Nine million a year, through 2028-29
Mark Stone is not going anywhere. The Vegas Golden Knights put their captain under contract for two more seasons earlier today, an $18 million extension that carries him through the 2028-29 campaign.
That is $9 million a year for a 34-year-old forward who has spent large parts of recent seasons on the shelf and still produces at a rate most healthy players cannot match. Vegas has never wavered on him. Since the February 2019 trade that brought him in from Ottawa, he has been the face of the franchise and one of the men who lifted the Cup in 2023.
Last season he finished with 73 points, 28 goals and 45 assists, in 60 games. That matched his career high, and he got there in 22 fewer games than a full schedule allows.
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A point a game, for seven years
Here is the number that explains the contract. Stone has 396 points in 400 games as a Golden Knight. One hundred and thirty-six goals, 260 assists, and a games-played column sitting almost exactly level with the points column across seven seasons.
The postseason line is stranger still. Ninety-seven points in 97 playoff games, split 48 goals and 49 assists. Twenty-four of those, 11 goals and 13 assists, came during the 2023 run to the Stanley Cup.
Across the whole career, Senators and Golden Knights combined, Stone sits on 707 points in 766 games. Two hundred and fifty-nine goals, 448 assists. The ratio barely moves whether you look at Ottawa, at Vegas, or at April and May.
A sixth-round pick who kept the letter
Ottawa called his name 178th overall in the 2010 draft. Sixth round. The Winnipeg native played 366 games for the Senators before the 2019 deadline deal sent him to a franchise that had existed for less than two years.
He wears the C there now and will keep wearing it into his mid-thirties. Training camps open across the league within days, and Vegas walks into theirs with the captaincy settled and $9 million a season committed to a player who turns 35 during the deal.
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