The NHL’s 10 worst contracts (2022 edition)

[Zamboni]

Hmmmm 🤔

Edited July 28, 2022 by Zamboni

[irregularly irregular]

Parayko? Am I missing something? Yeah that's a boatload of $$$, but I'd take him for the Sabres in a nano-second.

[GASabresIUFAN]

I'm not sure how they arrived at that number.  He put up 63 points last year including 30+ goals.  At a minimum that $100k per point, that's 6.3 mill per season.  So with 5 years left on his deal he is currently overpaid by at most 3 mill per season or 15 million total.

[French Collection]

Habs fans are saying Suzuki’s new deal had not even kicked in last year so he was making a lot less.

[Flashsabre]

But I’ve been told Yzerman is a GOD. How could one of his free agent signings be on the list already?😜

[ddaryl]

In 6 more years that Skinner contract will be a bargain

 

[Carmel Corn]

Hopefully Skinner can be durable, have good line mates and coaching to keep his production numbers up.   

[Drag0nDan]

9 hours ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

I'm not sure how they arrived at that number.  He put up 63 points last year including 30+ goals.  At a minimum that $100k per point, that's 6.3 mill per season.  So with 5 years left on his deal he is currently overpaid by at most 3 mill per season or 15 million total.

I have an athletic subscription and read the article and im still not sure i understand it 🙂. From what i can tell they put him at a 47 point pace to split the difference between last year at 2.1 wins and the year before at basically 0.  They then forecasted some age related deterioration.  

https://theathletic.com/3435602/2022/07/26/nhl-worst-contracts-2022/ -- Paywall obvi

Edited July 28, 2022 by Drag0nDan

[GASabresIUFAN]

40 minutes ago, Drag0nDan said:

I have an athletic subscription and read the article and im still not sure i understand it 🙂. From what i can tell they put him at a 47 point pace to split the difference between last year at 2.1 wins and the year before at basically 0.  They then forecasted some age related deterioration.  

https://theathletic.com/3435602/2022/07/26/nhl-worst-contracts-2022/ -- Paywall obvi

I read the article as well.  While I agree generally that Skinner, who just turned 30, is unlikely to keep scoring 30 goals and 60 points for the remaining length of this contract, I can see Skinner, who has been incredibly durable during his career, still be very effective well into his early 30s.  I do go look at Pominville as a reference point.  After 29 he had seasons of 59 (adjust for the lockout), 60, 54, 36, 47, 34 and 31.  He retired following his 36 year old season.  I suspect Skinner, if used properly, will exceed those numbers.    If he stay healthy, we can assume we'll get 3-4 more good to decent seasons from Skinner before the decline seriously kicks in. So while I agree Skinner is overpaid, he's not going to be overpaid by 35 million over the next 5 years as the article suggests.  I think the number is more in the 18-20 mil range.

That's said, now you know why I hate really long contracts.  

Off topic a little, how much is Calgary going to have to overpay to re-sign Huberdeau (age 29) and Weeger (age 28)? 

Edited July 28, 2022 by GASabresIUFAN

[Drag0nDan]

4 minutes ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

I read the article as well  While I agree generally that Skinner is unlikely to keep scoring 30goals and 60 points for the remaining length of this contract, I can see Skinner, who has been incredibly durable during his career, still be very effective into his early 30s.  I do go look at Pominville as a reference point.  After 30 he had seasons of 60, 54, 36, 47, 34 and 31 points, and retired following his 36 year old season.  I suspect Skinner, if used properly, will exceed those numbers.  So while I agree Skinner is overpaid, he's not going to be overpaid by 35 million over the next 5 years.

That's said, now you know why I hate really long contracts.  

He's a solid skater, good shooter, decent on the walls, draws penalties, and doesn't rely on straight speed.  He just seems to know how to get to areas to score goals be it rebounds, one timers, whatever.  He's also not PP dependent at all which boosts his value a bit.  

I don't mind a long contract if I'm buying out RFA years.  Usually you get a discount there.  But it was a poor decision to give skinner that term, with that salary - while never scoring more than 63 points in his career.  2M more AAV, and 4 more years than Pacioretty (admittedly coming off a poor year there, but), but pacioretty has some additional value at the defensive side of the ice and kills penalties.  Kucherov got 9.5M AAV for 8 years - but he had arb eligibility left.  

[In The Buff]

Well at least we don't have 2 players on that list. For awhile i would've added Okposo & i still think that contract was bad, but at this point its not an issue given where the team is at & what Kyle adds to this team. Hopefully Skinner just keeps his production up, living up to the deal until we can get out from it. But i wouldn't say its the absolute worst deal we've ever made. Plenty of other options for that one... maybe that could be a thread? But tbh I'd rather look forward & at all our potential than revisiting the trash of the past lol.

Pretty excited to watch this team continue to improve. We just need the rest of the world to hang in there & not blow itself up these next few years, so our prospects have enough time to season & we can make the playoffs again. Just hang in there world a little big longer! Go Sabres! 😛

[mjd1001]

Coming off of last year, I'd say the Skinner contract should not be that high on the list. It STILL IS a bad contract, but with the year he had last year and how much cap room the sabres have the next year or two, it doesn't justify 3rd.  Get back to me in December of this year though....

 

[grinreaper]

Hmmn, seems like a certain #9 with bad hair should be on that list.

[PerreaultForever]

I'm not sure I'd agree with that list entirely. It's hard to measure the value of big minute D men against forwards and their production. Seth Jones for example might be overpaid, but he's probably more important to Chicago than Jonathan Toews at this point. Erik Karlsson certainly hasn't given the Sharks his money's worth but I'd disagree on Zach Werenski. 

I know Shea Weber's on LTIR but doesn't that count as a bad contract still? Carey Price value questionable at this point too. 

Unless he turns it around this year, that curly haired dude, what's his name............Jack something or other, plays for Vegas, his 10 million is a pretty bad contract too. 

Jakub Voracek would be another bad one imo and so would Oliver Ekman Larson. There are others. 

Skinner imo will continue to be an undisciplined streaky scorer who may go through prolonged slumps where he is a liability to the team and may also have hot streaks where he scores more goals than his mistakes cost. Hopefully the scoring outweighs the dry spells. It's still a dreadfully bad contract though, but maybe at this point not the worst in the league any more. 

[Doohicksie]

3 hours ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

how much is Calgary going to have to overpay to re-sign Huberdeau (age 29)

Didn't Huberdeau already say he wasn't going to sign with Calgary when his deal is up?

[Doohicksie]

Apparently that was more rumor

than fact

 

[dudacek]

Just to be clear, the list takes a players’ performance under a specific analytics model, projected based on recent trends over the lifetime of the contract.

It’s not about how many points a player got last year versus how much he got paid. It’s about the term and the trend.

It’s about how poorly a player is trending under Dom Luscycyn’s model versus how much he is going to get paid.

[LTS]

Bobrovsky - 4 seasons left at $10M and currently a reason the Panthers are over the cap

Price - 4 seasons left at $10.5M and not even playing (perhaps they discounted for injury, potential LTIR?)

I'd also consider Tavares, his contract goes until he is 35, Skinner's until he is 36 (Skinner is a year younger).

Tavares put up 79 points (4th) and was -8 (33rd worst) last season on a team that scored 308 goals (2nd best) and gave up 252 goals (14th worst)

Skinner put up 63 points (2nd) and was -14 (9th worst) on a team that scored 229 goals (22nd best)and gave up 287 (8th worst)

Tavares makes $11M. If I am putting Skinner on that list, Tavares has to get consideration.

8 minutes ago, dudacek said:

Just to be clear, the list takes a players’ performance under a specific analytics model, projected based on recent trends over the lifetime of the contract.

It’s not about how many points a player got last year versus how much he got paid. It’s about the term and the trend.

It’s about how poorly a player is trending under Dom Luscycyn’s model versus how much he is going to get paid.

Well, that changes things a bit.  But still, Tavares hasn't been a ray of sunshine in Toronto.

[JujuFish]

This should surprise no one.  It also shouldn't surprise anyone when he disappears from next year's list after continuing his resurgence in the upcoming season.

[GASabresIUFAN]

19 minutes ago, LTS said:

Skinner's until he is 36 (Skinner is a year younger).

Jeff will be 34 at the start of the final year of his deal. He'll turn 35 in May of 2027.

I do agree with you that Tavares should also be considered for the list.  I think his model seems to punish players on no-playoff teams.  It also doesn't take into account how helpful Skinner's deal is in keeping this young team cap compliant.

[Buffalonill]

6 hours ago, ddaryl said:

In 6 more years that Skinner contract will be a bargain

 

Whats wrong with skinner? He isn’t hurting buffalo 

1 hour ago, Doohickie said:

Apparently that was more rumor

than fact

 

Wrong place ? 

[Sabres Fan in NS]

What is any of this based on?

Just made up junk?

[PromoTheRobot]

8 hours ago, ddaryl said:

In 6 more years that Skinner contract will be a bargain

 

Would have been already if he wasn't misused like he was.

[Doohicksie]

2 hours ago, Buffalonill said:

Wrong place ? 

Responding to @GASabresIUFAN's post.  (see the post above the one you quoted)

Edited July 28, 2022 by Doohickie

[Curt]

17 hours ago, Doohickie said:

Apparently that was more rumor

than fact

 

If you were at your introductory press conference with the Calgary media, would you have the guts to go up and say “yeah, I’m really not very interested in signing long term with Calgary.  I mean, maybe if you they overpay me by a lot, but otherwise probably not.”?

Or would you just say “My agent and Treiliving have started talking about a potential contract.  We’ll keep the communication open through the season and see if we can come to an agreement.”?