It’s not a bad deal, but an unfortunate deal. If he signed 8 years now then the contract would be worth it for the entire deal. Not only will his cap hit not start to help the team at some point as teams usually hope for, but his age when he gets his next deal will likely with a max contract see a few good years and then a Tavares contract anchor situation.
Strictly year by year it’s not awful cap hit, it keeps the window open 4 more years. The contract by itself can’t be bad because of the cap hit that’s pretty much in line with stars, it’s how the management now deals with the other forwards. Just depends if they lose on of the core for
Last thing is, if you believe in it, contract culture. It certainly exists in some teams. Bruins had it for years, Tampa, Pens
It’s not always about taking huge discounts, but at least something of a a discount. Or at the very least not trying to clearly squeeze every penny you can get.
The team still has other stars to pay. They’re not sheep so maybe Marner and or Nylander don’t copy Matthews and sign fair value relative to term and or go straight for the long term deal at least despite their age, so the latter half their cap % will drop more over 8 years. Something.
This approach just really isn’t especially helpful to winning a cup in a league that, barring some great luck in matchups/injuries/bounces, you typically need great depth to tear through other top teams and have enough in the tank at the end to keep going. Star player is cold or injured this round? Okay he got you through the last round, now your 3rd line is popping off
As long as Matthews never says something like “all I care about is winning”