Thanks to Leo Carlsson, the sticker shock on Macklin Celebrini's new $18.8-million cap hit is already muted. But because of the rising salary cap, there's a real chance Celebrini makes it look like an outright bargain.
If it weren't for Leo Carlsson's obstinance around getting a cap hit of at least $15 million, Macklin Celebrini would probably not be in the position he's in now.
The San Jose Sharks center, who just signed a five-year, $94-million contract starting in 2027-28, is the beneficiary of the new window on what constitutes a reasonable deal.
When Carlsson accepted the Philadelphia Flyers' offer sheet, it was universally understood as an overpayment, exactly what GM Daniel Briere needed to get the player, and at least give the Anaheim Ducks something to think about when matching.
Maybe they didn't have to think all that hard, but the idea of what an $18-million player looks like in this league completely changed overnight.
You could argue Carlsson's overpay wasn't especially big, given where the salary cap went this summer, and will go for the next two or three years – growing by perhaps more than $30-plus million by the time that five-year deal ends. And as a guy who will turn 22 in December, Carlsson obviously still has plenty of room to improve on the step he took this season.
The good news for the Sharks is that Celebrini is a year younger and took a great leap forward.
He is already a significantly better player than Carlsson and is signed for just 4.4 percent more money on a contract that doesn't kick in for another year.
By the time Carlsson's deal is expiring, Celebrini will have a year left, and that's going to be for a player who at that point should be firmly in the "best in the world" discussion.
Even better, pundits will be able to talk about Celebrini's deal as not just a solid return on the Sharks' investment, but potentially as a steal.
The big-name superstar veterans of the NHL will be able to point at Carlsson and Celebrini's deals and say, "I deserve more than that."
How much will Nikita Kucherov, Jason Robertson, Cale Makar and Quinn Hughes be able to ask for on their next contracts if two guys who can't rent a car for a few more years are making much more than them? The number starts in the $20 million range, if they want to push that button. (Like most star players, they might leave a bit of money on the table to leave some financial flexibility for their teams, but they certainly don't have to.)
But then the next summer, face-of-the-franchise players, such as Connor McDavid, Auston Matthews, Zach Werenski and Matthew Schaefer, will all come up. Some of those guys, under the right circumstances, can obliterate the $20 million threshold if they choose.
All of which is to say that because of the Carlsson deal, Celebrini – coming off the second-highest scoring season for a teenager in the Salary Cap Era, behind only Sidney Crosby – is going to be well worth $18.8 million against the cap very soon.
It might not be in the first year of the contract, just because the salary cap won't quite be where it needs to be to justify almost any skater getting that much money (16.6 percent of the upper limit of $113.5 million). But he should at least be in the ballpark, and again, that's Year 1 of a five-year deal for a kid who won't be 21 years old until next June.
Connor McDavid's cap hit is now more than $6 million less than the one Macklin Celebrini will get starting in 2027-28. (David Gonzales-Imagn Images)There's a rocket strapped to Celebrini's back, especially because the players who will be supporting him are almost universally also young, high draft picks who will be able to grow alongside him. Probably not at the same pace, because it feels like Celebrini is that Crosby/McDavid/MacKinnon brand of "special player," but guys like Will Smith, Ivar Stenberg, Michael Misa and Sam Dickinson are all high-ceiling players as well.
The idea of a justifiable $18-million cap hit in the NHL used to be out of reach for all but multiple-time MVPs, and even then, it felt like that would take more time to arrive. But Carlsson and the Flyers slammed down the accelerator to such an extent that $18.8 million for Celebrini is going to feel not just like a good deal, but an outright bargain by the end of the decade.
It's a totally new financial world. The Sharks are getting ahead of it once again.
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