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Jarmo Kekalainen made news in the hockey world on Friday when announcing a lucrative six-year deal to keep Brandon Dubinsky with the Blue Jackets for the long haul.

Dubinsky's six-year pact with the team will see him compensated quite well, as he'll earn over $35 million in that span and earn an annual average of $5.85M per season.

While on first glance it may seem a little too lucrative for Dubinsky, he's better offensively than most people give him credit for. He's also a guy who can carry the mail in possession, play in all situations and is coming off an excellent playoff series against Pittsburgh, which almost certainly helped his cause.

Here's a look at the centers who have posted the most similar numbers to Dubinsky over the last season or two.

Note I: 5 vs 5 shot attempt relative is simply the amount of shot attempts more or less a player generates compared to his team when he's not on the ice. PK% is the percentage of short handed minutes a player eats up. If a player has a 50PK%, that means if his team took three minors (six minutes) he'd play three of them.



Note II: it's important to remind people that a) the salary cap is going up and; b) some contracts (i.e. David Backes and Jeff Carter) were signed a couple seasons ago when the salary cap was lower, and that they'd make more if new contracts were given out today.

As you can see, Dubinsky's 5 vs 5 production over the last two years rivals that of some pretty good players, and is higher than others such as Daniel Sedin, Alex Ovechkin, Paul Stastny and Evander Kane.

He's also done well possession wise, as the Blue Jackets get almost 3% more of the shot attempts when he's on the ice rather than on the bench. On top of that, only Frans Nielsen eats up more of his team's penalty killing minutes than Dubinsky.

Dubinsky's contract carries a pretty big ticket, but with the cap rising it'll look better as time goes on.

In the meantime, the Blue Jackets still have plenty of cap space moving forward. They used some of it to re-sign someone who they view to be a core player, and given the tough minutes he plays along with his ability to produce despite that, it's hard to argue against.

With Dubinsky signed long-term, you have to wonder if they'll turn their attention to Sergei Bobrovsky and get him extended in short order.

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