Thorner

I dunno about “likely”. I’d certainly settle for “reasonably possible” when the player in question is a Smythe winner, perennial Selke type player through his prime I may even say he likely outscores him but besides that being only one factor, scoring has gone up so much over recent few seasons it’s tough to compare year over year fairly. I think I read that McDavid, a little over half way through the year has already surpassed what Benn won the Art Ross with a while back lol. Of course that’s CM but scoring is up overall

He’s definitely drawing a relative comparison: that we should be equally patient with these players because they, too, in time could live up to or even exceed their individual projections.

Ya I mean Dahlin is as good as Fox. He’s signing off multiple bridges and Fox was off his ELC, *and* Dahlin is signing later. If he comes in at about the same 9.5 I can’t see how we deem that anything but a bargain.

You are astute. I’ll probably always dislike the “deal”, but that’s part and parcel with the way my brain works - for better or worse there are distinctions I/anyone may draw that can lead to two things being compatible that would ordinarily appear to be mutually exclusive: I’ve said in this very conversation, while seemingly taking opposition to the “deal”, that Adams would “get away” with what I personally deemed to be unnecessary risk due to his potential “GM genius“. I think the evaluation was right. I just, forgive me the lack of seemly modesty, think I was absolutely correct a year ago when I said that we could have waited and paid Samuelsson about the same. If you concede that, I’ll concede that, even though we can’t prove it, locking him up early *much more* likely actively aided rather than hindered culture. I said at the very first it made sense - even if I question the extent it made a difference. In truth I think if anything, though we can’t prove it’s literal effects, individually, it serves as compelling symptom: the overall body of work re: Adams contract dealings has been excellent (we’ll see on Dahlin). Even if I think the decision to pay Samuelsson WHEN we did was flawed, the methods that led to the overall contract output have proven very effective. In that, I take this overall process all day long and twice on Star Wars day regardless of a singular disagreement I have that amounts to what I find to be at least, if not an engaging waste of time for those reading, undoubtedly at least the latter. - - - If you think Samuelssson WOULD have gotten more than the 4+ he got, should we have waited until this summer (or next), based on the production and appearances (and sometimes notably: lack thereof) we’ve seen this season, and my concession agreement doesn’t work for you, I’ll take you up on the other thing, considering it’s not even the Samuelson thread: Word.

My point laid bare. We do not know that he is leading to wins - certainly not the extent of the potential winning. You can choose any metric you want - my point, that we “didn’t know” yet at the time how he’d pan out relative to your chosen evaluation metric and lost nothing by waiting, doesn’t change. It’s not Peca. We are a mid pack team, currently. Average. We paid him early for the wins we think he’ll add in the future - the price at which he’d still have been available, this summer. Again, I actually think his evaluation bears out - it was just locked in stone way earlier than it needed to be inclusive of unnecessary risk. I HATE dealing from both hands. I am able to personally deal Adams so much credit for his Tage evaluation because of how swimmingly it’s going - I’m not gonna sit here and say, “well, Samuelsson’s didn’t statistically pan out to that level, yet, but I’ll lump his deal in with the others because I don’t need to evaluate it by the same, consistent principles.” Just not for me. If Cozens regresses to a 40 point guy, Savoie takes his place, and we’re a great team with DC on line 3, I’m not calling the deal good because the macro worked out. Because the culture looks good. I prefer to try to apply consistent principles to each individual, unique situation on a case by case basis

Defensive D operate by their own rules re: avenues of earning, yes: but the fact they have their own, lower-salary niche where they are evaluated by a different set of rules in the first place is my point. The guys who score points go to the “guys who get paid” tier The ones that don’t go to the “well, we have to measure their pay based on *something*“ tier. My mention of points has always been to illustrate the tier he’s in, he was never a threat to break bank. The fact is we went ahead and paid him what the top, 5 point purely defensive d make before he established (and has yet to) as a top, 5 point defensive D. He is overpaid relative to his peers, the guys who score points aren’t even in this conversation.

If Dahlin is sitting at about 10, I could see him going down to 9.75 purely because it negligibly changes what he makes in all reality yet the message it sends out to the fanbase ala “Wow! Insane underpay, vibes!” I don’t think can be denied by anyone reading the overall discussion. I’m actively shifting my stance because of this. People will ignore the substance and react extremely based on 250 thousand dollars for sure. Adams probably pushes strong for the oft @thewookie1mentioned ”9.99” million - it’s no different than 10, substantively, but it’s clearly being suggested for a reason and that reason is optics

But your explanation of the psyche of the players is beyond question, right?We can ONLY suppose “making Samuelsson rich” made other players buy in more, right? It can’t be that, others may look at his deal and say “oh, that guy is making way too much. I should too.” Im not saying that’s the case, not at all - but I’m not the guy slotting the unknown variables where I want them to because a negative can’t be proven. We do not know that Samuelsson being paid early helped culture. Why? You are just assuming. Its all well and good but it’s a purely “feel” based discussion. By the same token I could say “culture is most improved by players being shown they need to earn it.” Why not? We can say a team’s culture is appropriate, for them, regardless of how it presents itself if the results are good, right? There’s no one way. We are just looking at the results and then retroactively filling in the answers we want. It’s fine it’s just not interesting

Yes, I know. I understand the argument ”Perhaps we can question the specifics of the Samuelsson deal, but a world where Kevyn Adams doesn’t reward his players early isn’t a world with the real Kevyn Adams at all.” That without him operating by those principles with Samuelsson we wouldn’t have got that same operation that led to Thompson being at a bargain. I get it and it makes sense - it’s just very boring. It’s a boring argument. Rather than an interesting discussion of how Adams’ particular set of skills results in oodles of positives with the trade off being a wonky evaluation here or there, it’s “no move is beyond question because of the sum total”. low brow message board fodder he paid a 5 point stay at home defender 4.5 per over a million years before he showed squat. If Samuelsson signed on the *open market* today he wouldn’t get that. It’s a wonky evaluation to pay that early regardless of the fact it looks like he probably will be right one day in a few years. Saying “well I can only assume it aided the culture”, supposing that, what, if Samuelsson was just playing here still but not YET signed we’d somehow be worse, other players would have lost out on something necessary is a massive “can’t prove a negative” stretch its “I have a rock that keeps away tigers, do you see any tigers around me right now?” Level stretch At least the “what do 5 point stay at home defenders get on the open market” discussion has a basis in provable data. The other discussion is just wading through the weeds.

Team friendly 9.5? I can see it but don’t think it likely Team friendly 7-7.5 like Tage? More confident than usual my brain is hardwired to some sort of matrix I’ve now somehow subconsciously developed the ability to control

I think the guy (me) is saying something just by pointing out that McDavid’s contract by way of value is even *close* to comparable to the value being had within two contracts the whole hockey world is saying represent a massive steal. The fact that the per point cost is in the same ballpark to the best player in the world is my point - McDavid provides not just exceptional play but insane contract value, too

I mean we may get to the point where any evaluation can be swept under the rug with “well, the team is good, any chance if we alter this variable everything changes ala butterfly effect? So I’m happy with it.” ... it’s just a far less interesting breeding ground for discussion. Ya, maybe paying Samuelsson before he earned it, when he still hasn’t done anything to prove he’d get any more upon signing now, help caused such a phenomenal environment it led to Cozens playing well and signing, sure. That’s not snark it’s just me saying “ok”. There’s no answer that can really be given or allow the discussion to move forward. We can’t know how the motivation of another random player was affected. I can see that we paid Samuelsson the money players who statistically perform better then him, still, make, but I can’t pretend to guess at or know the internal thinking of all the human beings in range If Dahlin DOESN’T sign for a bargain are we blaming the Samuelsson and Tage deals for leading to that thinking? It’s just a messy and murky avenue

I don’t even include the Samuelsson deal because, like with the Tage deal, I’m comfortable with my analysis at the time: Kudos to KA being “right” on Samuelsson but shrewd evaluation or not, it still seems to have been needlessly risky at the time: as I said then, it’s points that pay and if we just look objectively at the season he’s had, even had we waited and signed him now, looking at his production, the numbers these guys take into negotiations, what these types of players make LT, we’d probably get him for a negligibly different deal this coming summer Id guess I’d say distinction is the Tage deal *reveals* Adams potential genius, whereas he “gets away” with what I’d still deem an odd decision at the time on Samuelsson *because of* his potential GM genius. He was right on MS I just don’t think he needed to be, that soon it bodes well - the better his evaluation skills are the quicker he’ll have information on players and assets before others attain said knowledge. You can get away with a lot if you are a great judge of talent and how it fits into *what you are building*

Both the Tage and Dylan deals to me appeared to be fair under the context/scenario where both continued to play at the rate they did at time of signing. Ie if either levelled out at ~70 points per, the deals looked good. For this reason to me these deals are “no brainers” from KA’s point of view, if the players were willing to sigh them. If you trust your evaluation skills at all, *of course* you’d be happy to pay the guys you like what they’ve already proven to be worth (should it sustain, but again, you HAVE to take some risk or have no chance, anyways) - so the deals at their *baseline* already are reasonable, they don’t need to improve to live up to them, Adams already highlighted the players most deserving of being bet on, when you have to bet on someone, and locked them up to deals where the real real wiggle room can be found in outperforming them, there’s a much more apparent avenue there than the other way.

I cannot oversell how crazy McDavid just is in general. The Tage deal is an astronomical steal, and when we add in another good value contract to the equation, that insane combined *value* is still being equaled by the BIGGEST contract in the league for the game’s *far and away* best player. Oilers should be way better. McDavid should also be making way more. Any other sport, man

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.

Makes sense, thanks. I guess re/ Ventura my thought was that I thought paying off ELC was a common thought good practice now, that bridging your good players was seen as a mistake, on the whole. If he’s on the forefront there where others are NOT, all the better for us

When I say negligible I mean you clearly have a range laid out where either end of that 2 million falls within “reasonable” for his worth ie the 2 mil one way or the other doesn’t change your interpretation on whether it’s a fair deal or not I agree with the first bit - that’s why I see Dahlin’s deal being at least 10 - same principles but the deal being signed ~ 2 years later. I’ve always used them as a comparison, Thompson doesn’t present a great one under the context

Boooooooooone

They should absolutely go 8 I’d be disappointed with 7

Half a season, yes, in a full season that wasn’t even point a game. When prior to that, there were questions about whether he’d even be an NHLer, long term. The body of work prior to deal is not a close comparison. This is why their deals won’t be in the same ballpark, right? But we may not even agree on that - you are indicating forgoing 2 million per, 21% of potential pay, as a non-negligible difference between what he “could/should” get and the level you say he might settle at deemed “fair.” This is a rather easy discussion as our differences in the interpretation of the numbers is clear. If we think Dahlin’s play is worthy of 11.something is an accurate reading of his value, and I do, as I think he’s the best dman in the nhl, I cannot think 2 million less to be “fair”. I’d call it a significant underpay. Cozens’ deal seems about right under the prism of the “paying early” deal. If Dahlin, a significantly better player, signing under the terms of it NOT being a pay early deal, only gets 2 million more than Cozens, how is that not an underpay? I don’t really see how you can say plus/minus 2 mil is negligible when it comes to “fair” when it would be the entire difference between Cozens and Dahlin at 7 and 9.

When you’re right, you’re right

The last Jedi, sure. But I thought nhl deals could only be 8 years?

That’s a good point, learning from the failings of year 1. Reminds me of something Yoda says in the best Star Wars movie, the last Jedi. What do you have Dahlin coming in at?

COVID could be the biggest factor, certainly.