Tomorrow may be the first real checkpoint in Drake Batherson’s contract situation.
Both Batherson and Senators general manager Steve Staios are expected to be at the club’s annual Foundation charity tournament on Friday at Rideau View Golf Club in Manotick, according to Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Citizen. That gives the situation a natural window for an update, especially with the Sept. 15 deadline tied to the NHL’s new CBA creeping closer.
That deadline matters because it changes the rules on term. Under the new agreement, players re-signing with their current team can no longer get eight-year deals; the max is now seven. If Batherson and Ottawa don’t get something done before then, that option disappears.
Batherson has spent the summer in Halifax and recently returned to Ottawa, Garrioch reported. The 28-year-old right winger would like to stay with the Senators, where he’s settled since joining the team in 2018.
He’s entering the final season of his six-year, $29.85MM contract with a $4.975MM cap hit, and if he plays out that deal he’ll hit unrestricted free agency next summer. At that point, he could chase more money on the open market, though his maximum term elsewhere would be six years under the new CBA.
From Ottawa’s side, the appeal is obvious. Batherson has been a steady source of offense throughout this contract, and last season he delivered a career-high 33 goals and 71 points. He finished second on the Senators in scoring behind Tim Stutzle’s 83 points and ranked fourth on the team in cost-per-point at just $70K in 2025-26.
The value has been there for a while. Batherson has put up three 60-plus-point seasons since 2022-23, and even earlier in the deal he was chipping in in the 30- to 40-point range.
For a player Ottawa took 121st overall in the 2017 NHL Draft, that kind of climb stands out. His 364 career points are already good for a top-10 spot among players selected in that draft class.
The next contract, though, is where things get expensive. AFPAnalytics projects Batherson could land a six-year deal worth about $60MM total, with a $9.8MM AAV. That would run through his age-35 season and would ask Ottawa to pay for what he’s done while betting he can keep producing at the same level into his age-37 season, with the cap expected to keep rising.
Batherson is believed to be aiming for an eight-year deal in Ottawa, with the money still the sticking point. League sources told Garrioch he could be in the neighborhood of Alex Tuch or Adrian Kempe, which would push him into the $10-$11MM range annually. If that happens, he’d become the Senators’ highest-paid player, ahead of Jake Sanderson’s $8.05MM, Linus Ullmark’s $8.25MM, and Stutzle’s $8.35MM.
There is a clear comparison point, but it comes with a caveat. Tuch and Kempe have both played far more NHL games than Batherson, who has 470.
Kempe has 711. Batherson also trails Tuch’s 200 goals with 149, and sits roughly 100 points behind Tuch’s 448 and Kempe’s 474.
Even so, both are top-line players earning top-tier money at their positions.
For now, the talks are still delicate. A league source told the Ottawa Citizen that it remains a complicated negotiation, even with Ottawa projected to have $40MM in cap space in 2027-28.
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