Podcast Ombudsman Report for Blueshirt Bandwidth Ep. 92

Welcome back to the Blueshirt Bandwidth Podcast Ombudsman Report. Each week, Charlie Vidal will listen to the latest episode of the podcast and correct the record on anything Joe and Eric get wrong. If you aren't already, you can listen and subscribe to the podcast here.

More Offer Sheets?

When discussing the recent round of offer sheets being signed, Chip asked if an offer sheet yielding four first round picks as compensation has been signed before. Carlsson is actually the third player to sign an offer sheet that would have returned the maximum compensation to the team losing the player since the great lockout. 

• During the summer of 2007, Tomas Vanek of the Buffalo Sabres signed a seven-year, $7.14 AAV million offer sheet with the Edmonton Oilers. 
• Over the summer of 2012, Shea Weber of the Nashville Predators signed a 14-year, $7.86 million AAV offer sheet with the Philadelphia Flyers.

Like Carlsson’s, both of these offer sheets were matched, meaning that a maximum compensation offer sheet has never gone through. Interestingly, both Vanek and Weber ended up being traded to both the New York Islanders and Montreal Canadiens while they were on those contracts.

Joe also brought up the Joe Sakic offer sheet. Over the summer of 1997 the New York Rangers attempted to fill the Mark Messier-sized hole in the roster by adding Joe Sakic on a 3-year, $7 million AAV deal. The deal was structured with a $15 million signing bonus due within a week of signing, which Rangers GM Neil Smith believed would preclude the cash-strapped Colorado Avalanche from matching. 

While the Avalanche were losing money as a hockey team, their ownership group had just financed the Harrison Ford-vehicle Air Force One. Air Force One was a huge box office success out of the gate, giving the group the cash needed to match the Sakic offer sheet.

Once Colorado had matched, Avalanche GM Pierre Lacroix faxed Neil Smith a picture of former New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller giving the middle finger:

Finally when discussing the ramifications of the Anaheim Ducks matching the Carlsson offer sheet and what it would mean for them keeping Cutter Gauthier and Beckett Sennecke, who are RFAs this summer and next, respectively, Chip said, “you can’t have three players taking up 60 percent of the salary cap.”

Assuming that Gauthier and Sennecke were able to demand identical $18 million AAV contract extensions, the first year that they would all kick in and be paying $54 million for three players would be 2027-28. The NHL currently projects that the cap will be $113.5 million in 2027-28, so $54 million would be 47.5 percent of the cap. If the Ducks actually gave all three matching extensions, then they would set the record for the highest cap percentage paid to three players. The 2006-07 Tampa Bay Lightning hold the record with Brad Richards, Martin St. Louis, and Vincent Lecavalier combining to make 45 percent of the salary cap. Those Lightning were knocked out of the playoffs in the first round by the New Jersey Devils, and would trade Richards to Dallas for Puckdoku legend Mike Smith the following season. 

Darnell Nurse

Chip said that it could be worth acquiring Darnell Nurse if the San Jose Sharks could get him playing at the level that earned him the $9.25 million per year contract. Nurse signed his eight-year extension during the summer of 2021, at which point he was a 26-year-old who had a 25 percent expected WAR. During the shortened 2021 season, Evolving Hockey rated Nurse as the 26th best defenseman by xGAR/60 mins:

When Nurse’s contract went into effect in 2022, he was the fifth highest paid defenseman in the league behind Zach Werenski, Adam Fox, Seth Jones, and Charlie McAvoy: 

Lehigh Accolades

Chip mentioned that Lehigh has an NCAA tournament win over Duke, which was lead by the only player score a basket to give his team a series lead over the 2026 Knicks, CJ McCollum.

Artemi Panarin Goals

While discussing how Pavel Dorofeyev differs from Panarin, Joe pointed out that Panarin is more of a playmaker than a pure scorer, despite scoring 50 goals for the Rangers. His high was 49. Panarin lead the Rangers in assists in every full season that he spent with the team except for the abbreviated 2021 season, when he spent about three weeks away from the team dealing with personal issues.

NCAA Production

Joe talked about Gavin McKenna and Keaton Vearhoff’s production being lower in the NCAA than it was in the CHL during the interview with Timo Seppa, and Timo called the NCAA the “premier feeder league.” This is a fair assessment, as per Hockeystats.com NHLe (comparative equivalency to the NHL) metric the NCAA is at least 50 percent stronger than each of the four North American major junior leagues:

Top Paid Forward 

There was a question about whether Dorofeyev becoming the top paid forward will be an issue for Mika Zibanejad.

Mika Zibanejad is making $8.5 million per year, which was over $3 million less than the $11.6 million Artemi Panarin was paid under the contract that he signed with the Rangers during the summer of 2019. Dorofeyev’s $11 million cap hit will be 10.8 percent of the salary cap this season. When Artemi Panarin first signed his contract, he was paid over 14 percent of the league’s $81.5 million salary cap for the 2019-20 season. Zibanejad’s $8.5 million contract was over 10 percent of the league’s $82.5 million salary cap when it went into effect during the 2022-23 season.

84 Game Schedule

Chip and Joe questioned the reason for going to the 84 game schedule. Under the 82 game schedule, each team would play two of their division rivals only three times. Under the 84 game schedule, each team will play their division rivals four times, their conference rivals from the other division three times, and teams from the other conference twice each.