Not bad. I'll take it.
 

I'm not sure why everybody is surprised over the amount. He did score 68 points last year. I can't imagine his arbitration number would have been a lot less than this.
 

Horrible deal for the Oilers. I defy anyone to find a good comp for Stoll that gets paid this kind of cash. Lowe is scared of arbitration.
 

I think we'll see how fair this deal is after arbitration. Here's a list of guys who are maybe comparables, they are all born within 2 years, (1980 - 1984) and were within 15 points of Stolls total (53 - 83) last season. I used the NHLPA salary numbers, not cap hits.

Most of the possible comparables are unsigned.

Simon Gagne (1980) 83 pts Unsigned
Ales Hemsky (1983) 77 pts Unsigned
Justin Williams (1982) 76 pts 3.5M
Vincent Lecavalier (1980) 75 pts 7.2M
Henrik Sedin (1980) 75 pts 3.6M
Daniel Sedin (1980) 71 pts 3.6M
Brad Boyes (1982) 69 pts Unsigned
Jarret Stoll (1982)68 pts 2.2M
Marian Gaborik (1982) 66 pts 5.0M
Mike Comrie (1980) 60 pts Unsigned
PM Bouchard (1984) 59 pts 1.9M
Jason Williams (1980) 58 pts Unsigned
Michael Ryder (1980) 55 pts Unsigned
Mike Cammalleri (1982) 55 pts Unsigned
Jussi Jokinen (1983) 55 pts 0.7M (Entry Level)
Tim Connolly (1980) 55 pts Unsigned
Rick Nash (1984) 54 pts 4.5M
Nikolai Zherdev (1984) 54 pts Unsigned
Alexander Frolov (1982) 54 pts 2.0M
Joffrey Lupul (1983) 53 pts Unsigned
 

Gaborik? Lecavalier? Even an NHL arbitrator isn't that stupid.
 

I'll add...Rick Nash? Simon Gagne? Comparable to Jarrett Stoll?? HAHAHA!
 

There are maybe three Stoll comps on that entire list. So I guess it's not a total waste of time.
 

I was using statistical comparables obviously. I put on every forward who as around Stoll's age and production regardless of any subjective opinion of how good I thought they were. I didn't pick and choose the players, it's every single one who fits the criteria.

This means that I would pay Marian Gaborik more money than Jarret Stoll. It's just a list for informations sake.
 

Let's leave age out of it for a minute. Mike York (13g 39a, -9, 8ES goals) just got 2.85 million from an arbitrator. Is Jarret Stoll dramatically worse as a player, and if so, by what measureable criteria? All this number crunching is nice, but it's not clear that the arbitrators are looking at things like strength of opposition, or PPP/hr, or anything beyond goals, assists, +/-, and players that are comparable within those criteria. We can make judgements about what players are worth, but Lowe has to live in the real world of salary abitration. I have a distant memory of people talking about Stoll being worth a million, maybe one and a half. I'd say Lowe made an educated guess that Stoll could get a lot more than two and change, and hoped to head that possibilty off. The York award shows where the market might have been for a guy who had better point totals.
 

Fun fact of the day: Briere just got awarded $5M. Odds of Buffalo accepting? I'm going with 10:1 against.
 

RC: There's no way that the York arbitration case has anythimg to do with Stoll's. Years of service matter. There's no way around it. I highly doubt that an arbitrator fails to consider that.

And BTW, I'd take York at that money over Stoll at his contract any time.
 

RQ, I took a good look at the CBA's salary arbitration section, and indeed, years of service are there, but that's only one of many listed factors, and I'll tell you one that isn't mentioned: number of years before free agency. That is not an obligatory or even necessarily significant consideration for an arbitrator, but I see that brought up repeatedly. A 27 year old RFA with one decent year under his belt isn't dramatically better off in arbitration than a 23 year old. His team may look at him differently, but the arbitration process isn't about that at all. As for York being a better deal than Stoll, who cares? As I said previously, Lowe has to deal with where the salaries are going, and rolling the dice on an arbitrator, with the consequent player bashing he'd have to engage in, just to possibly save a few hundred k is pretty risky. Let's flip this on it's head. There were rumours that the Isles might walk away from York's award. If Stoll had received 2.85 million in arbitration, would anyone be talking about walking away? Accept and trade, maybe, but bailing all together? No chance. At the end of the arbitration period, Stoll's deal may look a lot more like the norm. If Lowe had gone into arbitration with a win or lose offer of much less than 1.8-1.9 million, and Stoll asked for 2.5-3.0 million, given the current atmosphere, Stoll had a decent chance of a win.
 

RC said...
If Lowe had gone into arbitration with a win or lose offer of much less than 1.8-1.9 million, and Stoll asked for 2.5-3.0 million, given the current atmosphere, Stoll had a decent chance of a win.
I disagree. In fact that's the whole point - I'm quite certain he wouldn't have won because there isn't a single decent comparable for him making over $2MM. So what is the basis for that statement? What even leads you to that conclusion?
 

To reverse the question, what comparable to Stoll makes less than 2 million? Bouchard makes 1.9 and Stoll probably would have looked about 300000 better than him at arbitration based on numbers.

I'll also point out that Michael Ryder just signed for 2.2, so that's seems to be going price for that caliber of player.
 

Rivers , I've never argued that Stoll's contract is fair value, but your problem is that you're so hung up on what you consider as "comparable" that you discount raw point totals in favour of other metrics. That may be the proper way to measure value, but an arbitrator isn't as likely to do that. It doesn't matter that Stoll got a bunch of PP points, or that Pronger and Hemsky made a lot of his PP points easy to get. Arguing this in front of an arbitrator would lead to this rebuttal: What non-subjective evidence do you have? Just because you think these guys made his numbers doesn't automatically make it so. Stoll's point totals are fact. He was a top 60 scorer in the league, and how he got them is irrelevant. A point is a point, EV, PP, or SH. As well, one of the points an arbitrator is to consider is the overall contribution of the player to the team in the preceding season. If you want to argue that Stoll was a marginal contributor on a team that went to the Finals, feel free, but good luck getting an arbitrator to buy it. Stoll could have presented his numbers from last year and said, "I got serious ice time for the first time, and put up 68 points." What is Lowe's rebuttal? "Well, he got a lot of soft ice time, and had a bunch of power play points, and he's not really that good." Would you want to try to make that argument in your allotted 90 minutes to an arbitrator who may or may not be all that hockey savvy? The either/or system was put in place because owners thought that arbitrators were too quick to split the difference under the old system. On the initial evidence, it doesn't seem that arbitrators are shy about going to the higher number. Lowe's job is getting value for money, but it also includes risk management. Stoll's number may be high, but the number and length of term aren't draconian. The risks of going to arbitration are high, and I'm guessing Darcy Regier's digestive tract tonight might be Exhibit A.
 

Mike York's money makes me ecstatic we didn't go to an arbitrator.