Zach Paries – How much will he get?

Zach Parise is probably this year’s biggest UFA name. Even though he has said he wants to stay in New Jersey, there will be many teams lining up to make him an offer.  Former GM Lou Nanne has said the Minnesota Wild will make him the highest offer.  What makes his comments interesting are how they must factor into Parise’s value.  Zach Parise’s on-ice performance is pretty consistant, with his true value worth about $5M during the regular seasons for three of the past four years (he had a significant injury in 2010-11 which kept him out most of the season):

			Zach Parise
	GP	G	A	Pts	Cap Hit ($M)	True Value ($M)
2008	81	32	33	65	3.13	3.49
2009	82	45	49	94	3.13	5.33
2010	81	38	44	82	3.13	5.03
2011	13	3	3	6	3.13	0.46
2012	82	31	38	69	6.00	4.96

Then when you look at his performance during the playoffs, his leadership and captaincy and the supply/demand of this elite level UFA he will surely get at least $6M per year.  But in a market like Minnesota where his father J.P. Parise played for many years, Zach’s value is even greater as his presence could be directly tied to increased revenue for the Wild (TV viewers, ticket sales, ticket prices) as people come to games specifically to watch him play. If only 150 people become season ticket holders because of Zach Parise, that could easily allow the Wild to pay him an additional $1.5M (150 x 44 games x $200 (2 tickets/gm)).

We shall see how this all plays out, but it would not be surprising if Zach Parise gets up to $7.5M per years if he goes to a market where he will be the center-piece player (compared to NJ where he shares the spotlight with Martin Brodeur and Ilya Kovalchuck).