Confirmed with Link: Canucks Re-Sign W Nils Hoglander to 3y/3m AAV Contract

[Ernie]

Right and with the cap going up, the Canucks are making a bet that 3m will be a bargain contract for a young 30-40 point 3rd liner that has shown the ability to surpass 20 goals. I'm guessing they look at this contract as something that provides cost certainty and this will either increase or hold his value. Not sure why they are doing this now but I suspect they think he's more valuable with a contract for next season than without.

I'd bet that Castonguay worked through the different outcomes and ran the numbers to figure out how to extract value. While the Canucks currently do have a lot of depth at forward, those players are all in their late 20's. Hoglander is now signed through what should be the most productive years of his career, and while he may underperform the contract slightly, he could also outperform it considerably.

I think the idea that he's in Tocchet's doghouse is inaccurate. Tocchet has repeatedly said how much he likes Hoglander's play in the corners and in front of the net, referring to him at one point as "like a dog with a bone." Why he faded down the stretch and in the playoffs is an open question but the team has a lot more information on it than we do.

 

[F A N]

Look at the market for Heinen this offseason for example, who’s bigger and has PK utility.

I would point out that Heinan got a 2 year bridge contract for $2.8M AAV back in the day. His play and offensive production has also been up and down throughout his career. The contract we gave him accounts for this. He also wasn’t known for being good defensively or killing penalties when he was younger.

No doubt that the Canucks could have waited but players get paid for their potential and teams do like cap certainty. Hoglander scored 24 goals last season and if he scores 20+ again his arbitration case won’t be affected much by the fact that he is small and doesn’t have PK utility. There’s also the possibility that Hoglander continues to get better. This extension we gave him accounts for this.

 

[Diversification]

The floor Hogs has to meet is to be a bonafide everyday 3rd line winger. In order to reach this goal he will need to improve his off-puck (and on-puck) decision making.

That's the gamble.

If he can't, he's a winger that needs to be sheltered with soft deployment and that's not the kind of player you want to spend 3M on.

 

[LemonSauceD]

24 goals 24 goals 24 goals 24 goals 24 goals 24 goals 24 goals 24 goals 24 goals

 

[iceburg]

Good succession planning for top 6 wingers. He needs to keep on his current trajectory.

I'll add that Hoglander, from his draft year, is in or near the top 10 in goals, pts and games played and that's with very little powerplay time. Sure he still needs to work on some things but 3x3 is not unreasonable based on the comparables, particularly for a guy with upside.

 

[WetcoastOrca]

By the way, the Garland comparisons in this thread are puzzling.

Garland is an established 2nd liner that drove offense for us very consistently all season.

Hoglander would have to take a major step in his development for him to replace what Garland brings.

I think that’s fair. But Garland is making close to $5 million. Hoglander doesn’t need to be as good as Garland to be worth his $3 million salary. If he scores 20 goals and plays consistently in the top 9 somewhere then he will be worth that. Then there’s the potential upside that the contract could bring if he continues to improve. His off season work rate reminds me of the Sedins in terms of conditioning.
I think that also management is looking longer term as well and we don’t have a lot of younger impact players in the organization.

 

[iceburg]

By the way, the Garland comparisons in this thread are puzzling.

Garland is an established 2nd liner that drove offense for us very consistently all season.

Hoglander would have to take a major step in his development for him to replace what Garland brings.

Somewhat comparable would be Garland when he signed his current contract.

25 years old
164 NHL games played (plus 8 playoff games where he had 1g and 1a)
47 regular season goals and 96 points
11g/15a on powerplay with Arizona

Hoglander at 23 (24 in a couple of months)
221 games (plus 11 playoff games where he had 1g and 1a)
50 regular season goals and 90 points
2g/2a on powerplay (none in the last two years)

When factoring in Garland's powerplay time and Hoglander's lack of, they are quite close in points per game. The biggest difference in the two players is that Hoglander just signed for 3x$3M whereas Garland signed for 4x$4.95M in a year when the cap was at least 10% less.

 

[Ernie]

The floor Hogs has to meet is to be a bonafide everyday 3rd line winger. In order to reach this goal he will need to improve his off-puck (and on-puck) decision making.

That's the gamble.

If he can't, he's a winger that needs to be sheltered with soft deployment and that's not the kind of player you want to spend 3M on.

He was 9th in ES ice time last season with a coach that prioritizes defensive play so I'm not sure what the issue is.

Edit: to add, in the final 20 games of the season he was 6th in average ES ice time. He's being paid like a middle six winger, which was the role he played at the end of last season.

 

[Ernie]

To the naysayers in this thread, what would be an acceptable contract number for a 3 year extension?

 

[arttk]

I'd bet that Castonguay worked through the different outcomes and ran the numbers to figure out how to extract value. While the Canucks currently do have a lot of depth at forward, those players are all in their late 20's. Hoglander is now signed through what should be the most productive years of his career, and while he may underperform the contract slightly, he could also outperform it considerably.

I think the idea that he's in Tocchet's doghouse is inaccurate. Tocchet has repeatedly said how much he likes Hoglander's play in the corners and in front of the net, referring to him at one point as "like a dog with a bone." Why he faded down the stretch and in the playoffs is an open question but the team has a lot more information on it than we do.

Management now uses Excel!

 

[Ernie]

Management now uses Excel!

Lol, maybe even AI.

I threw this question into ChatGPT:

What is a fair contract for Nils Hoglander?

To determine a fair contract for Nils Hoglander, a few key factors need to be considered:

1. Performance and Potential: Analyze Hoglander's recent performance, including goals, assists, and overall contributions to the team. Also, consider his potential for growth based on age and playing style.
2. Market Comparisons: Look at similar players in the league regarding age, position, and performance. This will provide a benchmark for salary and contract length.
3. Team Cap Space: Consider the team's salary cap situation. This will impact how much the team can offer and the structure of the contract.
4. Contract Length: A shorter contract (1-2 years) might allow Hoglander to prove himself further, while a longer-term deal (3-4 years) could provide stability for both the player and the team.
5. Bonuses and Incentives: Including performance bonuses or incentives can align Hoglander's motivations with team success and make the contract more appealing.

A fair contract might fall in the range of $2-4 million per year, depending on these factors, with a term of 2-3 years being reasonable. Ultimately, it should reflect his contributions and the team's investment in his future.

 

[arttk]

Lol, maybe even AI.

I threw this question into ChatGPT:

i think we would've been pretty peeved at 4M. 2M-2.5M feels unrealistic. I think 3M is somewhat fair and yeah there are some risks to it but I guess the way management sees it is, if he doesn't live up to it, we'll just Kuzmenko/Mikhyev him.

The mentality is just different with this group, I think they just know they can get rid of any problems they create but they won't let the idea of them f***ing up limit them from making moves/bets.

 

[F A N]

I assume there's no movement clause on this deal. I don't think this particularly influences whether they move Hoglander one way or another. The deal isn't prohibitive at this point, though it could be if he struggles as some have noted. I still think there's not an insignificant chance he's moved post-extension.

He isn’t eligible for no movement clauses until his UFA years.

I agree that while there is some risk at the end of the day I don’t think it significantly changes the team’s ability to move him.

 

[Ernie]

i think we would've been pretty peeved at 4M. 2M-2.5M feels unrealistic. I think 3M is somewhat fair and yeah there are some risks to it but I guess the way management sees it is, if he doesn't live up to it, we'll just Kuzmenko/Mikhyev him.

The mentality is just different with this group, I think they just know they can get rid of any problems they create but they won't let the idea of them f***ing up limit them from making moves/bets.

That's the thing - he's at worst a 3rd line player as it currently stands. He could be overpaid $500k to $1m per year if he doesn't improve from where he is, but that barely registers on a $100m payroll.

They have made a bet that he'll be a $3m player through the ages of 24-27, just like they made a bet that DeBrusk is a $5.5m player through the ages of 28-35.

It shouldn't be hard to figure out what is the higher risk bet, especially since Hoglander will likely be right back on Pettersson's wing when the whole Sprong experiment doesn't work out.

 

[arttk]

That's the thing - he's at worst a 3rd line player as it currently stands. He could be overpaid $500k to $1m per year if he doesn't improve from where he is, but that barely registers on a $100m payroll.

They have made a bet that he'll be a $3m player through the ages of 24-27, just like they made a bet that DeBrusk is a $5.5m player through the ages of 28-35.

It shouldn't be hard to figure out what is the higher risk bet, especially since Hoglander will likely be right back on Pettersson's wing when the whole Sprong experiment doesn't work out.

I think it's fine, yeah it's a risk but I think there should be confidence that management will be able to clean it up and pull another bunny out of the hat if it doesn't work out.
I don't think the plan is to have Hog be on Petey's line, I think they plan to have Lekk there and (I've repeated this like too many times), Hog is Garland replacement. Garland's 5M -> Hog(3M) and Boeser's raise (2M + 6M). Lekk replaces Sprong at the same cost essentially. Raty replace Suter and give us like 600K savings? 2M out of the 5M cap increase will go towards OEL so with Forbort out, we'll have like 6.5M in cap? Maybe that cap will be allocated to keeping that player we'll trade for at the TDL but the cap situation is fine from the perspective that a) we are not going to be cap f***ed b) still have money to upgrade.

 

[credulous]

those of you who think hoglander won't be hard to trade with 9m and 3 years on his deal if he disappoints this season better hope he has a good season so your fantasies aren't crushed

 

[Ernie]

those of you who think hoglander won't be hard to trade with 9m and 3 years on his deal if he disappoints this season better hope he has a good season so your fantasies aren't crushed

Why would the Canucks sign him to this deal if they wanted to trade him?

 

[Diversification]

He was 9th in ES ice time last season with a coach that prioritizes defensive play so I'm not sure what the issue is.

Edit: to add, in the final 20 games of the season he was 6th in average ES ice time. He's being paid like a middle six winger, which was the role he played at the end of last season.

The issue is that he’s a low hockey IQ player who plays a high intensity board battle style game. With that style of play, it only takes one bad decision for the puck to be headed up ice for an odd man rush against with all of his linemates on the wrong end of the rink supporting a cycle. It’s why he was scratched for the playoffs.

If he can fix this issue, great. It’s a good value contract even with expected offensive regression. But it’s definitely a gamble.

 

[arttk]

those of you who think hoglander won't be hard to trade with 9m and 3 years on his deal if he disappoints this season better hope he has a good season so your fantasies aren't crushed

Sunday Allvin

 

[ChillyVanFan]

Its safe to say Hoglander wont match his shooting % with limited minutes. Its obvious hes come to camp with something to prove. Its fair to think that he could excel and succeed with higher minutes and better linemates and a normal shooting percentage. In Hog we trust

Looking at Hoglander's career stats, he's been a higher-volume shooter in previous seasons.
132 shots in 60 games in 2021-22.
118 shots in 56 games in 2020-21.
His shooting percentages in those seasons were 7.6 and 11.0 respectively, so there was probably a lot of low-percentage shot taking in there.

Still, it leads one to believe there's a fairly good chance he ups his shot volume this season, and hopefully with better shot selection. Playing on a semi-dangerous second PP unit with Sprong may help, or maybe he'll get a look in the PP1 bumper spot if DeBrusk struggles.
I liked him in that spot during the preseason game with Raty and Karlsson.

I also don't look at him as a pure scorer, even though he tends to post Cy Young stats. Some of the plays he makes for others are interesting. He has the puck-handling and passing skill to be better in that area if he chooses to.

I definitely like Hoglander's forechecking and energy.

They must have seen enough defensive growth as well to do this.
It seems unlike this management team to saddle Tocchet with a defensively-deficient player he can't work with. I'd believe there were discussions between coach and front office about that area of Hoglander's game, with the belief that he's A ) at an acceptable level or B ) will get there soon.

 

[TruGr1t]

Why would the Canucks sign him to this deal if they wanted to trade him?

I don't think this impacts their inclination to trade him at all. If Sprong and/or Bains blows the doors off they still might. With this contract at least there's some cost certainty attached to the player.

It could obviously blow-up if he takes a big step back and the contract becomes inefficient, but for now I could see this actually being net positive for his value.

The earliest they'd even contemplate it though, is when Joshua returns.

 

[MS]

I think you've become a bit myopically focused on a certain player type that you dislike. It didn't serve you well with Boeser and it probably won't serve you well here.

Shooting percentage fluctuates, but in some ways it's a reflection of that fact that there are a lot of bounces in hockey.

Sometimes you get the last bounce and the puck goes in 20 times on 100 shots but you didn't get the bounce on earlier plays where perhaps you would have gotten 140 shots in a year with more 'luck'.

But more than that, I concur that JFresh is a charlatan but I think you're a bit hyper fixated on stats too. These aren't video game mites. The fact that he scored 24 goals will give him confidence and help instil a belief that he belongs in this league. No, he's not going to shoot 20 percent again, but he's probably gonna generate quite a few more shots/chances.
Also, it's not like he was scoring on a bunch of random dump-ins. He gets into the high danger areas and those tend to lead to higher shooting percentage.

But to me there are a couple of primary things that make this a decent bet.

1. He is clearly a contributing NHLer who can, at worst, play on a skill based 3rd line somewhere and make them feisty and skilled. That's worth 3 million, particularly as the cap goes up.

2. I think the team is projecting on micro skills and he has some really elite ones. His puck control/ability to win battles in tight spaces is like watching Brad Marchand. He wins so many 40/60 puck battles that it's wild. I'm not saying he has the hockey sense of Brad Marchand (of course, neither did Brad for the first 5 or 6 years of his career), but he's an absolute menace on the forecheck with top 5 percentile abilities on certain microskills on winning puck battles and maintaining possession in phone booth situations.

The problem has been that he's been poor defensively, though improving, and that his hockey sense isn't always great in terms of knowing when to make the simple play or defer to the teammate who is in a better position than he is.
But if he didn't have those drawbacks, he would be signing a 5x5, not a 3x3.

Again, I don't 'dislike' Hoglander. I think he's a useful depth player, same as Blueger or Desharnais or whoever, provided he's at the right price.

This is a capped league. You need to tightly manage your budget and Hoglander is the sort of depth player (again, the 14th or 15th most important player on the team) that you need to squeeze every penny out of in contract negotiations. This is a lesson that we've learned over and over again in the last decade.

And again : compare his performances over the last two years to Dakota Joshua and then compare the AAV that Hoglander just received (for RFA years) to what Joshua received (for UFA years). It is very clearly a blatant overpayment relative to our internal structure.

And I most definitely don't see the upside to giving him this deal right now. He's penciled in on the 4th line right now and still won't be getting much PP time. Unless something very unexpected happens, he isn't going to blow the doors off this season and make this contract look like a bargain. Conversely, if his SH% regresses and he struggles to get icetime with our improved depth, there is a massive chance that his production will fall and he would have been signable for much cheaper than this in a year.

 

[Ernie]

The issue is that he’s a low hockey IQ player who plays a high intensity board battle style game. With that style of play, it only takes one bad decision for the puck to be headed up ice for an odd man rush against with all of his linemates on the wrong end of the rink supporting a cycle. It’s why he was scratched for the playoffs.

If he can fix this issue, great. It’s a good value contract even with expected offensive regression. But it’s definitely a gamble.

He made huge strides last season and by the end was playing high leverage minutes.

The playoffs were unfortunate but that shouldn't wipe out all the real gains he made last season. And to be fair, he was scratched for 2 games when the Canucks were desperate to create some offence and the whole of the Pettersson line wasn't getting much done.

 

[Ernie]

Again, I don't 'dislike' Hoglander. I think he's a useful depth player, same as Blueger or Desharnais or whoever, provided he's at the right price.

This is a capped league. You need to tightly manage your budget and Hoglander is the sort of depth player (again, the 14th or 15th most important player on the team) that you need to squeeze every penny out of in contract negotiations. This is a lesson that we've learned over and over again in the last decade.

And again : compare his performances over the last two years to Dakota Joshua and then compare the AAV that Hoglander just received (for RFA years) to what Joshua received (for UFA years). It is very clearly a blatant overpayment relative to our internal structure.

And I most definitely don't see the upside to giving him this deal right now. He's penciled in on the 4th line right now and still won't be getting much PP time. Unless something very unexpected happens, he isn't going to blow the doors off this season and make this contract look like a bargain. Conversely, if his SH% regresses and he struggles to get icetime with our improved depth, there is a massive chance that his production will fall and he would have been signable for much cheaper than this in a year.

He's pencilled in to the 3rd line right now in Joshua's spot. When Joshua returns he could go higher or lower in the lineup. I wouldn't bet on Sprong holding down that spot on Pettersson's wing and Hoglander looked decent there for much of last season.

Joshua's 28-32 year old UFA years are expensive but the 24-27 prime years of Hoglander's career are on the whole more valuable. And it's a LOT more risky to give a long term deal to a guy who had a breakout season at 28 than a guy who had one at 23. Both these deals have significant risk, but unless Hoglander's play completely drops off he was on track to get that $3m in arbitration anyhow. If he scored 20+ goals again this season, he'd be looking at $4m plus.

You are complaining about people referencing the 24 goals, but you keep repeating the playoff scratch thing. Both are relevant but overall pretty small factors when evaluating this player. More important is his natural talent, his high motor, and the rapid improvement in his defensive game.

As for your comment that he was 15th on the depth chart - he was 6th in ES ice time amongst forwards in the last 20 games of the season. Sure, you can place him below late 20's NHL journeymen Sprong, Heinen, and Sherwood on the depth chart, but Canucks' management clearly doesn't agree, and see a player they want in their long term plan.

 

[MS]

He's pencilled in to the 3rd line right now in Joshua's spot. When Joshua returns he could go higher or lower in the lineup. I wouldn't bet on Sprong holding down that spot on Pettersson's wing and Hoglander looked decent there for much of last season.

Right now with everyone healthy he's on the 4th line.

Joshua's 28-32 year old UFA years are expensive but the 24-27 prime years of Hoglander's career are on the whole more valuable. And it's a LOT more risky to give a long term deal to a guy who had a breakout season at 28 than a guy who had one at 23. Both these deals have significant risk, but unless Hoglander's play completely drops off he was on track to get that $3m in arbitration anyhow. If he scored 20+ goals again this season, he'd be looking at $4m plus.

Dakota Joshua is a better player than Nils Hoglander, and it isn't close right now.

And there's no need to make the bet on huge improvement right now.

We've been through this a million times who overpaying non-core depth players is a bad idea and people understand it with UFAs or guys coming from other organizations but then lose their minds with it's a 'system guy' that they're attached to.

You are complaining about people referencing the 24 goals, but you keep repeating the playoff scratch thing. Both are relevant but overall pretty small factors when evaluating this player. More important is his natural talent, his high motor, and the rapid improvement in his defensive game.

The last thing we saw was a player not good enough to be in our best 12 forwards in the playoffs. It's pretty relevant.

As for your comment that he was 15th on the depth chart - he was 6th in ES ice time amongst forwards in the last 20 games of the season. Sure, you can place him below late 20's NHL journeymen Sprong, Heinen, and Sherwood on the depth chart, but Canucks' management clearly doesn't agree, and see a player they want in their long term plan.

I didn't place him behind of Sprong or Sherwood. I placed him behind Heinen, who is going to be nailed to JT Miller's line and a regular PKer.

Obviously they don't agree, but that's just an appeal to authority at this point.

If I'm handicapping the odds of what Hoglander does next season and have it at 10% offensive breakout over last year (deal looks great), 45% similar production to last year (deal looks average), 45% regression from last year (deal looks bad) ... this isn't a good bet. And I feel like I'm being generous with those numbers, if anything, given his current usage. If they were lining him up on PP1 heading into the season ... sure, there will be an obvious breakout looming. But that isn't the case.

At this point I'm kind of done talking about this. We'll see how this deal is looking at Christmas.