Restricted Free Agents
Players who are no longer considered "entry-level" but do not qualify as unrestricted free agents become restricted free agents when their contracts expire.
- Qualifying Offers
The current team must extend a "qualifying offer" to a restricted free agent to retain negotiating rights to that player.
Players who earned less than $660,000 in the previous season must be offered 110 percent of last season's salary. Players making up to $1 million must be offered 105 percent. Players making over $1 million must be offered 100 percent.
If the qualifying offer is not made, the player becomes an unrestricted free agent.
If the player rejects a qualifying offer, he remains a restricted free agent.
- December 1 Deadline
Restricted free agents must sign NHL contracts by December 1, or they are not eligible to play in the NHL for the rest of the season.
- Salary Arbitration
A team or player can file for salary arbitration as a mechanism to settle contract disputes.
A team can take a player to arbitration once in his career, and cannot ask for a salary reduction greater than 15 percent. Players can ask for salary arbitration as often as they want.
See also: salary arbitration explained
Offer Sheets and Restricted Free Agents
An offer sheet is a contract negotiated between an NHL team and a restricted free agent on another team.
The offer sheet includes all the terms of a standard player contract, including length, salary, bonuses, etc.
A player who has signed a qualifying offer or is going to salary arbitration with his original team cannot sign an offer sheet.
When an offer sheet is signed, the player’s current (original) team is notified. That team can keep the player under the terms of the offer sheet, or decline and let the player join the new team under those terms.
The original team has seven days to make its decision.
Once an offer sheet has been signed by a player, the original team cannot negotiate a new contract under different terms or trade the player’s rights. It’s only options are to accept or decline the offer sheet.
If the original team chooses to accept, or “match” the offer sheet, the player cannot be traded for one year.
If the original team declines the offer sheet and loses the player, it receives draft picks from the player’s new team as compensation.
Compensatory draft picks are determined by the player’s new salary, on a sliding scale.
For example:
- In 2008 a team signing a restricted free agent to a salary averaging $2,615,625 to $3,923,437 per season will lose a first-round draft pick and a third-round draft pick to the player’s old team.
- Signing a restricted free agent to a contract worth over $6,539,062 per year costs a team four first-round draft picks.
Previous page: Unrestricted Free Agents Explained
