What is Patrik Nemeth really worth?

Nothing is official yet with the Patrik Nemeth contract I wrote about last night. Still some i’s to dot and t’s to cross. So until it is, I suppose there’s still a chance – it might be a Jim Carrey/Dumb and Dumber chance, but still a chance – it could still go to arbitration between the big Swede defenseman and the team.

Nemeth elected for arbitration, and a hearing is still set for Saturday in Toronto, should his case get that far. Nobody wants to get on a plane to Toronto and haggle this out. I wrote about how arbitration cases really go down, a few years ago for Sports Illustrated. It’s no fun for either side.

So, I expect this deal to be consummated still before it goes that far. But in this business, you never know.

Based on Nemeth’s statistics this past season and comparables with other players, I think he would get between $2.75 million and $3 million on a new deal from an arbitrator. Nemeth made $945,000 last season.

I expect the Avs to get him at a lower price than that. I don’t know what the actual number is, but I’m pretty sure it would be more than $2 million, probably closer to $2.5 million. So, it would still look like a win for GM Joe Sakic and Avs ownership. And Nemeth certainly would have reason to feel good too, more than doubling his last salary.

I’m not sure I’ve written about a player who draws more polarizing reactions from fans about what his true value is than Nemeth, not recently at least.

Some people really don’t like him as a player. Some think he was a steal for what he gave the Avs last year. It’s that plus-27 of his that is his great big bargaining chip. Plus-minus remains the disdain of analytics people, but it’s still a stat that coaches and GMs pay a lot of attention toward. But he had some other stats that would look good to an arbitrator. His 185 blocked shots were fifth in the league. He played a lot on a penalty-killing unit that was pretty good last year.

It’s all funny money once you get to this level. Nemeth is going to get paid one way or the other very soon.

What kind of contract would you give him, Avs fan?