I don't think the 'better situation' bump makes much sense. First of all, the underlying numbers shouldn't change because of a better situation (scoring should increase while underlying numbers stay largely the same due to more shot attempts and/or better quality chances). Second, regarding personnel Chychrun's had solid D partners (Chabot, Bernard-Docker and Hamonic) and Ottawa isn't short on offensive talent up front (Stutzle, Batherson, Tkachuk, Giroux, Norris, etc.). While Carlson is better than Chabot, I don't think there's enough difference there to 'explain' the jump.
To be clear, Chychrun's on-ice shooting percentage is higher than Cale Makar's (12.3 all situations vs 14.8 for Chychrun). Do we think that the Caps supporting cast is better than playing largely with MacKinnon and Rantanen, ignoring Makar's individual talent? Or do we think that Chychrun has benefitted heavily from what largely comes down to luck?
Circling back to your first question, if Chychrun hit the market last year, I'd expect him to sign for what Montour signed for, maybe with a slight upward adjustment for the cap going up quite a bit. Montour signed at 7,142,857 AAV (what an odd figure) long-term in Seattle. So given the cap, let's say 7.5 million with some wiggle room (I would go higher aav for a shorter term as wickedwitch said).
If he's in that range, I'm interested. If he wants 10+ or 11+ (which I think he could touch if he scores 25+ goals and 60+ points), then I would prefer to let someone else fall on that sword. Dahlin signed 8x11 after his 15 goal, 73 point campaign which is arguably in line with what Chychrun is on pace for when you adjust for more goals but less points.
Edit: To be very clear, Chychrun is a good player. I just don't want to overpay based on his 42 game heater.
