Matthew Tkachuk & Johnny Gaudreau Signing Watch Thread

[JohnnyB]

Originally Posted by Vinny01

People seem to be thinking it will be Calgary or Philly. Obviously if it is Philly it is purely a move to get back home. It is crazy though that Philly has absolutely no cap space so they would need multiple moves to get the space to fit Johnny in. Would Johnny go to Seattle because they offer him the most money? Can’t see it.

Philly is a trash team and would have to move out good players to add Johnny. He would have to want to be at home and not care about winning any time soon to go there. If he stays in Calgary he is comfortable, gets all the money, and has a chance to win.

Are people thinking that?is there some new news? Most of what I've seen is about Calgary or New Jersey, for reasons you have given.

[Jiri Hrdina]

Originally Posted by JohnnyB

No need to say people's views are "idiotic" or represent a "fantasy world".

The contract was great, but there have been suggestions in the past based on end of season exit interviews that the Flames chose to keep letting him play for extended periods when he was in bad shape and playing through terrible pain for months rather than making him sit and get it sorted. Bodies breaking down or failing to heal when playing injured kind of is predictable, and at least is controllable wrt attempting early treatment or not. It's not insane to have a discussion around whether or not the Flames were making choices to prioritize the long-term health and future contributions of the player or the immediate contributions of the player.

People can talk about what they want, but whenever fans start to speculate on injuries and how those are treated we are leaning even more into talking completely out of our asses.

[The Cobra]

Originally Posted by GioforPM

I’ve made this point to someone else but if you think he can get 6m in the year after a 7 year deal isn’t he almost as likely to get that after an 8 year contract as well?

Sure, but we are only talking about year 8 and comparing 7 and 8 year contracts. What he'll get in year 9 is not particularly relevant.

I expect the chances would be greater at a multi year contract after this contract ends is better after a 7-year contract than a 8-year contract.

But I doubt it comes down to money. It will come down to where he wants to play. If he is indeed negotiating with Calgary on the money right now, there seems no reason for them not to get a deal done, as it means he's decided that he can stay in Calgary if the contract is right.

[SuperMatt18]

Originally Posted by Strange Brew

Malkin turns 36 this month and he will get that much. I think you need to look at a smaller group subset of elite forwards and see what their 35+ contracts look like. Gaudreau has less tread on him too.

Gaudreau is great but IMO he’s not Ovechkin, Malkin, Crosby tier.

He’s more in the Perry, Getzlaf, Carter type of tier, and those guys were all more in the $2-4M contract type of range.

And my guess is 8 years from now the age is trending even younger, just like it’s much younger than it was 8 years ago at this point.

[Toonage]

Had to see if that was Lebrun writing the ESPN piece about Gaudreau possibly in Seattle as he has been the only insider to approach it. It was Whysh..Whis...Puck Daddy. Anyway, can't see it, but weird seeing it come up from another industry type.

[devo22]

yeah Seattle is a weird team to throw into the mix. Can't see it.

I'm really only worried about the Devils ... and the Flyers to a degree, but they'd have to work some magic to make the cap work. But Jersey worries me.

[dissentowner]

If he were to go to Philly or NJ it is strictly a I want to go home scenario. Neither of those teams are a contender and he will never build any kind of big legacy there. He will just be another Johnny-come-lately.

[Scroopy Noopers]

He’s going to sign.

You wait until 15 minutes to midnight for maximum dollars. The delay is just business.

[SuperMatt18]

Seattle feels like a good name for an agent to throw out as interested to drive the cap price up.

Gross can use Philly as being Gaudreau's preference as his home town - but without a JVR or Provorov trade happening first they don't have the space to offer much more than $9.5-$10M.

Seattle is the perfect tool for an agent to use in negotiation because they have nothing but cap...that's the team Landeskog used last season too when the rumors of him getting $9-$10M offers came up.

[dustygoon]

Going through Capfriendly numbers...sorting by percent of cap at time of signing and then filtering for.....

- wingers
- signed in last few years

You can see why Flames could be offering that 9.5mm number (11.5% of cap), and will need to come up.

Marner isn't a great comparable i don't think since he was 22 and it was a 6 year deal (13.4% of cap).

Kucherov, Stone and Point were all recently signed wingers near JG's age (i'm assuming Point is more winger than centre) at $9.5mm and were all just under 12% of cap, but those are tax friendly states, so we need to be higher.

The best comparable for the upper range is Panarin's 7 year deal proform'd to an 8 year equivalent. That equates to $10.14mm or 12.5% of cap at time of signing. That means Johnny would be $10.3mm using 12.5% of today's cap. We can argue who is better, but i think $10.5mm would be a reasonable upper limit.

That is of course unless Johnny's comps should include centers.

If another team is going to beat $10.5mm, then they need to be offering +$12mm over 7 years which is over 14.5% of the cap. Only guys signed to that dough in modern era? McD and Matthews (Toews, Kane and Crosby are over 14.5% but those are older contracts).

Sorry for all the numbo jumbo, but just trying to frame this argument....I think there is a good chance that Johnny comes down. I don't see another team beating our offer if we go to $10.5mm.

[The Cobra]

Originally Posted by dustygoon

Going through Capfriendly numbers...sorting by percent of cap at time of signing and then filtering for.....

- wingers
- signed in last few years

You can see why Flames could be offering that 9.5mm number (11.5% of cap), and will need to come up.

Marner isn't a great comparable i don't think since he was 22 and it was a 6 year deal (13.4% of cap).

Kucherov, Stone and Point were all recently signed wingers near JG's age (i'm assuming Point is more winger than centre) at $9.5mm and were all just under 12% of cap, but those are tax friendly states, so we need to be higher.

The best comparable for the upper range is Panarin's 7 year deal proform'd to an 8 year equivalent. That equates to $10.14mm or 12.5% of cap at time of signing. That means Johnny would be $10.3mm using 12.5% of today's cap. We can argue who is better, but i think $10.5mm would be a reasonable upper limit.

That is of course unless Johnny's comps should include centers.

If another team is going to beat $10.5mm, then they need to be offering +$12mm over 7 years which is over 14.5% of the cap. Only guys signed to that dough in modern era? McD and Matthews (Toews, Kane and Crosby are over 14.5% but those are older contracts).

Sorry for all the numbo jumbo, but just trying to frame this argument....I think there is a good chance that Johnny comes down. I don't see another team beating our offer if we go to $10.5mm.

You are assuming that comparables matter to Johnny or any team chasing him. They can be simply ignored by any team at their will, especially if leverage is completely on one side.

[Textcritic]

Originally Posted by howard_the_duck

Not a good comparable, IMO. Sid had already won a cup and therefore the loyalty to that organization was warranted to help improve their chances through taking a reduced AAV. He also does well through endorsements to more than offset.

Not really. Even the biggest endorsements for NHL players are fairly small.

Johnny is heading into his last lucrative contract, hasn't won anything, and is coming off a deal where he was underpaid vs. market.

Gaudreau was not "underpaid" on his last deal. He signed for very close to market value for a player of his calibre and with the results he had collected. One might say he put performed his deal, but that has mostly to do with cap inflation than anything else.


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[Roof-Daddy]

Carolina has to be a bit of a dark horse option too if Johnny hits free agency.

Clearly a contender, they have lots of cap space to work with and are a north eastern US located team. Not sure if they are willing to dole out that kind of money in free agency, but Johnny is very marketable and coming off a 115 point season as we all know.

[TheIronMaiden]

Today is the day1!11!!!

[JohnnyB]

Originally Posted by howard_the_duck

Not a good comparable, IMO. Sid had already won a cup and therefore the loyalty to that organization was warranted to help improve their chances through taking a reduced AAV. He also does well through endorsements to more than offset.

Johnny is heading into his last lucrative contract, hasn't won anything, and is coming off a deal where he was underpaid vs. market.

Well, Sid was already a cup-winning team captain and the top elite center in the game, which is much more impressive than what Johnny can claim. Would someone in the league have paid him $14M per season if he wanted the money? Probably, or at least pretty close to it, and the endorsement money would have been lined up for him whether he stayed with the Pens or not. In the end, he chose to leave a huge amount of money on the table because he actually prioritized winning over the financial benefits. Sid quite possibly left $50M on the table over the length of the contract, unlike Johnny who may be leaving less than $8M.
And, Sid did end up getting two more cups out of what the Pens could do with roster building cap space, which I'm sure helped with keeping that endorsement money rolling in.

Either way, I just shared it as a counterpoint to the idea that money is everything. It obviously doesn't have to be.

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

Gaudreau will be 36 (7 year deal) or 37 (8 year deal) when this current contract expires.

He needs to look at this as his retirement contract.

I can’t think of many players signing for $5M+ at age 36 or older in recent history.

Ovechkin, Letang, and Pavelski are the only 35+ contracts in the entire NHL over $5M this season. There are only 17 players on 35+ contracts in the entire league.

It’s likely that the league gets even younger over the next 8 years too and Gaudreau doesn’t even have a next contract.

Elite players even being available to sign again at this age is a pretty recent phenomenon...most elite players before 2012 were signing deals into their 40s.

We can look at guys like Perry and Parise, but their buyouts may skew what they were willing to accept - Perry could almost certainly have made $2M+ for the last few years.

[Toonage]

Originally Posted by Roof-Daddy

Carolina has to be a bit of a dark horse option too if Johnny hits free agency.

Clearly a contender, they have lots of cap space to work with and are a north eastern US located team. Not sure if they are willing to dole out that kind of money in free agency, but Johnny is very marketable and coming off a 115 point season as we all know.

Not a North Eastern team.

[Strange Brew]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

Gaudreau is great but IMO he’s not Ovechkin, Malkin, Crosby tier.

He’s more in the Perry, Getzlaf, Carter type of tier, and those guys were all more in the $2-4M contract type of range.

And my guess is 8 years from now the age is trending even younger, just like it’s much younger than it was 8 years ago at this point.

For sure on not being in the tier with those guys. But I think the type of game he plays and starting his NHL career later are some factors that would extend his career.

Getzlaf signed for $4.5 and is the best comparable of those three IMO. Interestingly Perry signed an 8 year deal in 2013 that was not much less than what Flames offered Gaudreau.

Anyway I would put the odds quite long that Gaudreau retires in 7 years.

[GioforPM]

Originally Posted by The Cobra

Sure, but we are only talking about year 8 and comparing 7 and 8 year contracts. What he'll get in year 9 is not particularly relevant.

I expect the chances would be greater at a multi year contract after this contract ends is better after a 7-year contract than a 8-year contract.

But I doubt it comes down to money. It will come down to where he wants to play. If he is indeed negotiating with Calgary on the money right now, there seems no reason for them not to get a deal done, as it means he's decided that he can stay in Calgary if the contract is right.

Of course it's relevant. Because a player worries about what he makes in a career. Not in one particular year. Total dollars on this contract favour Calgary, total dollars over his career favour Calgary. And in my example, he's not mitigating year 8 by signing a 6M contract that year. He's just making his 6M contract one year earlier than he had to. 7x11 plus 4x6 is still less than 8x10.5 plus 4x6 (or even 3x6).

[Vinny01]

Listened to Frank’s Daily face off show live a couple minutes ago talking about Johnny. He says the Flames are likely willing to go as high as 11M per on an 8 year deal so the speculation is the fact Johnny wants to go back east. They compared it to the Tavares situation in terms of how it is shaping up.