Damon Severson Re-Signed

[newarkcupparade]

https://twitter.com/TSNBobMcKenzie/status/907232936675684357

6 years...

[CommonDreads]

6 Years/$25M, which comes out to about $4.167 a year. Absolutely love it, amazing job Ray.

[Marshall]

Good and expected deal.

[MadDog2020]

Good deal.


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[DevilMinder]

Great deal. Nice job Shero

[DevsMan84]

Not entirely happy with the term but whatever.

[Devilsfan118]

Sweeeeet

3 minutes ago, DevsMan84 said:

Not entirely happy with the term but whatever.

Why not?

[Daniel]

3 minutes ago, DevsMan84 said:

Not entirely happy with the term but whatever.

The term is great and there's pretty much no possible downside.  Basically, he's getting paid slightly above an average NHL salary and later in the deal it'll probably be right at the average league salary, maybe a little less.  So even in the worst case scenario where his play falls off a cliff, he's still very tradeable, or at the absolute worst, you could buy him out without that much pain. 

But I don't expect his play to fall off a cliff, and I think he'll continue to develop into a very good defenseman.  As I keep saying, the only way this might be a problem is if Nico, Zacha and McLeod all end up needing huge pay bumps in the next two to four years.  That would be a good problem to have though.

[DevsMan84]

10 minutes ago, Daniel said:

The term is great and there's pretty much no possible downside.  Basically, he's getting paid slightly above an average NHL salary and later in the deal it'll probably be right at the average league salary, maybe a little less.  So even in the worst case scenario where his play falls off a cliff, he's still very tradeable, or at the absolute worst, you could buy him out without that much pain. 

But I don't expect his play to fall off a cliff, and I think he'll continue to develop into a very good defenseman.  As I keep saying, the only way this might be a problem is if Nico, Zacha and McLeod all end up needing huge pay bumps in the next two to four years.  That would be a good problem to have though.

6 years is just a bit much for a player that is at best a middling defenseman on most other teams.  I would have been happy with 4 or maybe 5 years.  6 is just too long.

His actual salary also increases every year of his contract.  Even if his AVV is decent, some teams might balk at trading for a player who they have to pay $5m+ in actual salary.

[EdgeControl]

That's the going rate for decent 2nd paring dmen... so it won't prevent us from an upgrade if he doesn't take the next step. He's young and won't even be 30 in your years .. it's a good deal.

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

This one's risky.  You're betting heavily that Severson is going to get a LOT better than he currently is...not saying that he can't, but I haven't seen a ton that suggests that he will.  The guy had 12 points (3 G, 9 A) through his first 15 GP (obviously wasn't going to keep up that pace), but didn't score so much as a single goal from that point on...and also racked up the minuses like no one's business.  Not saying these are the only numbers to measure Severson by, more that I don't really see what Severson did to earn this much trust so quickly.  Six years is a pretty serious commitment. 

I'm with DM84, not thrilled with the term.  All this being said, I understand fully why GMs attempt deals like this...you hope the player involved turns out to be a serious bargain down the line...sometime you just roll the dice...and for a guy like Damon, that's some serious coin for a 23-year-old...even if he doesn't improve much, that's still a lot of money he's got coming to him.  I just don't know if I would've done this so soon for Severson.   

And this is coming from someone who loves what Ray's done to date. 

Edited September 11, 2017 by Colorado Rockies 1976

[Triumph]

4.16M per season is just not a lot of money in today's NHL.  Defenders who signed as UFA age who are making that:

Dmitri Kulikov, Brendan Smith, Alexei Emelin, Kris Russell, Jonathan Ericsson, Jason Demers

And then you've got Brodin and Larsson and Klefbom as guys who signed similar RFA deals at Damon's age.

The risk isn't signing this deal, it's not signing a deal like this and waiting for Damon to 'prove himself' before signing him to a much larger deal.  In 4 years when the Devils should be good again if things go well, they'll be very glad to have Severson at this number or whatever they traded Severson's valuable contract for.

Edited September 11, 2017 by Triumph

[Daniel]

15 minutes ago, Colorado Rockies 1976 said:

This one's risky.  You're betting heavily that Severson is going to get a LOT better than he currently is...not saying that he can't, but I haven't seen a ton that suggests that he will.  The guy had 12 points (3 G, 9 A) through his first 15 GP (obviously wasn't going to keep up that pace), but didn't score so much as a single goal from that point on...and also racked up the minuses like no one's business.  Not saying these are the only numbers to measure Severson by, more that I don't really see what Severson did to earn this much trust so quickly.  Six years is a pretty serious commitment. 

I'm with DM84, not thrilled with the term.  All this being said, I understand fully why GMs attempt deals like this...you hope the player involved turns out to be a serious bargain down the line...sometime you just roll the dice...and for a guy like Damon, that's some serious coin for a 23-year-old...even if he doesn't improve much, that's still a lot of money he's got coming to him.  I just don't know if I would've done this so soon for Severson.   

And this is coming from someone who loves what Ray's done to date. 

It isn't risky at all.  So far as length, it's one more year than what Andy Greene got, and Severson's deal will be over at the time that Greene's started (age 29-30).  It's also about $1 million less of a cap hit than Greene's, and, is very close to what the average NHL salary is or will be in few years time.  So even if Severson doesn't get any better, he'll still have a place on the team, and even if he seriously regresses, it's not the type of deal that prevents the Devils from doing something they otherwise want to, unless somehow during the six years of the deal, some combination of Nico, Zacha, McCleod, Butcher and whoever the Devils draft this year are all $6 million plus players.  And if that turns out to be the case, the Devils will be in a situation where they're competing for the Cup and have to dump salary like the Blackhawks often have to (their 3 Cups and being perennial Cup contenders is a small price to pay).

[DevsMan84]

2 minutes ago, Daniel said:

It isn't risky at all.  So far as length, it's one more year than what Andy Greene got, and Severson's deal will be over at the time that Greene's started (age 29-30).  It's also about $1 million less of a cap hit than Greene's, and, is very close to what the average NHL salary is or will be in few years time.  So even if Severson doesn't get any better, he'll still have a place on the team, and even if he seriously regresses, it's not the type of deal that prevents the Devils from doing something they otherwise want to, unless somehow during the six years of the deal, some combination of Nico, Zacha, McCleod, Butcher and whoever the Devils draft this year are all $6 million plus players.  And if that turns out to be the case, the Devils will be in a situation where they're competing for the Cup and have to dump salary like the Blackhawks often have to (their 3 Cups and being perennial Cup contenders is a small price to pay).

I like Greene but if we are using his contract to justify Severson's then that doesn't make me feel any better.

[Derlique]

Severson is a borderline top pairing dman, there is no downside to this....

[Jimmy Leeds]

Same deal as Larsson.

He's no Larsson

[Triumph]

Greene is a bad example.  The risk is, what, (beyond the obvious that he gets injured at some point and can't fulfill the contract) that Severson never gets any better than he is today?  Look at the list of UFA D who make Severson money I put up there - he's clearly better than those guys today.  So it's still not a terrible use of cap space regardless - it'd be unfortunate, but it would not be a disaster.

[NJDevils1214]

I like it. Besides what has been mentioned already, this only makes NJ look that much more attractive to guys within the organizaion that need to re-sign and guys outside that might look to come in at some point. I would think that by most accounts Severson is considered to be on the upswing.

[Daniel]

39 minutes ago, Triumph said:

Greene is a bad example.  The risk is, what, (beyond the obvious that he gets injured at some point and can't fulfill the contract) that Severson never gets any better than he is today?  Look at the list of UFA D who make Severson money I put up there - he's clearly better than those guys today.  So it's still not a terrible use of cap space regardless - it'd be unfortunate, but it would not be a disaster.

The point of comparing to Greene is that Greenes deal is less team friendly, and it's  not bad at all, much less any sort of calamity.

[MantaRay]

As long as he is on the third pairing and won't be exposed to elite forwards humiliating him nightly, I am ok with this.


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[Satans Hockey]

No complaints from me, I like it. 

[mfitz804]

I would have been fine with 4-5 years, except for 4 years is probably exactly when he would turn into a somewhat elite player and then he'd refuse to sign back with us to go to his hometown. 

[Colorado Rockies 1976]

4 hours ago, Triumph said:

4.16M per season is just not a lot of money in today's NHL.  Defenders who signed as UFA age who are making that:

Dmitri Kulikov, Brendan Smith, Alexei Emelin, Kris Russell, Jonathan Ericsson, Jason Demers

And then you've got Brodin and Larsson and Klefbom as guys who signed similar RFA deals at Damon's age.

The risk isn't signing this deal, it's not signing a deal like this and waiting for Damon to 'prove himself' before signing him to a much larger deal.  In 4 years when the Devils should be good again if things go well, they'll be very glad to have Severson at this number or whatever they traded Severson's valuable contract for.

I didn't mean a lot of money in today's NHL...I mean a lot of money to a kid who hasn't really done that much in the NHL to date (though he's shown some teases here and there)...I'm looking at it from Damon's point of view.  I can understand why he'd sign that deal...pretty nice to have $25 million coming to you when you've just turned 23. 

I do think Shero could've waited a little longer...it's not like Severson was going to be a UFA anytime real soon.  It's not even a case of Damon 'proving himself', as much as it is I just would've liked to have seen more from him to this point.  No, the contract isn't crippling and will be hard to ever categorize as some flexibility-hindering albatross...and like I said in my post, I get why GMs roll the dice on these kind of deals.  I just don't think I would've done this for Severson...he just seems like too much of a question mark.  Hopefully I'm proven wrong.      

[CommonDreads]

This is the exact deal I was hoping for, the days of the bridge deal are gone because with the premium placed on young talent, if you have a young player you believe in you lock him up. If you don't, you're left with the Galchenyuk situation in Montreal where he is 100% gone after his current contract because of how the organization has jerked him around, I think Severson is already good enough to play as a #3 at least and getting that at a little over $4M is a great price tag in today's NHL, and he's only 23 with room to grow into that top pairing guy we need.

[Beezer34]

2 hours ago, Satans Hockey said:

No complaints from me, I like it. 

Same.