Black Sunday

July 1st 2007 will go down in NHL history. Thats the day fans realized that the season long NHL lockout was all a joke. Yup....you read it here first....a joke.

Management locked out the players or an entire season, for what....the reasons they gave us schmuck fans was to create parody....make sure the smaller market teams could keep up with the big market ones.....

Lets recap today's events....

Big Winners....

NYR siging Chris Drury and Scott Gomez for a combined $87 million.

Detroit signs Brian Rafalski for 5 years and $30 million dollars.

Philly signs Daniel Briere for 8 years and $52 million dollars.....(thats after they blew away the defenseman market with that ridicilous Kimmo Timonen contract)

Toronto signs Jason Blake for 5 years and $20 million dollars.

Matheiu Schneider to Anaheim for 2 years and nearly $12 million.

Big Losers....

Buffalo....lost their top 2 players with nothing to show for it.

Islanders....the team has lost 6 of their top 18 players in the last 2 weeks....including their future Captain and the former Captain, their leading goal scorer, leader in ice time and additionally a 25 goal scorer.

Devils.....losing probably their top 2 players the summer before they move into a new building.

Teams like Columbus, Nashville, Phoenix, Chicago, the Islanders, Buffalo.....we're just unable to attract any of the top free agent talent....why you ask?....well it's simple.....money

Not that the above teams dont have any.....they just havent been stupid with it.

Lets look at some of the big signings today....

Detroit and Rafalski.....Brian Rafalski is a very good NHL defenseman....he's durable and is a former Stanley Cup winner. Down side is he is 5'10....190lbs....and has never scored more than 9 goals in a season. Yet Detroit gave him an unbelievable 5 year $30 million deal. An average of $6 million per for a a 34 year old.....

Philly and Briere....this deal irks me to no end....why you ask???....well first of all....they are paying him $10 million the first year of his contract. Secondly....the contract has a no movement clause.....(this is something new)....that apparently means that the Flyers can not do ANYTHING to Briere for the next 8 seasons. They can't release him, demote him, trade him, buy him out......NOTHING!

The Rangers coming away with both Chris Drury and Scott Gomez.....the fact that the Rangers can afford to have Jaromir Jagr, Chris Drury, Scott Gomez and Henrik Lundquist is just sheer lunacy.....you have a team like the Penguins that are playing in a building that resembles the Newbridge Road rink....let alone an NHL arena....and the "Salary Cap" allows the Rangers to spend $87 million dollars in the same day.

I honestly believe that someone day in the future the NHL will be again in major financial trouble....and Gary Bettman will be replaced as Commissioner....and then.....and only then will the NHL be able to restore some of the glory it once had.

Now on to the train wreck that is the New York Islanders hockey Club.

This is what the Islanders have at this point.

They have a 2nd line center in Mike Sillinger....a man who has been traded and switched teams more than anyone in league history.

They have some young wingers in Trent Hunter, Jeff Tambellini, and Sean Bergenheim.

They have some young defenseman in Chris Campoli, Bruno Gervais, Freddy Meyer and Radek Martinek.

They have a franchise goalie in Rick DiPietro.

and very little else.....

in one day the Isles lost their potential Captain, Their most steady defenseman, their leading goal scorer, their reclamation project from the scrap heap, and any chance of saving their reputation.

Ryan Smyth, Tom Poti, Jason Blake and Viktor Kozlov are all gone....and pretty much any chance to better last years team also signed with other franchises today.....as formentioned Scott Gomez, Chris Drury, Daniel Briere, Matt Schneider, Paul Kariya....and the list goes on....

The deal that bothers me the most is Kariya.....reason being is....he signed the same contract that we offered to Jason Blake 3 months ago. Paul Kariya would be a better player that Jason Blake if he only had one hand!.....Where was that offer to Kariya?....at 12:01???....once again the Islanders had the opportunity to take a step foward....build on the momentum from last season....(and anyone who watched this team will tell you it was a special year)....and they have totally shot themselves in the foot.

The names that are left on the market...(Todd Bertuzzi, Danius Zubrus, Brad Stuart, Roman Hamrlik, Peter Forsberg, Ladislav Nagy, Robert Lang, Sheldon Souray, Mike Comrie, Bill Guerin, Michael Peca, Bryan Smolinski...etc all have question marks....or one kind or another...either health questions or age questions....

In order to make today be not a total disaster....Snow would need to sign at least 5 of the above players....Guerin, Bertuzzi, Comrie Stuart and Souray for starters....and for good measure....bring Peter Forsberg in and see what he has left. This team has some major holes to fill and Garth needs to fill them ASAP.

I dont blame Garth Snow for the problems they have had today. Snow is obviously a very good judge of talent and a shrewd trader as we saw last season....but the team needs to bring in someone who has an understanding of the financial part of the game to work with him. Cliff Fletcher, Bill Torrey....etc....someone of that stature would be a tremendous help.

I am probably rambling at this point....we'll see what tomorrow brings I guess....

As always your thought are always appreciated...

Tony