Since the Bruins won the Stanley Cup in 2011, their core that was once renowned as an archaic foundation for a dynastic reign similar to those enjoyed across the NHL in the 70's and 80's. And yet, as the salary cap as sliced down on the team's roster like a butchers knife does a flank of beef, there remains hope. Now devoid of guys like Michael Ryder, Mark Recchi, Andrew Ference, Shawn Thornton, Nathan Hornton, Tyler Seguin, Tim Thomas and now Jarome Iginla, the Bruins have been shown that veteran talent is beginning to become something that no team can win a Stanley Cup off of.
More and more often now, cup champions have been winning via homegrown and or young talent. In both LA Kings victories, guys like Dwight King, Kyle Clifford and Jordan Nolan have made great, sustained contributions to the team at very little cost. The same could be said for some of the Blackhawks key role players like Dave Bolland, Viktor Stallberg and Nick Leddy who also contributed to the team 2013 Cup win at minimal cost to the team.
Among many other trends that are all becoming more and more evident in the evolving NHL, rookies are now the way to win. Small figure deals to young players with not enough experience to command any more money allow for teams to get the best bang for their buck. Or more simply, if you are able to base your team around rookie deals and rookies goals you end of paying much less money per goal than you would if you based your team around the Jaromir Jager's and the Jarome Iginla's of the league.
To solidify that assumption, I point towards the Tampa Bay Lightning. By the end of the year, the Colorado Avalanche had produced a Calder Trophy winning player in Nathan McKinnon. McKinnon scored 24 goals for Colorado last season but cost the team a cap hit of just $925,000. When you divide those two numbers, you are given a cost per goal total of $38,541. When you compare him to Johnathan Tavares who scored the same number of goals in 2014 as McKinnon, the $229,000 the Islanders paid per Tavares goal was nearly 6 times more than that that the Avs paid for McKinnon's goals.
Now an argument could be made that Tavares had an off year in 2014 that was obviously cut 20 games short by an MCL tear suffered in Sochi and so therefore the stunning rip off that the Islanders suffered was a onetime thing. However, if you look at an player with much less of an offensive reputation than Tavares, the veteran vs rookie cost per goal trend still stays true and says the same thing. The Bruin's Milan Lucic who was not even the top scorer on the team scored 24 goals in 2014 just like McKinnon. But unlike McKinnon, Lucic made 6 million dollars thus inflating his cost per goal to a whopping $250,000 per goal.
Furthermore, beyond the pay checks handed out to individual players, one could also look to overall team payroll to judge the truth behind this trend. Looking at a veteran heavy team like the Bruins, the overall payroll is whopping. Last season the Bruins paid out over 73 million dollars to a total of 26 players. Those 26 players scored a total of 258 goals in repayment of their team. But much like the sheer rights to name those players on their roster, the Bruins had to pay dearly for all those goals. They had to pay $282,945 for each of those goals. That is an astounding number but some believe that it is a necessary sacrifice because to win a Stanley Cup a team needs veterans.
Nathan McKinnon's Avalanche however, do not agree. As of now, the average age of players listed as Avalanche starters is 25.6 years old. The average age of the players listed as Bruins starters is 27. While almost a year and a half difference is not a very big difference in the spectrum of life, when you take into account the quirks of contract negotiations it is substantial. Most great players start their careers by signing a 3 year rookie deal worth 3 million dollars paid when a player is 19 years old. That deal concludes when a player is 22 at which point a player, if he is good enough, then signs a longer generally 5 yearlong deal that can at times cost a team 20+ million dollars. Obviously the more players under the age of 22 a team has the lower their payroll will be. As of now the Bruins have just 1 such player while the Avalanche have 3.
As a result of that that they paid their players a total of only $54,799,000 last season which amounts to a cost per goal of $239,995. That is $42,949 fewer dollars than those paid per goal by the Bruins.
As a result of that that they paid their players a total of only $54,799,000 last season which amounts to a cost per goal of $239,995. That is $42,949 fewer dollars than those paid per goal by the Bruins.
So what does this all mean? This means that unless teams like the Bruins, Penguins and Blackhawks ditch their veteran hungry ways, they will quickly run out of money. Looking forward if the NHL continues to turn towards this rookie driven future than we could be treated to a nearly constant turnover of NHL dominant teams as the worst teams one year nab top picks the next and run away with the league for a few years before loosing their stars and falling back to the bottom.
*** Please note ***
All salary statistics for this report were gathered from Capgeek.com and Sportscity.com.
All ages of players discussed were gathered from Bostonbruins.com and Coloradoavalance.com.
All goals scored statistics discussed in this report were gathered from NHL.com
0 comments:
Post a Comment