What does AAV mean in hockey? The AAV (Average Annual Value) is a measure for player salaries in the NHL. It does not apply to players’ statistics but rather their overall contract value and length/term of said agreements, which are then divided by total years or months played under that banner at the team level – this gives you an idea about how much money they’re getting per year from your favorite club.
How Is AAV Calculated?
The AAV is the most lucrative component of an NHL player’s contract. The total value divided by the number of years on their current deal will give you a good idea about how much they are worth to your team and what kind of paycheck (or windfall) that would generate for them if gone after during free agency period or traded with another club who has a need at forwarding position where the player can be used as trade bait.
Here are a few quick examples:
If a player signs a $15 million dollar contract for 3 years the AVV will be: $15 million/3 years = $5million/year AAV
If a player signs a $25 million dollar contract for 6 years the AAV will be : $25 million/6 years = $4.17 million/year AAV.
The AAV is the average annual value of a player’s contract. It does not necessarily reflect what you will actually pay for each year, but it gives an idea about how much your investment may be worth overall over time.
Why Does AAV Matter?
The success or failure of an organization can be measured by its AAV. The NHL (the owners) and NHLPA(player’s association), have a collective bargaining agreement that governs how revenue is shared between themselves in order to create balance sheets for each side with a 50/50 split over time.
The way this works is that each team has a minimum amount of money they must spend on salaries but also an upper cap for how much can actually go towards players’ wages. For example, the 2019-2020 season had its floor set at $60 million with any excesses going into revenue sharing or other incentives programs which might explain why many teams were within just two steps from their respective ceilings–the highest being 81%.
The National Hockey League (NHL) has a salary cap in place that limits the number of money teams can spend on players’ salaries. When figuring out if they are within range, this league takes all player contracts’ AAVs together and not individual ones to determine if it exceeds what’s allowed for each team.”
Teams are required to have a balanced team with players whose AAVs don’t exceed the salary cap. If one player makes more than another on your roster then you will be forced into trading or releasing them so that all parties involved can maintain competitive balance in terms of competitiveness levels, performance statistics such as goals scored per game played by position, etc.
So Do Players Get Paid Another Amount Beside Their AAV?
The salary cap is a hard and fast limit on the amount of money that any one team can spend. If you exceed this maximum, then it’s back to trading players or putting them in minor-league hockey–no trade deals for big names here.
Let’s take a look at a couple of actual contracts and how they are actually paid out compared to their AAV.
We will look at two more recent signings of Mitch Marner and Matthew Tkachuk, both of which are very interesting contract structures.
Mitch Marner
Below is the contract that Marner signed for $65,358,000 over 6 years. The first thing to point out is that Mitch is getting paid a larger sum at the start of the contract than at the end.
Matthew Tkachuk
Below is the contract that Calgary Flames forward Jaccob Tkachuk signed for $21,000,000 over 3 years. As you will notice in this example from his new team with an additional financial offer at year’s end compared to other offers made by other teams who are not restricted under NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement rules until they become unrestricted free agents after playing two full seasons within one league before being able to negotiate freely wherever he wants without any limitations whatsoever.
The Flames have to offer Tkachuk $9,000,000 if they want him for the last year of his restricted free agent status. This way he gets a higher salary than what was originally agreed upon in order not only to qualify him but also make sure that there are no other teams interested who might be able to contract better terms with Calgary’s own players before it ends up becoming too late.
AAV Used To Help Teams Reach The Salary Floor
The AAV is an essential tool in rebuilding teams. It can be used to help a team stay under the salary cap while they are developing their young players and hopefully gain some good draft picks as well, which will allow them to get back on top sooner than later! This model worked for Chicago & Pittsburgh and went through similar situations before winning Stanley Cups. The input gives more details about what exactly happens when using this particular contract term but also discusses other potential uses outside of just purely player acquisition like helping out financially struggling organizations.
The rebuilding process is always difficult, and when you’re trying to build your team around young players it can be even more challenging. That’s why in this situation we recommend that instead of signing veterans or superstar youngsters their second contracts – which would bring expensive salaries into the league–you go with cheaper options such as journeymen NHL-ers who make up a good portion on any given roster.
You can find players on other teams who are in the last year of their contracts and have high AAV salaries. Most money was paid upfront during previous years’ portions, making these desperate sellers eager to get rid of or release them before they become an albatross contract themselves.
Arizona was in desperate need of players and had to make drastic moves. They got Grossman, who they knew would be injured but still cost them nothing but a 4th round pick. The Flyers also send over Gagner with an AAV worth 5 million dollars despite him only having 750K real- money owed on his contract at this point.
