Capped: The Value of PK Subban
Eric Daoust
2014-08-07
What does Subban’s new deal mean for his cap league value?
One of the big stories of the summer has been the signing of P.K. Subban to an eight-year, $72-million contract with the Montreal Canadiens. Judging by the amount of activity discussing the topic on the forum, this is clearly a controversial contract signed by a controversial defenseman.
The contract itself is massive to say the least. Its length is the maximum allowed and the cap hit of $9 million is the highest among all defensemen by a fairly wide margin. Subban only trails Alexander Ovechkin and Evgeni Malkin in cap hit among all NHL players.
42
55
5
53
86
101
14
6
170
4.00
MON
82
10
43
53
-4
81
135
125
23
0
204
9.00
PHO
82
8
45
53
-23
63
22
105
31
0
241
5.25
STL
81
8
43
51
20
32
24
164
18
1
164
6.50
COB
75
7
44
51
0
61
101
73
28
0
166
5.50
What really stands out in this list is the difference in cap hit between Subban and some star-level defenders producing equally. The same story will repeat itself in offense-heavy formats as well as multi-cat. There are simply other top-level options out there that cost much less.
Over time, the other star defensemen will have their current contracts expire and will obviously cash in, in some cases at a much higher cap hit than Subban's $9 million. Unfortunately, that day is not coming any time soon. Among the defensemen listed above, only Yandle (2016), Wisniewski (2017), Hedman (2017) and Karlsson (2019) have their current deals expire before 2020. The full list of top paid defenders can be found here.
Clearly, Subban will remain the top paid defenseman for a while. In fantasy hockey time is an underrated factor in determining player value. Simply put, too much time will pass before Subban's cap hit becomes more normal compared to his elite peers. This hurts his fantasy value.
Conclusion
Even though Subban's new contract hurts his value among star defensemen, it does not mean he should not be owned. It just means that his trade value or draft position should be adjusted accordingly. If you can draft him in a good spot after the other top blueliners are gone, you can make it work by doing your homework and discovering cap bargains in your league format. Much like NHL teams, fantasy teams go beyond one single player. In cap leagues everything hinges on finding the right balance throughout the roster to combine good production with a legal budget.
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