September 19, 2025 by Ryan Lotsberg

The hockey world is waiting on pins and needles for any bit of news about Connor McDavid signing an extension with the Edmonton Oilers. He was eligible to sign an extension on July 1, but here we are mid-September with training camps underway across the league, and McDavid still hasn’t signed.

Every once in a while, we see a high-profile player in his prime like Artemi Panarin in 2019 or John Tavares in 2018 seek greener pastures when they get their first opportunity to do so; but players carrying McDavid’s magnitude usually avoid the stress and the hoopla that comes with delaying a contract decision until the last minute. That’s especially true for players of that ilk that are still with the teams that drafted them like McDavid is.

McDavid is certainly the biggest story in hockey right now, which is natural since he’s the best player in the world; but he’s not the only NHL superstar whose contract expires on July 1, 2026 that hasn’t signed an extension yet. 

Kirill Kaprizov, Jack Eichel, and Panarin haven’t signed extensions with their current clubs either. The same goes for Kyle Connor, Martin Necas, and Ardian Kempe. It even extends to impending RFAs like Jason Robertson.

I can’t recall a year where so much talent on expiring contracts entered training camp without an extension in place. What makes 2026 so much different than other years?

One thing is that we have expected salary cap figures through the 2027-28 season. There’s usually no word about the following season’s salary cap until around Christmas time, and it’s never usually finalized until after the season; but the league released expected salary cap figures through 2027-28 on January 31, 2025:

This matters because salaries rise as the salary cap rises. If a player is worth 10% of the salary cap right now, that will be $10.4 million next season. In 2027-28, 10% of the salary cap will be $11.3 million. Locking in for eight years at 10% of what the cap will be next season rather than 10% of what the cap will be in 2027-28 for seven years (the new maximum length for an NHL contract after this coming season) would cost a player $6.3 million. Rumours have the value of McDavid’s new AAV coming in at around 16% of the salary cap for 2026-27. Applying the same logic, McDavid would stand to forfeit $10.08 million by locking in early. The superstars in question here certainly don’t want to miss out on the opportunity for a massive payday.

Normally, star players in the NHL just sign the longest deals they can to maximize their earnings. That’s been a reliable way of doing it for many years, especially in recent years with the cap having been as flat as it has been.

Not anymore. These players can see the dollar signs beckoning in the light at the end of the tunnel, and they need to figure out how to take advantage of the rising salary cap.

A long-term deal costs teams more money. That is especially true right now because these players understand that they have an opportunity to cash in. Any long-term deal signed by any of these players now needs to reflect that. If a player feels that they are worth 15% of the salary cap, they will want 15% of the $113 million cap expected in 2027-28 rather than 15% of the $104 million cap in 2026-27. That would mean the team would have to spend 16.3% of the cap in 2026-27 to get to 15% of 2027-28’s cap. Teams might be uncomfortable with that year one spike before the cap finishes rising.

That’s why short-term deals are on the table for these players. They could sign a short-term deal that puts them in position to capitalize on the rising cap a year or two down the road.

Recent reports suggested that Kaprizov turned down an eight-year contract with an average annual value of $16 million with the Minnesota Wild. Other reports have suggested that is false information; but if that’s true, then it means the player thinks he can get more after a short-term contract or that the player wants to play elsewhere.

Evan Bouchard’s four-year extension with a $10.5 million AAV kicks in this season. He went four years because the Oilers weren’t comfortable with the asking price for a longer term.

The other unique factor in all of this is the McDavid factor. He’s the best player on the planet. McDavid would be the highest profile free agent in the history of the sport. 

McDavid will be the highest paid player in the league. As great as Kaprizov, Eichel, Panarin, and all the other stars in the 2026 free agent class are, they aren’t McDavid. Therefore, they don’t deserve to be paid as much as McDavid will be. McDavid will essentially set the ceiling for NHL salaries for the duration of his next contract.

We saw players like Nathan MacKinnon, Auston Matthews, and Leon Draisaitl surpass McDavid’s current AAV during his current contract. The cap rose high enough to allow the AAVs of those players to surpass McDavid’s without surpassing the percentage of his team’s salary cap in year one of the deal. MacKinnon’s $12.6 million AAV took up 15.09% of the Colorado Avalanche’s salary cap in 2023-24. Draisaitl’s $14 million AAV that kicks in this season takes up 14.65% of the Oilers’ cap space. McDavid’s $12.5 million took up 15.72% of the cap in the 2018-29 season. The deals I referenced above were signed multiple years after McDavid signed his deal. 

Related: Oilers extend Leon Draisaitl

Players signing at the same time as McDavid will not surpass his AAV. These players likely have ideas about what they think they’re worth, but GMs are likely waiting until McDavid signs his deal to determine just how fair the asks from their players are. Perhaps the McDavid contract is the domino that needs to fall before we see a series of extensions involving the star-studded 2026 free agent class.

The cap jumping by $8.5 million next year will put a lot of teams in a position to make a pitch to McDavid. Any GM in the league would be stupid to not make a phone call to McDavid’s agent, Judd Moldaver, if McDavid ends up being available. Negotiations around the league are at a standstill, and teams wanting to prepare themselves for a potential pitch to McDavid is likely a huge reason for that.

McDavid understands that other teams would line up around the block for his services and that the rising cap has put more teams into the equation. He has spoken about having earned the right to take his time with this decision, and he’s taking it.

Related: Deep Dive: McDavid’s Contract Options

None of this necessarily means that McDavid is leaving Edmonton. He’s clearly evaluating his options, one of which is the Oilers. He has said that he enjoys Edmonton and wants to win in Edmonton, so what’s the hold up?

Considerations involving the Oilers

When Oilers GM Stan Bowman addressed the media on Wednesday, he predictably fielded multiple questions about the McDavid contract. Bowman suggested that money isn’t as big of a factor for McDavid as it might be for other players.

“When I talk to Connor, I’ve never gotten the impression that he’s really focused on money. That’s just not so. It may be, but I’m just saying, when I talk to him, I just don’t get that impression. He’s all about winning. He never talks about ‘I need to make this much money’. The cap is going up, which I think is great for our league. It shows that the league is healthy and the revenues are growing, and when that happens, salaries escalate. How that exactly relates to Connor, he would be in a better position to answer that one than I. But I think it’s obviously better than the cap flatlining or going down.”

McDavid recently said that he deserves to be paid what he thinks he’s worth, which is absolutely fair. I don’t think the Oilers object to that in any way, shape, or form. They will gladly slide a blank cheque across the table and tell McDavid to write a number on it. Money won’t be an obstacle between McDavid and the Oilers.

What could the obstacle be then?

Bowman shed some light on what he and McDavid have been talking about over the last while. This was his response when asked if there’s any kind of sales pitch to be made to McDavid at this point:

“I think the conversations with Connor are [less of] a sales pitch and more just dialogue when he has questions. I don’t want to get into what we talk about, but I think it’s just more free-flowing conversations. I’ve gotten to know him now. I’ve been here for a year and I feel like we can just sit down and talk hockey or talk about things that are on his mind; things about the current team or the future team. I’ve done that not just recently, but also throughout last season. I find he’s got a real good pulse on the team as well. As the leader and the captain, I think he has thoughts on things, and I want to understand that so we can work together on it. I would say it’s not so much a sales pitch as it is just a conversation, and it goes in a bunch of different directions.”

This is what Bowman said in response to a question about whether McDavid’s questions are more focussed on this year’s team or future iterations of the Oilers:

“Well, it’s a blend of that. I would say he does ask me about where I envision things going, so that’s a part of it. We talk about this year too, and we talk about what we did well last year and what we think we could change or should change. I would say it’s not limited to just one thing, but it does definitely touch on the future.”

McDavid has said that all he wants is to win multiple times. Being a part of a team that will contend over the length of his next contract is clearly the most important thing to McDavid. On the surface, it would appear that Edmonton is the best place for him to win because the Oilers have come so close to winning the last two seasons. It helps that his best friend and partner in crime, Leon Draisaitl, just committed to Edmonton for the next eight years.

If we’re being brutally honest about the Oilers right now, they’re entering a transition phase of sorts. They had to shed some cap space this summer to accommodate the new big tickets of Draisaitl and Evan Bouchard, who got $5.5 million and $5.9 million raises respectively. That came at the cost of experienced players like Evander Kane, Viktor Arvidsson, Corey Perry, and Connor Brown.

You could argue that Kane missed all of the regular season last year and that he was a non-factor in the Stanley Cup Final, and he’s a 34-year old coming off a season lost due to a serious injury. Arvidsson was a healthy scratch for much of the playoffs after an ineffective regular season. Perry was great, but he’s 40 years old and his success was unlikely to be replicated. Brown ended up getting more than he’s worth in the open market in my opinion. Not retaining these players was shrewd business by Bowman, but they brought valuable elements to the table that won’t easily be replaced.

Their departures and the tight salary cap situation have facilitated the need to find value contracts to replace them. Two young rookies, Matt Savoie and Ike Howard, are going to be broken into the league this season. They have a ton of potential, but their potential growing pains could be one reason the Oilers end up taking a step back this year. Their speed and skill could also be a reason the Oilers take a step forward this year. We don’t know how that will play out.

Former Oilers GM Ken Holland made some great additions, namely Zach Hyman and Mattias Ekholm, that helped the Oilers get to the Stanley Cup Final the last two years; but none of the draft picks taken in his five years at the helm will ever contribute to the Oilers. The two that could have, Dylan Holloway and Philip Broberg, were lost to offer sheets last summer. I’m not here to assign blame to any one particular person for that because lots of people are to blame for that situation; but the end result is two young players that would’ve made the idea of the Oilers being in a position to contend for many years to come more plausible are gone.

Both Savoie and Howard were acquired in recent trades by the Oilers not just to add some speed and skill to the current lineup, but to be building blocks for the duration of a potential long-term deal with McDavid.

I’ve said this MANY times before. Long-term contenders always have internally developed prospects that emerge as key contributors. The Oilers haven’t had that in the McDavid era. The strategy has been to trade future draft picks for players that could help the team win now because of the urgency to get McDavid a Cup sooner. Unfortunately, the Oilers didn’t get a Stanley Cup win by spending all of those assets.

The cost of that, along with piss poor drafting and player development, is a depleted prospect pipeline at a time when the team is trying to convince McDavid that Edmonton is a place where he can have the best chance to win and to be a long-term contender.

Note that Oilers CEO Jeff Jackson has made a concerted effort to beef up the amateur scouting and player development departments since coming on two years ago. His first move was to fire Tyler Wright and to bring in Rick Pracey to lead the amateur scouting department and to be in charge of drafting players. He also brought in Kalle Larsson to oversee a new player development department. The prospect pipeline being dry is a known issue, and steps have been taken to rectify that issue. That has to be a part of the pitch to McDavid.

Bouchard and Darnell Nurse are the only two defencemen signed through the 2026-27 season. McDavid understands how important defencemen are to team success. He likely needs to see how the defence will evolve under Bowman. Ekholm, Jake Walman, and Brett Kulak are all entering the last seasons of their respective contracts. There have been rumblings about a desire to extend Ekholm and Walman, but nothing has been set in stone yet. Ekholm is 35 years old and coming off a torn adductor that kept him out of the playoffs until Game 5 of the Western Conference Final last spring and that hampered him during the Stanley Cup Final. Ekholm is a rock when healthy, but is committing any kind of term to a 35-year old with that type of injury a wise choice? I have my doubts. Extending Walman seems like a great choice that would boost the appeal of being in Edmonton for McDavid. 

McDavid would never publicly admit to having doubts about the viability of the Oilers being a long-term contender, but the fact that he’s having conversations with Bowman and asking questions about future iterations of the Oilers tells me that it’s something he’s thinking about and that he’s uncertain about.

We also have to remember that Oilers head coach Kris Knoblauch is also entering the last year of his contract. Knoblauch and McDavid have a relationship that dates back to when Knoblauch coached him in the OHL. That doesn’t necessarily mean that McDavid will leave if Knoblauch isn’t retained, but I’m sure McDavid wants to know what the coaching situation will be going forward before committing to an extension. 

The Oilers hired a new assistant coach, Paul McFarland, who will run the Oilers powerplay. McDavid hasn’t had a chance to work with McFarland yet. If that relationship ends up being sour, then McDavid isn’t likely going to want to stay. I don’t see that being the case, but it’s an unknown element at this time.

Related: Deep Dive: Oilers hire three new coaches

The Oilers also hired a new goalie coach, Peter Aubry, to work with Stuart Skinner. Skinner’s play has often been criticized for his lack of consistency. Many people doubt Skinner’s ability to get the Oilers over the hump and to backstop them to a championship. Perhaps a new voice will get more out of Skinner and play a role in convincing McDavid to stay. Skinner losing fifteen pounds over the summer could also help with that.

McDavid has been consistent with his messaging. He likes playing in Edmonton and wants to win in Edmonton, but he has also earned the right to take his time with this decision.

His comment about being committed to this season but anything beyond that remaining to be seen caused some panic in Edmonton, but we have to remember that he’s in the middle of a negotiation. He can’t tip his hand one way or the other, especially not in the media. He doesn’t have a contract beyond this season, so he can’t say he’s committed to anything beyond this season. It’s a meaningless comment.

I remain confident that McDavid will sign an extension with the Oilers. Bowman is confident as well. “I just go by what Connor says, which is that he wants nothing more than to win in Edmonton. So I take him at his word, and he’s going through his own process. I think you have to understand that and respect it, and I do. When he’s ready, he’ll be ready, so I realize that’s on everyone’s mind, and the media and the fans, and it’s on our mind too. But it’s one of those things where we’ve had multiple conversations and he’s been very consistent with what he’s been saying to the media as well as me, so we just go with it from there.”

The anxiety that Oilers fans feel is merited because there are a lot of unknowns regarding the Oilers both now and going forward, but I’m still confident that McDavid will sign an extension. All we can do is wait to see how it plays out.