Stamkos Signs Rookie Contract

[timothy]

Stamkos signs:

Entry level contract worth the maximum allowable $850,000 per year and up to $2.4 million in potential bonuses.

Ref: Jon Jordan's Blog (http://www.hockeybuzz.com/blog.php?post_id=16364)

[Sotnos]

The Times (http://blogs.tampabay.com/lightning/2008/07/sign-stamkos-li.html) has his possible bonuses as being at $2.85 mil.

Not exactly a surprise or anything, but yay! :)

[Hoek]

Here's hoping he earns all of those bonuses. :D

[Kowalski]

If he earns them, we'll see some playoff games this year. :)

[bassassin]

What exactly are the bonuses for? I mean is it a set number of goals/points that he has to hit?

[Sotnos]

What exactly are the bonuses for? I mean is it a set number of goals/points that he has to hit?
Erlendsson put them all in his blog (http://www.tboblogs.com/index.php/sports/comments/stamkos-to-sign-on-tuesday/). Some of them are a little strange (to me anyway), but this is a standard contract for a first rounder:

The bonuses for each season are capped out at $2.85 million.
The bonuses are divided into two categories, Type A and Type B
The A bonuses include: finishing among top six on team in ice time; reaching minimum 20 goals, minimum 35 assists, minimum 60 points, averaging .73 points per game, finishing among top three on team in plus/minus among forwards, being named to the All-Rookie team, being named to the All-Star game and being named All-Star game MVP. The maximum bonus for each category is $212,500

The B clauses include finishing in top five voting for Hart or Selke Trophy and top five in the Rocket Richard trophy (goals scored)
Top three in Lady Byng voting
Top three in Calder Trophy
Named first or second team all-star
Winning the Conn Smythe Trophy
There are also bonuses allowed for finishing in the top 10 in goals, assists, points or points per game. There is also a bonus for number of games played, but I haven’t been able to figure out how that all factors into the equation.
I read somewhere how much Kane earned last year, and he got a good chunk of change despite (of course) missing a lot of these.

[timothy]

Since not only talking about pushing up against a salary cap is somewhat foreign to Lightning fans, so is discussing how performance bonuses relate to the salary cap. Here's a performance bonus/cap primer:

When teams calculate how much room they have under the cap to add players, any potential bonuses that a player can earn must be included in the player's cap count.

For 2005-06 through 2007-08, teams could exceed the Upper Limit by up to 7.5% [the "Performance Bonus Cushion"] in order to pay such bonuses (for 2007-08, teams could effectively have an Upper Limit of $54,072,500) with the provision that any team doing this would have its Upper Limit reduced for the following season by the amount it exceeds the current year's Upper Limit. If the bonus is not paid, no penalty is imposed.

The Performance Bonus Cushion is not available for the 2008-09 season, because the CBA is set to expire at the send of the 08-09 season.

As the season progresses, if a player becomes ineligible for a bonus it will come off the player's cap count and that amount will become available to the team - but only for that season.


Stamkos' cap hit at the start of the season is $3.725M, and the Lightning have no option to invoke the Bonus Cushion this season. But... his cap hit will be reduced as the season goes along if some of the bonuses are determined they cannot be obtained. Not sure how much of that can be determined during the season unless the player suffers a season-ending injury.

Oh... and who is eligible to have performance bonuses in their contracts?


With a few exceptions, players may only earn roster, reporting, or signing bonuses under the new CBA. Entry-level players may earn bonuses for certain awards and performance bonuses. Players 35 and older as of June 30 who sign a contract for the immediately following League Year may earn performance bonuses, as well as players with 400 or more games played and who spent 100 or more days on injured reserve in the last year of their most recent contract; however, in these two cases, performance bonuses are only allowed for 1-year contracts. If players in these two categories sign a multi-year contract, they cannot earn performance bonuses.


Anyway, hope that helps....

[Sotnos]

TSN has a clip of him signing. http://watch.tsn.ca/nhl/clip70359#clip70359