MacK_Attack

MacT said he was out up to two months.

It came out today that the Ducks filed papers to allow Brian Burke to speak with other teams. Those were accepted by the NHL early this afternoon. Tomorrow, Brian Burke will fly to Vancouver to meet with the Toronto Maple Leafs as they're in town to take on the Canucks. Looks like it will be done fairly soon.

They're best friends, I think they'll manage.

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=255849&amp...s=secStory_main

So what would you rather have as an incoming GM, a team fully locked up that's somewhere between good and average, or only 8-10 contracts and the flexibility to build the way you see fit?

That rule was tossed out in 1999 after the Brett Hull no-goal that won the Stanley Cup.

You mean how Burke got rid of Ryan, Perry, Getzlaf, Kunitz? Those young assets? Andy McDonald was what, 30 years old when Burke traded him, which he had to do because Niedermayer had him by the short n' curly's. That's hardly selling off a young asset. There was Lupul and Smid, but they landed Chris Pronger and eventually, the Stanley Cup....and isn't that the idea? I hardly see how Lupul & Smid are "most" of the young assets. Plus, he re-couped some with the compensation for Penner. The Ducks still have guys like Mitera, Mikkelson, Tangradi, MacMillan in their system. Not top tier guys but decent prospects. Plus, Burke has left Bob Murray with a HUGE amount of cap flexibility next year. Perhaps as much as $20 million to spend.

I highly, highly doubt it. Maybe next summer, but not this season.

Bob McKenzie:

Darren Dreger reported that on the radio. Everybody in the hockey world knows that Burke was forced to stay in Anaheim. He was telling anybody that would listen behind the scenes last year that he was going to leave Anaheim because of his family situation. When it all seemed to be coming together, with Anaheim management saying that they would let him leave if he wanted to, Bettman made the decree that he was tired of executives leaving one team for another in mid-contract. All of the sudden, Anaheim says they won't let him leave and won't let the Leafs talk to him (when the Leafs asked permission in late May/early June). I would say he won't become the Leafs GM until May or June 2009.

Latest is that Burke turned down the Ducks final offer on Nov. 1st and at that point, the Ducks & Burke began to put together a plan for his departure, which apparently is going into effect today.

That's going on the assumption that the Ducks forced Burke out, which hasn't been substantiated.

Burke said not that long ago that he would make up his mind whether he would stay in Anaheim or not and that decision would come by Christmas. Clearly, that decision was made quicker than expected. Burke tried to leave the Ducks in June but was told he had to honour the final year of his contract by Bettman because Gary wanted to stop the hiring of executives who were still employed by other teams.

Well, the Burke-to-Toronto rumours are about to hit hyperdrive.

As long as your name isn't Sidney Crosby, you'll get some leeway sooner or later.

A humiliating loss usually does the trick.

I'm pretty sure it's the NHL that owns the logos.

During tonight's 6-3 Leafs win over Montreal, the two teams managed to re-ignite the rivalry that had gone a little stagnant over the last little while... Tom Kostopolous blatantly ran Mike Van Ryn from behind. Van Ryn was taken to hospital where he is being held overnight for observation due to a concussion. Van Ryn also broke his nose and hand. Kostopolous received a boarding major and game misconduct, but will hopefully be suspended, too. Andrei Markov also hit Niklas Hagman from behind early in the 3rd and the Habs spent most of the game going after Mikhail Grabovski (another 2 points for him tonight). For the Leafs part, they spent a good portion of the game crashing Carey Price's crease. Should be interesting when these two teams play again, but sadly, not until January.

That's exactly why Messier is promoting the thing. It's supposed to have some kind of padding that resembles honey-comb that absorbs the shock of a head shot that would normally be absorbed by the player's head.

3 games for Kostopolous

He was expected to announce his retirement over the summer, but I don't think he did. In any event, an eye injury has basically ended his career.

Imagine that, talking about the teams who their audience cheers for.

The teams that survived did so by getting the elite to buy tickets, or already had financially stable owners. Teams in Montreal, Ottawa, St. Louis, Pittsburgh & Philly weren't so lucky. The Toronto Maple Leafs survived by Conn Smythe making his hockey events into galas of sort (and you could say that never really changed). The Montreal Canadiens nearly folded in 1935.

Kostopolous runs Van Ryn from behind

http://tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=254758&lid...os=secStory_nhl