NHL Season 08-09

[Brill Weave]

There is no grand exodus out of Detroit. Losing Hossa was essentially a given. Kopecky is a meh player at best and is now being grossly overpaid. My biggest concern for Detroit isn't free agency. It's age. They have some big names all over the age of 35, they started slowing down a little last season. You never know if nagging injuries turn into missed games when players get around this time of their careers. Detroit will still be a contender as they always seem to be. But it could be that Chicago's youth this time around might be more than they can handle should the two meet again.

[Arnwulf]

Detroit always seems to have guys that can step in when they lose people, I have no doubts that will be the case again this year. They're a very well run team that is very deep with talent, that said, I do think they take a step backwards next year.

[Alderaan]

Why is there still no rookie salary cap yet? The 4 major sports have been talking about it for a few years now and the majority seem to be in favor. Yet here we are, over paying for players that have not played a single game in the big show yet. It's utterly ridiculous to me and boggles my mind. Stop talking and start doing. For hockey, basketball, and football that have a salary cap, there's no reason not to have a rookie cap. Baseball is another story, they've screwed themselves with no cap and every team not on the east or west coast.

[Ishido]

Draper, Maltby, and Holmstrom are the only guys that I worry about their age. Osgood to a lesser extent, but I think he has at least 2 years where he can still perform at a good level (better than last year) as long as he does not need to start 60+ games. Lidstrom, I have no idea what to say about him. The guy is a machine, people said he was looking old at the start of last season but finished the season looking like the same old, and looked great in the playoffs except for that testicle injury.

The first three mentioned though, Draper still plays well, he just is injured fairly often. Maltby isn't really anything special on the ice anymore, and Holmstrom does not play well except sitting in front of the crease these days.

However I am more than excited to see Darren Helm, Ville Leino, and Jonathan Ericsson on the main squad this year. Possibly Justin Abdelkader as well, but he might be spending another year in GR.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEBiW3CPuFo

[Richybear]

I thought there was a rookie salary cap of $850,000 on entry-level contracts? Based upon people like lolDaigle who signed giant contracts.

Montreal signed Travis Moen as well.
Though aside from Mr and Mrs Moen, most didn't even know he was still playing. j/k, but there's a guy named Alex who needs a contract in Montreal pronto.


Edit: Rookie salary cap is $900,000, so I was close.
Hedman's just has a buncha bonus clauses.
Probably
"Can he spell Tampa Bay?" $500,000
"Does he wear skates?" $1,000,000
etc

[BadKarma]

Rangers signed Ales Kotalik a few days ago as well, guy was a potent player a few years ago but since slipped under the radar.

[Tythera]

After seeing how hard Helm was playing in the playoffs, I was tempted to go get a jersey of him. The first few times I saw him in the season I wasn't overly impressed, but he played really well down the stretch.

[Ishido]

There have been people clamoring for the Wings to sign Moen on another board I frequent, actually.

I can't really expect Helm to play like he did in the playoffs every game, but I'm thinking of a faster, more physical Draper, which sounds nice as the latter is on the last legs of his career.

Also yeah, Hedman's contract is $900,000 for 3 years with 2.85 mil in bonuses each year.

[Ratatapa]

moen??? that's not tanguay .........


fuck you gainey

[Bweigelt]

I thought there was a rookie salary cap of $850,000 on entry-level contracts? Based upon people like lolDaigle who signed giant contracts.

Montreal signed Travis Moen as well.
Though aside from Mr and Mrs Moen, most didn't even know he was still playing. j/k, but there's a guy named Alex who needs a contract in Montreal pronto.


Edit: Rookie salary cap is $900,000, so I was close.
Hedman's just has a buncha bonus clauses.
Probably
"Can he spell Tampa Bay?" $500,000
"Does he wear skates?" $1,000,000
etc

Rookie Bonuses are actually very hard to reach. For most forwards it will be something like scoring 30 goals and having 70+ points. Winning the Calder might be another. Barely any of the rookies ever get all their bonuses.

[Bregor]

Caps sign Brendan Morrison to a one year/$1.5M deal, not like he's the missing piece but it's a low-risk type move. If he ends up playing decent on the second line, or pushing Laich to step up his game, I'll be happy.

[Arnwulf]

Well, after Weds. of this week, we enter the "Dead Zone" of the hockey offseason where there is very little going on that is going to be noteworthy. Hopefully I'm wrong and teams start making blockbuster trades haha. But I doubt it.

[Brill Weave]

Tanguay signs with the Penguins 4 years 20 million.





















That's not actually true I just wanted to see if Rata would go completely berserk.

[Arnwulf]

Got this off of thehockeynews.com.

"He wrote it all himself - you can tell, because there were no big words. He must have reread that speech about 10 times in bed."

- Joe Sakic's wife, Debbie, on the all-time great's retirement speech from Thursday.

Goes to show you, no matter how awesome you are, your wife will always be a bitch. lol

Also, to spark some discussion, from hockeyleaks.com:

Sunday Rumours
- The biggest UFA left on the market is Tanguay, and I'm surprised he is still available. It looks as though he will get something around a 2-3 year deal worth $3 million per. The teams to watch are NYI and Colorado, though I'm hearing Columbus could be in on this. One source even has Calgary getting him back if the Flames can find the funds to do so.

- Zubov seems to be between returning to Dallas and ending up in Columbus. Dallas really needs Zubov back as this is a franchise going in the wrong direction.

- As I've said all along, I believe Heatley will end up in San Jose. San Jose has to shake things up and this is the fastest way to do so. Marleau, Cheechoo and Ehrhoff are three players the sharks are rumoured to be shopping, with each player being linked to about five teams each. We know the Islanders would love to grab one of those players, while Montreal, Columbus, Toronto, and of coarse Ottawa have been linked to at least one of them.

- Mats Sundin, if he doesn't retire, will be an August signing. If he returns, his only two options are Vancouver and Toronto. It could end up being which team has room under the cap to bring him in. I'd expect him to sign a one year deal worth around $4 million.

- Martin Biron is still available and I'm hearing he could land in LA.

- Despite all of Chicago's cap concerns, they like there team as is and don't plan on worrying about all their cap issues until next summer. They're going for it now.

- Zherdev and Kessel are the two biggest RFAs on the market. Zherdev has filed for arbitration and rumours have the Rangers willing to let him go if the price tag is too high. As for Kessel, teams have not made the RFA an offer yet due to the fact that the Bruins still have a little room under the cap and could probably match an offer. This will change in the coming weeks and things will get interesting. The Bruins are still looking for a top three d-man.

[Ratatapa]

Tanguay signs with the Penguins 4 years 20 million.




















That's not actually true I just wanted to see if Rata would go completely berserk.

pretty sure it's over with tanguay, they signed another nobody from sweden.



/sigh

hope tanguay ends up in a good team




edit : finally some news about tanguay the Florida panthers are one of the 5 teams interested in tanguay. ORZ


no idea who are the other 4 but habs better be there or ELSE

[Palin]

- Zubov seems to be between returning to Dallas and ending up in Columbus. Dallas really needs Zubov back as this is a franchise going in the wrong direction.

Doubt it'll happen. We paid him 5million last year to play 10 games. We want him to sign a contract similar to what Lehtinen did, 1.5 millionish base with bonuses for games played and performance. His doctors aren't even sure if he'll be 100% until next month, but he seems to want to see what the market offers him. Kinda shitty for a guy who's been a Star forever. Have a lot of respect for Jere for the contract he took to stay in Dallas with us, knowing his age.

[Arnwulf]

Report: Chicago Blackhawks fire general manager Dale Tallon - ESPN

What the heck do you make of this? First I've seen of a team firing a GM while they're poised to make a serious run at the cup next year. The only thing I can think of is his recent comments about how badly they've screwed themselves for next offseason, salary cap-wise where he said he didn't care or something haha.

One thing is for sure, next year is the "now or not for a while" year for them, they can't keep that team together after next season so they better win it or they're screwed.

[Brill Weave]

The firing kind of surprised me as well. He made some damn nice moves over the past two years. But now after this season, he's essentially hamstrung the Hawks in regards to the salary cap. He made a ton of moves, then fucked up with his RFA's. Not something an owner wants to see. Bowman's kid is going to have a lot of cleaning up to do before the end of the upcoming season. Campbell is going to be gone if at all humanly possible. Otherwise they don't have a leg to stand on to resign Keith, Toews, etc.

[Arnwulf]

I read that they're shopping Campbell, I really don't think anyone's going to take that horrible contract though. If they do, Chicago sure isn't going to get a fair market value for him.

I read this article yesterday (from a local site), talks about how the salary cap has created sort of a second stage to free agency where there are great deals to be had for patient GMs.

Blue Jackets Xtra : Blue Jackets wait for trade opportunities

[Brill Weave]

Even before they signed Hossa and picked up the other guys they did, Campbell's days were numbered. You can't give a guy that much money and still expect to be able to spend the way Tallon has. The question is now whether or not the Rangers are going to be dumb enough to trade for Campbell. After reading that article I'm amused that Malhotra is only asking for 2 million and he can't even get that. I was thinking 1.5 at the most for a guy of his skill level.