Thursday, August 30, 2012

What’s Travis Zajac worth?

Former Fighting Sioux forward Travis Zajac will be looking for a new unrestricted free agent deal when his current deal expires next summer. Zajac over the course of six seasons he has played in 423 NHL games has scored 91 goals and 164 assist for 255 career points.

According to Cap Geek, Travis Zajac has one more year of a deal that is worth $3,887,500. While Zajac was injured this past season and only played in 15 games during the regular season scoring (2g-4a—6pts), he did pick up his game during the New Jersey Devils run to the Stanley Cup Finals scoring (7g-7a—14pts) during the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

Zajac was pretty good through much of the playoffs – tieing Bryce Salvador for third in scoring  on the Devils - much like the rest of his Devils teammates - Zajac ran into the Los Angeles Kings buzz-saw during the finals and his game cooled off and he was pretty much held in check like the rest of his team scoring (0g-2a—2pts) in the last five games that he played in.

For comparison sake, former Wisconsin Badger’s and current Ottawa Senators forward Kyle Turris recently signed a contract extension for 3.5 million dollars per year for five years’ worth 17.5 million dollars. Based on the Turris signing I would have to think that Travis Zajac is going to be due a substantial pay raise.

Breaking it down further, Zajac is currently making only 300,000 more a season than Turris and yet has been substantially more productive on the ice than Turris, this is why I think that Zajac is due is a pretty big raise. Here is the line on Kyle Kyle Turris, he has played in the NHL for parts of five season and has a modest line of 186 NHL games played, he has scored 31 goals and 41 assist for 75 points.

When Zajac’s line mate Zach Parise signed a big unrestricted free agent deal with the Minnesota Wild some suggested that the Minnesota Wild also make an attempt to sign Zach as well. Others have suggested that Zajac will try to sign with the Winnipeg Jets during the offseason next summer.