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The Coyotes Contract Gambles: Do They Pay Off?

August 19, 2019, 12:29 PM ET [17 Comments]
James Tanner
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If you're reading about hockey in August, they you've definitely heard about the six or eight Restricted Free Agents who are without contracts.

As these are some of the best young players in the NHL, it's been a heavy topic of discussion over the summer.

Without getting too heavily into it, suffice to say that players now believe they should be paid for what they will do, and not what they have done.

Teams disagree.

Teams were quick to realize that you could forgo bridge contracts and lock up players for long term at a cheap rate.



But players quickly saw how badly they were getting screwed, and now there's a big fight. (Just look at what a bridge deal did for Subban and and ask yourself why a player would ever sign long term before fully developing).

For the Marners and the Laines and Points, that's a pretty easy case to make. Those guys can reasonably assume they'll be elite for years to come.

For players where it's not so clear, there is room for some interesting deals.

Enter the Coyotes.

They have given out long-term deals to Dvorak (23), Schmaltz (23) and Chychrun (21).

If we are basing the contracts of these three players on their performance, then they are some of the worst contracts in the NHL.

But the Coyotes have paid them more than they are worth today in exchange for getting them cheap long term.

If these players pan out, the Coyotes will be able to stack their team and manipulate the salary cap like crazy.

Nick Schmaltz scored 14 points in 17 games on the NHL's worst scoring team. If he can become a point-per-game player, his $5.85 million dollar cap hit will be a joke.

It could be a deal this season, and they'd have him for six more years. Potentially, the reward for this absolutely huge. It's also pretty risky because Schmaltz doesn't seem to be very good if he isn't racking up points, and his sample size of success is small.

But if it wasn't risky, it wouldn't have such a big reward.

Same goes with Chychrun. If he's a legitimate #1 defenseman, which admittedly he probably isn't, then his contract might as well be free.

He already gets paid less than Brady Skjei and is three years younger. There really isn't even any risk on this as it seems that at worst, Chychrun will be an OK second pairing defenseman.

Any improvement on his end makes this deal a win for the Coyotes. Considering his performance to date in light of the strength of his team and his back-to-back off-season knee injuries, I'm pretty confident his contract will pay off.

As for Dvorak, his deal ends one year before Kevin Hayes deal ends, and Dvorak is four years younger. They had almost the identical sophomore year:

2017-18 78 GP 15G 22A 37Pts
2015-16 79GP 14G 22A 36Pts

Now, if the Coyotes are paying $3 million dollars less per year for the player who is four years younger, how much better does Dvorak really have to get before this contract is, at worst, reasonable?

Not very.

And it can still pay out considerably.

So, while you can't really apply the Coyotes philosophy to every team , player or situation, I think for them, it's working out nicely.

The Coyotes - if they are going to compete with the Toronto Maple Leafs and New York Rangers - are going to have to take bigger risks in order to try and reap rewards great enough to level the playing-field.

This is why an aggressive move on Schmaltz is a good play. For a team that doesn't necessarily need that reward, the risk might not be worth it. But for the Coyotes, given the potential reward, it's the right play to swing for the fences.

As for the other two, they're both now almost worth their salaries and given the abominations that occurred on July 1st, they now barely carry any risk, and look like they might just pay off.

So, while we can't officially declare if these deals are good, the status for now is: One sensible attempt at a grand slam, and two that now have barely any risk in relation to their potential rewards.

Capfriendly helped greatly with this article.
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