No one questions that Ovechkin is by far and away the best player in the game right now (at least, I don’t question it), but will he still be a decade from now? In other words, will Ovie still be that productive in 2018, when he’s older and has been injured a few times? Generally speaking, a guy with lots of time and $$ left on his contract is very difficult to trade if the need should arise…

Don’t get me wrong–the Caps would have been VERY stupid to let Ovechkin walk, and maybe this was indeed the price of keeping him. I just wonder about the contract length, dat’s all.

http://capitals.nhl.com/team/app/?service=page&page=NewsPage&articleid=351906

(But please, no one stick a donut in your mouth and claim to be a zit. That would just be too much.)

Gretz, in terms of this being bad for the NHL, I think its important to put the Ovechkin deal in its proper league-wide context. The Caps may be perpetuating an unhealthy trend (I think they must might be), but they are by no means the only ones. There is a trend toward multi-year mega-deals –DiPietro is the most extreme example, but you can also count Briere, Gomez, Heatley…all with contracts or extensions of over five years. And don’t forget Yashin, before he had the last four years (!!!!) of his contract bought out.

The Yashin experience, I think, instructive, may provide some clues as to where this may lead. At least a few of these teams will end up eating the last few years of these deals when the players run into injury trouble of just aren’t performing or some other reason.

I like that million-dollar bill- very nice.

So…whaddya say?

Long-term deals make a little more sense for younger players like Ovechkin than they do even for slightly older players like Rick DiPetro, who will be 40 when he finishes his 15-year contract. Ovechkin will be 36 when his contract expires, and while its possible that he could be at the end of his career by then, its less likely. (BIG difference between 36 and 40 when it comes to most pro athletes.)

All the same, I can’t say I’m a big fan of these long-term contracts. They expose a club to an awful lot of risk over an awfully long time (and can also tie up an awful lot of cap room for an awfully long time), and if things don’t work out, the player is pretty much untradeable.

On balance, though, Ovechkin is probably worth the gamble more than other players are.

Say, you guys in Washington need a goalie? We’ve got one in Ottawa who seems to want to be anywhere but Ottawa…

BTW: This reminds me of our blog (except no dastardly “C”)

TG, here’s the thing: Would you rather see him wearing another team’s sweater and scoring goals against the Caps? In other words, let some other take on the risk?

I share your nervousness about injury potential, though your expectation of it seems much greater than mine. But getting hurt is a risk for every player on the ice, and I don’t see fear of injury — note, not a history of being injury-prone, just the fear of it — being a reason to avoid a long-term deal with Ovehckin.

Me, too.