He can sign an extension in July 2023. He'll be a free agent in July 2024.
My point was, given his down year, he may wait till UFA. Just in his interest.He can sign an extension in July 2023. He'll be a free agent in July 2024.
Unexpected report emerges about Auston Matthews’ contract in Toronto
All the details here:www.hockeyfeed.com
They mentioned on the brodcast the other night that the difference has been multi goal games.
Goals in 18 games last year versus 16 games this year.
I don’t think they really have any choice but to give him pretty much whatever he wants.
Every single year he changes something about his game. Adding in new shot types (i.e. he never used to do slapshots or one timers), and now he's hitting and seems to be trying to be more well rounded of a player. He hasn't look like himself this year but he is adding new elements to his game.
Kipper knows nothing when it comes to what Matthews wants. Matthews doesn’t say anything about it and changes the subject as soon as it’s brought up, so unless a notoriously tight lipped management group leaked out something I don’t see exact numbers being tossed around until the off season.
True.
Because it is, by far, the most likely term he will sign for.
Signing for 5 years (the most common post-ELC term for players of his caliber) had nothing to do with "cashing out more". They agreed on 5 years to keep the cap hit lower and make sure everybody could be kept.
More term would lower the cap hit on this contract, because mid-30s years are cheaper than prime years.
No, they agreed on 5 years because the alternative was to pay Matthews the McDavid contract for 8 years. To say it was "to lower the cap hit" is inaccurate and revisionist history, it was because he wanted his comparable to be McDavid, instead of settling into a 8 year contract somewhere between McDavid's and Eichel's, which is what was expected his contract would end up at.
What does this even mean? You really think he has any desire or intention to play for LESS on his next contract, for 8 years? Because his next contract will bring him to his mid-30's? Are you contradicting your previous point? I'm honestly not sure.
It was to lower the cap hit, because 8 years would have been more expensive and made it harder to keep everybody together. Matthews was paid appropriately for his term, consistent with the history of post-ELC contracts. Matthews was a lot closer to McDavid (who took a significant discount) through their pre-signing periods than you'll ever admit, and both of them were multiple tiers better than Eichel.
Incorrect. Nothing has ever indicated this.
5 years is the most common term for that caliber of player, and NMCs in the UFA years is pretty standard.
I didn't say his contract is going to be less than his current contract. I said that increasing the term on a UFA contract decreases the AAV of that UFA contract, because the years you're adding on are worth less than the years you're adding onto.
We don't have a salary cap mess. We have one of the best teams in the league.
If Matthews wanted to get to UFA as fast as possible, wouldn't he have insisted on 4 years instead of 5. The deal included his first possible UFA year -- that's why he has an NMC for it -- that wouldn't be legal if it wasn't a UFA year.
