How the NHL’s top earners performed during the 2022-23 season

In today’s NHL, money wins titles. Not the most money, not money simply splashed haphazardly in all directions, but the best-managed money, the most wisely spent.

Such is the reality of a hard-cap league, where winning requires the ability to navigate that salary cap in such a way as to stockpile as much talent as possible within its limits. Where overextending to land a star player means one fewer valuable contributor elsewhere in your lineup, and where bargain-bin players who outperform the money invested in them can have a season-altering impact.

The 2022-23 season brought a mixed bag of results on this front across the league. Last week, we looked at some of the best bargain point producers from the season, the players who chipped in offensively while costing their clubs next to nothing relative to that offensive contribution.

This week, we look at another aspect of that financial picture — the contributions from the game’s top earners.

While this off-season’s seen clubs around league take a cautious approach to filling their cap space, amid another summer of minimal salary-cap movement, teams are simultaneously working around the hefty deals handed out in years past.

With that in mind, we took a look at how the highest-paid players in the league lived up to their price tags in 2022-23, and how that list overlaps with that of the players who earned MVP votes at year-end.

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HIGHEST CAP HITS

The cap hit is king in today’s game, determining which clubs are best at striking the balance between collecting elite talent and leaving room to build a deep overall squad. Here’s a look at the players who counted the most against the cap and their key stats in 2022-23.

1. Connor McDavid, Edmonton Oilers: $12.5 million

2022-23 Stats: 64 goals, 153 points in 82 games

2. Artemi Panarin, New York Rangers: $11.643 million

2022-23 Stats: 29 goals, 92 points in 82 games

3. Auston Matthews, Toronto Maple Leafs: $11.640 million

2022-23 Stats: 40 goals, 85 points in 74 games

4. Erik Karlsson, San Jose Sharks: $11.5 million

2022-23 Stats: 101 points, 25:37 mins per night in 82 games

T5. Drew Doughty, Los Angeles Kings: $11 million

2022-23 Stats: 52 points, 26:15 mins per night in 81 games

T5. John Tavares, Toronto Maple Leafs: $11 million

2022-23 Stats: 36 goals, 80 points in 80 games

7. Mitch Marner, Toronto Maple Leafs: $10.9 million

2022-23 Stats: 30 goals, 99 points in 80 games

T8. Jonathan Toews, Chicago Blackhawks: $10.5 million

2022-23 Stats: 15 goals, 31 points in 53 games

T8. Patrick Kane, Chicago Blackhawks/New York Rangers: $10.5 million

2022-23 Stats: 21 goals, 57 points in 73 games

T10. Jack Eichel, Vegas Golden Knights: $10 million

2022-23 Stats: 27 goals, 66 points in 67 games

T10. Aleksander Barkov, Florida Panthers: $10 million

2022-23 Stats: 23 goals, 78 points in 68 games

T10. Sergei Bobrovsky, Florida Panthers: $10 million

2022-23 Stats: .901 SV%, 3.07 GAA, 1 SO in 50 games

T10. Anze Kopitar, Los Angeles Kings: $10 million

2022-23 Stats: 28 goals, 74 points in 82 games

What jumps out most from the above list is the cap situation in Toronto. No other club in the league has three players among this group — the Maple Leafs have three in the top seven alone, and all three of those players are forwards. You’d have to extend this list out to the top 20 to find another club with three teammates all ranking among the league’s most expensive cap hits: the Florida Panthers’ Barkov, Bobrovsky and Matthew Tkachuk, three very different players, who took their club to a Stanley Cup Final in their first year together. Extend out to the top 30, and you find another — the Tampa Bay Lightning’s Andrei Vasilevskiy, Brayden Point and Nikita Kucherov, again a more varied trio, and one that’s found even more success in the post-season.

Moving past the Maple Leafs’ cap troubles, the top tier among the above list held their own in 2022-23. McDavid answered for his league-leading cap hit with a historic season that netted him the Hart Trophy, Ted Lindsay Award, Art Ross Trophy and Rocket Richard Trophy, while Karlsson, the most expensive blue-liner in the game, put up a career year as well en route to the third Norris Trophy of his career. Neither Panarin nor Matthews finished among the league’s top 15 scorers despite carrying the second- and third-highest cap hits in the game this season, but even so, both remain among the most dynamic offensive talents in the league.

It’s in the middle of the list that the front-office decisions begin to seem dicier, with veterans Doughty and Tavares both counting $11 million against the cap in 2022-23, just a shade below award winners at their positions. Marner had a career year offensively and finished as a Selke finalist for the first time in his career, seemingly earning his near-$11-million hit — still, as mentioned, the problem is he shows up on this list with two other members of his team’s top six. The Chicago contingent of Kane and Toews and their combined $21-million cap hit jumps out too, though 2022-23 was the final year at that number for the two veterans. The three players right below them seemed to earn their price tags, making up for somewhat lacklustre regular seasons with Cup Final runs, while veteran Kopitar put up his best offensive season in half a decade, earned Selke votes for the 12th time in his career (finishing fifth in voting) and still counted less against the cap than his teammate, Doughty.

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HIGHEST OVERALL EARNERS

Beyond the hits and their team’s all-important ability to navigate the cap, who earned the heftiest salaries overall in 2022-23? With teams front-loading deals and balancing money out over later years, the list of the league’s true top earners always winds up a wild one. Here’s a look at the 10 players who earned the highest salaries in 2022-23, and their production.

1. Tyler Seguin, Dallas Stars: $13 million

2022-23 Stats: 21 goals, 50 points in 76 games

T2. Artemi Panarin, New York Rangers: $12.5 million

2022-23 Stats: 29 goals, 92 points in 82 games

T2. Connor McDavid, Edmonton Oilers: $12 million

2022-23 Stats: 64 goals, 153 points in 82 games

T2. Darnell Nurse, Edmonton Oilers: $12 million

2022-23 Stats: 43 points, 23:30 mins per night in 82 games

T2. Erik Karlsson, San Jose Sharks: $12 million

2022-23 Stats: 101 points, 25:37 mins per night in 82 games

T2. Aleksander Barkov, Florida Panthers: $12 million

2022-23 Stats: 23 goals, 78 points in 68 games

T2. Sergei Bobrovsky, Florida Panthers: $12 million

2022-23 Stats: .901 SV%, 3.07 GAA, 1 SO in 50 games

T8. Adam Fox, New York Rangers: $11 million

2022-23 Stats: 72 points, 24:23 mins per night in 82 games

T8. Drew Doughty, Los Angeles Kings: $11 million

2022-23 Stats: 52 points, 26:15 mins per night in 81 games

T8. Andrei Vasilevskiy, Tampa Bay Lightning: $11 million

2022-23 Stats: .915 SV%, 2.65 GAA, 4 SO in 60 games

At the top of that list, it was 31-year-old Seguin’s hefty $13-million salary leading the league in 2022-23, the veteran playing out the fourth year of a front-loaded deal inked in 2018. After a slew of injuries saw him miss nearly all of 2020-21, Seguin returned to the Stars’ lineup in a lesser role the past two seasons, changing his game to serve as a depth option behind the club’s new young stars. Although he didn’t rank among the top 10 in terms of actual cap hit, he still counted a weighty $9.85 million against the Stars’ cap in 2022-23, 15th league-wide.

The rest of the top 10 earners in 2022-23 seemed a mixed bag. Near the middle was McDavid, who authored that already-mentioned historic season. And yet, the Oilers pivot earned a shade less than Rangers standout Panarin for that elite season, and the same salary as teammate Nurse. Rounding out the group in that $12-million range were Karlsson and a pair of Panthers, all of whom arguably earned their price tags by the end of the season. Behind them, the $11-million crew was similarly a mixed bag, with Doughty once again at the centre of it, the veteran earning the same salary in 2022-23 as Norris runner-up Fox and Vasilevskiy, one of the best netminders in the world.

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MVP EARNINGS

Money aside, who actually had the biggest impact on their club’s success in 2022-23? Here’s a look at the top 10 vote-getters in 2023’s Hart Trophy voting, and how they impacted their club’s financial situation this season.

1. Connor McDavid, Edmonton Oilers

Cap Hit: $12.5 million / Salary: $12 million

2. David Pastrnak, Boston Bruins

Cap Hit: $6.7 million / Salary: $6.4 million

3. Matthew Tkachuk, Florida Panthers

Cap Hit: $9.5 million / Salary: $9 million

4. Jason Robertson, Dallas Stars

Cap Hit: $7.8 million / Salary: $4.5 million

5. Nathan MacKinnon, Colorado Avalanche

Cap Hit: $6.3 million / Salary: $6.9 million

6. Mikko Rantanan, Colorado Avalanche

Cap Hit: $9.3 million / Salary: $6 million

7. Leon Draisaitl, Edmonton Oilers

Cap Hit: $8.5 million / Salary: $8 million

8. Jack Hughes, New Jersey Devils

Cap Hit: $8 million / Salary: $9 million

9. Ilya Sorokin, New York Islanders

Cap Hit: $4 million / Salary: $4 million

10. Linus Ullmark, Boston Bruins

Cap Hit: $5 million / Salary: $6 million

Aside from the eventual Hart Trophy winner, No. 97, none of the other players on the list of the season’s top earners, nor the list of 2022-23’s largest cap hits, finished among the top 10 Hart Trophy candidates.

A certain amount of that was timing, as a couple players on this list — Pastrnak and MacKinnon — have massive extensions kicking in next season. Still, take the costly contributions mentioned earlier in this piece alongside those of newly signed young talents Tkachuk, Robertson and Hughes — all of whom came up with MVP-calibre campaigns without cracking the $10-million mark — or the bargain netminding performances from Sorokin and Ullmark in the cage, and some of the numbers on those earlier lists begin to look even more questionable.

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