Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Free agent mania rules the day
Back to the Future movies starring Canadian born Michael J. Fox has nothing on the NHL after the first few days of July. Buckle up the chin strap because there are still a few beauties out there.
Notwithstanding the debacle involving Michael Nylander and the Oilers and the Capitals, it still was a scene very reminiscent of the late 1990’s and early 2000’s as the large market teams waded into free agency with reckless abandon. Clearly the focus at this time as opposed to then is the length or the term of the contract in conjunction with the obscene money. Teams are obviously attempting in at least a small way to guard against the rising cap by locking up players for longer periods of time thereby having that money guaranteed over the length of the contract. Truth be told Rick DiPietro played pretty darn good when he was in nets for the Isles last season and I know more than one person was saying ‘hold on here, we’ve ridiculed Garth Snow like crazy over that signing – but what if DiPietro really becomes a top 3-4 goalie does that make his salary of 4.5 million a year a bargain? Yes it does even though a fifteen year deal still sounds foolish. Let’s take a look at some of the other deals so far in the free agency frenzy.
The one that I like the most is Petr Sykora to the Penguins. I have to tell you, it was funny being in Columbus on draft day when the Penguins finally selected Angelo Esposito whose stock had fallen to the point that he was finally taken by the Penguins in the 20th position much later than he had been anticipated to go earlier last season. First reaction was the Penguins had landed another marquee scorer albeit one whose stock had dropped. In Sykora it has the same feel. Even though he was only a fifty-five point guy last year in Edmonton the feeling is as one of the top six forwards with Pittsburgh he could easily surpass that combined with time on the second unit power play and simply put on one of the most gifted offensive squads in the league. Getting Darryl Sydor on D should help as well as the Penguins continue to improve and ride the Crosby wave.
The next favourite of mine at this point are the Boston Bruins. I’ll admit an open bias. I know some of their personnel and I think this will be a vastly different team right from the get go. Manny Fernandez lost the goalie struggle in Minnesota but he has emerged immediately as the starter for an Original Six team that I think will be better right from the get-go. Fernandez is going to be paid the same as DiPietro, 4.5 a year. Ton of dough obviously for a guy who will be 33 next month and has a decent record outside of the NHL in both Laval and Houston respectively but I feel he’s a solid ‘tender and I think we’re going to see the absolute best out of Zdeno Chara this year so we’ll see how that translates for the Bruins. Also don’t discount signings that appear as trivial on the press releases. Picking up Shawn Thornton is exactly the type of player a rejuvenated Bruin team with aspirations to get back to the Big Bad Bruins needs to do.
My number three pick of teams in the “I like what they’ve done department” is the LA Kings. Of their new additions the one with less likely to have a significant impact would be Tom Preissing and his 2.75 per year deal. Reason being LA still has veteran Rob Blake and Lubomir Vishnovsky to anchor the power play and Jack Johnson is in the lineup now. These three will eat the most minutes on D. Preissing will not be as insulated as he had been on Ottawa and it’s doubtful he will match last years impressive +40 or his 38pts however as mentioned this is an LA team that should be on the way up. You have to love their top two centers, Mike Cammerelli and Anze Kopitar, a solid rookie from last season. Newly acquired Michael Handzus will probably go to one of the wings, Dustin Brown is a player I like a lot and although many may not have a lot of faith in the acquisition of Kyle Calder or Ladislav Nagy don’t write these guys off yet. If LA gets off to a good start on the left coast this could be one of the more improved teams in the Western Conference this year.
Last up on the docket for today. The Hockey Hall of Fame. Fortunately the glut of great names available this season gave us a break from the committee espousing the virtues of another Russian player from the Summit Series of 1972. Bad enough we have not seen Paul Henderson’s rightful induction yet but if anymore of the losing team from ’72 get in I’m afraid you might be reading about me on the front pages of your local paper as I’ll have to stage my own private sit in or some other sort of demonstration out front of the hallowed Hall. All kidding aside, Mark Messier, Ron Francis, Al MacInnis and Scott Stevens are obviously all worthy inductees. Does it not boggle the mind about Glenn Anderson’s omission? Granted there are those of you who would debate Henderson’s candidacy but Glenn Anderson??? Does it really matter that he was a ‘free spirit’ or of his off ice incidents? Who out there even reading this can cite them verbatim? Likely no more than 5% of you. Next to Henderson’s annual rejection this is the biggest farce in hockey. Six time Cup winner, 498 goals, 214 points in 225 playoff games, 83 game winners in the regular season….what a joke, what an abject farce that he is not in. I get the fact that Paul Henderson is out of the main stream consciousness, there are bigger plans for him and the rest of the team brewing anyway but for Glenn Anderson to be overlooked time and time again when almost every single one of us would have taken this guy in his prime over most of the last ten forwards inducted speaks volumes about how screwed up this whole selection process really is. Got a comment, please let me know. Next week we’ll look at the six Canadian teams and their free agency romp.
Liam Maguire
Notwithstanding the debacle involving Michael Nylander and the Oilers and the Capitals, it still was a scene very reminiscent of the late 1990’s and early 2000’s as the large market teams waded into free agency with reckless abandon. Clearly the focus at this time as opposed to then is the length or the term of the contract in conjunction with the obscene money. Teams are obviously attempting in at least a small way to guard against the rising cap by locking up players for longer periods of time thereby having that money guaranteed over the length of the contract. Truth be told Rick DiPietro played pretty darn good when he was in nets for the Isles last season and I know more than one person was saying ‘hold on here, we’ve ridiculed Garth Snow like crazy over that signing – but what if DiPietro really becomes a top 3-4 goalie does that make his salary of 4.5 million a year a bargain? Yes it does even though a fifteen year deal still sounds foolish. Let’s take a look at some of the other deals so far in the free agency frenzy.
The one that I like the most is Petr Sykora to the Penguins. I have to tell you, it was funny being in Columbus on draft day when the Penguins finally selected Angelo Esposito whose stock had fallen to the point that he was finally taken by the Penguins in the 20th position much later than he had been anticipated to go earlier last season. First reaction was the Penguins had landed another marquee scorer albeit one whose stock had dropped. In Sykora it has the same feel. Even though he was only a fifty-five point guy last year in Edmonton the feeling is as one of the top six forwards with Pittsburgh he could easily surpass that combined with time on the second unit power play and simply put on one of the most gifted offensive squads in the league. Getting Darryl Sydor on D should help as well as the Penguins continue to improve and ride the Crosby wave.
The next favourite of mine at this point are the Boston Bruins. I’ll admit an open bias. I know some of their personnel and I think this will be a vastly different team right from the get go. Manny Fernandez lost the goalie struggle in Minnesota but he has emerged immediately as the starter for an Original Six team that I think will be better right from the get-go. Fernandez is going to be paid the same as DiPietro, 4.5 a year. Ton of dough obviously for a guy who will be 33 next month and has a decent record outside of the NHL in both Laval and Houston respectively but I feel he’s a solid ‘tender and I think we’re going to see the absolute best out of Zdeno Chara this year so we’ll see how that translates for the Bruins. Also don’t discount signings that appear as trivial on the press releases. Picking up Shawn Thornton is exactly the type of player a rejuvenated Bruin team with aspirations to get back to the Big Bad Bruins needs to do.
My number three pick of teams in the “I like what they’ve done department” is the LA Kings. Of their new additions the one with less likely to have a significant impact would be Tom Preissing and his 2.75 per year deal. Reason being LA still has veteran Rob Blake and Lubomir Vishnovsky to anchor the power play and Jack Johnson is in the lineup now. These three will eat the most minutes on D. Preissing will not be as insulated as he had been on Ottawa and it’s doubtful he will match last years impressive +40 or his 38pts however as mentioned this is an LA team that should be on the way up. You have to love their top two centers, Mike Cammerelli and Anze Kopitar, a solid rookie from last season. Newly acquired Michael Handzus will probably go to one of the wings, Dustin Brown is a player I like a lot and although many may not have a lot of faith in the acquisition of Kyle Calder or Ladislav Nagy don’t write these guys off yet. If LA gets off to a good start on the left coast this could be one of the more improved teams in the Western Conference this year.
Last up on the docket for today. The Hockey Hall of Fame. Fortunately the glut of great names available this season gave us a break from the committee espousing the virtues of another Russian player from the Summit Series of 1972. Bad enough we have not seen Paul Henderson’s rightful induction yet but if anymore of the losing team from ’72 get in I’m afraid you might be reading about me on the front pages of your local paper as I’ll have to stage my own private sit in or some other sort of demonstration out front of the hallowed Hall. All kidding aside, Mark Messier, Ron Francis, Al MacInnis and Scott Stevens are obviously all worthy inductees. Does it not boggle the mind about Glenn Anderson’s omission? Granted there are those of you who would debate Henderson’s candidacy but Glenn Anderson??? Does it really matter that he was a ‘free spirit’ or of his off ice incidents? Who out there even reading this can cite them verbatim? Likely no more than 5% of you. Next to Henderson’s annual rejection this is the biggest farce in hockey. Six time Cup winner, 498 goals, 214 points in 225 playoff games, 83 game winners in the regular season….what a joke, what an abject farce that he is not in. I get the fact that Paul Henderson is out of the main stream consciousness, there are bigger plans for him and the rest of the team brewing anyway but for Glenn Anderson to be overlooked time and time again when almost every single one of us would have taken this guy in his prime over most of the last ten forwards inducted speaks volumes about how screwed up this whole selection process really is. Got a comment, please let me know. Next week we’ll look at the six Canadian teams and their free agency romp.
Liam Maguire
# posted by Liam Maguire @ 11:03 AM
