Looking at the top 20 salaries in the league.....(not cap hits as the argument here has been expecting a trend towards actual value/salary rather than long contracts with frontloaded salary to drop cap hit towards the end of the contract).
Shea Weber $14M
Brad Richards $12M
Tyler Myers $12M
Zach Parise $12M
Ryan Suter $12M
Ilya Kovalchuk $11M
Vincent Lecavalier $10M
Evgeni Malkin $9M
Alex Ovechkin $9M
Eric Staal $8.5M
Mike Richards $8.4M
Jason Spezza $8M
Duncan Keith $8M
Christian Ehrhoff $8M
Steven Stamkos $8M
Marian Hossa $7.9M
Henrik Zetterberg $7.75M
Rick Nash $7.6M
Sidney Crosby $7.5M
Getzlaf certainy belongs among those names when you consider what he brings to the Ducks. There are names on that list that simply inspire a big ole WTF.
When you look at that list and see the number of names that are on teams that are really no threat whatsoever to win a Cup.....well you have to think that the teams that are going to be at top of the league 4 years from now are not going to be the teams paying out those salaries that are in the top 5 of that list. Not with a salary cap in the $66M range.
I know I would hate to be an owner of one of the NHL franchises that makes money and have to watch teams like Anaheim who lose $10.9M a year (according to Forbes) sign a player like Getzlaf to that kind of money when I would love to have him on my team for the same cash.....then have to cut a cheque to the league for revenue sharing.


