Jedi

Whoa... Holy crap... Melrose trimmed his hair... Unreal... (Sure, this may be old news, but that's the first I've seen of it)

Dats with the LASER. Nice cycle work boys!

Goalies tend to be a rather superstitious lot. That might have something to do with it. Although it might be a SJ Sharks thing, more so than a Boucher thing. The bench is closer to the players on the PP, so it might be something that the coaches in SJ have instituted. Anyone know if Nabokov does the stick tap?

Is it just me, or does it seem like a vast majority of the non-Detroit media is playing the whole "Z must decide on to accept less money to stay, or test the market" card alot more than is probably true? So many of the Detroit media outlets are pointing to the fact that it's not a matter of IF, it's a matter of WHEN, and that Z has stated publicly he wants to stay with Detroit for his whole career.

At this stage of his career, Z is ineligible to sign an incentive based contract. The CBA allows only 3 types of players to sign a contract with performance based bonuses. 1 - Players on entry level contracts. 2 - Players signing one year contracts who are returning from a long-term injury. This is specified as a player who has played 400 or more career games, and spent 100 or more days on IR in the last year of their most recent contract. 3 - Players over the age of 35 who sign a one year deal. Since Z doesn't fall into any of those categories, we can't sign him to an incentive based contract.

Actually, that contract would be rejected by the NHL, as per the CBA. While the CBA does allow for variations from year to year on the contract, such a drastic change over the course of the deal is not allowed. The higher end years (salary wise) can't be more than double the lower end years. So if you were only going to pay Z 3 million on the lowest-paid year of the deal, his highest-paid year could not be any more than 6 million. There are also clauses in there that would prevent a player's salary from rising/dropping too much from year to year, but your example is actually in line with that. If a contract has a player raising in salary from one year to the next, it cannot raise more than 100% of the value of the lowest salary given in the first 2 years. So if a player has a 3 year contract making 3 million the first year, 4 million the 2nd, and 8 million the 3rd, it would be rejected, since his salary cannot rise more than 3 million from year to year. Spreading it to 4mil, 4mil, 7mil would be accepted, and the player would still make the same amount of money over the course of the contract. If a contract has a player dropping in salary from one year to the next, it cannot drop more than 50% of the value of the lowest salary given in the first 2 years. In your proposed contract example, the minimum salary from the first 2 years of the contract is 10 million, half of that is 5 million. So from year to year, Z's contract cannot drop by more than 5 million per year, which your proposal falls in line with. It was that kind of fluctuation from year to year that caused the NHL to reject Martin Erat's deal with the Preds over the summer. When they tweaked the salary given from year to year, the NHL accepted it, even though it was still the same length and same overall salary. So to conform to all the aspects of the CBA, if you're wanting to sign Z to a front-loaded 7 year, $45 million contract, you would need to spread it out a bit more. For example... Year #1 = 9mil. #2 = 9mil. #3 = 7mil. #4 = 6mil. #5 = 5mil. #6 = 4.5mil. #7 = 4.5mil. That still lets you front-load the crap out of the deal, but it doesn't fluctuate too much over the course of the contract, nor fluctuate too much from year to year.

That's a great idea, in theory. However, The CBA averages out the cap hit that you have. So if Z signs for less in the first few years, and more in the last, it will use the average over the life of the deal rather than his actual salary that year. In the end it wouldn't help in trying to re-sign Hossa.

Rafalski. Stuart. Kronwall. Datsyuk. Holmstrom. All of those players took shots while Hossa was on the ice after he scored his second goal in the Atlanta game. Why aren't you berating those guys for their selfish acts of ignoring Hossa's chance for a hat trick? Zetterberg also had 2 goals that night. Kronwall, Sammy, and Rafalski all took shots with Z on the ice, while he was sitting on 2 goals for the night. Same story, were they attempting to rob Z of a potential hat trick? In for a penny, in for a pound, I say... Raf, Kronner, Dats, Homer, Sammy, Stuart... They're all selfish players. After all, it shouldn't be about which TEAM ends up on top at the end of 60 minutes, it's about which player gets the coveted hat trick...

There is a slight, slight, chance that I might be able to make this. It's all going to depend on work scheduling. I have Thanksgiving day off, and if I luck out and am able to get the day after T-giving off as well, then I'll be free and clear to attend. *crosses fingers*

Whew... Thank god this road trip is done. Special teams was the story of this game. 3-for-5 on the PP, 7-for-7 on the PK.

PP.

Big kill! And HUGE save by Ozzie!

Cleary, 2 min for Goalie Interference. HUGE kill here boys...

*whew* Gotta do something to take the crowd out of it...

Ah... Not much Ozzie could have done...

Penalty on Meech for tripping.

Good kill boys!

Game on!

I seriously love seeing Babs going water skiing with the Cup. That's EXACTLY what I would do. The Cup. On my boat. PERFECT day.

And (wait for it)... ...ANOTHER Wings penalty.

Luongo was thinking "pass" all the way there. Z just straight fooled him for the goal. Beautiful play.

Z!!!!

Long 5 on 3 here!!! 1:35 total. HUGE chance!!

And Salo's off for Cross Checking. Another chance to grab the 2 goal lead boys.

C'mon guys. We were so disciplined to start the game. It's coming unraveled now, justified calls or not. Gotta play smarter than this.