Cale Makar Just Broke the NHL’s Salary Scale — What Happens When Connor McDavid Comes Due?

The $20 million NHL player has officially arrived. The bigger question is how long it takes before $20 million starts looking like a bargain.

For years, the NHL’s salary hierarchy operated with an unofficial ceiling. Superstars made $10 million, then $12 million, then $14 million. Every time the league appeared ready to push substantially beyond that territory, another franchise player would sign a deal that preserved at least some semblance of financial restraint.

That restraint may officially be over.

Cale Makar and the Colorado Avalanche have agreed to an eight-year contract extension through the 2034-35 season. The reported financial terms are staggering: eight years and $163.2 million, carrying a $20.4 million average annual value.

Makar hasn’t simply become the NHL’s newest highest-paid superstar.

He may have fundamentally changed what we consider an elite NHL contract.

And somewhere roughly 1,800 miles north of Denver, the Edmonton Oilers should be paying very close attention.

Because Connor McDavid gets another crack at the open market in 2028.

Makar Didn't Just Raise the Bar. He Almost Hit the Ceiling.

There is an important piece of context surrounding that $20.4 million number.

The NHL salary cap for 2026-27 is $104 million. Under the league’s salary structure, an individual player's compensation cannot exceed 20 percent of the upper limit at the time the contract is signed. That currently puts the maximum at $20.8 million.

Makar just signed for $20.4 million.

In other words, Colorado didn't merely make Makar the highest-paid player in hockey. The Avalanche essentially walked right up to the maximum amount an NHL team is currently permitted to pay one player.

And it is difficult to argue that Makar hasn't earned the leverage.

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He is a Stanley Cup champion, a Conn Smythe Trophy winner, a Calder Trophy winner and a two-time Norris Trophy winner. He has already accumulated 507 points in 470 regular-season games, and his 90 playoff points are the most by a defenseman in Avalanche history. Last season alone, Makar produced 20 goals and 79 points in 75 games.

This isn't simply paying a great defenseman.

Colorado is paying one of the most impactful players in hockey like one of the most impactful players in hockey.

Position no longer matters.

And that distinction changes everything.

The Superstar Market Was Already Exploding

Makar's contract didn't happen in isolation.

Kirill Kaprizov signed his eight-year, $136 million extension carrying a $17 million AAV. Leo Carlsson followed with an $18 million AAV after Anaheim matched Philadelphia's offer sheet. Then Macklin Celebrini raised the standard again when San Jose signed him to a five-year, $94 million extension worth $18.8 million annually.

Now Makar has jumped directly to $20.4 million.

Think about how quickly the ladder has moved.

Seventeen million.

Eighteen million.

Eighteen-point-eight.

Now twenty-point-four.

The NHL isn't slowly approaching the $20 million superstar anymore.

We're already there.

And the league's rapidly increasing salary cap is a major reason why.

The upper limit jumped to $104 million for 2026-27 and is scheduled to rise again to $113.5 million for 2027-28.

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That second number is especially important because Makar's extension doesn't actually begin until 2027-28.

His $20.4 million contract represents roughly 19.6 percent of today's $104 million cap, but when the new deal actually begins against a $113.5 million ceiling, it will represent approximately 18 percent.

That is the new NHL economic reality.

The dollar amounts are exploding because the cap itself is exploding.

Which brings us to No. 97.

Connor McDavid's $12.5 Million Contract Suddenly Looks Absurd

Perhaps the strangest part of the NHL's current salary structure is this:

Connor McDavid makes $12.5 million against the salary cap.

Makar will make $20.4 million.

Celebrini will make $18.8 million.

Carlsson will make $18 million.

Kaprizov makes $17 million.

And none of those sentences mean those players are better than McDavid.

They demonstrate how dramatically the market has changed.

McDavid intentionally signed a two-year, $25 million extension with Edmonton in October 2025 that kept his AAV at $12.5 million. The contract covers the 2026-27 and 2027-28 seasons and makes McDavid eligible for unrestricted free agency in the summer of 2028 at age 31.

That contract was never really about establishing McDavid's market value.

It was about giving Edmonton another opportunity to win.

McDavid essentially told the Oilers: here is your window. I won't squeeze every available dollar out of the roster. Build the team. Go win.

But that arrangement has an expiration date.

And Makar just made the eventual conversation considerably more interesting.

What Is McDavid Actually Worth in 2028?

Here is where this gets fascinating.

We don't yet know the official NHL salary cap for 2028-29. The league has only established the upper limit through the $113.5 million figure for 2027-28.

But we can demonstrate the possibilities.

If the cap eventually reaches $120 million, a 20-percent maximum contract would equal $24 million per season.

At a $125 million salary cap?

$25 million per season.

Those are not predictions of what the cap will be. They are illustrations of just how quickly the maximum salary can move as league revenues and the upper limit increase.

And after Makar just received $20.4 million, it becomes almost impossible to construct a hockey argument that McDavid should enter his next negotiation below Makar's number.

If $20.4 million is the value of a generational defenseman, what exactly is the value of the player who has defined this era of NHL hockey?

Twenty-two million?

Twenty-three?

Twenty-four?

The maximum?

None of those numbers sound ridiculous anymore.

That is what Makar's contract has changed.

McDavid May Have the Greatest Negotiating Leverage in Hockey History

McDavid's eventual contract isn't going to be determined by whether Edmonton thinks he's worth $22 million or $24 million.

It will be determined by what McDavid wants.

That is an entirely different negotiation.

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If he wants to remain in Edmonton and continue taking less than his absolute market value so the Oilers can surround him with talent, perhaps another discount enters the equation.

But even a McDavid "discount" has been completely redefined.

A $20 million contract might technically represent McDavid leaving several million dollars per year on the table by 2028.

Imagine saying that even three years ago.

Under the NHL's new collective bargaining structure, maximum contract terms are also scheduled to shrink to seven years for players re-signing with their existing club and six years when signing elsewhere.

That potentially makes McDavid's 2028 decision even more fascinating.

At $24 million annually over seven seasons, you're talking about a $168 million contract.

At $25 million?

$175 million.

Those numbers once sounded completely foreign to hockey.

They don't anymore.

The NHL Has Entered a Different Financial Era

For decades, hockey lagged well behind the NFL, NBA and Major League Baseball when conversations turned toward individual player salaries.

That obviously isn't disappearing. NBA superstars will still sign contracts that dwarf NHL agreements because the economics and roster structures of the sports are completely different.

But within hockey's own financial universe, something significant is happening.

The NHL's superstar middle class is disappearing.

There is increasingly going to be one price for good players, another for great players and an entirely separate financial category for franchise-altering talent.

Makar belongs in that final category.

So does Celebrini.

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And McDavid may exist in a category by himself.

That's why the biggest story surrounding Cale Makar's $20.4 million extension isn't simply that a defenseman is going to make more than $20 million per season.

It's what happens next.

Because once the league establishes that $20 million is acceptable compensation for one of hockey's truly elite players, there's no putting that number back in the box.

Future agents will point toward Makar.

Future stars will point toward Makar.

Teams will structure their salary caps around the Makar precedent.

And in two summers, hockey's biggest superstar could walk into the most fascinating contract negotiation the NHL has ever seen.

Connor McDavid already gave Edmonton a discount.

He already gave the organization additional flexibility.

He already gave the Oilers two more years.

Come 2028, the question may no longer be whether an NHL player is worth $20 million.

Cale Makar just answered that.

The question will be whether Connor McDavid becomes hockey's first $25 million player.

And suddenly, that doesn't sound crazy at all.

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