NHL players who took long contracts before salaries skyrocketed shake off signer's remorse

After setting career highs with 38 goals, 30 assists and 68 points, Tage Thompson signed a seven-year, $50 million extension with Buffalo in the summer of 2022. Before it even kicked in, he topped himself again with 47 goals, 47 assists and 94 points.Thompson is under contract through 2030 at an annual salary cap hit of $7.15 million, a steal for his production and size. Robert Thomas at $8.15 million with St.

Louis and Frank Nazar at $6.6 million with Chicago are on similar team-friendly deals.They are among players who signed long term before this past summer of high spending, when Leo Carlsson’s offer sheet set off a domino effect of big-money deals. Suddenly this group looks grossly underpaid, perhaps with a tinge of regret, but also generally happy with prioritizing security for themselves and their families.“It’s tough to kind of gauge where the cap’s going to go and honestly where your career’s going go,” Thompson said. “Do I think there’s guys that wish they would have held out a little bit?

Yeah, obviously you would have liked to sign a big ticket and get as much money as humanly possible. But at the end of the day, you’re still talking about (a lot of money).”Thompson’s father, Brent, bounced around during his career on a series of one- and two-year contracts that moved the family around North America. That played into his decision to choose stability over the risk of something shorter.“When you sign it, too, there’s a big weight off your shoulders,” Thompson said.

“There’s so many things that go on inside your head. I think when you sign one of those long-term deals, it just kind of frees you up to just focus on what you can do to just help the team win and not have to worry about that next contract.”Thomas signed a few weeks before Thompson in 2022 and joked that he wished he could predict the future.“If anybody could predict the future, then I don’t think there will be guys signing eight-year deals,” Boston captain David Pastrnak quipped. It’s a little bit of luck.”Nazar signed for $46.13 million a little over a year ago, knowing the cap was going up and that he could have waited and made a little more.

He, too, set career highs with 15 goals, 26 assists and 41 points.“Obviously, no matter what, you’re going to think about it,” Nazar said.