This past summer, one of the major storylines for the Colorado Avalanche was the contract negotiations of Nikita Zadorov. The 22-year old defenseman was a restricted free agent and wasn’t re-signed until training camp began. What seemed like easy contract negotiations turned into a summer of KHL rumors and reports of an absurdly small amount of money being haggled over.
A day into training camp, Zadorov and the team eventually agreed to a 2-year deal worth $2.125m per season. Everything seemed fine and we could now pencil Zadorov into the team’s top-4 as he continued his development towards becoming a foundational piece of the team.