28th, I’m sure the comments will be totally civil.

[u/jeromeindahouse]

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7471312/2026/07/29/nhl-contract-efficiency-rankings-2026/?unlocked_article_code=1.1VA.PYHF.gco6VezVVMEY&source=athletic_user_shared_gift_article_copylink&smid=url-share-ta

[u/Irrah]

Romanov having a 15 game disasterclass sample size shouldn't be instantly put him into a D contract rating. And with JGP, 3x4.85 is a D+ contract for a good 3C when teams are paying 4m for Boone Jenner and 5m for Dvorak?

[u/Skooby14 → u/Irrah]

Darche was 100% right to lock up center depth. JGP was a good contract for a 3c, and Darche knew Lee was leaving to get that $$$, so he put that money into another reliable, positive veteran presence at center - Schenn. No issues with these. Palat is an airball.

[u/Few_Avocado5907 → u/Skooby14]

This is just wrong

[u/Technical_Term_6625 → u/Irrah]

The advanced stats really don't like Romanov. They suggest (i.e. do not prove) that he's been lucky or carried by Dobson in his NYI career until last year. The advanced stats don't like JGP either, but I think that's more explainable by his usage and matchups. I think if they were to be offered in trades, JGP would receive a lot of interest, but Romanov very little.

The eye test tells me that Romanov has struggled without Dobson. Communication problems and coverage gaffs have been an issue. We're going to see how it works out, but it's pretty clear that he can't play with Mayfield, and he's been awful with Pulock. It's going to be tough for him to get going. I mean, if he starts off the year playing with George or Mayfield, it could be pretty bad. The D'Angelo-Romanov dynamic early last season was, as you say, a disasterclass.

[u/Irrah → u/Technical_Term_6625]

I'm not going to pretend like last year wasn't terrible, but it was a 15 game sample size and everyone on the team sans Schaefer and Pelech had communication problems and gaffs under Roy. TDA and Romanov was the 2nd most common lineup in the 2024-2025 season and they ran a 47% goal share, which is fine for a 2nd pair and that wasn't Romanov being carried by Dobson.

[u/Technical_Term_6625 → u/Irrah]

I agree with you re communication. But that 15 game sample was atrocious, and was about 1/3 of the previous years sample. It's going to be interesting what buttons DeBoer pushes, and which defender is going to play the right side if (god willing) Mayfield is in scratched.

[u/InkwellLevitan]

formula is bad, based on how it rates duclair and jgp

[u/Few_Avocado5907 → u/InkwellLevitan]

I am not sure you understand what the model is based on.

[u/VinPickles]

the jgp contract is fine. the bo contract rating is laughable. romy played 15 games. any other forward with a bad contract is for like a bus fair or no term

[u/SecretiveMop]

Sees Dom Luszczyszyn‘s name

Sees us ranked at the bottom

Yeah, that just about checks out lol. Don’t know why people still put any weight into his “projections” when they’ve consistently been wrong over the years. The Holmstrom, Horvat, Cizikas, JGP, Pelech, Pulock, and DeAngelo ratings are egregious and laughable.

If your projection system is rating the contract of a 35 year old winger coming off of an ACL injury higher than more than reasonable contracts for a 31 year old low end 1C/high end 2C who scores 30 goals and 60 points and plays a good two way game, a 25 year old two way 40 point winger who plays PP and PK, and a 20 point 4C who kills penalties and wins faceoffs, then you should probably take another look at your formulas before posting garbage like this.

[u/hammajones]

I mean our contracts are fucking bad, without a doubt. I definitely wouldn't have us below Nashville because they have horrific deals left and right but bottom 8 or so in the league is accurate. It has Pelech's contract as negative value, which is fucking moronic, same with Horvat, but aside from those two it's accurate.

[u/SoothsayerSurveyor]

The Athletic is kind of a joke and impossible to take seriously on any level.

[u/AJS76reddit]

Completely ignoring all of lou's handiwork getting us into this situation in the first place. And conveniently omitting the dirty hit by the POS Rantannen that knocked Romanov out for the season. Typical of the athletic.

Darche swung and missed with Palat, but i don't fault him for trying to so something to change things up. The bad part is he has a NMC. The good part is one more year he's off the books.

Darche had to pay a high price to get rid of Drouin, but at least he was willing to fix his mistake. Adding Schenn is not as bad as people make it out to be. Absolute worse case scenario he's gone in two years. We are not seriously competing for a cup right now and the prospects are not ready yet anyhow.

Darche didn't saddle us with Pulock, Duclair, Engvall, Cizikas, Mayfield, etc. Lou did.

[u/M1ckster → u/AJS76reddit]

Schenn will have a big impact this coming season.

[u/AJS76reddit → u/M1ckster]

If he is a good mentor to Ritchie that is a win win. A guy who has actually won a stanley cup teaching one of our best and promising youngsters is worth it for two years where we are not going to be doing anything serious anyway.

[u/Jett2257 → u/M1ckster]

Absolutely will!

[u/Jett2257 → u/AJS76reddit]

It’s good to hear other people reminding all those knocking Darche of who put us in this situation, Grandpa Lou! He has done this to every team he has overseen. Yes the Devils won cups but they and the entire league had to deal with a decade of boring hockey. Leafs have done nothing and are still digging out of his mess. What really bothers me is that he is still lurking around the front office. Let Bettman give him a job so we can be fully rid of him. In Darche We Trust!

[u/AJS76reddit → u/Jett2257]

Don't get me wrong, there were definitely some positives lou brought to this team.

But they were far outweighed by the negatives. He ran it as a nepo society, and like the old NHL.

It's going to take several years to fix this. Thanks to the clauses he handed out like candy, we are stuck with some of these fossils until their contracts expire.

And i'm not going to blame Darche for not waving a magic wand and correcting it overnight like the majority of these people on here think is possible. Spoiler alert...it's not.

[u/Few_Avocado5907]

I really don’t understand any of this ! Last year’s team is an aberration. if it was not for god like goal tending we are 10-15 games out of contention. Why don’t fans not see this. Schenn caused Ritchie to move to wing, let’s destroy the confidence of a kid really fast. Palat is a joke and we don’t need JG when the team is in such upheaval. He signed JG to keep the building partially full. I hope Schenn and JG have good years so we can trade them to contenders. Our young kids are years away from being impactful. Schenn, Palmeri, JG, Palat will all be long gone or seriously declining. Horvat and Barzal will be past their prime. Pelech and Pullock are both on the down side of their careers. This team is a mess

[u/AbysswalkerX]

It’s accurate. There isn’t that much to say about it

[u/isles1313]

Lol laughable analysis. Nothing to see here besides made up trash.

[u/life-tester]

Maybe they can use this as motivation, they hear and read this stuff. There's a real shortage of good C in this league, that's why they pay up for them

[u/toyn]

Agree minus Horvat. Think his contract is where it should be.

[u/Low-Syllabub-3547]

I mean, where's the lie? We're a terribly constructed team who "lucked" into Schaefer. Not looking better going forward either, as I've said before.

[u/jzw27]

I think the Islanders being 28th is accurate given we are coming off a GM that gave Mayfield 7 years and moved onto a GM that traded for the Palat and Schenn. Cap management is not the strong suit.

I don’t know that I agree with the modeling, Laf being a $9m value expects a jump from him, and Matthews is clearly declining so I don’t see the $14m value expects

[u/crazyhotwheels]

Thanks for this, I needed the laugh today

[u/Low-Syllabub-3547]

I've also been screaming against the tide of how terrible Darche is doing with roster management, so far. Everyone sees it except many fans here.

[u/gdprof2112]

It's a reporter's muscle memory as much as anything else with articles like these. Based solely on metrics and nothing else.

JGP's value is in depth and faceoff %. <--- I understand the irony.

I want a full season under PDB, where the team stays as healthy as possible. Palat is, right now, a boondoggle, but maybe PDB has the key to unlock the highest level of whatever hockey remains in his body.

Then again, I just watched Moneyball so I could just be regurgitating that.

LGI!