Which players could sign an eight-year extension before CBA change?

The National Hockey League’s new collective bargaining agreement goes into effect Sept. 16, which means teams only have a few days left to re-sign a player to an eight-year contract extension before the maximum term you can extend someone drops to seven.

On Wednesday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, Tyler Yaremchuk and former NHL goaltender Carter Hutton discuss which young stars around the league could sign for an eight-year deal ahead of next week’s deadline.

Tyler Yaremchuk: We’ve got about a week left until eight-year deals are off the table. Is there a player around the league that you’re looking at and going, “Hey, I think this is a guy who is primed for an eight-year deal and should be trying to get one done — or the team should be trying to get done before the deadline”?

Carter Hutton: It’s Denton Mateychuk with the Columbus Blue Jackets. Last year, he had 13 goals and 31 points. He’s on his third year of an entry-level contract … these are the guys that you want to get ahead of.

We’re talking about the defenders who are going to pull big numbers. He’s never had a big payday, and I think that’s the carrot that you can hang in front of him, where you can say: “We can get you for eight years, put that number in the $7-to-$9-million range, this is a really big ticket.”

This is the guy who I think has potential to grow, and Columbus has got to be on him to try and get this deal done before that date.

Tyler Yaremchuk: There’s a couple of reasons why I like this as your pick.

First off: he had a great season last year. People might look at 31 points and think that’s not that impressive, but he doesn’t play on the power play because that’s Zach Werenski’s job.

When you look at five-on-five goals — not even strength, so there’s no empty netters (padding) this up — five-on-five goals by a defenseman last year, he was tied for fifth in the NHL. The only defenseman who scored more goals at five-on-five than Denton Mateychuk were Justin Faulk, Cale Makar, Jakob Chychrun, and of course, Zach Werenski. That right there tells you that they have a really, really talented player on their hands.

Secondly, I love the Blue Jackets, but you’re Columbus: If you can go and lock a guy up for eight years, you should absolutely be trying to do that.

And the third thing: As much as Werenski came out and said the right things, and said he wants to stay in Ohio, he’s two years away from unrestricted free agency. If you have Mateychuk for eight years, it’s just an insurance policy where if Werenski isn’t there, at least you can point to a guy who is 23, 24 years old and say he’s going to be the power-play guy, and he’s going to be a 20-goal defenseman.

I want to throw another name at you that’s important: Adam Fantilli. Just like Cutter Gauthier with the Anaheim Ducks, he’s still unsigned. What’s complicating this one is that Fantilli is a restricted free agent for this year, meaning he doesn’t have a contract for the upcoming season, and the Blue Jackets only have, once they send their third goalie down, $13.4 million in cap space. They’re almost in a similar spot as the Ducks where if they want to go long term with Fantilli, they have to find a way to get money off the board.

Carter Hutton: I think when you pull up PuckPedia, you look at the top contracts on this forward roster, it’s Valeri Nichushkin at 31, Charlie Coyle at 34, Conor Garland at 30, Sean Monahan at 31, those are your big four and they’re all in that $5.5-to $6-million range.

So then you start to look at the future. Where do you get that superstar talent? You still have a few guys like Kirill Marchenko who is going to be 26 when his deal is up. Fantilli needs to be signed, because no one has that superstar status. As you look forward to next year, maybe Werenski becomes that piece who has to move out to try and draw in some younger talent as you want to build.

As of right now, Elvis Merzlikins and his $5.4-million salary will be off the books, you have Jet Greaves locked up, so there’s potential to try and grow this team into something. It feels like something will have to drop for Columbus to have much of a future.

You can watch the full segment and the rest of the episode here…