The modern NHL team is built around a line that can produce offense, a line that can be used to shut down the other teams top lines, and then a secondary (backup) scoring line and a secondary (backup) shutdown line. If your team has an elite scoring line, an elite shut down line and decent secondary lines you are in a good position to compete. The fact that the Backlund line also manages to produce decent offensive numbers makes them that much more valuable (although Tkatchuk plays a big part in that). The point is that Backlund is a cornerstone for this team and the rest of the structure of the team doesn't work without him. He is probably in the top 5 players in terms of importance to the success of the team and it could be argued he is the second most important forward.
There is no doubt that he will slow down over the duration of the contract. However, I suspect he'll age well since his game relies on smarts rather than physical abilities that tend to deteriorate. Six years is a long time, yes, but it is likely his percentage of the cap in 6 years will decrease or he may choose to retire. I don't think we can project that far in the future and determine he will suck. For the next two years he's is probably underpaid a little bit.
It's great to have two really good people, mentors and teammates locked up for the long term in Giordano and Backlund.
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