June 25, 2025 by Eric Friesen and Ryan Lotsberg

Trent Frederic and the Edmonton Oilers finalizing a contract extension is one of the worst kept secrets in hockey right now.

Per Andy Strickland, the two sides are closing in on an eight-year, $32 million deal ($4 million AAV) on June 18. Frederic was traded to the Oilers by the Boston Bruins as part of a three-team trade also involving the New Jersey Devils on March 6. The 27-year-old had no points in one regular season game as well as one goal and four points in 22 playoff games with the Oilers.

Eric Friesen and Ryan Lotsberg debate whether that contract is fair value for Frederic, and if it’s a good contract for the Oilers.

Eric:

On the surface, this looks like an overpayment for a player who has only hit 40 points once in his seven-year NHL career. However, with the salary cap set to significantly increase in each of the next three seasons, we need to rethink what a $4 million player is in the NHL going forward. The salary cap ceiling for the 2025-26 season will jump to $95.5 million, which means Frederic will only be taking up 4.2% of Edmonton’s total cap in the first year of his new deal. That percentage will drop to 3.8% in 2026-27 and 3.5% in 2027-28.

General Manager Stan Bowman said in his season-ending media availability that he expects there to be several new forwards on this team next season. Finding a replacement for Adam Henrique as the third line centre is arguably the most important role they need to fill up front. Considering there isn’t a strong market for centres this off-season and that prospect Sam O’Reilly likely isn’t ready to handle that role at age 19, Frederic is potentially an internal solution for the Oilers that would allow them to spend their resources elsewhere.

The Oilers have roughly $10.3 million in cap space this summer, but they will likely try to move out Evander Kane and Viktor Arvidsson, who each have one year remaining on their contracts, which would open up an additional $9.1 million. Even though Evan Bouchard’s next contract will take up more than half of their available cap, paying $4 million for a third line centre who can moonlight on one of the top two lines next season is probably close to his market value.

Is eight years too long of a commitment for a middle-six forward? Yes. But Frederic makes the Oilers better right now. Additionally, even if his game starts towards the end of that deal, his $4 million cap hit won’t be a major burden on the Oilers when the salary cap is greater than $120 million.

Ryan:

If it looks like an overpayment on the surface, then it’s likely an overpayment. Frederic earned a two-year contract with an AAV of $2.3 million after a breakout 2022-23 season in which he got 31 points in 79 games. He followed that up with a 40-point campaign in 2023-24, which made $2.3 million look like great value; but he only put up 15 points in 58 games last season. Frederic had a career-high 2.11 points/60 at five-on-five in 2023-24 according to Natural Stat Trick, and his 1.03 points/60 at five-on-five with the Bruins in 2024-25 was his lowest such rate since his rookie season. His goals against/60 rate increased by 0.25 from 2023-24 to 2024-25, and it has been on the rise every year since 2022-23.

I understand that he had an ankle injury this season, but that injury did not occur until late February. The ankle injury does not explain the numbers that I just referenced as those numbers were all from games played pre-ankle injury. Players typically peak in their mid to late 20s. Frederic is a 27-year-old forward that is a year removed from what appears to be an outlier of a productive offensive season. That makes me think he’s peaked. I fail to see what Frederic has done to earn a 74% raise on his AAV on an EIGHT YEAR contract. If you’re making the argument that you’re paying for future performance, I don’t see the evidence that suggests that the Oilers will get $4 million worth out of Frederic over eight years. I can’t reliably say that the Oilers would get one year of positive value out of that contract. If you’re making the argument that you’re paying for his past performance, I also fail to see how one season of averaging just a shade under 0.50 points per game warrants an eight year contract with an AAV of $4 million.

Related: Oilers acquire Frederic

When you consider that 20 players dress every night, an average player is worth about 5% of the salary cap. Natural Stat Trick put Frederic’s points/60 rate in a tie for 342nd out of the 378 NHL forwards that played at least 500 minutes of five-on-five hockey last season. That’s FAR below average. To be fair, his career-high output in 2023-24 put him in a tie for 73rd out of 375 qualifying forwards. He has two seasons of above average production, two seasons of WELL below average production, and one season of production that was just below average. I would argue that puts him just below average, but “just below average” includes two seasons of inflated production that we aren’t likely to ever see again. 4.2% is just below average, but I would argue that isn’t far enough below average to reflect what the Oilers will get from Frederic in the future. Those two inflated seasons aren’t enough to justify an eight year contract at the reported price point.

That percentage will dip as the cap increases over the next eight years, but the Oilers are squarely in a championship window right now. They just lost a second consecutive Stanley Cup Final, and it’s the last year of Connor McDavid at his current price point. The Oilers have to sign Bouchard to a big deal this summer, which will take up nearly all of the team’s available cap space. They don’t have the cap space to be signing players for more than they’re worth right now. Frederic at this number is a mistake that would impact the Oilers’ chances of winning a Stanley Cup in 2026 negatively.

Eric:

I think we can connect the dots that Bowman views Frederic as the Kane replacement on this team. Frederic brings a similar skill set to the table as Kane, but he’s seven years younger and will be more than $1 million cheaper. He’s big, physical, drives hard to net, is always willing to drop the gloves and has a bit of a scoring touch. He plays the style of game that Oilers fans have always loved, and I’m convinced he will be a popular player in Edmonton for years to come.

As for the concern over his offensive drop-off last season, I think can be somewhat attributed to playing on a Bruins team that struggled to put the puck in the net. The Bruins averaged 3.21 goals for per game (13th in the league) in 2023-24 when he scored a career-high 18 goals, and just 2.71 goals for per game (28th in the league) last year. Now, he might not push for 20 goals with the Oilers, but I don’t think a healthy Frederic will finish in the single digits again either. I think 12-15 goals is a reasonable expectation for him, especially if he ends playing on Draisaitl’s wing on occasion.

However, his most valuable asset to the team will undoubtedly be his physicality. Look no further than the 2025 Stanley Cup Final as a perfect example of how important it is to have that type of player if you want to win the tournament. Zach Hyman, who led the 2025 playoffs in hits, suffered a dislocated right wrist after colliding with former Dallas Stars forward Mason Marchment in Game 5 of the Western Conference Final, which ended his season and severely hurt the Oilers’ chances in the Final against a punishing club like the Florida Panthers.

Frederic wasn’t much of factor in these playoffs, but that’s due to the fact that the high ankle sprain he suffered in his final game as a Bruin on February 25 never had the necessary time to fully heal. That type of series against the Panthers is where Frederic thrives, and I suspect he will see him playing with a ton of intensity and energy when the 2026 playoffs get underway 10 months from now.

I’m a fan of the player, even if the contract is slightly rich for his level of production. But he’s a player this team needs and I think his true value will be on display when the Oilers look to make another run at Lord Stanley.

Ryan:

I think it’s totally fair to call Frederic the replacement for Kane from a stylistic perspective, but his physicality doesn’t make him worth that 74% raise. He was just as physical with his $2.3 million AAV.

The Florida Panthers are a physical team, and the Oilers have lost to them in the Stanley Cup Final two years in a row; but I would argue that hitting isn’t the reason for that result. Part of the reason that they are able to hit so much is because they execute their system so well. They’re in the right positions to be able to get to puck quickly enough to make hits. Their forecheckers were able to anticipate where the play was going because they knew where their teammates were applying pressure and where the Oilers were being forced to move the puck. The Panthers played a smothering style of defence in their own zone. Hitting is a part of that, but they were only able to make so many hits because of good positioning. It’s not only being close enough to attackers to be able to hit them, but forcing them to hold on to the puck for too long because of defenders blocking passing lanes with their positioning away from the puck. Having Hyman would’ve put the Oilers closer to the Panthers’ hit total in the series, but I honestly don’t think the outcome would’ve been any different with Hyman in the lineup because the Panthers executed their system at such a high level.

While physicality is important, I really don’t think it warrants overpaying a player by a million dollars a season or more. You need to be able to do more than just hit. Kane had several big hits in the Stanley Cup Final, but he scored one goal in the series. That was his only point of the series. He also took several penalties, some of which resulted in Panthers goals that put the Oilers behind early in games. Everyone was super excited about Kane getting a chance to have an impact in the Stanley Cup Final because of his physical style, but he wasn’t all that effective. The one thing he did was hit. I don’t think the Oilers got their money’s worth from Kane in that series. Frederic also didn’t show me that he could do more than just hit. I can cut him some slack because of his ankle injury, but not $4 million by eight years worth of slack.

The Bruins scored half a goal less per game as a team last year than they did in 2023-24, which represents a 15.58% reduction. Frederic scored eighteen goals in 82 games in 2023-24, and only eight goals in 58 games. That works out a 37% reduction in goals per game for Frederic. The team’s reduced offensive output might account for some of Frederic’s dip in production, but there were clearly other factors at play as well. As I said earlier, the ankle injury happened after he played 57 games with the Bruins, so that isn’t an excuse for his regular season performance.

Wrap

While the contract hasn’t been officially signed, Frederic extending with the Oilers is all but a certainty at this point. Oilers GM Stan Bowman paid a premium to get Frederic at the trade deadline. Frederic is likely to become a fan favourite based on his positive personality and his physical playing style, but time will tell whether the contract was worthwhile or not.