Hey, Johnny, you’re up.
The Calgary Flames and top centre Sean Monahan have agreed to terms on a new seven-year contract, the club announced Friday.
The deal is worth $44.625 million and carries a salary cap hit of $6.375 million, according to Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman. This gives Monahan the highest annual average salary of any RFA centre who signed this year.
“I don’t want to play anywhere else. I would sign as long as I could,” Monahan said at the press conference.
Monahan, 21, became a restricted free agent on July 1 and negotiations between the club and agent Pat Morris had been ongoing.
In 81 games in 2015-16, the 6-foot-3, 195-pound native of Brampton, Ont., scored 27 goals and a career-high 63 points. He was selected by Team North America to participate in September’s World Cup of Hockey.
“We look at this as really securing Sean for the prime years of his career,” GM Brad Treliving said. “To get Sean at this number and this type of term worked for us. It works having him locked up as a key pillar of this team for the next seven years, which we think will be very productive years for Sean.”
Monahan, the sixth-overall pick at the 2013 NHL Entry Draft, joins an impressive class of pivots who completed their entry-level contracts this summer and inked long-term extensions. That list includes Florida’s Aleksander Barkov (six years, $35.5 million), Winnipeg’s Mark Scheifele (eight years, $49 million), Colorado’s Nathan MacKinnon (seven years, $44.1 million), and Nashville’s Filip Forsberg (six years, $36 million).
Earlier this week, Friedman reported that fellow Flames restricted free agent Johnny Gaudreau will participate in the upcoming World Cup of Hockey regardless of whether he has signed a new deal before the tournament begins. Friedman added once the tournament begins, Gaudreau will stop negotiating until it concludes.
Treliving maintained Friday that the two sides are working away and will find a fair deal.
“It takes time. I’m positive [Gaudreau] will be here for Oct. 12 and playing for the Calgary Flames,” Monahan said.
“I’m not worried about it, and obviously Brad’s doing his work on that part. I’m looking forward to getting up to the World Cup and playing with him there.”
