- Bowen Byram’s agent says another team had a $14M-per-year offer ready this summer
- Byram instead signed a six-year, $75M deal in Chicago with full trade protection
- Read below for what agent Darren Ferris said on the PuckPedia Hockey Show
Bowen Byram left money on the table to land in Chicago.
The Blackhawks defenseman signed a six-year, $75 million extension earlier this month, a $12.5 million cap hit. His agent, Darren Ferris, says another team was ready to pay him even more.
Ferris went on the PuckPedia Hockey Show and walked through how the offseason played out. He said one club had a four-year deal worth $56 million, a $14 million average, sitting on the table.
Trade talks with that team had gotten far enough that Buffalo gave Ferris permission to discuss an extension with the new club. Byram passed on the richer number.
Security and control drove the call. The Chicago pact runs two years longer and comes with full trade protection. Ferris added that Chicago also gave his client a friendlier tax situation. He would not say which team made the bigger pitch.
Watch Ferris lay out the whole thing:
Role factored in too. Ferris said Byram wanted a bigger job than he had in Buffalo, and the Blackhawks are handing him one. Given the size of the outside offer, he probably would have been a top guy on that team’s blue line as well.
The 25-year-old is coming off the best season of his career. He put up 11 goals and 31 assists in 82 games last year without a top-pairing workload. Chicago is betting a bigger role turns him into a full-blown number one, and it locked him up with the six-year extension to prove it.
The deal does not even start until 2027-28. Byram is wagering that a lead role in Chicago pays off before his next contract comes due at 32.
