The Hockey Economist's Thought Factory: 2023 Final NHL Free Agent Contract Predictions

Welcome to my final 2023 NHL contract predictions, which will have a very high correlation to my preliminary list published on New Year’s Eve. That list was made using data from the second half of 2021/22 and the first half of 2022/23. This one will only be using data from the most current season and are ostensibly an upgrade to my original list. I recently modified my “Expected Free Agent Value” models to ensure that an equal amount of the most recent deals are above and below expectation. Some regression lines were moved to account for market evolution.

I’ve been doing these annually for a few years now and employ two different methods to reach my final decision on each deal. The first method is compiling a list of comparable stat lines for players of that position and age, then averaging the outcomes. The comparables average is then compared to my “expected free agent value” algorithm outputs, and my final prediction will generally fall somewhere between those two values. A predicted term is also included, because for older players, more term is often offered to lower annual cap hit.

One potential flaw in my mid-season numbers was that my comparable lists used too much data from lower scoring seasons. The last two years has seen a boom in goal scoring, meaning that 80 points is not worth what it was formerly worth. My free agent value algorithm has been modified to account for this deflation in cap hit per point, but the comparable lists were not. To fix this in the future, I created a PTS2023 variable to standardize scoring across the entire salary cap era. This will also be accounted for in future best and worst contract rankings.

My models are currently tuned so that as new contracts are signed, I can immediately and easily run them through career modelling and contract grading worksheets, assigning expected value and a grade to each new deal. It’s in my toolbox to assign a grade to all the predictions below, but for the most part, if a player signs for that precise amount, it’s unlikely to earn a failing grade. Those who get substantially more term or cap hit than the projected number (especially older players) are more likely to show up on a future worst contracts list.

It should also be noted that the Cap Friendly “qualifying offer calculator” was consulted, and some of these “predictions” are higher than my inputs desired. Some examples are Jesse Puljujarvi, Denis Gurianov, Travis Dermott, and Max Comtois; but it’s more likely than not that all of them receive qualifying offers. There’s more on the list, but they’re all at the lower end of the salary spectrum. The only player whose predicted outcome is lower than their required QO is MacKenzie Blackwood. I think there’s maybe a 5% chance they qualify him at a $4M price tag.

To view last summer’s list, click here. I will also be posting a preliminary list of 2024 predictions, but that won’t be coming out until June 30th (possibly sooner if I finish early).

UPDATE: It was announced on June 1st that Patrick Kane had hip surgery and will be out 4-6 months. So I'm revising my Kane prediction to be 1 year $4M, possibly less. I think he'll sign a cheap "prove it" deal to play on a really good team that might be tight against the salary cap.

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