Is Zeev Buium's $75 Million the Going Rate for D-Men?

Something feels a little strange about the Vancouver Canucks giving Zeev Buium an eight-year, $75.04-million contract and then immediately having people explain why $9.38 million a season might be a pretty reasonable number. Buium is 20 years old. He has played 76 NHL games. He has 26 points.

How much does the rising salary cap impact players’ contracts right now?

And yet here we are. The contract doesn't begin until 2027-28, and that's an important little detail. By then, the NHL salary cap is scheduled to be considerably higher. The league and NHLPA have already established a $113.5-million upper limit for that season. So $9.38 million is going to represent a smaller piece of the cap than it does today.

That is one of the good things about this contract from Vancouver's point of view. The Canucks are buying eight years of a player who is still only 20. If Buium develops into the top-pair defenceman Vancouver believes he can become, the back end of this contract could look awfully attractive. He will be 29 when it ends.

That's the dream with these contracts. You pay for the player you hope he becomes, not necessarily the player he is today.

Buium has the potential to become a difference maker for the Canucks.

And there is plenty to like about Buium. He was a first-round pick; he had an outstanding career at Denver; he has already played internationally for the United States; and Vancouver clearly sees him as part of the young core it wants to build around.

But here's the other side of the ledger. Twenty-six points in 76 NHL games is not exactly $9.38-million production. Last season, he had 12 points in 45 games after arriving in Vancouver. Projections are all over this contract. That's where the risk lives.

If Buium becomes a legitimate No. 1 defenceman, Vancouver may eventually look back at $9.38 million and wonder how it got him so cheaply. If he becomes merely a good second-pair defenceman, the number will feel considerably different.

Buium’s contract is a fascinating sign of the NHL’s times.

When did $9.38 million become normal money for a player who has barely begun his NHL career? Partly because of the salary cap. It is rising. Contracts that looked enormous five years ago don't necessarily look enormous today. And eight years buys Vancouver something valuable: cost certainty through Buium's prime years. That's the upside.

The downside is that Vancouver has committed a very large chunk of future cap space to potential rather than production. Darnell Nurse is in the conversation here, too. We have spent years talking about whether contracts like Nurse's become difficult because teams are paying today for tomorrow's player.

Now everybody seems to be doing exactly that. Maybe that's simply where the NHL has gone. The interesting thought is whether we’re watching the definition of an NHL overpayment change in real time.

Buium is getting paid for what he produces in the future.

The interesting question isn't whether Buium is worth $9.38 million today. He isn't being paid for today. He's being paid for what Vancouver believes he will be when this contract really matters.