NHL's leading scorer in contract standoff with his current team.

There have been a ton of surprises at the start of the 2025-26 National Hockey League regular season with several teams coming out of the gate looking much better than had been anticipated, while others have faltered.

One of the biggest surprises has been the play of the Utah Mammoth, a team that has scored more goals than any other in the NHL thus far this season, but unfortunately for the Mammoth there are some headaches that will come as a result of their newfound success.

Mammoth forward Nick Schmaltz is currently the NHL's leading scorer with 16 points already on the season, tied with Golden Knights forward Jack Eichel who has 1 less goal than Schmaltz, and while that is great for the Mammoth in the short term in could also mean big trouble for them in the long term.

NHL insider Elliotte Friedman has revealed that Schmaltz and the Mammoth are quite far apart when it comes to their negotiations on a new contract, and Schmaltz's red hot start to the season is likely only going to drive up his current asking price.

"The really interesting one there is the league's leading scorer, Schmaltz," said Friedman on the 32 Thoughts podcast. "I heard that the two sides weren't even close."

Schmaltz, who is currently in the final year of a 7 year deal that carries an average annual value and salary cap hit of $5.85 million per season, is set to earn a huge raise on his next deal. That however may not be in the plans for the Mammoth moving forward.

"I just heard that however things went there they weren't even close," added Friedman.

Schmaltz is 29 years old so there would be some risk to signing him to a long term deal, but there's no question that at his current pace he would be a highly sought after commodity should he hit the open market at the end of the season.

In just 10 games this season Schmaltz already has 7 goals and 9 assists for a total of 16 points.

The question now is will the Mammoth allow Schmaltz to walk to free agency at the end of the season, or will they look to be proactive and make a trade before the NHL's trade deadline if they can't come to terms on a new deal?