That star-studded 2026 class of free agents is disappearing before our eyes.

No truly elite players made it to July 1 last summer after Mitch Marner went to the Golden Knights on a sign-and-trade the day before free agency. And only two players from the tier below reached the open market: Nikolaj Ehlers and Vladislav Gavrikov.

Every other player signed early, from Leon Draisaitl and Mikko Rantanen to Sidney Crosby, Carter Verhaeghe, Jaccob Slavin, Shea Theodore, Igor Shesterkin, Jake Oettinger and so on.

So it really isn’t that surprising that the 2026 free agents are coming off the board early; it’s par for the course. It only stresses why teams need to draft and develop their own stars and find ways to keep them long-term.

That’s what a handful of teams have been doing over the last couple of weeks, and it’s making waves for the rest of the league.

McDavid’s staying in Edmonton, for now

A star-powered class of free agents lines up perfectly with cap growth. For stars not named McDavid, at least.

McDavid is the best player in the world, period. He could have commanded the maximum from Edmonton or anyone else in the league. In 2026-27, his market value is projected to be around $18.3 million; a year later, it is expected to jump to $19.3 million. But his next contract is clearly bigger than the dollars and cents of it all — he said as much last June, after another loss in the Stanley Cup Final, and he proved it with an incredibly team-friendly deal: an extension of his current $12.5 million cap hit for another two years.

It’s also a pretty unique situation. Elite players generally don’t sign shorter-term deals at this point in their careers. Auston Matthews is one of the few with a four-year contract (which expires in 2028).

But McDavid is a unique player, and this makes a lot of sense for him. It puts pressure on management to do whatever it takes to win within this window, while leaving the team some financial flexibility. It also gives McDavid a natural exit point in 2028 if he doesn’t feel Edmonton is moving in the right direction. Plus, he can still cash in on his next contract; the cap will presumably be higher, and the Oilers will have more cap space to work with as supporting contracts expire.

This signing really isn’t a needle-mover for other free agents, but it doesn’t have to be. McDavid should be thought of as a unicorn, like Crosby, who has had a flat $8.7 million cap hit in every single season since 2008-09. The only way to justify the fact that McDavid isn’t the highest-paid player in the league is that he chose not to be. Just because he signed for less than he is worth doesn’t mean the rest of the stars have to.

Kaprizov gets the bag

Kaprizov’s $17 million AAV extension is a slight overpayment. But if anyone should be in that realm, it should be a top-10 player in the world, which we consider him to be in this year’s Player Tiers, behind only Nikita Kucherov on the wing.

Kucherov’s $9.5 million cap hit was worth 11.7 percent of the cap in 2019, Year 1 of his deal. David Pastrnak, who landed in 1C with Kaprizov, signed for $11.25 million, which was worth 13.5 percent of the cap in 2023-24. The Tier 1 centers push that a little higher; Leon Draisaitl took up 14.7 percent of the cap in Edmonton in the first year of his extension, while Auston Matthews and Nathan MacKinnon were both at 15.1 percent.

Kaprizov, on the other hand, is coming in at 16.3 percent of a projected $104 million cap (or 15.9 percent of a $107 million cap).

That obviously looks a lot different than McDavid’s reasonable 12 percent hit, but Kaprizov isn’t McDavid and the two are in very different situations.

Minnesota doesn’t have the same recent history of Edmonton as a selling point. This isn’t a team that has gone to back-to-back Stanley Cup Finals. The Wild haven’t made it past Round 1 since the 2015 postseason, and have no chance of finding the contender’s circle without Kaprizov’s star power. His play has electrified this franchise in a big way and helps make up for the fact that this team doesn’t have an elite first-line center.

Then factor in the market. Say Kaprizov signed for only 12 percent of a $104 million cap. That translates to a $12.5 million AAV, which is in a similar range to Rantanen and Marner, two 2B wingers. There should be more separation between wingers, especially in this cap world. The degree of separation may be a little extreme here, but it’s better to overpay someone with game-breaking skill on a franchise that craves it, versus paying the middle class like most buyers did on July 1 this past summer.

The ripple effect on 2026 wingers

Sometimes, it just takes one contract to get the ball rolling for a free agent class. After the two top 2026 free agents extended, in Kaprizov and McDavid, the next wave is already starting to come in. Kyle Connor and Jack Eichel each signed eight-year contracts on Wednesday.

There seem to be a few influencing contracts for Connor’s $12 million AAV. The obvious are the two star wingers of the 2025 class, Rantanen and Marner, who signed matching contracts a couple of months ago. Connor isn’t in the same tier as these two — we have them separated by a whole tier, to be exact. The goal scoring is elite, but he hasn’t always had the substance to back it up, which makes his top comp (Mika Zibanejad) somewhat concerning. But if last year was an indication that Connor can be the play-driver the Jets need and the scorer, then maybe he can follow a path like that of Steven Stamkos, which would help this deal age a lot better.

The growing cap is one consideration, as a $12 million contract starting in 2025-26 is slightly different from one in 2026-27. Then there’s the Kaprizov effect. As the Wild showed, sometimes it’s worth overspending on stars — maybe even more so now that the 2026 market is starting to dry up early. The Jets’ top six is already short-handed without Ehlers, which makes Connor’s offense even more valuable to this team in particular. Then add in the “tax” of playing in Winnipeg, a market without the same playoff success track record as other contenders.

That could become a factor in negotiations for players such as Adrian Kempe and Alex Tuch as well.

While neither one is MVP, franchise or even All-Star tier, Tuch and Kempe are two of the top wingers on their respective teams. And that could cost the Kings and Sabres, like it did the Jets (and Wild). Evolving-Hockey’s model projected eight-year extensions for both this past summer — Kempe at $10.2 million AAV and Tuch at $9.1 million. But the needle may officially be moved higher for both, with some of the 2026 free agents raising the bar higher and higher.

Eichel stays golden

Want proof the McDavid contract is an outlier? Just look at Eichel’s contract, signed one day later: an eight-year deal worth $13.5 million a year on average.

This already looks like great value for the Golden Knights, considering what an all-around threat Eichel has become in Vegas. He essentially quarterbacks offensive situations with his puck-moving play. And now he takes on matchup minutes and kills penalties, thanks to his defensive growth. It’s a safe bet that the 2024-25 season reset the bar for Eichel, who will now have a two-way winger such as Marner to help take his game higher.

The difference here for Eichel, compared to a Kaprizov, Connor, or even a Kempe or Tuch, is that Vegas has won the Stanley Cup in the last five years. That playoff track record is stronger, and so is management’s willingness to do whatever it takes to better this team’s chances. That separation between the actual contenders’ circle and the rest of the projected playoff field could become a factor in contract situations as salaries continue to grow. That could affect players such as Jason Robertson in Dallas as other winger contracts rise around him.

Recalibrate the market for young guns

Proven difference-makers aren’t the only players benefiting from the rising cap. Rising stars are also getting paid.

On defense, the Luke Hughes contract was a tone-setter. A seven-year deal with a $9 million AAV looks a bit high for a player of his caliber right now. Cale Makar only carries a $9 million cap hit, while the likes of Adam Fox and Zach Werenski come in around $9.5 million. But the more Hughes takes over that No. 1 role in New Jersey, the more he will grow into this cap hit. The offensive sense is already there, and he had a chance to show it down the stretch at even strength and on the power play when Dougie Hamilton was sidelined. He needs to build up his game away from the puck, and having Brad Shaw on the coaching staff could help add more structure.

That contract was announced on Oct. 1. One day later, Jackson LaCombe signed a similar deal — eight years at $9 million AAV. Like Hughes, he isn’t a $9 million defenseman yet. But if he keeps building on last year’s progress, he will definitely become one. LaCombe’s three-zone-play stood out through all of the chaos in Anaheim last year. Factor in a potential new coach bump, and a growing roster around him, and the path is there for him to solidify himself as a true top-pair defenseman.

Every long-term deal carries some risk, even for a player in their mid-20s. In LaCombe’s case, it’s whether he follows the path of a Kyle Quincey, versus a Josh Morrissey or Ryan Suter.

Still, it’s better to bet on these types of players before they even hit their prime, compared to overpriced free agent defensemen in their late 20s and early 30s — especially after prices spiked this summer.

But if Hughes and LaCombe are worth $9 million, what does that mean for Lane Hutson? As ESPN’s Emily Kaplan reported, a $9.5 million contract was a consideration until these two reset the market price.

Quinn Hughes, keep in mind, was worth 9.6 percent of the Canucks’ cap in Year 1 of his six-year contract. That translates to about $10 million in 2026-27. Makar’s 11 percent hit would take him closer to the $11 million range.

As the up-and-coming defense market takes shape, there are some centers to keep an eye on, too. Whoever strikes first between Logan Cooley, Leo Carlsson, Connor Bedard and Adam Fantilli, among others, could set the tone for the rest of the 2026 RFA class.

There can be pressure to sign early, especially as others do around the league, but it would actually benefit this group of centers to wait. That way, they aren’t just betting on their promise and potential, but rather their actual track records. It wouldn’t hurt to see how others below that elite tier in the 2026 free-agent class get paid, either. The more star players advocate for higher pay, the more the market will continue to shift in their favor in this rising cap world.

— Data via Dom Luszczyszyn, CapWages, Evolving-Hockey, HockeyViz, HockeyStatCards, All Three Zones and Natural Stat Trick. This story relies on shot-based metrics; here is a primer on these numbers.