That is a good point, but Subban is/was a top 2 D on MTL while Leddy is/was a bottom pairing guy on Chicago.
The season leading up to his new contract, Subban was a 0.44 PPG player with a +9 in 24+ minutes a game against the opponents best and only got a raise of 129% in the 1st year and a 87.5% raise in the 2nd year. Leddy was a 0.38 PPG player with a +15 in about 17 minutes a game against the opponents bottom six with a 200% raise.
Leddy doesn't deserve a 200% raise and Bickell doesn't deserve 400% raise next season ($600k to $3M) with an additional raise from 2013-14 to 2014-15 in a deal with a max salary of $4.5M for the final two seasons of his new contract.
My issues is two fold...1) I don't think these guys can play up to their new contracts; 2) We had a shortened season because of owners complaining about salaries, yet they continue to approve of insane deals relative to a player's production.
Yes Leddy's contract is a little high, but what do you do if you're Bowman? Let him sit out? Or wait for a possible offersheet that might be more? In the end, 200k-500k isn't all that much if you want to keep good relations with the player going forward. I believe Stan views Leddy as Oduya's replacement and keeping a top four D of Keith, Seabrook, Hammer, Leddy.
As for Bickell, you pay him what his market value is. He wanted 4 million and would have received that on the open market. If the Hawks don't give that to him they lose him and don't have a top-6 power forward in their lineup. The Hawks weren't keeping Bickell at 3 million - not after his post-season run.
The lockout had more to do with the players receiving 57% of the revenue share and contracts getting into the 10-13 year range and less to do with individual contracts becoming inflated.
