Players contracts in the NHL may be bought out by the team in accordance with the NHL and NHL Players Association (NHLPA; their union) agreed upon Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). [The current rules of the CBA are succinctly summarized at CapFriendly.](https://www.capfriendly.com/buyout-faq) Contracts may only be bought out during a specific window of dates during the off season. Each year, the buyout period begins on June 15th or 48 hours after the Stanley Cup Final ends, whichever comes last. It concludes on June 30th at 17:00 Eastern time.
The steps to determine the buyout hit are as follows:
1. Multiply the remaining salary (excluding signing bonuses) by the buyout amount (as determined by age) to obtain the total buyout cost
2. Spread the total buyout cost evenly over twice the remaining contract years
3. Determine the savings by subtracting the annual buyout cost from Step 2. by the players salary (excluding signing bonuses)
4. Determine the remaining cap hit by subtracting the savings from Step 3. by the players Annual Average Salary (AAV) (including signing bonuses)
Elvis Merzlikins was born on April 13th, 1994. This means he’s currently 28 years old and will turn 29 this year. Because of his age, a buyout of his contract means that the cap hit for the team would be 2/3 the remaining contract value. If a player is under the age of 26, it would only be 1/3 the remaining contract value (e.g. Alexander Wennberg’s buyout).
Elvis’ contract is structured with only salary and no signing bonuses. Performance bonuses are restricted to ELCs and ’35+’ (if the player is older than 35 years of age) contracts, so no performance bonuses for Elvis, either.
[Elvis’ salary](https://www.capfriendly.com/players/elvis-merzlikins) is broken down thusly, over the next four years:
Season | (Age) | Salary
* 2023-24 (29): $6,000,000
* 2024-25 (30): $6,000,000
* 2025-26 (31): $5,525,000
* 2026-27 (32): $4,225,000
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If we buyout Elvis’ contract in 2023, the impact would be:
His contract would be on the books for 8 more seasons, until the 2029-30 season. The average annual value (AAV) of the contract cap hit would be ((6,000,000+6,000,000+5,525,000+4,225,000)x.66666) / 8 = $1,812,482 per year for 8 years.
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If we buyout Elvis’ contract in 2024, the impact would be:
His contract would be on the books for 6 more seasons, until the 2029-30 season. The average annual value (AAV) of the contract cap hit would be ((6,000,000+5,525,000+4,225,000)x.66666) / 6 = $1,749,983 per year for 6 years.
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If we buyout Elvis’ contract in 2025, the impact would be:
His contract would be on the books for 4 more seasons, until the 2028-29 season. The average annual value (AAV) of the contract cap hit would be ((5,525,000+4,225,000)x.66666) / 4 = $1,624,983 per year for 4 years.
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If we buyout Elvis’ contract in 2026, the impact would be:
His contract would be on the books for 2 more seasons, until the 2027-28 season. The average annual value (AAV) of the contract cap hit each season would be ((4,225,000)x.66666) / 2 = $1,408,319 per year for 2 years.
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The cap hit for a buyout of Elvis’ contract would range from between $1.4MM to 1.8MM (ish). There’s not a dramatic difference between those two numbers in relation to the salary cap available for NHL teams. The NHL salary cap is currently set at $82.5MM but it may go up in the next couple years. The amount it goes up is unknown, because the league is still trying to stabilize from the impact of the pandemic and revenue is in uncharted territories now that ads have been introduced to helmets and jerseys, alongside the advent of digital ads on the boards on top of the regular printed ads on the boards, etc. in conjunction with the new media package for TNT/ESPN, etc. that is more lucrative than ever. NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman just announced at the All Star weekend that the league is expecting to jump the salary cap to $83.5MM next season but that’s not confirmed yet. There’s no reason not to expect the cap to continue going up over the next few years. For the projections below, I’ll raise the salary cap by $1MM per year as we don’t have any reason to believe NHL revenue won’t remain flat or continue improving.
* If we buy out Elvis’ contract in 2023 the cap hit would be 2.2% of our team’s available salary space.
* If we buy out Elvis’ contract in 2024 the cap hit would be 2.1% of our team’s available salary space.
* If we buy out Elvis’ contract in 2025 the cap hit would be 1.9% of our team’s available salary space.
* If we buy out Elvis’ contract in 2026 the cap hit would be 1.6% of our team’s available salary space.
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**TL;DR Elvis’ cap hit if we buy him out will be about 1.6-2.2% of our team’s cap for the duration of the buyout, which comes out to between $1.4-$1.8M per year.**
The data shows a buyout wouldn’t be a deal-breaking obstacle for the team, especially with the cap expected to go up. If we consider context, like how Voracek may be done for his career, then we may have quite a bit of wiggle room with our finances.
What would you do? Would you buy out Elvis? If so, when?
by knukklez
13 Comments
I’m human and therefore not perfect. If anyone feels like checking the process, or checking my math, I appreciate it and will edit/update as necessary.
Even with his issues way too soon to say scrap the plan. Here’s the thing too I think people tend to forget…Tarasov is good but he’s had a lot of injuries so far in his young career. I honestly wouldn’t be shocked if we pick a goalie this year early in the draft like with a second pick. Yet on your discussion I think that the end of the 2023-2024 season is going to cause alot of turn over if we have a similar year like this one and Elvis would be target #1 but I extremely doubt it because this roster is much more talented than our current standings show if healthy.
Thanks for the post, this is the most detailed analysis I’ve seen around and gave me new insight into the whole process.
Personally I’d either see next year if he can still bounce back, or attempt a trade or bad contract swap. If neither happens, then consider the buyout next offseason. I’d probably end up hoping against hope that the buyout won’t be necessary.
I appreciate the overview, it’s great information to have
Like others have said, it’s probably too early to give him up. The next process for the FO, though, is going to be determining if we can use the ~3.6 million saved in a positive way or if it will be more beneficial to trade an asset(or multiple) to mitigate that loss entirely.
Before the 2025-26 season when there are only 2 years left on his deal would be when to seriously consider doing this imo. That will be when Tarasov’s current deal is over and they’ll need to make a choice on whether or not to offer him starter money if he has earned it. They should have plenty of cap to cover any other expenses between now and then. Gives Elvis plenty of time to clearly show whether or not he can work out the issues in his game too as the defense should be pretty well developed by then.
Definitely too early to give up on Elvis.
He’s been playing better recently, but it’s genuinely hard to tell with how the team is right now. Some nights, they give a ton of effort. Other nights, they leave our goalies out to dry.
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If he’s still not performing by this time next year, yeah, maybe look at options but this has been such a shitty year that I’m willing to just wait.
Ignoring whether or not Elvis ever gets back to peak form, it is better to think of a potential buyout in the context of how much total money is being committed to the goaltending tandem.
An average backup costs around $2million. A good backup is somewhere in the $3-4million range. If Elvis is bought out, you’re basically just paying whichever backup (or god forbid starting goaltender) is brought in an extra $1.4-1.8million for 2-8years.
So in order for keeping Elvis to be the better value, you essentially just need him to perform at a level that is worth $1.4-1.8million below his actual cap hit.
So which of the following scenarios is the most likely?
A $2million backup performing like a $3.4-3.8million backup
A $3-4million dollar backup performing like a bonafide starting goaltender
A $4million+ goaltender adding $1.2-1.8million of surplus value
Elvis performing like a $3.6-4.2million backup
Honestly I don’t see the point of buying him out. Just roll with a tandem of Elvis and Tarasov. We’ve got two more years of Tarasov at $1.05million. $6.45million for a goalie tandem is cheap.
We also aren’t gonna be anywhere near the peak of our cup window in the next two years, so if Elvis handles most of the workload, it’s honestly a win-win scenario. Either Elvis continues to suck, and we get better draft picks. Or he regains form, which then diminishes Tarasov’s workload and therefore his leverage for the next contract.
Its not like we’ve had magnificent defense…way too early to consider buying him out. Roll on with Elvis and Tarasave at least until next off season.
Thank god CBJ fans have no deciding power
Good god the whole teams been injured and playing like shit this season. Korpi gets traded at the deadline and Elvis becomes #1 goalie. Elvis bounces back and has a great year next year and everyone pretends they weren’t shitting on him every single day the previous season.
I’d like to give Elvis (or any goalie really..especially Tarasov) a better look playing with an actual competent defense in front of them. I don’t THINK Elvis is the answer to get us to the promised land, but I am pretty sure he’d be better with an actual structured D in front. I think he’d be a very competent back up though. Maybe not so much at his current price.
If we have to eat a cap hit, I’d rather try to retain and trade so the hit comes off our cap sooner.
Thanks for this, the Elvis contract is the number 1 thing in the cons category to their future. Lots of big things in the pipeline to be excited about. They are definitely building and developing things towards a bright future but this contract is A number 1 on things in the way of that future.