Logan Cooley turns down enormous contract offer.

It is a new era in the National Hockey League, one that features a rapidly rising salary cap and along with that a drastic rise in player salaries around the league.

On Monday morning we were treated to our latest example of that when National Hockey League insider Frank Seravalli revealed that another massive contract offer had been rejected by a player prior to the start of the 2025-26 NHL regular season. That player, Utah Mammoth's forward Logan Cooley, has reportedly turned down a massive 8 year deal that would have seen him earning an average annual value and salary cap hit of $9.6 million per season. That represents a grand total of $77 million over the full course of the 8 year contract.

Cooley, a former Arizona Coyotes first round pick (3rd overall) at the 2022 NHL Entry Draft has kicked off his NHL career with two terrific seasons and it seems that both he and his representatives will attempt to use that to their fullest advantage.

In his first ever NHL season Cooley recorded 20 goals and 24 assists for a total of 44 points in 82 games and his second season was even better with Cooley producing 22 goals and 40 assists for a total of 65 points in spite of appearing in just 75 games last season.

Cooley's decision to turn down the contract could be financially motivated, with the player perhaps preferring a shorter term to maximize his earning potential with the cap going up so much in the next few years, but it could also be due to other factors as well. It has to be said that Cooley's NHL career began under less than ideal circumstances with the league's most dysfunctional team, the Coyotes, being the the team that drafted him. On top of that Cooley's time with the Coyotes came to an abrupt end when the team was unexpectedly moved to the state of Utah, something that most definitely could have created a lot of turmoil in a young man's life.

If Cooley would indeed prefer to play somewhere else in the future, there will be a ton of demand for an incredibly talented centerman who is just 21 years old.