On Sunday, Nino Niederreiter signed a five-year contract extension with Minnesota worth $5.25 million per season.
In this edition of the hotstove, we share our thoughts on the deal.
Todd Cordell
I think this is a great contract for the Wild.
Niederreiter is among the best defensive forwards in the NHL -- his shot suppression numbers are spectacular -- and his offensive game has really taken off over the last few years. His point totals have risen in three consecutive seasons and last year he put up a career best 57 points, which is 1st line production.
With a five-year term, the Wild have Niederreiter signed through the entirety of his prime. By the time his contract expires, and he remotely begins his decline, he'll be off the books.
James Tanner This is a great deal for the Wild. That is a very manageable cap hit for a guy who is among the NHL's best defensive forward. He also kicks in a fair bit offensively, especially 5v5 where he had 41 points - the same as Matthews, Ovechkin, Malkin, and Forsberg.
Considering he's better at defense than all four of those guys, and put up the same even-strength points, I think he's probably underpaid by a mile.
Nino is top 20 in points/60, 5v5 points, and elite defensively. I'd rather have him on my team than either Ryan Johansson or Kuznetsov, both of whom just got eight million.
Absolute steal for the Wild here.
Peter Tessier This is fair deal and maybe perhaps undervalued Nino. The guy is a shot suppressing beast and out performs the average top winger in most categories. Now using some of the cool tools to visualize rates and numbers shows a very nice portrait of the player, they do not tell the whole story entirely.
The guy is a scorer too and probably will be more of one under Boudreau as he enters the prime years for the next 4. The wild did good with this one and there are few GMs who will love using this deal as a bench mark for future contracts.
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