Dustin Penner Makes Bank!

Dustin Penner has been offered a contract worth a substantial $21.25 Million over 5 years by the Edmonton Oilers.

NHL Digest reported this past season that Penner was probably the best deal in the NHL with a salary of only $450,000.

NHL Digest also listed Penner as one of 5 players to watch next season and this offer sheet only extends that emphasis. While Penner proved his worth last season, he slightly faltered in the playoffs. Can he prove his worth at an average of $4.24 million per season, almost 10 times his current salary?

Ducks General Manager, Brian Burke, is irate at Kevin Lowe for making what he claims is “an absurdly high offer by a General Manager fighting for his job”. Burke was also disgusted at the “lack of class” shown by Lowe in making the offer. Burke mentions that he and Lowe used to speak quite a bit and that he was disgusted that he didn’t receive a phone call from Lowe informing him that he was making an offer on Penner, and learned of the offer sheet via a fax to the team office.

I must agree with Burke in the fact that offer sheets are part of the CBA and that if they are used correctly to identify a player and make an appropriate offer, they are a good thing. However, if the system is abused, the inflated salaries will eventually impact every team.

Offer sheets are a part of the CBA and I have no problem with that. If you can identify a player and pay him appropriately and make him an offer, that’s fine. At some point, the deals you make, the offers you extend, whether the team matches it or not, impacts all 30 teams, including your own.

It’s a five-year deal for a lot of money. I’ll let you guys evaluate the deal.

Burke has announced that he will have to confer with management and the ownership of the Ducks prior to announcing whether the team will match the offer sheet. The sum of money offered by the Oilers to Penner was , by all accounts, substantially higher than what was being negotiated with the Ducks.

Personally, I would be very surprised if the Ducks announced that they were going to match the offer. The Ducks have both Corey Perry and Ryan Getzlaf up for free agency next year and I would venture a guess that they would place their priority on securing those two players for the future of the franchise.