Christian Peterson/Getty Images[/caption]Even though the NHL and its players association signed a new collective bargaining agreement after the players were locked out earlier this season, teams are still signing players to long-term multi-million contracts.
The latest saw the Anaheim Ducks give an eight-year extension to their captain Ryan Getzlaf on Friday for a reported $66 million. This will see him being in Anaheim until the 2020-21 season. This sees the Ducks paying an average of $8.25 million on the salary cap each year.
Getzlaf is currently playing out the last year of his $26.6 million, five-year deal and has scored nine and 18 assists for 27 points so far this season in 22 contests. Bob Murray, the general manager of the Ducks, said the franchise is glad that Getzlaf has committed the next eight years to it and hopefully he’ll spend his entire career with the organization.
The 27-year-old hails from Regina, Saskatchewan in Canada and at the time of the contract extension, he had played in 534 regular season games with the team. He had scored 146 goals and added 353 assists for a total of 499 points.
If he had played out his contract, he would have been eligible for unrestricted free agency during the upcoming summer. However, Getzlaf said he and his family love living in the Anaheim area and wanted to remain there.
This is the main reason he signed the maximum-length contract allowed by the new collective bargaining agreement and it will likely see him retire as a member of the Ducks when it expires; unless of course, he extends the deal again.
Anaheim is off to its best start in franchise history with a mark of 16-3-3. Another Ducks player, Corey Perry, is also set to become a free agent during the summer and it’s unclear if he’ll re-sign with the team or test the waters.
Perry currently makes $4.8 million per season, but he will undoubtedly be asking for a raise when his contract expires, especially since Getzlaf will be making over $8 million. However, the Ducks might not have enough salary cap space to sign him. Getzlaf said he hopes his teammate and the club can come to a new contract agreement.
They were teammates on the Ducks’ Stanley-Cup winning squad in 2007 and also played together for Canada in 2010 when they won the gold medal at the Winter Olympics. Getzlaf and Perry were born within six days of each other and are close friends.
Some hockey experts figure that Getzlaf could be a candidate for the Hart Trophy this season as the league’s MVP if he keeps up his fine play and scoring pace. The Ducks haven’t fared too well in the postseason since winning the Stanley Cup, as they’ve won just one playoff series since.
Anaheim shouldn’t have any problem making the playoffs in the shortened season this year. With the season almost at the halfway-point, they would need to collapse to miss the post-season.
