Quote:
Originally Posted by devo22
this fear of US players shafting us really needs to die. Even knowing he'd never sign for us, you make that Fox pick 10 out 10 times. We've had this discussion a ton of times already, but go back and look at the players drafted after Fox. Lots of good boys from Western Canada who never got a sniff of NHL action ... Fox still had a lot of value as a trade chip. I'll take that.
|
Especially for first round picks. Even more so for top 10 picks.
A top ten pick should be playing in the NHL after a year. It would rather stupid for a player not to sign an ELC after a D+1 year. Otherwise they could be pushing back their first RFA contract by several years and then lose out on several millions of dollars.
Lets use Gabriel Perreault for an example.
With 54 points in 31 NCAA games, he looks NHL ready.
He could sign a 3 year ECL and get his first real RFA contract at the age of 21 (and he could burn a year of the ELC by signing early). If he's good, he can potentially make 7 mill+ per year from the ages of 21 to 26. Then he can really cash in even more as a younger UFA.
Order, he could refuse to sign, and play with Boston College for another r3 years. He then signs his ELC at the age of 21, and then his first RFA contract at 24. At this point, he has less leverage, and he would have made much less money while in his early 20s.
For a guy like this, the difference could be tens of millions of dollars between agreeing to sign the ELC and holding out. I don't care how much he loves NYC or hates Canada (even though he was born in Canada). He'd be crazy to give up this much money.