{"id":516139,"date":"2026-03-22T05:19:21","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T05:19:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/516139\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T05:19:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T05:19:21","slug":"insider-offers-real-reason-behind-connor-mcdavids-team-friendly-extension","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/516139\/","title":{"rendered":"Insider Offers Real Reason Behind Connor McDavid\u2019s Team-Friendly Extension"},"content":{"rendered":"

The ups and downs of the Edmonton Oilers this season have once again started to raise questions about the future of Connor McDavid.<\/p>\n

If the Oilers don\u2019t win or reach a Stanley Cup Final in the next two years, will he ask out before the final year of his deal? Could that process be expedited if Edmonton flames out early in 2025\u201326? That chatter is starting to swirl around the hockey world<\/a>, and everyone will be keeping a close eye on how the Oilers fare down the stretch.<\/p>\n

Nobody will truly know what\u2019s going to happen until we see how the next few months\u2014and more likely the next year\u2014unfold. However, Sportsnet insider Nick Kypreos believes the real reason McDavid signed such a team-friendly extension to stay in Edmonton goes beyond simply helping the team win. While Kypreos believes that was certainly part of it, he feels the main motivation was to show that if\u2014or when\u2014he leaves, no one can say he didn\u2019t give it every last chance to win as an Oiler.<\/p>\n

Kypreos said<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\u201cNever got a raise, like, go find me a superstar that, I know he could have, but like he chose not to for a number of reasons. Not like that, not in their prime, not in their prime with a small window of you claiming that you are far and away the best player on the planet. My point is that he did it for a number of reasons, but the biggest reason of all is when I leave, no one can accuse me of not giving it every last chance to win here,\u201d\u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n

The 29-year-old McDavid\u2019s two-year, $25 million extension signed with the Oilers in October begins next season (2026-27), and will expire following the 2027-28 campaign.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"McDavidMcDavid Oilers frustrated<\/p>\n

His mention of \u201cwhen I leave\u201d feels like the most important part of it, though if Edmonton finds a way to get over the hump and win a Cup this year or next, that \u201cwhen\u201d becomes irrelevant.<\/p>\n

All of this is to say there is immense pressure not just on McDavid, but especially on the Oilers to maximize this short window where the best player in the world is in his prime\u2014and not even among the top five highest-paid players over the duration of his next deal.<\/p>\n

McDavid is in year 11 in Edmonton; 11 years with one team is an eternity in sports. He truly has done everything he can to win as an Oiler, and while he still has a great opportunity to follow through on that\u2014especially in such a weak Pacific Division\u2014if it doesn\u2019t happen, it will be hard to fault him should he ultimately .<\/p>\n

Next: Insider Asks the Difficult Question: What Has Happened to John Tavares?<\/a><\/p>\n

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\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The ups and downs of the Edmonton Oilers this season have once again started to raise questions about…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":408509,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[155,5,4,2175],"class_list":{"0":"post-516139","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-connor-mcdavid","9":"tag-hockey","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-top-story"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116271145336833152","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/516139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=516139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/516139\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/408509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=516139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=516139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=516139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}