The Edmonton Oilers locked in one of their most important young stars on Monday by signing defenseman Evan Bouchard to a four-year extension worth $10.5 million annually.
It’s full price for an elite offensive defenseman, and it’s fair to ask whether Bouchard hurt the Oilers’ future cap flexibility, simply made a smart business decision in today’s NHL or both.
Speaking with the media, Oilers GM Stan Bowman said an eight-year contract – something many insiders and fans believed was the obvious move – was never a realistic option. Bouchard’s camp made it clear early in negotiations that a long-term commitment didn’t make sense for them.
“Getting him signed was critical,” Bowman said. “I guess in the negotiations, an eight-year term was never really in the cards… It’s really a function of the salary cap and where that’s going. We certainly know over the next three years, that’s going up considerably.”
Bowman said the asking price for an eight-year deal was so high that it “wouldn’t really make sense for anybody.”
While the Oilers were open to locking Bouchard up long-term, they were forced to shift gears, settling on a shorter-term deal that pays the 25-year-old top dollar now but also sets him up to cash in again when the cap is even higher.
In the short term, Bouchard’s $10.5-million cap hit will eat up a substantial portion of Edmonton’s salary space, potentially limiting the team’s ability to round out the roster. Add that cap hit to Leon Draisaitl’s $14 million, Darnell Nurse’s $9.25 million and Connor McDavid’s $12.5 million, and four players are eating up over 48 percent of the cap.
The Oilers now only have just under $176,000 in cap space with Andrew Mangiapane, Curtis Lazar and David Tomasek replacing Evander Kane, Viktor Arvidsson, Connor Brown, Corey Perry and Jeff Skinner.
With the club in win-now mode, every dollar counts in achieving Cup-winning depth. Bouchard not taking a slight haircut on a four-year deal could ultimately hamper the Oilers’ chances of capturing the Stanley Cup.
At the same time, it’s hard to fault Bouchard for betting on himself.
With the salary cap set to climb, locking into an eight-year deal now could have left millions on the table. By taking a shorter contract, he keeps his options open and ensures he can negotiate another lucrative deal when the financial landscape is even more favorable.
Bouchard is arguably worth every penny of this deal. He’s been the high-scoring defenseman in the NHL for three straight playoffs. He had the most points by a D-man through the first two rounds of a single post-season in NHL history in 24, with 20 in 12 games, and he had the second-most points per game of any blueliner playing at least 15 games in the playoffs in 2024-25, trailing only Bobby Orr.
Defensemen are also getting paid good money this off-season. Noah Dobson just got a $9.5-million cap hit on an eight-year deal, and Ivan Provorov got an $8.5-million cap hit. Bouchard went one step further with his cap hit while potentially getting another raise in 2029.
In the end, this could be a case of Bouchard putting himself ahead of the team, but it’s a savvy decision for him in an evolving NHL market, and the Oilers got their star defenseman signed. That’s good news for keeping their Stanley Cup window wide open.
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