Which NHL Teams Are Getting the Most Out of Their Cap Space? (2025-26)

Since 2005, the salary cap has been the great equalizer in the NHL. Every team gets a certain amount of cap space to build a roster, with an upper limit of $95.5M for the 2025-26 season. But cap space isn't created equal. What matters is whether the players eating that cap space are earning their salary. When you pay a player $8M and they're producing like a $4M player, you've wasted $4M in space that could have gone to someone who earns their keep.

Using the PuckTheory Contract Prediction Tool, specifically the Market Value prediction model, I looked at the value that each player was providing for their team for that season. The Market Value model predicts this based on what teams typically are paying for the player's current production, regardless of age, contract structure, or any other context. All numbers in this article are given by version 1.1.0 of the Market Value model. By looking at all 32 teams' rosters, I was able to determine which teams are getting the most value out of their rosters. The difference between what a team pays and what it gets back is surplus value. We can look at teams' total surplus value and market value as a whole, as well as broken down by position, use of entry-level contracts, and more.

This article will showcase my findings and analysis, as well as provide interactive visuals. You can view the model predictions yourself using the Contract Prediction Tool. Unless explicitly mentioned, surplus numbers exclude entry-level contracts, since their cap ceilings are structurally below market rate, so including them can inflate the surplus for teams with lots of young talent. One limitation with this study is that I do not have access to which players currently have salary retained by another team, so it is assumed that teams are currently taking on the entire salary cap of each player.

At the Top: Efficiency as a Competitive Edge

In the 2025-26 season, the Colorado Avalanche led the league with +$28.9M in total surplus value. Colorado didn't just lead the league in points, they led in contract efficiency too. Their surplus value was +$10.9M ahead of the next highest team, and their entire roster (ELCs included) carried a market value of $126.5M. Cale Makar ($9.4M cap hit) produced at a $14.3M market rate (+$4.9M surplus). Martin Necas, on a $6.5M deal, provided the most value out of any non-ELC player this season with +$7.4M surplus value. Even goalie Scott Wedgewood contributed +$5.7M in surplus. 71% of non-ELC players on Colorado provided positive value, so it's no surprise they were dominant this season.

One finding of note was that the Pittsburgh Penguins had the 2nd most total surplus value with +$18.0M in total surplus. What makes them interesting is that they had the 16th most money on non-ELCs in this study at $85.1M, yet those contracts provided the 5th highest market value at $107.8M. This is because players like Ryan Shea, Anthony Mantha, and Parker Wotherspoon all provided at least +$3M in surplus value each while signed to relatively low cap hits.

The Tampa Bay Lightning also provided a noteworthy case: Darren Raddysh, a defenseman on a $975K cap hit, produced at an $11.8M market rate, giving him the most surplus value by a non-ELC player this season with +$10.8M surplus. He more than made up for the negative surplus of Victor Hedman, who provided a -$4.9M surplus after missing 49 games this season due to injury and personal reasons. This allowed Tampa Bay to have the 3rd highest total surplus value at +$16.7M.

While most of this article excludes entry-level contracts, it's hard not to mention the San Jose Sharks. They had the highest number of ELCs eligible for this study, with 8. When including ELCs, their total team surplus value jumps from -$0.9M to +$30.7M, meaning that those 8 ELC players contributed +$31.6M in team surplus value. This is largely thanks to the player providing the single most surplus value out of anyone, Macklin Celebrini, who produced at a market value of $13.1M while only making $975K (+$12.1M surplus).

At the Bottom: The Cost of Bad Contracts

The Vancouver Canucks sit last in the league with -$15.1M in total surplus value. Elias Pettersson is their biggest offender, providing -$6.0M surplus value at his $11.5M cap hit. Their goaltending tandem of Thatcher Demko and Kevin Lankinen also combines for a surplus value of around -$5.3M. It is important to mention that the Canucks sold away players that were providing positive surplus value, such as Quinn Hughes and Kiefer Sherwood. This only left them with negative surplus veterans when not including players on ELCs.

The New Jersey Devils (-$14.8M) and New York Islanders (-$13.8M) round out the bottom three. The Islanders are dragged down by contracts such as Anders Lee (-$3.2M), as well as newly acquired players such as Ondrej Palat (-$4.4M) and Brayden Schenn (-$3.1M). The Devils are being hindered by the fact that they have no defensemen who provided significant positive value other than Simon Nemec (+$3.3M) who is on an ELC. The rest of the Devils' notable defensemen all provided negative value: Brett Pesce (-$3.1M), Dougie Hamilton (-$2.6M), Johnathan Kovacevic (-$2.5M), Luke Hughes (-$2.2M), Brenden Dillon (-$1.7M), and Jonas Siegenthaler (-$1.7M).

As far as individual players go, Sergei Bobrovsky had the lowest surplus value of any player in 2025-26 with -$7.4M. Florida got goaltending worth about $2.6M from their goaltender making $10.0M. The lowest surplus value from a non-goaltender belongs to Auston Matthews, who, while still providing $6.3M worth of production, is signed for $13.25M, putting his surplus value at -$6.95M. When your highest-paid players are the ones underperforming the most, it is easy to see why Florida and Toronto both finished lower than expected in the standings.

The Importance of Efficiency and ELCs

It is easy to assume that the teams with the most efficient spending, the ones getting the most value from their contracts, are going to be the ones who perform the best during the regular season, and you would mostly be right.

Total Surplus Value vs. Regular Season Points

First, we will look at the relationship between a team's total surplus value and regular-season points. For this relationship, there seems to be a stronger correlation when excluding ELCs. As a whole, there is a correlation with r=0.72 between a team's total surplus value and their regular season points excluding ELCs, compared to an r=0.63 correlation when including ELCs. An r=0.72 is a moderately strong relationship, so teams that extract positive value from their non-ELC contracts consistently tend to win more, but it is by no means a guarantee. Still, the gap between r=0.72 and r=0.63 is meaningful: non-ELC surplus is a noticeably cleaner predictor of wins than overall surplus. This would suggest that it is more important to get positive value on non-ELCs as opposed to ELCs. There is no notable relationship between individual positions and the importance of their value.

The reason excluding ELCs provides a higher correlation is that ELC surplus can heavily skew a team's total without actually reflecting their competitiveness. ELC-heavy teams are typically younger and less consistent, and a team built around a handful of star rookies often lacks the veteran depth to translate that cap efficiency into wins. The San Jose Sharks with Macklin Celebrini (+$12.1M), the Anaheim Ducks with Leo Carlsson (+$9.1M), and the Chicago Blackhawks with Connor Bedard (+$8.5M) all have a young superstar alongside several other ELC players generating significant positive value, yet all three are rebuilding franchises near the bottom of the standings. Their ELC windfalls inflate total surplus without translating to wins, which is exactly what drags the r=0.63 correlation down.

Total Market Value vs. Regular Season Points

Second, we will look at the relationship between a team's total market value and regular-season points. For this relationship, there seems to be a stronger correlation when including ELCs. As a whole, there is a stronger correlation with r=0.87 between a team's total market value and their regular season points when including ELCs, compared to an r=0.76 correlation when excluding ELCs. This would suggest that teams performing the best during the regular season are the ones getting the most out of ELC contracts to complement veterans supplying value.

The most glaring example is the Montreal Canadiens, who got $23.9M in market value from their ELCs: Lane Hutson ($10.9M), Ivan Demidov ($5.21M), Zach Bolduc ($2.8M), Oliver Kapanen ($2.6M), Jacob Fowler ($2.3M), and Joshua Roy ($1.25M). Getting that much value from players making so little drastically helps offset any veterans who might be underperforming.

Unlike with total surplus value, there is a moderate positive relationship between forward and defense market value and regular season points, both with r=0.77 when including ELCs. There is no notable correlation when it comes to goaltending value, with only an r value of 0.40. These findings suggest that building from the net outward may not be the optimal approach.

A detailed table of each team's data is directly below, as well as a quick look at each team's highest and lowest value players this season.