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I'm more looking at that 4 years. Piggy nose is the kinda player you want locked down on an 8 year. Auston likely limited the team to 4. That tells me he's basically giving the Leafs 4 more years to win a cup, and if they don't, he jets on the open market.

Cya Nylander.

It's a great contract, and to be honest he's probably marginally underpaid. Veleno's defensive metrics grade our really well (amongst the best on the team) and his offense is mediocre for his ice time. He's probably worth more than league minimum, but he has zero leverage and it's a buyers market for NHL GMs right now so he had to take what he could get. Smart on his part to do a one year deal though, as he should be in line for a nice little raise if his offense improves even a little bit (the aforementioned 15 goal, 30 pt. season I referenced above). As far as Holland goes, his UFA signing at the end of his tenure in Detroit were really bad but I never had a problem with how he handled RFAs. If anything I think he probably could have stood to pay a bit more for RFAs and get them on longer term deals (the way Dave Poile did in Nashville) for guy who were obviously going to make it (Tatar, Nyquist). Otherwise, every bad deal he signed was with a UFA (Nielsen, Ericsson, Dekeyser, Abdelkader, etc.).

I do too. I'm not mad at the deal, and I like the flexibility. I also think that it's not out of the realm of possibility that he has 15 goal, 30 point upside from the 4th line with good defensive metrics. IF he gets there, and SY can take full advantage of Veleno's RFA years, then he might even become a real asset for the team. He has a lot to prove this year and his career with the Red Wings is more or less riding on it but I definitely think he's got a good shot at getting there.