J.T. Miller’s name was on the tip of every hockey fan’s tongue in Vancouver for the past several months. The heat was on new Canucks management to make a decision on Miller’s long-term future after his career-high 99-point season, one year out from his eligibility as an unrestricted free agent at the end of the 2022-23 campaign.

Trade or extend was the choice. Regardless of which path they took, the ripple effect of the decision was going to be felt for the better part of this decade. It was by far the biggest domino in showing us what direction Jim Rutherford and Patrik Allvin want to take in building the team.

Late Friday afternoon, management planted its flag, locking up Miller, 29, with a massive seven-year extension carrying an $8 million average annual value.

The extension is reasonable from the perspective of market value. It’s identical in term and salary to the seven-year, $56 million contract that Matt Duchene signed in 2019 and falls a bit short of those for Mika Zibanejad ($8.5 million AAV for eight seasons) and Tomas Hertl ($8.1375 million AAV for eight seasons). Zibanejad and Hertl had statistical profiles similar to Miller, and compared with their deals, the Canucks were able to shave off an extra year and a few hundred thousand dollars in annual salary.

The contract is relatively front-loaded, has more than $20 million in signing bonuses and includes a full no-movement clause and a modified no-trade clause for the final three years, The Athletic was told.

Risk-wise, it profiles like most long-term deals for top players in their late 20s. The value should be decent for the first few seasons. After that, there’s some cause for concern.

Colleague Dom Luszczyszyn’s Game Score Value Added (GSVA) model projects that Miller will provide first-line value until the final three years of the deal.