Carolina Hurricanes may have just helped the Blackhawks afford Connor Bedard long-term

PUBLICATION

Daniel Lucente
September 3, 2024 (5:50 PM)

SHARE THIS STORY

The way the Carolina Hurricanes have just deferred Seth Jarvis' latest contract could be the model the Blackhawks use when they have to re-sign Connor Bedard.

The Carolina Hurricanes made the surprise announcement of a new star forward deal for Seth Jarvis Saturday morning. It was an eight-year deal worth $63.2 million. Usually, that would carry a cap hit of $7.9 million annually, but the Hurricanes will only be on the hook for a $7.42 million cap hit. Why the discrepancy? It's all about a creative financial trick in the way deferred payments work in the Jarvis deal.

It includes $29.24 million in signing bonuses, some of which are deferred. As Frank Seravalli has reported, and PuckPedia has explained, the deferrals serve as a cap hit reduction that helps the Hurricanes work with their salary cap situation more effectively.

This isn't a new use of deferred payments, but the Hurricanes did something very similar with defenseman Jaccob Slavin earlier this summer, albeit to a far lesser extent when it comes to the final cap hit. The NHL's collective bargaining agreement does permit deferring payments longer than the standard eight-year contract term, allowing teams to minimize the immediate financial load in-house.

This is similar to how the Los Angeles Dodgers tried to work their way around the luxury tax situation involving Major League Baseball's rules with Shohei Ohtani's contract. On a minuscule scale, yes, but the Hurricanes' means of handling Jarvis do show that same level of creativity in working around financial issues.

Moving forward, this may impact the Chicago Blackhawks as they look to sign emerging star Connor Bedard to his next contract. Given Bedard's next contract is expected to be huge, perhaps the Blackhawks take on a similar type of deferral in the future to soften their cap hit. The more teams that do it, the more this will be commonplace in the NHL.

Could the NHL possibly look into this loophole during the next round of collective bargaining agreement discussions? It remains to be seen.

Source: Sports Mockery
Carolina's Trending New Cap Circumvention Technique Could Allow Blackhawks To Afford Connor Bedard's Next Deal