Buppy

Not really. For Flip, only this last year really was, and that was derailed a bit by his injury. And he still improved. For Cleary, I think we were happy with him as a 20 goal/40 point guy who could play in any situation. Then his goals dropped a bit, and we were hoping he'd do better this year to help replace some of the lost offense. He was baged up for most of the season, and with all the other injuries, I don't think he was too bad. We tried to have 3 scoring lines this past year. Then we got hit by the inuries. It's not like we started the season with a 4th line of May-Miller-Maltby. What our attempt at 3 scoring lines got us Bert and Cleary on the 2nd line, Williams and a woefully underperforming Leino on the 3rd. Had Willy and Flip not gotten hurt, that third line might have broekn through and started scoring (they were playing well, just not finishing), but the 2nd line would have still been weak. 3 scoring lines in the cap era means you have to have some players performing well over their contracts. For that, you have to be lucky in FA or the draft. Not something you can really plan on. Afinogenov was a $3m player, had a couple bad years, a lot of injury problem, and some questions about his work ethic. No one wanted to take a chance on him. Atlanta did and it paid off. We could offer him $1.5 and he'd most likely laugh at us. He will probably get back close to $3. Prospal was another guy no one seemed to want that turned into a bargain. You might even put Bert in that group. We could try the same thing this year with Bert, and/or maybe someone like Tanguay or Chris Higgins, but you have to realize there's just as much chance for moves like that to turn out the way Williams did. I'd rather bring in someone like Nystrom or Asham that are more sure bets, and hopefully save some room for the deadline.

Automatic raises are for qualifying offers, but we could sign him for less if he agreed to it. Also, I believe the raise is based off actual salary from the last year ($710k in this case). That would mean a 5% raise to ~$745. That said, he's a good young player that should develop into a solid 3rd liner. Good defensively, decent offensive potential, pretty good size, not slow, likes to hit, will drop the gloves on occasion. (Funny that you complain about his penalties, then praise Downey for fighting. 26 of Abby's penalty minutes were either fights or scrums sticking up for teammates. Only one of those penalties resulted in an opposing PP. And that was late in a game we were losing 5-1.) $900k-1M would be a good price for him.

This is what we have signed so far: FORWARDS Pavel Datsyuk ($6.700m) / Henrik Zetterberg ($6.083m) / Johan Franzen ($3.955m) Valtteri Filppula ($3.000m) / Jiri Hudler ($2.875m) / Daniel Cleary ($2.800m) Tomas Holmstrom ($1.875m) / Kris Draper ($1.583m) / Mattias Ritola ($0.517m) DEFENSEMEN Nicklas Lidstrom ($6.200m) / Brian Rafalski ($6.000m) Brad Stuart ($3.750m) / Niklas Kronwall ($3.000m) Jonathan Ericsson ($0.900m) / Jakub Kindl ($0.883m) GOALTENDERS Chris Osgood ($1.417m) / Jimmy Howard ($0.717m) CAPGEEK.COM TOTALS (these totals are compiled using the bonus cushion) ROSTER: 17; CAP: $56.8m; PAYROLL: $52.255m; CAP ROOM: $4.545m BONUSES: $0.000m Need 4 forwards and one defenseman, with room for one additional player if we can afford it. (I included Ritola, though I don't think he is necessarily a lock for a roster spot. You might say Kindl isn't a lock either, but he'd probably have to have an extraordinarily terrible camp to lose a spot.) We have $4.545m + whatever the cap does. I've heard $900k, 'slight increase', 'about a million', 'around $1.2m', and $2m, so it's probably safe to assume it will go up some. We have the following players we may be interested in bringing back: FORWARDS * Todd Bertuzzi UFA($1.500m) / * Justin Abdelkader RFA($0.850m) / * Darren Helm RFA($0.599m) * Drew Miller RFA($0.525m) / * Patrick Eaves RFA($0.500m) DEFENSEMEN * Andreas Lilja UFA($1.250m) / * Derek Meech RFA($0.483m) We don't have roster spots for all of them, so at least 2 will be gone. Helm and Abby aren't going anywhere. They'll probably cost anywhere from $1.7-2.1m. So most likely something like $3.345-4.845 left over for 3 or 4 players. I think we need someone other than Meech on defense, and we'll have to spend in the neighborhood of $1.5m to get someone halfway reliable. Then assuming we bring back one of Eaves or Miller (or some new UFA) for $750-ish, the most we're probably looking at is around $2.5m to fill out the last forward spot (or a forward + a 23rd player). That certainly takes Lombardi off the list. Quite possibly everyone aside from Asham & Nystrom. No chance really of getting Bert AND another skilled forward. Higgins might be interesting. Couple poor years in a row (scoring-wise), so he might come cheap. Pretty good on the PK, hits a fair amount, and definitely has some skill hiding somewhere. Not sure I want another 'recovery' project though.

No, they don't owe Yzerman anything. But they do owe current employees the courtesy of allowing them to get better jobs. We have no right to hold people back. Contracts or no, refusing to allow our people to pursue better opportunities would be a '******' move, and would likely ensure that those people left when their contracts (if they have them) are up anyway. You're the one getting hung up on it being Yzerman. It's no more 'hostile' a tactic than it was for Vinik to offer Yzerman the GM position in the first place. Were you bitching about that? Were you bitching when the Sharks 'poached' Mclellen? This is no different. We're not doing Yzerman a favor, we're showing some respect for our current employees, as any decent organization would.

What was he supposed to do? Put an add in the paper? Hang out at the unemployment office hoping an out-of-work capologist walks in? People in these positions usually come from similar positions in other organizations. NHL, other hockey leagues, other sports, other businesses where similar knowledge/ability is used. It's no more 'raiding' us as it would be raiding anyone else. Would you all be upset if you heard he was talking to someone from Chicago or San Jose or Pittsburgh? Maybe if we want so many of our front office guys to stay here, we should make them a better offer. (And keep in mind that neither Martin nor Verbeek have actually left yet.)

With a management philosophy like that you'd be overhauling the roster every year. Great way to suck, but much less effective as a way to build a Cup team. Yes, Nick and Rafi are getting older. That happens. Trade core players, both of whom have friendly cap hits, and both of whom have a history of strong playoff performance? Give up on a Calder nominee after a somewhat poor playoff in his first time? Get rid of his hall of fame caliber mentor (who has one year left on a rather cheap contract)? Kronwall too would be tough to replace at his money. Cleary is one of our more versatile players, had a great playoff a couple years ago. I'm not in love with his contract, but it's not that bad either. He can still be a very valuable player. His injury problems haven't been near as bad as you suggest. How would you propose replacing those guys? Matby and Lebda are all but gone already. Draper only has a year left and won't likely be back afterward. Meech could likely be gone. None of those are really important moves (individually at least), nor do they represent enough money to really make a difference. They're minor roster tweaks that are already happening, not sure what you're complaining about. I guess I understand your point, and agree to some extent. Our years of success combined with the salary cap are taking a toll. But I hardly think the situation is as grim as you seem to suggest. Not much to be excited about this year, but we won't be a bad team. Maybe not a top contender, but really any team in the playoffs has a chance if they get hot at the right time. And we still have great management and a solid core for at least a few more years. No reason to think it will be impossible to solve the problems we'll encounter.

McIlrath does fill a need, but not likely for at least 1 or 2 years (if he continues to develop at a good pace). He's not someone that looks to be NHL ready right away. If it wasn't for the fighting, I doubt anyone here would be excited by him at all. Furthermore, players like him can usually be added via free agency at a moderate price. And with that, you'd also get a proven commodity. Even top draft picks aren't sure things. Late first-rounders never are. I wouldn't hate it if we got him, but it wouldn't excite me either. But really, no one we're liable to get this draft is going to excite me, unless by chance we can pickup Kabanov in the 2nd round.

The discounts (which aren't huge btw) and cap raise won't likely pay for anything more than Hudler and the raises for some of our RFAs. Barring a trade (which I think is unlikely atm) we won't be able to afford anything better than Lilja. Not this year at least, supply is too low. ~$2 million won't buy anything decent. I just hope we can save a decent amount of space to add something at the deadline if we need it.

Nothing '******'-like about it. Happens all the time I'm sure. It's not against any rules to ask permission to talk to someone. Do scouts and 'capologists' even have contracts? If they do, it's not the same as a player contract. No cap on front office salaries, nor prohibition on renegotiating or disolving contracts. Like a previous poster said, who wants to work for an organization that won't allow you to talk to someone about a possible promotion? It's not a ****** move for Steve, or anyone else for that matter, to offer a job to anyone in our organization, provided they don't break any rules doing so. Don't be surprised if Steve (or someone else) makes a pitch for MacClean too. We don't have any right to hold people back if someone can make them a better offer. If we want to keep people on the management and coaching side, we just need to make the best offer.

These are kids we're talking about. McIlrath was one of the biggest at the combine and he's 212. 18 year-old hockey players over 200 lbs are rare. 180 really isn't small. 6'1+, 190+ is a more realistic range for a 'big' player.

1st, sign Helm, Abby, Homer, and Eaves. Nystrom, Pyatt, Winchester, Burish, Artyukhin(sp), Asham, Miller. No particular order other than Nystrom 1st. Can't afford any d-men I would really care about, so just someone cheap other than Meech.

I won't dance around anything. I hate the idea of Bert coming back. It's not a personal problem with Bertuzzi so much as a problem with the fact that Bertuzzi isn't very good. Bargain or not, 18 goals and 44 points in 82 games, playing on the top lines with Pav or Hank, with a lot of PP time is simply not very good. And he'll be a year older. We would be lucky if he can match what he did this year, much less improve as some people expect. More likely he'll miss 1/4 of the season injured, and put up 30ish points. And I would argue that Bert's playoff numbers were inflated due to the play of his linemates. He scored almost half his points in one game, which happened to be a game where Franzen went nuts. Maybe not 'anyone' could have picked up 5 points in that game, but you certainly can't suggest that Franzen's play wasn't a factor (or Nabakov's/the Sharks for that matter). Likewise, in the first round it wasn't Bert's play that had people raving. It was Hank and Flip. Bargain, bargain, bargain. That's all anyone can ever say to defend Bert. To which I respond, 'So what?'. We don't need a bargain. We need someone who can play a real role on this team. Bert isn't good enough for the top 6. We can't afford good enough linemates to make him effective on the third line. Someone suggested taking Bert's pay combined with some free cap space to get an upgrade. In a sense, we already did that by bringing back Hudler. We have a decent top 6. Now we need a bottom 6 that can be effective in some kind of role. Helm, Abby, Eaves, Miller, Cleary can all contribute. Draper and Ritola maybe. But they need a boost. Maybe an upgrade to Miller, and maybe a 14th forward that will free us from reliance on Draper and Ritola. And even though our options are limited, a solid #5 defensemen would sure be nice. Any or all of that would be better for the team than a slow, old, mediocre, has-been like Bert. Bargain or not.

Well, having more defensive responsibility will certainly have an effect on offensive performance, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. And of course, some players are better suited to certain styles than others. Our system works. It's been the most successful and widely emulated system in the league for a reason. It also has a record of increasing overall team offense, even if it comes at the expense of a few individuals. (And don't confuse our recent lack of execution as a lack of efficacy. There's no indication that the puck-possession style is becoming outdated.) That said, I don't think what you're seeing has anything to do with the system. More a matter of opportunities. All the players you listed, as well as Quincey, were stuck here behind players who were either better, or better suited to a certain role. Sammy got a bit larger of a role in Vancouver and scored a few more goals. He had a very good year. He had a bad year in '08, but good years the other 3 he was here. Doesn't mean the Vancouver system or coaches are better, or that we did something 'wrong' with him in '08. Players do have good and bad years. Kopy, it's debatable as to whether he's really doing better. He's not exactly lighting anything up. Quincey and Leino, unfortunately, had only limited opportunities here. Equally unfortunately, neither of them did anything with them. In both cases, we had to make a move due to the cap and roster limits. While I hate the constraints that forced us to give them up, I'm happy they're doing well.

Not to nitpick, but we don't know how much the cap is going up, and Helm and Abby aren't signed yet. There's room for 14 forwards (roster room at least, cap room we'll see). Ritola is a big question mark. I hope he at least has a good enough camp that we don't have to risk waiving him, but we'll see. 32 years old. No better than a dozen or so other guys 3 or 4 years younger. Will probably cost more because of the Finals spotlight. Wouldn't be the worst choice ever, but wouldn't be my first choice either. .... Like others have said, there's not much to be excited about. Hudler is the best addition. wow. Mostly we're just a year older.

Bear in mind that making a qualifying offer is not the same thing as signing a player to contract. Qualifying offers are required for matching rights and to recieve compensation. I doubt that both Eaves and Miller will be back. Maybe if we have enough cap room for 14 forwards. I wouldn't be surprised to see Ericsson, Kindl, and Meech as our bottom three defensemen. I won't like it, but it won't surprise me. With your suggested salaries, and after signing a 7th defensemen, you'd have $1-2 million left (assuming a 2 mil cap increase). "Third line winger with offensive upside" in that price range = Jason Williams. Helm, Eaves, and Miller CAN score once in a while. Abby has a higher potential than any of them except maybe Eaves. All are young enough they could still improve. Beyond that, we don't really have the cap space for any decent scorers. Nor do we really have the means to just 'get some more young scoring forwards'. Nearly two decades of success does take a toll. IMO we should forget about Bert. Sign a couple third/fourth liners that could be tough to play against, but can chip in ~10 goals or so. Preferably younger guys. Nystrom, Winchester, Burish, Pyatt, Malhotra. Get off the futile attempt to build three solid scoring lines. All that gets you is guys like Bert in the top 6 and JWilly. Bert is old, and not that good. If he comes back, no matter what role they put him in, he'll be taking a spot away from someone who'd be better suited to it. He'd basically be injury depth that makes the team worse when healthy.

With Larsson leaving, I think there's a good chance they go after Pickard. None of the players likely to be available sound all that impressive, honestly. Some decent potential in some, but it sure doesn't sound like there's going to be a future top 6 there. Trading down is another good possibility I think. Trading up I would seriously doubt. There's just not enough players to trade up for, so the cost to get one of them would likely be too high. I know next to nothing about most of the Euros this year. Usually that means they aren't that good, but who knows.

And it's not our job to nominate the guy for sainthood because he's a good hockey player. Here's the bottom line. Nick certainly had a lot of influence in determining his salary. He could have hurt the team by asking for more, he could have helped us improve by taking less. No matter what he decided, it wouldn't likely have much (if any) impact on his long term financial security. What he chose to do was pretty much the minimum needed in order to essentially stay the same. That disappoints me. I had hoped he was better than that. I don't hate him, or think he's a greedy prick. I'm still happy he came back and I'll still miss him when he does finally retire. I still appreciate everything he's done in the past. I realize he'll likely still be one of the premier defensemen in the league this year. I'm not asking anyone else to dislike him, nor suggesting we shouldn't retire his number when he's done. I know he wasn't obligated to take a huge discount. I know he had every right to take what he did. But he could have done more for the team; it wouldn't have hurt him any to do it; and he chose not to. I have every right to be disappointed by that.

I'm certainly happy he came back, but i too am a little disappointed in the cap number. For me, it has nothing to do with how much he's worth. It's about how much we have. If we had a ton of space I'd be fine with him taking $10 or $12 million. But we don't. We now need a decent cap raise to get back basically the same team from last year, some small changes for the better, but also everyone a year older. AUTO-GENERATED CAPGEEK.COM LINES FORWARDS Pavel Datsyuk ($6.700m) / Henrik Zetterberg ($6.083m) / Johan Franzen ($3.955m) Valtteri Filppula ($3.000m) / Jiri Hudler ($2.875m) / Daniel Cleary ($2.800m) Kris Draper ($1.583m) / Mattias Ritola ($0.517m) DEFENSEMEN Nicklas Lidstrom ($6.200m) / Brian Rafalski ($6.000m) Brad Stuart ($3.750m) / Niklas Kronwall ($3.000m) Jonathan Ericsson ($0.900m) / Jakub Kindl ($0.883m) GOALTENDERS Chris Osgood ($1.417m) / Jimmy Howard ($0.717m) CAPGEEK.COM TOTALS (these totals are compiled using the bonus cushion) ROSTER: 16; CAP: $56.8m; PAYROLL: $50.380m; CAP ROOM: $6.420m BONUSES: $0.000m $6.42 + whatever cap increase to sign five forwards and a defenseman. Helm, Homer, Abby, and Eaves/Miller should be the priorities, and will probably cost around $4.5-5 million. That would leave ~$3-4 million for the last two spots. At best, not really enough for meaningful improvement. That's Bert and Lilly w/maybe a little deadline wiggle room. Add another $1.2 or 1.7 to that and it might just have been enough to pull in a defensemen like Michalek or a forward like Frolov. That's why I'm disappointed.

Helm, Eaves, and Miller were all better value per point. At some point, 'value' has to be a secondary concern. Obviously a whole team full of Helms would be a great value, but it wouldn't be a good team. We already have 7 top-6 quality forwards, but no combination of them +Bert really gives us a great scoring third line like so many people here think. Too many of our guys rely too much on the talent level around them. Bert, Homer, Flip, Cleary, and probably Hudler. If we could find some combination in the top lines that lets us use Flip and Hudler on the third line, I think that would work, but more likely I think is that we just end up with a 3rd line that doesn't score much more than Helm/Eaves/Miller/Abs/Draper/whoever would, but cost 2-3x as much.

He took less than Draper and Maltby made that year. Really, I think it's more about Yzerman taking much less than he likely could have gotten, than being that far under what he deserved. He was almost certainly in the same situation as Nick, in that he probably could have written his own check more or less. If he had asked for 4 million, I doubt anyone would have said no. Nick has made almost $90 million in his career. Money shouldn't be a factor now. He also should know that the organization respects him enough to basically give him whatever he wants. In light of that, if he takes over $5m I would be a little disappointed in him.

It's $5.275/year. Term is way too long, otherwise I'd love to have him. He played well for us, and we wouldn't have been in the Finals without him.

Scoring nearly a point a game in the late 90s/early 00s definitely still qualifies as 'star' caliber. He was 10th in the league in scoring the year he won the Selke. He might not have been Sakic/Forsberg/Jagr level, but he was still a top-end forward in the league.

The only year you could say Stevie was 'a third liner at best' was his last, when he made $1.25. And the PA might whine about it, but there's nothing they could do. Nick taking 2 million wouldn't violate any rules.

Don't mean to 'piss in your Chelios' regarding Yzerman, but he didn't take his big paycut until after the lockout. Of course, pre-lockout his salary didn't matter (to anyone besides Ilitch I suppose) so it's not really the same situation anyway. I really wouldn't be surprised if Nick did take something ridiculously low, like 3 or 2 even, but I wouldn't be surprised if he gets 6.7 or more either. Holland will let Nick know our cap situation, what kind of options we'll have depending on what Nick takes, then let Nick decide what he wants.

FORWARDS Henrik Zetterberg ($6.083m) / Pavel Datsyuk ($6.700m) / * Tomas Holmstrom ($2.250m) Jiri Hudler ($2.875m) / Valtteri Filppula ($3.000m) / Johan Franzen ($3.955m) Daniel Cleary ($2.800m) / * Darren Helm ($1.000m) / * Patrick Eaves ($0.800m) * Adam Burish ($1.000m) / * Justin Abdelkader ($1.000m) / * Eric Nystrom ($1.000m) Kris Draper ($1.583m) / Mattias Ritola ($0.517m) DEFENSEMEN * Nicklas Lidstrom ($6.000m) / Brian Rafalski ($6.000m) Brad Stuart ($3.750m) / Niklas Kronwall ($3.000m) * Andreas Lilja ($1.250m) / Jonathan Ericsson ($0.900m) Jakub Kindl ($0.883m) GOALTENDERS Jimmy Howard ($0.717m) / Chris Osgood ($1.417m) CAPGEEK.COM TOTALS (these totals are compiled using the bonus cushion) ROSTER SIZE: 23; PAYROLL: $58.480m; CAP ROOM: $0.320m BONUSES: $0.000m Such a bad year for FA defensemen, all the decent ones will get overpayed. But we could definitely make our 4th line tougher to play against if the cap does go up that much.