NHL contract grades: Panthers spend big for Brad Marchand, but so what?

The contract Forward Brad Marchand signs a six-year deal with a $5.25 million AAV with the Florida Panthers.

Mark Lazerus: There will come a time, maybe a few years from now, when the Florida Panthers incredibly expensive chickens will come home to roost.

When Sam Bennett, Sam Reinhart and Carter Verhaeghe are each 36 years old and posting 30ish regular-season points while making a combined $23.625 million.

When Aaron Ekblad is dragging down the blue line, barely mobile at 36 years old, also making $6.1 million.

When Brad Marchand is getting Bobby Bonilla payments after being bought out at, say, age 41 with a couple years left on his $32 million contract.

Advertisement Yes, the Panthers will eventually pay for all this.

But who cares? Florida is in the midst of a run of absolute dominance, having made three straight Stanley Cup Final appearance and having won two straight championships.

Thanks to the culture theyve built in what was once the undisputed laughingstock of professional sports, the undeniable allure of a sunny and warm winter and, yes, the advantage of being in a state with no state taxes, they can keep running it back.

The Chicago Blackhawks of the early 2010s had to dump a key piece of their team every summer.

Heck, after the 2010 championship, they shed 11 regulars and still were stuck in cap hell for years to come.

The Penguins of the late 2010s endured a similar fate.

Even the Tampa Bay Lightning had to get a little creative and a little ruthless in the early 2020s.

Weve never seen a truly elite team (with apologies to Toronto) run it back over and over again like this in the cap era.

But Bill Zito and the Panthers are doing it.

Theyre keeping the band together and making a run at being the first true dynasty (dynasties, by definition, do not yield power for a year here or a year there) in the NHL since the 1980s Islanders ripped off four championships in a row.

Yes, yes, the taxes play a role in this, and Canadians and New Yorkers and Californians and Pennsylvanians and so many others are justifiably rankled by it.

But its about more than money.

Bennett could have gotten $10 million or more on the open market; instead, he stuck around for an eight-year deal worth $8 million a season, recognizing that no team suited him better.

Ekblad could have gotten around $9 million the going rate for top-pairing defensemen had he tested free agency; instead, he stuck around for an eight-year deal worth just $6.1 million, sticking with the only franchise hes ever known and ever wants to play for.

Advertisement Now Marchand, coming off a spectacular playoff run, during which he turned back the clock with 10 goals and 10 assists in 23 games including six goals in the Stanley Cup Final is sticking around, too.

Zito got the hat trick, re-signing all three of his big pending UFAs, keeping the team and its brash, fun-loving, DQ-downing, winning culture together.

Marchand could have done the ultimate heel turn and joined the Maple Leafs, who have been searching for a Marchand-type forever.

He could have signed with any number of teams and cashed in one last time.

But instead, he decided to stay in Florida.

The Panthers style suits him.

The Florida lifestyle does, too.

Chasing championships does most of all.

Signing Marchand a few months ago seen as little more than an erstwhile icon in decline to a six-year deal is absolutely bonkers.

Frankly, all of these long-term commitments the Panthers are making are, to varying degrees.

This could all end very badly for Zito and the Panthers.

But if they have their names on the Stanley Cup three or four (more?) times by then who cares? Totally worth it.

Contract grade: B+ Sean Gentille: From the outside, its hard to say just when it happened.

Was it the lap with the Stanley Cup? Was it the mid-celebration Instagram troll job? Was it the Dairy Queen affair? Its clear, though, that at some point over the last month or so, Marchand sticking with the Panthers went from possibility to probability to certainty.

My bet, for the record, is that the die was cast when Ekblad agreed to a deal with a $6.1 million AAV.

After that, Floridas math got a lot simpler.

By the end of it all, Marchand made a decision similar to Ekblads: prioritizing term (the deal will last through his age-43 season) and team (Florida, more than ever, is locked in as the leagues 10-ton gorilla) over annual value.

Advertisement That, as we heard at various junctures, wasnt always a given.

Marchands talents will put him in the Hockey Hall of Fame someday, and theyve certainly made him a fabulously wealthy man, but he also never quite landed a mega-deal.

He came closest in 2016, re-signing with the Bruins for eight years and $49 million a number, on a team led by the similarly underpaid Patrice Bergeron, that did the front office a favor.

Hes in a similar position today, but not an identical one.

Great as he was with the Panthers after they acquired him Boston at the deadline, hes still been in decline as a regular-season point-producer for the last five years.

If he stabilizes at a 60-to-70-point pace for the next few years, though, while continuing to elevate his game in the playoffs, something tells me Zito will look at it as money well spent.

For years, Marchand was a superstar paid like an elite complementary piece.

Now, hes an elite complementary piece whos basically paid accordingly.

One of the biggest reasons to like this deal for Florida is what it means for Anton Lundell.

Paul Maurice spoke during the playoffs about how the Panthers acquired Marchand in part for what they believed he could do for Lundell, their still-developing 23-year-old center.

Maurice and Co.

believed he had plenty more to give as a point-producer.

Lundell, centering Marchand and Eetu Luostarinen, had 18 points in 23 playoff games, looking more and more like a true do-everything piece down the middle.

For Florida, the give-back is a year or so in term.

Marchand has plenty left in the tank, especially on a team on which he doesnt need to be the second-best forward in the lineup, and betting against him would be foolish.

Its also not terribly likely that hes a $5.25 million player in five years.

Make no mistake: Absolutely none of that matters.

Florida is chasing history now, and what Marchand added tangibly and intangibly aids them greatly in the quest.

To criticize this deal on the basis of what it might look like in 2030 would be pure, uncut loser energy and an utter waste of time.

Marchand and the Panthers works.

Both sides have proof of concept.

Why mess with that type of success? Contract grade: A- (Photo: Carmen Mandato / Getty Images).

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