Early Season Bargain Hunting

Eric Daoust

2014-10-30

NikitaKucherov

Identifying 10 players who have emerged as real bargains for your cap league.

The study of cap bargains is very interesting. The group of players that you can consider cap bargains changes every year mainly because these guys are way underpaid and eventually get paid the money they deserve. Obviously, it is important to stay on top of things to know about expiring contracts that might lead to big raises and take appropriate action to make sure your roster remains cap-compliant.

It is also important to know how to identify future cap bargains. Having them on your radar or already in-house if your league has farm rosters will help you deal with the big raises more effectively. While the pool of cost-effective players changes all the time, there are similarities in these players. Knowing these similarities can give you indications of which players can help you in the future.

With the NHL season now about 10% done, we can take a look at which players offer the best bang for the buck in points-only leagues. Using CapGeek's Bargain Hunter tool, we will look at the five best forwards as well as the five best defensemen.

Forwards

Name	Pos	Team	GP	G	A	P	ATOI	CAP HIT	VALUE
Toffoli, Tyler "	F	LAK	9	5	8	13	14.33	$870,000	$66,923
Kucherov, Nikita "	F	TBL	10	4	5	9	12.41	$894,167	$99,352
Pearson, Tanner "	F	LAK	9	7	2	9	13.26	$925,000	$102,778
Nash, Riley "	F	CAR	8	2	3	5	17.85	$575,000	$115,000
Comeau, Blake "	F	PIT	8	2	4	6	13.81	$700,000	$116,667

The trio of Toffoli, Kucherov and Pearson are all newcomers on entry-level contracts. Since neither of them was selected at the top of their draft, their cap hits end up being minuscule. Unfortunately, it is not as simple as stashing away prospects with cheap entry-level contracts because most prospects take much longer to develop and many fail to meet expectations. Each of these three players have shown plenty of great signs in the years following being drafted.

The final two players are also very interesting. Nash is in his second full NHL season and is in the final year of a two-year contract that he signed before becoming a full-timer at the highest level. Given that he was by no means proven at the time, his signing cost was obviously low. Meanwhile, Comeau is a depth player that has taken advantage of some early-season line shuffling to get off to a hot start. He is clearly achieving beyond expectations considering he has not been a factor at the offensive end of the rink since he posted 46 points back in 2011.

Defensemen

Name 📢 advertisement:	Pos	Team	GP	G	A	P	ATOI	CAP HIT	VALUE
Severson, Damon "	D	NJD	9	4	3	7	21.99	$888,333	$126,905
Maatta, Olli "	D	PIT	8	1	5	6	20.15	$894,167	$149,028
Vatanen, Sami "	D	ANA	10	3	4	7	20.09	$1,262,500	$180,357
Despres, Simon "	D	PIT	8	0	4	4	12.74	$900,000	$225,000
Gelinas, Eric "	D	NJD	8	1	3	4	16.16	$900,000	$225,000

The theme continues for the group of defensemen. Severson and Maatta are both on entry-level contracts and their respective draft positions certainly helped with their cap hits. Maatta's teammate Despres has been a pro for a few years and re-signed for cheap last summer mainly because he had not yet established himself at the NHL level.

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