Ryan Graves
2025-26· Data as of July 27, 2026
Status derived from CBA rules; edge cases (Group 6 UFA, 10.2(c), 35+ contracts) may be misclassified. Years remaining are not yet tracked.
Overpaid ~$2.7M/yr across 2 seasons so far · current season thin
Track record Judged as-of — with only the model and data available each season — this deal has cost −$5.5M over 2 seasons through 2024-25. See how past calls held up →
−0.05 cap-years of deficit ≈ −$4.2M
Judged as-of — each season priced with only the model and data available then — Ryan Graves has cost 0.05 cap-years more than he's delivered across our data window. One cap-year = a full season's salary-cap ceiling.
Career still active — this total will keep moving.
- Nikita Zadorov −$2.4M
- Brett Pesce −$2.9M
- Zach Whitecloud +$151K
Why this verdict
Why this verdict
Where this contract sits vs. the market
Each dot is a real free-agent signing (2015-2026): 613 comparable defense deals. The line is the going rate at each talent level, the market convention we price against. Real signings scatter around it; comparable players don’t all sign for the identical number.
The page’s headline verdict, −$2.1M/yr, refines this by adjusting the market rate for age, contract term. The plot compares to the raw market curve; the verdict adjusts it.
Structurally similar active deals
This contract sits in the Veteran depth region of the contract map. These are the active contracts whose shape is nearest to it, closest in spend, term, age, and role (not how they aged):
- Nikita Zadorov $5.0M −$2.4M
- Brett Pesce $5.5M −$2.9M
- Zach Whitecloud $2.8M +$151K
- Matt Roy $5.8M −$2.9M
- Brandon Montour $7.1M −$5.0M
- Jake McCabe $4.5M −$2.2M
Comparable by the shape of the deal, not by team or playing style. Archetypes are broad regions on a continuum; a deal near a boundary is genuinely in-between.
Outlook
Outlook
Future contract years valued by aging the player's current form forward against a projected salary cap — projections, not measurements. Each year carries a calibrated low–high range beneath its projected value — wider the further out the year runs and skewed downward to reflect players who leave the league. Confidence drops the further out they go, and the least predictable cases (elite players, goalies) show a wide insufficient comparable signings band rather than a precise figure. See the methodology.
This is a value trajectory, not a signing-price forecast — it does not apply the same-year discount the Free-Agent board uses for market timing and age risk. If a season below is also this player's free-agent year, expect the two pages to disagree; both are answering different questions.
| Season | Cap Hit | Proj. Fair Value | Verdict | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-27 | $4.5M | $2.9M $2.3M–$4.2M | Leaning overpaid | near-term projection |
| 2027-28 | $4.5M | $2.9M $2.2M–$4.3M | Too far out to call — projected range only | long-range projection |
| 2028-29 | $4.5M | $2.8M $1.8M–$4.4M | Too far out to call — projected range only | long-range projection |
Past his peak window
Production index for defensemen. The dot marks Ryan at age 31.
Empirical production-by-age index (delta-method WAR fit, 2010-11+). Illustrative of typical aging; the dollar model prices age with a separate, softer decline.
How this deal's surplus has accumulated — each elapsed season judged as-of,
scored with only the model and data available that season (no hindsight) and priced at the
player's age that year. This retrospective runs through 2024-25; the
current-season verdict is shown above. The waterfall builds the running total left to right; the subtotal below is a tally to date, not a forecast. Single-season value is noisy, and early-year
deficits partly reflect a lower salary cap — the same AAV was a smaller share of
the cap then — while the model tends to underprice an elite player's early-career
season, so read the early seasons with extra caution.
Partial record: part of this deal falls outside our as-of coverage, so only its 2023-24–2024-25 seasons are graded here.
Full stats
Full stats
On-ice expected-goals impact per 60 — RAPM-adjusted (teammate- and competition-adjusted) where career 5v5 ice time clears the reliability floor, a raw on-off xG differential otherwise. Not wins. The RAPM figure is career-pooled (one value across seasons); the on-off fallback shows the most recent season.
Counted outcomes — totals and rates that carry shooting and goaltending luck.
| Season | GP | G | A | P | TOI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025-26 | 22 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 15.3 |
| 2024-25 | 61 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 15.0 |
| 2023-24 | 70 | 3 | 11 | 14 | 18.4 |
| 2022-23 | 78 | 8 | 18 | 26 | 19.9 |
| 2021-22 | 75 | 6 | 22 | 28 | 20.7 |
| 2020-21 | 54 | 2 | 13 | 15 | 19.1 |
| 2019-20 | 69 | 9 | 17 | 26 | 18.9 |
| 2018-19 | 26 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 11.1 |
On-ice shot shares and modeled expected goals — these stabilize faster than goal totals, but xG is an estimate, not a count.
| Season | CF% | xG | xGF |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025-26 | 52.3 | 1.0 | 12.1 |
| 2024-25 | 49.6 | 1.3 | 29.0 |
| 2023-24 | 49.1 | 3.0 | 59.1 |
| 2022-23 | 51.9 | 5.7 | 75.9 |
| 2021-22 | 50.8 | 5.6 | 69.2 |
| 2020-21 | 57.2 | 4.1 | 42.9 |
| 2019-20 | 51.1 | 7.9 | 53.4 |
| 2018-19 | 49.6 | 1.1 | 12.1 |
- CF%
- Corsi-for percentage — share of shot attempts while on the ice
- xG
- Individual expected goals from the player's own shot attempts
- xGF
- On-ice expected goals — team's xG while this player is on the ice
Playoff track record
Playoff track record
Limited playoff sample
Descriptive only — not part of Value Score or Fair Value. Playoff samples are small and team-dependent; shown for the record.