The only players on the current roster with any real shot is Svech or Jarvis or Aho. Aho and Jarvis are not UFA until after the 31-32 season. Svech's current contract ends after the 28-29 season. At that point, if he is a 30 goal guy consistently, he will be in the $10 million+ market for sure.

Nikishin could have probably gotten there first with some patience. But I still think the Canes first $10 million+ AAV player is someone not currently in the organization. The Canes are going to have a massive amount of cap room to work with if they choose to deploy all of it.
 
The current roster payroll situation is a dream come true for a GM. But it's Cinderella's coach and isn't going to last. The big question is Dundon going to allow them to spend an extra $20m a season very soon. Or will they play money ball until they can't? It's becoming more and more obvious that these young players care more about the Brinks Truck than the cup.
 
I mean ... this is just a transitional phase because the normal Cap increases were disrupted by the Covid CBA pause. So it was always going to be this awkward carousel where some teams are moving at a different pace than others. Carolina's management is getting all sorts of praise for their Cap management right now, but honestly that was mostly lucky timing. If that Cap shift hit two years ago then Jarvis, Stankoven, Miller and Blake would be on wildly different contract structures than where they are. Of course it won't last, because it's can't. And Dundon has done exactly nothing to indicate that he won't spend what it takes to be competitive. It's just that right now, he can't spend under the Cap and compete.

And for me, there's no reason to blame the players for getting their money if they can. Of course, that's been my position on the subject forever. Makar is arguable the best D in the league. What's out of whack about him getting an AAV that's a pretty good chunk below the max salary allowed? Nothing.
 
Luke Evangelista to the Devils for a first and a second round pick yesterday. The kid had 44 assists a year ago and pretty young and cheap at $3m for another year. Seems like that kinda trade is setting the Devils up for another move…maybe Dawson Mercer is on his way out.
 
I would think that NJ still needs Mercer to play center. Still, adding Evangelista does add to their glut of middle six forwards. I like him though. He's tricky and smart, and they need that. I think he's a good compliment to Rodrigues in their secondary group, which otherwise features a lot of A to B kind of guys.
 
Evangelista is a good acquisition for the Devils. He really had a terrific year in NAS and I see that happening with him in NJ this season. That was a good hockey trade.
 
What happened to the days of at least showing 2-3 years of proven play under your belt before hitting the payday??? Nikishin and the agent must see this news and might as well start packing the bags for a new destination as this contract might be the next ask…
 
I get the rising cap and the resetting of contracts in the NHL and that’s all well and good right now but that kid in Vancouver is only 20 and suddenly gets more than a guy like Lane Hutson that certainly has shown much more and proven himself in all situations. Some of these contract numbers just seem incredibly inflated and a tidal wave of these seem to be coming which is going to throw some teams for a loop.
 
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