If you thought we were getting treated to another Mikko Rantanen-sized drama with Martin Necas and the Avalanche, you thought wrong.
Necas started out his 2025-26 contract year on a career pace, and he’s played an integral role on the Avalanche with nine goals and 17 points in 13 games. You’ll recall that last season, when the Avalanche were in a similar predicament with Rantanen, they opted to trade him and acquire Necas in that three-way blockbuster.
Necas was the latest of many stars opting to extend rather than explore the new market this offseason. Kirill Kaprizov kicked things off preseason with a record-breaking eight-year contract carrying a $17 million average annual value; Connor McDavid followed up in a different direction with a two-year, $12.5 million AAV bridge deal the day before the start of the season.
Since then, things have been all over the map: Jack Eichel’s eight-year, $13.5 million AAV deal, Kyle Connor at eight years with a $12 million AAV, Logan Cooley at eight years and a $10 million AAV, Lane Hutson at eight years and an $8.85 million AAV, Thomas Harley at eight years and a $10.5 million AAV.
These deals are revealing three patterns across the board, though, as we prepare for the new collective bargaining agreement that goes into effect next year: Anyone not named McDavid is valuing term above all else, signing bonuses are being utilized more and more, and wait, uhh, what are we going to do in early July when we look around and realize that all of the big names are already locked down?
You would think, with the salary cap increasing, that players would be itching to reach unrestricted free agency, but that hasn’t happened.
In Rantanen’s case, he ended up extending with the Stars for even less than the Avalanche were offering. It was relatively unprecedented and messy because the NHL as a whole was entering a new era with a new CBA looming, significant cap increases and greater player agency.
The Avs didn’t even feel pressured to trade Necas or risk losing him for nothing to free agency at the end of the year. Necas and the Avalanche agreed to an eight-year extension with an $11.5 million average annual value long before trade deadline anxieties even had a chance to pop up.
Some of these deals were as juicy as we expected with the cap rising: Kaprizov’s contract is the highest AAV and total amount of cash in NHL history; Eichel’s is 13 percent of Vegas’ cap space; McDavid’s is a different kind of juicy in that it affords him flexibility and time to win.
But next July won’t look all that different from last offseason, where not much was cooking except the Mitch Marner saga. Even that ended up in a trade. Why all the in-house extending and trades over the good, clean, fun of a free-agency slate recently?
The new NHL CBA, kicking in September 2026, eliminates eight-year contracts. The new maximum term will be seven years for re-signing players and six years for players joining a new team. The NHL is hoping to curb cap circumvention and promote greater fairness with new rules such as a seven-year max, phasing out deferred salary payments, and introducing a playoff salary cap.
For us, that means a few boring free-agency years. For the players—especially some “older” stars like Eichel and Connor, that means squeezing in the last opportunity for an eight-year maximum. It has changed the complexion of negotiations for the time being, and teams have been able to leverage players’ last chances at eight-year deals for more peaceful in-house negotiations.
Don’t panic about a future full of perpetual boring NHL transactions just yet. Considering how barren the free-agency field was last year, and will be this year, plenty of playoff teams—bubble and contender alike—have roster work to do.
Take the Leafs: They’re trending up, but if Chris Tanev’s injuries and the Marner-sized hole on the power play persist, there’s no way they aren’t making several moves at the deadline. The Wild must improve, especially considering the financial pressure and optics of Kaprizov’s extension.
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Unmet needs will be addressed, and we’ll see the trade market used more creatively—and potentially more aggressively—than in the past few years.
Further, free agency isn’t cooked forever. Like most of the bigger changes that come with a new CBA, it takes a few years for everyone to settle in and find a groove—which is partially why some of these deals are all over the board.
The end of the eight-year max is by far the biggest reason the past two free-agency periods have been duds. Once players and agencies get used to the seven-year max, the higher cap will once again incentivize them to hit the free market.
Let’s enjoy some wacky trades in the meantime.