Seth Jarvis Contract Tables Unique Structure Option for Devils & Dawson Mercer

The Carolina Hurricanes announced on Saturday that they’ve agreed to terms with Seth Jarvis on a new long-term contract. Jarvis’ new deal has a unique structural option that the New Jersey Devils can look into with forward Dawson Mercer.

Carolina and Jarvis agreed to an eight-year contract worth $63.2 million dollars. Usually, that would mean that the contract carries an average annual value (AAV) of $7.9 million per year. However, as first reported by Daily Faceoff’s Frank Seravalli and later — mended and confirmed by Chris Johnston, the AAV is actually $7.42 million due to money deferred in the contract.

Both the NHL’s Central Registry and the NHL Players’ Association have been briefed and signed off on the structure.

This actually isn’t the first time this has happened under the new collective bargaining agreement (CBA). Seravalli reports the Hurricanes already did this on July 1st with Jaccob Slavin. However, the deferred money wasn’t significant enough to catch anyone’s attention.

This isn’t the same as Ilya Kovalchuk‘s rejected, 17-year contract, either. That deal was extremely front-loaded in the first 10 years of the contract which was in violation of the previous CBA. Kovalchuk would have earned $95 million over the first 10 years and just $7 million over the final seven years.

Instead, in today’s CBA there’s nothing against what the Hurricanes did with Jarvis. Basically, Carolina will take a sprinkle of what Jarvis is owed (about $400K each season), hold onto it, and pay it to him following the conclusion of the eighth year of his contract.

In other words, this is quite similar to what the New York Mets did with Bobby Bonilla and the Los Angeles Dodgers are currently doing with Shohei Ohtani. It’s just much smaller scale.

So what does this all mean for the Devils and Dawson Mercer?

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Well, it basically means the Devils could dip their toe in these waters as well, if each side believes it makes sense.

The Devils currently own $4,976,103 in cap space.

AFP Analytics projects Mercer to earn a $3,793,680 AAV on a short-term, two-year contract — or a $6,521,182 AAV on a long-term, six-year deal.

Short-term, the Devils wouldn’t need to engage in the uniqueness their division rival did with Jarvis. However, if the Devils wanted to lock Mercer in long-term, they could very well do the same as the Hurricanes.

The question becomes how much money is too much when deferred and over what amount of time? Thus far, only about $400K per season for Jarvis is to be paid out for just the one season after his contract ends — approximately $3.2 million over eight years, which is also accruing interest.

Perhaps working on this type of deal makes more sense for a rising star such as Luke Hughes next summer. The then 21-year-old will be due for a new contract, and it could result in a bargain AAV. However, it is an interesting anecdote to keep an eye on moving forward as it saves teams cap space. And, it’s one that doesn’t violate the current CBA.

It’s fair game.

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