Pasta possible

1 - he’s staying in Boston

2 - if he would take 10m per he would have signed already. Boston made him that offer.

Pasta wants more than that to remain in Boston.

He'll probably come in the range of $11,000,000 to $11,500,000 x 7-8 years depending on if it's Boston or the open market.

Would love Pasta, but everything I have read suggests he will return to Boston.

But who knows, maybe he just wants to move to sunny New Jersey.

He’ll quickly realize he won’t be able to get that much because he has never played this well consistently

he's playing only slightly better than he did in 2018-19, so I don't think you can really say he's never played this well before

2019-20: 48-47-95 in 70 GP (1.36 PPG)
2022-23: 32-26-58 in 40 GP (1.45 PPG)

He's basically 0.09 PPG better this year than he was the year he won the Rocket Richard trophy. If he goes on a cold streak and gets "only" 2 points in his next 4 games, he'll be right in line with his scoring pace from that season. In the two years in between, he's been no slouch, either - he was at an even 1 PPG in the bubble season and 1.07 PPG last year.

He has a longer track record than Matt Tkachuk had this past summer ($9.5M AAV); he'll be 3 years younger than Jonathan Huberdeau was when he signed his extension ($10.5M AAV). When you add in the fact that the cap should be rising significantly over the next 3 years, an $11-12M cap hit isn't going to be as onerous as it has been over the past few flat cap years. I'd bet he pushes for 8x$11M from the Bruins or 7x$12M in the open market.