How the rising cost of Noah Dobson’s next contract will affect the Islanders

A question I’ve been thinking about a lot lately is what Noah Dobson’s next contract ends up looking like, for two reasons.

First: Dobson is currently on pace for the best season by an Islanders defenseman not named Denis Potvin, ever.

Second: The answer will help set the table for a 2025 offseason in which the Islanders have a lot of decisions to make.

Potvin is, somehow, the only defenseman in franchise history to average at least a point per game over a full season (funny enough, the next-closest player was Denis’ brother, Jean, who had 72 points in 78 games in 1975-76).

After recording two assists in Wednesday night’s win over Anaheim, Dobson is ahead of a point-per-game pace, with 29 in 28 games.

Moreover, he is doing so while averaging a staggering 25:18 — the most by an Islanders defenseman since Andrew MacDonald in 2013-14 (25:25) — and constantly putting out fires created by injuries to Adam Pelech, Ryan Pulock, Sebastian Aho and Scott Mayfield.

The Islanders have not had a Norris Trophy winner since Potvin won it for the third time in 1978-79.

Dobson is unlikely to beat out the likes of Cale Makar this season as things stand, but he will be on a lot of award ballots. And if things keep trending this way, he will win one eventually.

If this is the player the 23-year-old Dobson is now — and it does require more proof than the first 28 games of the season to say definitively — he needs to be in the same sentence as the likes of Makar, Adam Fox, Quinn Hughes, Miro Heiskanen and so on. The elite of the elite.

Which means he will need to be paid like it.

Dobson also has the good fortune to be hitting restricted free agency in 2025. The salary cap is scheduled to leap from $83.5 million this season to an estimated $87.7 million for 2024-25, Gary Bettman told reporters last week in Seattle. The way-too-early projection for the 2025-26 season has been estimated around $92 million. So even if Dobson elects to sign a contract extension this coming summer, the number will reflect an inflated cap.

The summer of 2025 also happens to be an offseason when the Islanders could see some real roster churn.

Brock Nelson and Kyle Palmieri are scheduled to become unrestricted free agents at age 34. Anders Lee will be going into the last season of his contract at age 35. Jean-Gabriel Pageau will be doing the same at age 33. There will be some very difficult decisions to make about those players, who represent a significant portion of the core.

Bringing back Dobson and Alexander Romanov — who is also a restricted free agent that summer — should amount to a no-brainer unless something drastic changes. But because Dobson, who will be 25 and entering his prime, should be the first priority for the Islanders, his number will be the first domino from which all the other decisions stem.

Under the current cap regime, the going rate for a high-end defenseman to sign long-term as a restricted free agent — and thus skip over unrestricted free agency during his years of peak value — typically starts with at least an eight in terms of average annual value.

Hughes, who signed for six years at $7.85 million per with Vancouver in 2021, is an exception, but he would have been a 10.2(c) restricted free agent, negating his rights to even negotiate with other teams.

Dobson would, in theory, at least have the leverage of a potential offer sheet — even if history dictates that almost no one ever uses it.

Fox signed at $9.5 million annually on a seven-year deal with the Rangers that expires when he is 31. The Stars’ Heiskanen signed for $8.45 million on an eight-year deal that expires right before he turns 30. Makar took six years at $9 million per from the Avalanche, and can hit the market as a 28-year-old.

All of this happened under a far more restrictive salary cap than will exist when Dobson’s next deal is being negotiated.

Given that, it’s reasonable to think Dobson’s ask could start with a nine. You could even dream about a 10 — which would make him the highest-paid player on the Island — if he continues to get better.

The Islanders, at that point, should probably care more about term than driving a hard bargain on the number anyway.

Buying as many years as possible from Dobson as opposed to another two-year bridge deal that allows him to either leave Long Island as an unrestricted free agent should be the goal.

Isn’t there a whole offseason before that?

Yes. But outside of the money they will get by dint of the cap rising, the Islanders probably won’t have tons of room with which to work this July.

Aho, Matt Martin, Cal Clutterbuck, Mike Reilly and Robert Bortuzzo are their only players becoming unrestricted free agents; none makes more than $1.5 million. Simon Holmstrom and Oliver Wahlstrom will hit restricted free agency. Currently, Reilly and Bortuzzo are only fitting under the cap because Pelech’s $5.75 million hit is on long-term injured reserve.

Other than Holmstrom, who should be in line for a bridge deal, it’s not yet entirely clear how the Islanders will handle that group of players. Martin and Clutterbuck will face questions about retirement. Reilly and Bortuzzo were acquired as short-term rentals to help the Isles through their injury situation.

If Samuel Bolduc improves enough that the Isles want him to be an everyday player next season, Aho’s path to playing time would be cut off. If Wahlstrom continues to be healthy-scratched, it is hard to see him being around next year.

So there could be potential to make moves. But remember, the whole league is getting the benefit of the raised salary cap. In relative terms, the money the Islanders are freeing up is not all that much, especially when you factor in a raise for Holmstrom and that the team would need to shore up its bottom-six if, say, Martin and Clutterbuck retire.

And on top of that, a lot of the dollars the Islanders will get with the cap rising eventually will be directed toward contract extensions for Dobson and Romanov (and potentially Nelson and Palmieri).

Of course, any number of things could cause the situation to change between now and then — let alone between now and 2025. But that is the reason to think, as things stand, the Islanders will not be in a position to go out and sign someone to a megadeal this coming summer.

Five thoughts from Islanders-Ducks

1️⃣ Early in the day, Islanders coach Lane Lambert was asked why he hasn’t tried using Mat Barzal in five-on-six situations and said he wanted to avoid putting Barzal in situations with heavy “shot-block requirements.” Then Barzal went out and came up with a huge blocked shot on Leo Carlsson with 5:24 to go in the third period of the eventual win. “It’s winning hockey,” Lambert said afterward.

2️⃣ In 15:58 of time on ice at five-on-five, the Aho-Reilly pair accounted for a 12-8 shot advantage and 9-4 scoring-chance advantage, per Natural Stat Trick, in what was an excellent return to the lineup for the Swede. The contributions of Reilly and Bortuzzo lately also cannot be overlooked. They have helped the Islanders survive an unbelievable level of attrition on the blue line.

3️⃣ Holmstrom jumped into the league lead with his fourth shorthanded goal and earned the excellent nickname, “The Shorthanded King,” from Barzal. Lambert made a good point after the game that Pageau — Holmstrom’s usual forward partner on the penalty kill — has a decent history of shorthanded goals as well, and led the league in the category with seven in 2015-16. “They have a decent idea of when to go and not to go,” Lambert said, “and that’s very important when you’re killing a penalty. You can have an opportunity, you can have opportunities, but it’s gotta be calculated. I thought they did a great job.”

4️⃣ Isles-Bruins on Friday night suddenly feels like a heavyweight matchup. Both No. 1 goalies should be in net after Semyon Varlamov and Jeremy Swayman started for their respective sides on Wednesday, and the Bruins will be looking to bounce back after an overtime loss in Jersey. Hopefully there’s some juice in the building.

5️⃣ Regardless of what happens there, this six-game homestand has been an unmitigated success. That the Islanders haven’t had a “normal” (aka non-disastrous) loss in a month makes this stretch a little bit weird. But they also have lost just one game in regulation over that span.