Flip Side of the Ryan Smyth Coin
Earlier I blogged about the winners and losers of today’s trade deadline. After including the Edmonton Oilers in the losing column, I’ve done plenty of thinking about the Ryan Smyth trade. While I’ll let the reader draw final conclusions at his or her own discretion, I decided I at least owe it to offer the other side of the argument.
Let’s assume that it would have taken about $5.5 million annually to keep Smyth in Edmonton. That seems to be the number thrown about these days. Now, not to diminish the value of Smyth’s attitude, his heart and soul, his intangibles, and of course his hairdo, but is $5.5 million a good number to throw at a player with a career high 70 points back in 2000-01?
I took a look at other players making at least $5 million this year as a fair comparison. That list is 44 players long. 27 forwards, 10 defencemen, 7 goalies. (if we make the list $5.5 million or higher we cut the list down by 4 goalies, 9 forwards and 2 defencemen). Though there are certainly some stinkers on the list, by and large this is the cream of the crop of the NHL; the best of the best of the best.
I’ll leave it to the reader to decide where on this list Smyth aught to reside. His current pace (31 G, 22 A, 53 PTS in 53 GP) plus his grit, determination and leadership will certainly earn him a fat raise. Did Kevin Lowe ultimately make the right decision getting what he could for the face of his franchise? Who will he spend that cap space on next year if not Captain Canada?
You be the judge. Here is the list of 26 forwards, plus Smyth, making $5 million or more this season and their current production (NB: “making” in this article refers to cap hit, not actual salary):
| Player | Salary | GP | PTS | PTS/GP |
| Iginla, Jarome | $7,000,000 | 52 | 72 | 1.385 |
| St. Louis, Martin | $5,250,000 | 64 | 85 | 1.328 |
| Savard, Marc | $5,000,000 | 62 | 82 | 1.323 |
| Lecavalier, Vincent | $6,875,000 | 64 | 84 | 1.313 |
| Thornton, Joe | $6,666,667 | 63 | 80 | 1.270 |
| Briere, Daniel | $5,000,000 | 62 | 77 | 1.242 |
| Hossa, Marian | $6,000,000 | 65 | 80 | 1.231 |
| Havlat, Martin | $6,000,000 | 40 | 49 | 1.225 |
| Sakic, Joe | $5,750,000 | 63 | 75 | 1.190 |
| Selanne, Teemu | $6,000,000 | 64 | 75 | 1.172 |
| Gaborik, Marian | $6,333,333 | 29 | 33 | 1.138 |
| Sundin, Mats | $6,333,333 | 56 | 58 | 1.036 |
| Tanguay, Alex | $5,250,000 | 62 | 63 | 1.016 |
| Smyth, Ryan | 53 | 53 | 1.000 | |
| Bertuzzi, Todd | $5,269,000 | 7 | 7 | 1.000 |
| Jokinen, Olli | $5,250,000 | 63 | 61 | 0.968 |
| Elias, Patrick | $6,000,000 | 61 | 58 | 0.951 |
| Kovalchuk, Ilya | $6,389,260 | 65 | 61 | 0.938 |
| Richards, Brad | $7,800,000 | 64 | 60 | 0.938 |
| Forsberg, Peter | $5,750,000 | 45 | 42 | 0.933 |
| Yashin, Alexei | $7,415,067 | 42 | 38 | 0.905 |
| Gomez, Scott | $5,000,000 | 55 | 49 | 0.891 |
| Gagne, Simon | $5,250,000 | 62 | 52 | 0.839 |
| Naslund, Markus | $6,000,000 | 62 | 51 | 0.823 |
| Nash, Rick | $5,400,000 | 56 | 39 | 0.696 |
| Tkachuk, Keith | $5,700,000 | 62 | 43 | 0.694 |
| Fedorov, Sergei | $6,080,000 | 54 | 37 | 0.685 |