Kyle Dubas is new Leafs GM

[Kin]

Seriously?

No, not seriously. I was being facetious. Good catch.

Do you really think the Leafs are asking all of these guys to take SIGNIFICANT discounts?  Like, what type of contract is a significant discount to you?

I don't know. I think the sums of money getting talked about here are pretty significant regardless of the percentage of the overall sum.

If you want specifics though my guess is that the Leafs are asking all three to take anywhere from 10-25% less than market.

 

[Zee]

About signing Nylander last year it's a fair question.  Lou was still GM, so it makes sense we wouldn't have heard anything if they were even talking to the agent about an extension, but the old "when you have time use it" crap that Lou spouted seems to have backfired here.  They should have tried to agree to an extension in the summer of 2017 with Willy like other RFAs did (signing their extension with still a year left on their ELC). 

My gut says they probably did try but the problem there is that typically RFA extensions getting signed before an ELC expires get worked out because the team is generally willing to give a deal that trends towards the more player-friendly of the comparables. If the Leafs general negotiating stance is "You guys should take significantly less than market because you should consider your own financial interests as less important than those of Rogers and Bell media" then that's a much tougher sell.

I don't think this is a fair statement at all.  If MLSE could give Nylander a bigger number they'd be more than happy to do so, but the realities of a hard cap are there.  Sure you can say the owners all negotiated for a cap, but my understanding is there didn't need to be all 30 owners on board for the hard cap to be passed, and a team with the financial resources of the Leafs probably realized it would be more beneficial for their on ice product if there was no cap, or if the league had some sort of luxury tax to allow high revenue teams to spend more.  Whether the Leafs spend $80M or $160M on salary it won't make much of a difference on their bottom line as they rake it in.

 

[cabber24]

Just playing with projected salaries for next year and the cap. I could see us coming in around $93M the cap is 79.5M this year. Raises to Kappi, Johnsson, Marnier, Nylander, Matthews, and Gardiner.

Should probably try to win today.

What I would like to see is Marleau pull a Hossa and trade one of Johnsson or Kappi for NHL ready prospect.

 

[leafsjunkie]

Yeah, I don't get it.

Nik has made great points and people gloss over it.

Nylander will get his money, he is worth it. He is not being traded and is not being greedy.
Anyone else would do the same thing.

And all this"Sign Marner and Matthew's now" or "they should have signed Nylander last year" stuff, it doesn't work like that, not with these caliber of players.

They are betting on themselves and are not signing a deal early, when they know they have another year to prove their worth and get their money....

The deals will get done and all 3 will be Leafs for a long time. Book it.

About signing Nylander last year it's a fair question.  Lou was still GM, so it makes sense we wouldn't have heard anything if they were even talking to the agent about an extension, but the old "when you have time use it" crap that Lou spouted seems to have backfired here.  They should have tried to agree to an extension in the summer of 2017 with Willy like other RFAs did (signing their extension with still a year left on their ELC). 

Dubas has made no secret of the fact he's already talking with Matthews and Marner's agents and he hopes to get extensions worked out before next summer, so hopefully it happens sometime in season.  They should have done the same approach with Nylander last year.

Just because they are talking, doesn't mean a discount and TBH, I would be very surprised if M & M signed during the season.
Their agents aren't dumb, again, this isn't middling players.

The numbers Matthews, Nylander and Marner are going to put up this year, will guarantee it won't get done until seasons end for M & M.

You don't know this.  Leafs and agents will use projections to base the framework of the deal, everyone knows what's up.  I have no doubt M&M will get paid but I think it can still happen during the season.

You are right, I do not know this or have any insider info.

But, with the quality of these two players and the depth of this forward group, leads me to believe that these guys are not going to user any projections and will allow their play to dictate their ask during next off season, IMO.

I will be very happy if I am wrong and they can get it done during the season, though.

We shall see.

 

[Coco-puffs]

Seriously?

No, not seriously. I was being facetious. Good catch.

Do you really think the Leafs are asking all of these guys to take SIGNIFICANT discounts?  Like, what type of contract is a significant discount to you?

I don't know. I think the sums of money getting talked about here are pretty significant regardless of the percentage of the overall sum.

If you want specifics though my guess is that the Leafs are asking all three to take anywhere from 10-25% less than market.

If I'm the player, 10% less than market is the max I'd take.  I think the main issue is where everyone pegs their market value TODAY (ie prior to them possibly exploding their point totals this season):

My values:

Willy:
6yrs:  7M  (Pasta + cap increase).... so 6 x 6.3M
8yrs:  8M  (a bit less than Draisatl)... so 8 x 7.2M

Marner:
Same as Willy IF they were signing in the same year.  Since Marner's contract starts a year later, add 5% for cap increase.

Matthews:
(I'll only consider the 8 yr):  12.5M ... so a 10% discount puts him at 11.25M

25% would be crazy discount, I agree.  So maybe you view their market values much higher because I doubt the Leafs are asking all 3 of these guys to sign for less than what I have above (with 10% discount).

EDIT:  From my perspective, if the team and player find that common ground on the market value near my numbers above, an approximate 5% discount is all I'd really want the players to take.  6 x 6.65M or 8 x 7.5M for Willy and Mitch I'd be fine with.  Matthews at 8 x 11.75M I'd be fine with.

 

[Zee]

Seriously?

No, not seriously. I was being facetious. Good catch.

Do you really think the Leafs are asking all of these guys to take SIGNIFICANT discounts?  Like, what type of contract is a significant discount to you?

I don't know. I think the sums of money getting talked about here are pretty significant regardless of the percentage of the overall sum.

If you want specifics though my guess is that the Leafs are asking all three to take anywhere from 10-25% less than market.

If I'm the player, 10% less than market is the max I'd take.  I think the main issue is where everyone pegs their market value TODAY (ie prior to them possibly exploding their point totals this season):

My values:

Willy:
6yrs:  7M  (Pasta + cap increase).... so 6 x 6.3M
8yrs:  8M  (a bit less than Draisatl)... so 8 x 7.2M

Marner:
Same as Willy IF they were signing in the same year.  Since Marner's contract starts a year later, add 5% for cap increase.

Matthews:
(I'll only consider the 8 yr):  12.5M ... so a 10% discount puts him at 11.25M

25% would be crazy discount, I agree.  So maybe you view their market values much higher because I doubt the Leafs are asking all 3 of these guys to sign for less than what I have above (with 10% discount).

These guys aren't robots.  They're people like us, and at some point other factors besides the most money come into play.  We saw with Tavares this summer, he could have gotten more money signing with another team, hell he could have had more just taking 8 years from the Islanders as opposed to only 7 from the Leafs, but he chose a bit less to go to a place where he thinks he can win. 

I have to believe that all 3 realize if they want to keep the band together they can't just aim for the highest possible contract.  Like I said before, other teams seem to be able to convince players to fall into a team salary structure, the Leafs should be able to do the same.

 

[Kin]

25% would be crazy discount, I agree.  So maybe you view their market values much higher because I doubt the Leafs are asking all 3 of these guys to sign for less than what I have above (with 10% discount).

Like I've said a ton of times, I think there's a massive difference between a market value and trying to find comparable deals under the current system. I think it's in a player's interest to try and get a market value. I think it's then in a team's interest to say "We've chosen to artificially kill your market for our own financial interests, so you've got to negotiate with us simply by the standards we've set for ourselves".

Now, clearly, NHL teams have been fairly successful in getting players to do that and hats off to them, but I still think you're asking guys to take significantly less than what they would in any semblance of a real market.

As to how much they're trying to get them to take less than comps, well, that's a different question because there are so many comps. In Nylander's case, for instance, as I've gone over in the other thread you could go as high as 8.5 or clearly some people think the Ehlers deal was a fair comp. So where the Leafs and Nylander are on that scale is more a question of what comps you want to use.

All that said, even a 250K difference on an 8 year deal is two million dollars which is a lot of money.

 

[Kin]

Sure you can say the owners all negotiated for a cap, but my understanding is there didn't need to be all 30 owners on board for the hard cap to be passed, and a team with the financial resources of the Leafs probably realized it would be more beneficial for their on ice product if there was no cap, or if the league had some sort of luxury tax to allow high revenue teams to spend more.

Probably would have been a good thing for them to say that then. Or, you know, work towards. Or continue working towards. Or try to build consensus among the bigger market teams until they had a group that represented a number the NHL did need. But, instead, they didn't and went along with a system that is ultimately financially beneficial to them.

Because the people who own the Leafs don't care about winning either. They care about making money and they "care" about winning to the extent that it will make their investment profitable. Because Rogers and Bell are bloodless corporations and not people. They care about the odd 80 million dollars as much as they care about someone skipping out on their 100 dollar phone bill, which is to say, totally and completely. 

Which is, you know, fine and all. I'm not naive about these things. I just generally speaking like to award players the same courtesy when it comes to the business aspects of the game. The Leafs made this bed, they don't get to complain about it.

 

[Kin]

These guys aren't robots.  They're people like us, and at some point other factors besides the most money come into play.  We saw with Tavares this summer, he could have gotten more money signing with another team, hell he could have had more just taking 8 years from the Islanders as opposed to only 7 from the Leafs, but he chose a bit less to go to a place where he thinks he can win. 

Tavares also signed a super team-friendly second deal. Every person has different priorities and I don't think there's any way around looking at Tavares' decision, to take less money here to win, as being linked to the rotten situation he'd been in with Long Island.

Conversely, the young guys here have only tasted success and done so at much lower salaries than they probably deserved. By asking them to take reduced rates to "keep the band together" you're essentially saying the success that was largely built on what they did should be the reason to pay them less and not more.

 

[Frank E]

Conversely, the young guys here have only tasted success and done so at much lower salaries than they probably deserved. By asking them to take reduced rates to "keep the band together" you're essentially saying the success that was largely built on what they did should be the reason to pay them less and not more.

What success?  And really, what do you mean they played for less than what they deserved?

 

[Kin]

What success?

I think, despite the early exits, most people over the last two years if presented with a binary of success/failure to judge the team would go with success for how they exceeded expectations. I think that, however you want to describe those years, it would stand in pretty stark contrast to how most of Tavares' LI years went.

And really, what do you mean they played for less than what they deserved?

That high performing players on ELCs are compensated at a rate that probably is not reflective of their value to the team.

 

[herman]

https://twitter.com/jeffveillette/status/1045810432764780545

I wasn?t going to give them the clicks, but I guess I?m going to give them a click.

 

[IJustLurkHere]

Yeah, I don't get it.

Nik has made great points and people gloss over it.

Nylander will get his money, he is worth it. He is not being traded and is not being greedy.
Anyone else would do the same thing.

And all this"Sign Marner and Matthew's now" or "they should have signed Nylander last year" stuff, it doesn't work like that, not with these caliber of players.

They are betting on themselves and are not signing a deal early, when they know they have another year to prove their worth and get their money....

The deals will get done and all 3 will be Leafs for a long time. Book it.

About signing Nylander last year it's a fair question.  Lou was still GM, so it makes sense we wouldn't have heard anything if they were even talking to the agent about an extension, but the old "when you have time use it" crap that Lou spouted seems to have backfired here.  They should have tried to agree to an extension in the summer of 2017 with Willy like other RFAs did (signing their extension with still a year left on their ELC). 

Dubas has made no secret of the fact he's already talking with Matthews and Marner's agents and he hopes to get extensions worked out before next summer, so hopefully it happens sometime in season.  They should have done the same approach with Nylander last year.

Just because they are talking, doesn't mean a discount and TBH, I would be very surprised if M & M signed during the season.
Their agents aren't dumb, again, this isn't middling players.

The numbers Matthews, Nylander and Marner are going to put up this year, will guarantee it won't get done until seasons end for M & M.

You don't know this.  Leafs and agents will use projections to base the framework of the deal, everyone knows what's up.  I have no doubt M&M will get paid but I think it can still happen during the season.

It can happen during the season, but would be incredibly unlikely, and it?s not a way for a team to get a discount. There just isn?t mutual incentive.

Marner and his agent know as well as anyone that he?s a great shot at 100 points this year. There?s no urgency for them to sign unless they get an offer commensurate to that. Conversely, not many guys hit those kind of numbers, so the Leafs are better off waiting to see what the actual value is rather than end up paying a premium.

 

[OldTimeHockey]

It?s not a union (?) thing, it?s that there are very few people in the world who can play hockey as well as William Nylander can.

I'm not speaking in the terms of the NHLPA but just a general observation. Most unions feel that by striking or holding out(or in this case not signing a contract), that they will be better off in the end but when in fact, they never make back they $ the lost in their time off.

Yeah, that's not really true though is it.

Probably not in the case of an individual player I suppose.

 

[Kin]

Probably not in the case of an individual player I suppose.

No, I meant in the other sense. It'd be effectively impossible to have the sort of data that would really let someone say with any degree of certainty what the average net gain or loss of a work stoppage is. Not only would it require having access to things that you really can't get, like the specifics of offers pre- and post-work stoppage but you'd also be dealing with the reality that lots of issues in any large scale labour dispute are either not financial or are hard to quantify in financial terms(you couldn't know the financial "gain" of a drug benefits plan without a member by member accounting of their prescriptions, for instance)

Even if you were to just focus on large scale sports work stoppages it'd be near impossible to say what was "won" or "lost" by strikes or lockouts because, again, not everything is easily quantifiable. Take the '94 MLB strike or the 94-95 NHL dispute. By striking, and "winning", those disputes players avoided a salary cap. How could you then quantify what sort of financial gain not having a cap meant to players without the specifics of a non-existent cap over the course those specific CBAs?

This is the sort of thing that was my field of study when I was in graduate school and the sort of large scale aggregated data on what "usually happens" as a result of a strike and especially a specific tally of what was gained or lost in any large scale sense just doesn't exist(trust me, some of my research would have been much, much easier if that existed). Usually you'd have to go case by case and the specifics of offers were almost never public record.

 

[Highlander]

Interesting thing to consider, while he sits at home he is not playing, he is about to start losing serious cash as of Wednesday. Nylander with his looks is going to be one of the top paid hockey endorsement players, but he won't start to cash in on that until he starts playing and proving he is as great as he thinks (and we think), he can be.
We are talking the potential of millions a year over and above whatever is  eventually worked out.

 

[Kin]

We are talking the potential of millions a year over and above whatever is  eventually worked out.

We're really not. Henrik Lundqvist is, by most accounts, a very nice looking man and a super talented hockey player and he's not making millions in endorsements. Sidney Crosby is probably doing the best in the league in endorsement money but I think we can all agree that it's because he's Sidney Crosby and not because of how he looks.

Even if Nylander becomes an incredibly valuable player, a PPG sort of Nicklas Backstrom on the wing, he's still not going to be a superstar.

 

[princedpw]

Yeah, I don't get it.

Nik has made great points and people gloss over it.

Nylander will get his money, he is worth it. He is not being traded and is not being greedy.
Anyone else would do the same thing.

And all this"Sign Marner and Matthew's now" or "they should have signed Nylander last year" stuff, it doesn't work like that, not with these caliber of players.

They are betting on themselves and are not signing a deal early, when they know they have another year to prove their worth and get their money....

The deals will get done and all 3 will be Leafs for a long time. Book it.

About signing Nylander last year it's a fair question.  Lou was still GM, so it makes sense we wouldn't have heard anything if they were even talking to the agent about an extension, but the old "when you have time use it" crap that Lou spouted seems to have backfired here.  They should have tried to agree to an extension in the summer of 2017 with Willy like other RFAs did (signing their extension with still a year left on their ELC). 

Dubas has made no secret of the fact he's already talking with Matthews and Marner's agents and he hopes to get extensions worked out before next summer, so hopefully it happens sometime in season.  They should have done the same approach with Nylander last year.

Just because they are talking, doesn't mean a discount and TBH, I would be very surprised if M & M signed during the season.
Their agents aren't dumb, again, this isn't middling players.

The numbers Matthews, Nylander and Marner are going to put up this year, will guarantee it won't get done until seasons end for M & M.

You don't know this.  Leafs and agents will use projections to base the framework of the deal, everyone knows what's up.  I have no doubt M&M will get paid but I think it can still happen during the season.

It can happen during the season, but would be incredibly unlikely, and it?s not a way for a team to get a discount. There just isn?t mutual incentive.

Marner and his agent know as well as anyone that he?s a great shot at 100 points this year. There?s no urgency for them to sign unless they get an offer commensurate to that. Conversely, not many guys hit those kind of numbers, so the Leafs are better off waiting to see what the actual value is rather than end up paying a premium.

I agree that there's no urgency for Marner to sign and it looks like he'll do very well this year.  Still, there's very, very little chance he gets 100 points.  I'd say it's more likely he gets injured, misses some time and gets 50 than he winds up with 100.  If he gets 80, that would be amazing.  If he gets 90, he outscored Sidney F'ing Crosby last year.

 

[rdowdall]

This person does not like the Tavares signing.

https://thehockeywriters.com/maple-leafs-dubas-tavares-wrong-move/

 

[Kin]

This person does not like the Tavares signing.

https://thehockeywriters.com/maple-leafs-dubas-tavares-wrong-move/

That is one of the worst written things I've ever read.