Saturday, July 10, 2021

2021 NHL Free Agency Predictions

Which NHL Free Agent will make the most money in the summer of 2021? At the midway point of the season, I posted a preliminary list of predictions for the contracts of pending free agents. One notable mistake is that the salary floor is being raised to $750K in 2021/22, where I still had the floor at $700K. This required some minor adjustments on my part. 

A number of players have signed their new deals in the months since my preliminary picks, and those are listed below (with a correction for the higher floor). It might be better for my self-esteem to pretend those predictions never happened, as my accuracy was unimpressive. My biggest error was Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, who opted to stay in Edmonton on an 8 year term instead of exploring free agency. 


With any luck, my final predictions will be closer to reality. My Expected Free Agent value algorithm did assist in the values above and below, but ultimately everything was a judgement call (hence why I label these as predictions instead of forecasts). There are 2 different techniques being used here; 1) the algorithm, 2) basket of comparables, where a pending free agent is compared to similar past free agents, with an average of those outcomes. My final pick becomes some combination of those two values. I also check the required qualifying offer of RFA players.

Some of the players listed below have already indicated that they'll be returning to Europe next season, but since that information is not readily available on Cap Friendly, the names are still listed.


UFA Forwards


UFA Defense


RFA Forwads


RFA Defense


Goalies










1 comment:

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