Confirmed with Link: Kotkaniemi signs 8 year extension

[DaveG]

More details to come

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[Boom Boom Apathy]

 

[Boom Boom Apathy]

 

[Chrispy]

8 years, $4.82M AAV.

 

[cg98]

Damn what a good contract

 

[GIN ANTONIC]

Would have preferred $4.5 obviously but this is really splitting hairs. This should be great pretty soon in the future. Hope he can become a solid 2C but even if we becomes a Staal replacement at that number it's looking pretty good.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Imagine being Tom Dundon and doing silly things with the decimals on contracts just for fun, in a context where .82 means $820,000.

 

[AhosDatsyukian]

I really do like the player but there's definitely risk involved, maybe more so than I would've liked. Would've been much happier if it were closer to 4, but I still like it. Now we need to give him a legit opportunity to shine with talented wingers and more ice time. I'd really love to keep Tro but this deal makes it significantly less likely that we do, unless we're getting rid of Staal. I don't think JK sitting on the 4th line past this year would be good for his development.

 

[AhosDatsyukian]

Imagine being Tom Dundon and doing silly things with the decimals on contracts just for fun, in a context where .82 means $820,000.

Just a smart way to get JK and his agent off of their hard stance of $5M.

"We'd be happy to give you $5M but how cool does $4.82 sound!? That is your jersey number!"

 

[DaveG]

Would have preferred $4.5 obviously but this is really splitting hairs. This should be great pretty soon in the future. Hope he can become a solid 2C but even if we becomes a Staal replacement at that number it's looking pretty good.

Yep. Money is starting to normalize again in the league. In about 2-3 seasons this will be about what 3.5 mil per would look like now.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Just a smart way to get JK and his agent off of their hard stance of $5M.

"We'd be happy to give you $5M but how cool does $4.82 sound!? That is your jersey number!"

This is why they made him switch from #15. Playing the long game so they could adjust down instead of up.

 

[SoupNazi]

This is going to be a good signing in a couple of years.

 

[Big Daddy Cane]

Not a huge fan at the moment. He's slow and hasn't shown much in the way of high end skill to compensate for it. I worry that he ends up a meh 2nd line center a la prime Bjugstad that they're constantly looking to upgrade on.

They have better information that I do, though. They've made a big investment into him. I hope his upside comes to fruition.

 

[A Star is Burns]

Seems fine. Unlikely to really kill us. Can be bought out cheapish for a few years. Can likely be moved easily enough. Has a chance to be a steal if his game continues improving and he gets to play up the lineup more.

 

[BrindAmours Army]

Christ. Was stuck on a conference call when I saw the Instagram post and at first glance thought it said "8 MORE YEARS FOR 8.2!!"

Much happier with 4.82M!

 

[GIN ANTONIC]

Not a huge fan at the moment. He's slow and hasn't shown much in the way of high end skill to compensate for it. I worry that he ends up a meh 2nd line center a la prime Bjugstad that they're constantly looking to upgrade on.

They have better information that I do, though. They've made a big investment into him. I hope his upside comes to fruition.

He's an effective player, he just is getting very little ice time right now due to being pushed down by Tro and Staal. That's gonna start changing as soon as next year and then especially the year after. I have a faith in Koko Miami!

 

[AhosDatsyukian]

It likely won't make a big difference at all but I wonder if locking up JK for 8 years will factor into keeping Aho on his next contract. They haven't really played much together and don't project to but having more Finns here could help make sure Aho doesn't look around elsewhere (I don't have a big concern about this, I think we'll pay him what he's worth after this contract, but the offer sheet situation definitely has us all thinking about his next contract).

 

[Chrispy]

Not a huge fan at the moment. He's slow and hasn't shown much in the way of high end skill to compensate for it. I worry that he ends up a meh 2nd line center a la prime Bjugstad that they're constantly looking to upgrade on.

They have better information that I do, though. They've made a big investment into him. I hope his upside comes to fruition.

I think this slots much more as a 3C after Staal's contract is up and he re-signs for a smaller number, probably as a 4C like RBA ended his career. Or you think of Staal on a defensive 2nd line and Kotkaniemi on an offensive 3rd line next season.

And as I pointed out on the main board, the worst-case scenario here is that as late as 2026, you can buy him out at 1/3 value because he's still under 26. That means a buyout penalty for 8 years of $803,333.

I think Dundon can handle that if Kotkaniemi flops.

 

[MinJaBen]

It likely won't make a big difference at all but I wonder if locking up JK for 8 years will factor into keeping Aho on his next contract.

Probably the only difference it will make is in how much money we have left to spend on Aho.

 

[Nikishin Go Boom]

Koko just needs some intense skating work and speeding up his shot attempt. He’l be really good after that. Hopefully improving the skating keeps him more balanced and allows him to shoot quicker.

 

[Surrounded By Ahos]

 

[Discipline Daddy]

Love it. At worst, he's a really good 4C. But honestly any time we've brought him up into the 3rd or 2nd line, he's looked really good. I notice his net-front presence almost every game. There are still lots of mechanical things to work on in his game, but he has a lot of tools, physicality, and he puts his ass in front of the net constantly. He's still 21 years old. Most 21 year old draftees are still on their college teams or major juniors at this point. He's not a finished product. It's severely unlikely he gets any worse at this point, and I think that right now his value is pretty close to $4.5M, so this is a really fair deal.

This move was unprecedented historically, to offer l'hostile a super young player and now have him under team control for 9 years, for his entire prime. We just bought 9 years of a 3C with room to move up for a 1st and 3rd, and most teams pay that price for 25 games of a 3C.

Edit - this also is pretty amazing for the culture of our team. We picked up a dude from another team. He wasn't thrilled with Montreal, but I doubt he had much of an impression of Carolina either. Him signing for max term makes it clear that he loves buys into this team and probably loves playing here. That says so much about our culture. Except, he probably will demand a trade since we can't score and are in free fall and have lost 4 games.

 

[Svechhammer]

 

[AhosDatsyukian]

Love it. At worst, he's a really good 4C. But honestly any time we've brought him up into the 3rd or 2nd line, he's looked really good. I notice his net-front presence almost every game. There are still lots of mechanical things to work on in his game, but he has a lot of tools, physicality, and he puts his ass in front of the net constantly. He's still 21 years old. Most 21 year old draftees are still on their college teams or major juniors at this point. He's not a finished product. It's severely unlikely he gets any worse at this point, and I think that right now his value is pretty close to $4.5M, so this is a really fair deal.

This move was unprecedented historically, to offer l'hostile a super young player and now have him under team control for 9 years, for his entire prime. We just bought 9 years of a 3C with room to move up for a 1st and 3rd, and most teams pay that price for 25 games of a 3C.

Edit - this also is pretty amazing for the culture of our team. We picked up a dude from another team. He wasn't thrilled with Montreal, but I doubt he had much of an impression of Carolina either. Him signing for max term makes it clear that he loves buys into this team and probably loves playing here. That says so much about our culture. Except, he probably will demand a trade since we can't score and are in free fall and have lost 4 games.

Agree and would give you a like if I could. Especially funny looking back at all the Habs fans wondering why he'd possibly consider signing a long term deal here for less than the qualifying offer. Oh I don't know maybe because we've built an incredibly fun winning culture here. Lots of credit to Rod for that. The borg too bringing in the right types of players but I think it's probably mostly Rod.

 

[Cardiac Jerks]

His 10 team no-trade list is all 7 Canadian teams and then Montreal 3 more times for good measure.