NHL Rumors: The Rapidly Changing NHL Landscape

The NHL landscape is changing quickly, with salaries going up, and how it will affect other players

Sportsnet: Elliotte Friedman on teams’ concern with how quickly the salaries have gone up and how it could affect their dressing rooms.

** NHLRumors.com transcription

Ron MacLean: “You know, on the internet you can see lol and FYI and OMG, but right now it’s AAV every two hours, (average) annual value. So what’s with all the contracts?

NHL Injuries: Sabres, Hurricanes, Avs, Panthers, Devils, Rangers, Penguins, Leafs, and Jets

Friedman: “Well, the thing is, we all knew the cap was going up, right, Ron? Like everybody knew it was coming, and everybody in the league knew it was coming, the players, the managers. Everybody knew it was coming, but everybody kind of waited to see what would happen in practice.

You know the number one thing when you talk to people right now, and it’s not just teams, it’s players too, and agents, it’s how quickly the world has changed. And go right back to (Kirill) Kaprizov on September 30th when he signed for 17 million a year, and then you take a look what happened since; Kyle Connor, Jack Eichel, you know, Luke Hughes.

Like nobody, like I don’t complain about what people make. People are worth, what somebody’s willing to pay you. But I think everybody’s kind of shocked about how quickly it happened. How much it’s changed. Usually, you get a summer to kind of process it, but this stuff didn’t really start happening until September 30th.

And I think the number one thing Ron is, that everybody’s worried about is, what is this going to do to their dressing rooms? The Jets, before they signed Connor to a deal that was very different from any other contract that they ever signed, they went to some of their top players and said, ‘Are you going to be okay if we do this?’ And they said, ‘Yes, we need him. We have a chance. Let’s do it.’

NHL Rumors: Connor Bedard, Carter Hart, and Michael McLeod

And I think that you’re seeing that in a lot of dressing rooms right now. Managers pulling their players and saying, ‘Are you going to be okay if we do it?’ And I get the sense some teams are more confident about their group handling it than others.”

Have you subscribed to our YouTube channel? Rumor roundups and hot topics from around the league. We’re also posting some stuff on Instagram.