Hedman at 6.5/year. I don't think so.
More or less?
My reasoning. Doughty is making $7M, Karlsson is making $6.5M. Subban is making $9M. Hedman will be ufa at age 27. So if you give him the max 8 year deal, that will be $52M. That means when he's 35, the cap hit will be $6.5M.
However the structure of the contract could be:
7, 7, 8, 8, 7, 6.5, 4.5, 4.
Since his contract is up in 2 years, it does depend where the cap is going to be set at. If I was Yzerman, I would talking to both Stamkos and Hedman's agents, explaining that the goal is to win a Cup or two, and in the salary cap era, a few key players cannot eat up the majority of the salary. Basically you're asking the players to take less to win. A good GM and team will convince players to do so. Detroit did it for years, the Hawks did it for awhile.
If the cap does go up to $77M when Hedman is a UFA, then if Yzerman wants to max out his cap, Hedman can make up to $8M/year. But that would mean Hedman would be getting paid $9.5M at his peak, and $5.5M when he's turning 35. The point of giving a max term contract is to save some cap space. If you give a huge AAV at max term contract, then the contract becomes immovable and huge buyout hit later.
I'm not a fan of Kopitar's contract because his salary when he's 35 is $7M. Stamkos is 3 years younger, so he'll be 32 when he plays the 8th year of his contract, so there's less risk of getting burned on a gargantuan contract.
If Stamkos takes less money, then there could be more for Hedman. But hopefully, it would set the team atmosphere, that even the captain and superstar player is willing to take less money for the team to win. Hedman may follow suit. Hedman has not shown any indication that he is the type of player that wants superstar money and has to be one of the top paid dmen in the league.
For me, the harder one to convince is Kucherov, to take a 2 year contract at a lower rate, and then pay him more later. If he does put up obscene numbers in the next couple of years, it'll cost $6M+ per year to re-sign him.
What ties Yzerman's hands for Hedman's contract is that Garrison and Carle have NTC's, so he will have to ask them to waive it. Filppula has a NMC, so technically, he could be buried in the minors, like how Bickell is for the Hawks. If he gets picked up on waivers, then it creates some cap room. But Filppula may have to be moved this year if Kucherov insists on a contract like Barkov's. Or it means there's less cash to spend on a replacement for Coburn. Tough to find a good top 6 d that will play for $3M/yr. Unless you're able to find a gem out of Europe or the KHL.
What would require a ton of trust, is if Hedman signs a one year extension now at $6M. Then he could be come a UFA when Garrison and Carle's contracts are up. Then giving him $7.5M-$8M AVV wouldn't be such a cap strap on the team.
If Hedman won't sign a 1 year deal, and Kucherov wants $5M+ AVV for his next deal, then trading Kucherov for Shattenkirk could make sense. But Shattenkirk is a UFA at the same time that Hedman is. So it would be better to trade for a d that has 3 years left on their contract. But Shattenkirk is a RHS, which is pretty hard to come by.
