{"id":787382,"date":"2026-07-08T02:40:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T02:40:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/787382\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T02:40:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T02:40:15","slug":"the-nhls-best-bargains-of-2025-26-cheapest-cost-per-point-among-forwards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/787382\/","title":{"rendered":"The NHL’s Best Bargains Of 2025-26: Cheapest Cost Per Point Among Forwards"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n By Ryan Long<\/a> |
\n at July 7, 2026 8:36 pm <\/p>\n

This offseason has focused a lot on the big names and the big contracts. From the league-altering Leo Carlsson<\/a> offer sheet to the seemingly never-ending Jason Robertson<\/a> contract negotiations, the league\u2019s stars have been in the spotlight. However, some of the most important players on a roster are those who provide the biggest bargain for their production. Tonight, we look at the top ten forwards from the 2025-26 season whose costs per point were the least expensive for their teams.<\/p>\n

List excludes players on their entry-level contracts.<\/p>\n

Marcus Johansson<\/a> ($16K Per Point) \u2014 Nobody in hockey produced a cheaper point last season. Playing on an $800K deal in Minnesota, Johansson posted 49 points, and his 0.65 points-per-game pace lapped the rest of this group. However, the list\u2019s best bargain is the only one not cashing in on an NHL raise: the 35-year-old is instead headed home to Sweden<\/a> on a one-year deal with F\u00e4rjestad BK of the SHL, likely closing the book on a career of more than 500 NHL points.
\nLinus Karlsson<\/a> ($22K Per Point) \u2014 Vancouver\u2019s fourth-line find was the first bargain on this list to expire. Karlsson parlayed a $775K cap hit into 35 points, and the Canucks didn\u2019t wait for the market to notice; they nearly tripled his salary with a two-year, $2.25MM AAV extension<\/a> back in January, buying out what would have been his walk to free agency and keeping him through 2027-28.
\nMavrik Bourque<\/a> ($23K Per Point) \u2014 Bourque gave Dallas 20 goals and 41 points on a $950K hit after taking on a bigger role during the second half of the year. He then watched that impressive sophomore season change his life in the span of a few days: Bourque\u2019s RFA rights were traded to Nashville on July 1, and he signed a six-year, $33MM contract<\/a> that pushes his cap hit to $5.5MM, almost six times what the Stars paid him to produce it.
\nParker Kelly<\/a> ($24K Per Point) \u2014 The group\u2019s top goal scorer this past season with 21, Kelly stretched an $825K cap hit into 35 points for Colorado. The Avalanche have never been shy about locking up their identity players, and they moved quickly here too, roughly doubling his money on a four-year, $6.8MM extension<\/a> that carries him through 2029-30.
\nJustin Sourdif<\/a> ($24K Per Point) \u2014 The one bargain still standing. Sourdif matched Kelly\u2019s line almost exactly, an $825K cap hit and 35 points in his first season in Washington after arriving from Florida, and unlike everyone above him, his deal isn\u2019t done. He\u2019s signed at the same number through 2026-27, giving one of the league\u2019s top offseason spenders, the Capitals, one more discounted season before his restricted free agency arrives.
\nMackie Samoskevich<\/a> ($24K Per Point) \u2014 Florida\u2019s cap crunch turned Samoskevich\u2019s value year into a trade chip. After posting 32 points on a $775K hit, the 2025 Cup winner was shipped to Seattle in June for first- and second-round picks, and the Kraken promptly paid him like the investment he was: three years at $3.85MM AAV<\/a> ($11.55MM Total Value), with a top-six opportunity Florida\u2019s forward depth never allowed.
\nMichael Carcone<\/a> ($25K Per Point) \u2014 Carcone\u2019s is the feel-good version of this story. A year after openly expecting to leave Utah, he returned on a league-minimum deal, produced 31 points, and by March had played his way into a two-year, $1.75MM AAV extension<\/a>, more than doubling his pay and cementing a roster spot that looked nearly gone twelve months earlier.
\nA.J. Greer<\/a> ($27K Per Point) \u2014 Nobody converted a value season into money faster. Greer\u2019s 32 points on an $850K deal made him a target the moment the season ended; Anaheim acquired his rights from Florida before the market even opened and signed him to a four-year, $4.25MM contract<\/a> on July 1, a five-fold raise for a bottom-six forward who picked the right year to peak.
\nVasily Podkolzin<\/a> ($27K Per Point) \u2014 The list\u2019s unique case of a player who banked his raise before earning it. Edmonton signed Podkolzin to a three-year, $2.95MM extension<\/a> last September, betting his game would grow into the number, then watched him deliver 37 points and 19 goals on his expiring $1MM hit. The new deal starts in 2026-27, and after a season like that, it might already be the next bargain on a future version of this list.
\nJamie Benn<\/a> ($28K Per Point) \u2014 The most well-known name here was also quietly one of the league\u2019s better contract values. Playing on a near-minimum deal in his 17th season, Benn produced 36 points in just 60 games despite missing 20 to injury, scoring his 400th career goal and crossing 1,200 games with the franchise along the way. And like most of this list, the number is already settled: the longest-serving captain in Stars history re-signed on July 3, one year at an $850K base<\/a> with up to $1.15MM in performance bonuses, meaning Dallas gets its captain at a discount one more time.<\/p>\n

All contract information provided by Puckpedia<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Ryan Long | at July 7, 2026 8:36 pm This offseason has focused a lot on the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":787383,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[433],"tags":[278225,49,48,146245,278226,7948,64350,146913,241263,278227,448,166520,14116,2368,82,23989],"class_list":["post-787382","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-a-j-greer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-jamie-benn","tag-justin-sourdif","tag-linus-karlsson","tag-mackie-samoskevich","tag-marcus-johansson","tag-mavrik-bourque","tag-michael-carcone","tag-nhl","tag-parker-kelly","tag-players","tag-pro-hockey-rumors-originals","tag-sports","tag-vasily-podkolzin"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/787382","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=787382"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/787382\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/787383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=787382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=787382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=787382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}