Five worst Tampa Bay Lightning contracts of the Salary Cap Era

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Jan 19, 2017; San Jose, CA, USA; Tampa Bay Lightning center Valtteri Filppula (51) looks to pass against the San Jose Sharks in the third period at SAP Center at San Jose. The Sharks won 2-1. Mandatory Credit: John Hefti-USA TODAY Sports /

Tampa Bay Lightning Worst Contracts: Valtteri Filppula

Five years for $25 million in 2013

Considering he was a third-round draft pick in 2002, Valtteri Filppula is probably satisfied with how his NHL career panned out. He played in 1,056 games over 16 seasons and finished his career in 2021 with 530 career points.

After winning a Stanley Cup with Detroit in 2008 and putting up 66 points in 2012, Tampa took a shot at Filppula in 2013 with a five-year, $25,000,000 deal.

And to be honest, his first season with the Tampa Bay Lightning wasn’t that bad. He scored 25 goals and put up 58 points. It still wasn’t quite worth the $5,000,000 cap hit Tampa had to take, considering the salary cap was only $64.3 million that year, but it wasn’t a disaster.

But then, during the Stanley Cup finals run of 2014-15, Filppula turned 30, and the wheels slowly started to come off.

He only scored 12 goals that season, though he did have 14 points during the playoff run.

By year three of the deal, his contract was an outright problem. He only put up 31 points during the 2015-16 season, and during year four, Tampa was able to get out of his contract when he was traded to Philadelphia at the trade deadline with an entire year still left on the contract.

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