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Booney, That's HI-larious about the Colin Farrell reference. Well done.
Is Lang gonna blow chow in that picture or what!
Thanks Vince for reposting those possible alternatives to acquiring Sundin. I don't watch enough to really comment intelligently on the fit of those players, in terms of style of play. What I can do is look at stats.
Marleau: good size. At 28 y/o, he's just coming into his prime. He's under contract for another 2 years, although I am not sure what the cap hit is. Only scored 19 last season, but previous to that, he was consistently 25-35 goals. Seems to be weak defensively with a +/- of -19, although +/- numbers were better in the past. He'd be Carbo's whipping boy if he turned in a -19 here though. Anyone know what bugging this guy? Someone said he has a no trade clause. Maybe he wants out of a bad situation.
Gomez: middle weight at 5'11" 200 lbs. So he is not the power forward we are looking for. Healthy as he played 81 games last year. 16G 54A 70Pts +3 70 pts sounds great, but all those assists make him a playmaker, not a scorer. Under contract for another 4 years at $7.357M cap hit.
Who would you move out to make room for Gomez? Pleks, Koivu, Chips, Lapierre? Not Lapierre as Gomez is not a shutdown artist. If you get rid of Chips, you are getting rid of our biggest centre when we need more size. Koivu is our captain. And Pleks is our best goal scoring centre. Not exactly what we are looking for.
SACKIC SIGNED 1 YEAR DEAL
We should have kept Grabovski centering the line between the Kostitsyn brothers!
"We will win the Cup only with Carey Price in the nets"
That is an interesting idea and I'm sure it has a sort of merit if Grabovski turns the corner and plays to his potential. I suspect he was promised a trade when he stomped out last spring on the western trip. The league needs stars so I hope you're right about him but I think the Habs already have better young centers than Grabovski. Heck, the Leafs let Wellwood go and he's better than Grabovski.
Wellwood was let go because he did not take care of himself physically, started to gain the pounds and spent less time in the gym. You might call him the Pillsbury boy!
Mikhail is solid as a rock! Strong, muscular and skill!
I bet Andre and Sergei wish they had Guy experiment this line together last season. Bad mistake letting him go.
"We will win the Cup only with Carey Price in the nets"
We'll see. Strong, muscular, skilled, he may have been but he was minus 6 in his 27 NHL games. (Wellwood is 189 games, 108 pts, minus 10)I thought Grabs was knocked off the puck pretty easy. You may be right about Wellwood, but Van might be able to change that. So Wellwood can get better, and has been better. I think Grabs was as good as he's going to get.
I bet Andrei and Sergei are glad they got the ice time last year, like blondes, and are looking forward to long careers and the good life regardless of who the coach puts between them 20 minutes every other night.
For sure! We should have kept Samsonov, Dagenais, and Niinimaa too. Ahh well, I heard Bob is talking to Alexei Yashin's agent to try to fill the heartless coward role that was left empty when they left.
Obviously, you've never seen him play in Hamilton as much as I have.
"We will win the Cup only with Carey Price in the nets"
SUMMIT NEWS
WE JUST HAD ANOTHER FATAL ERROR ON OUR SUMMIT BLOG TODAY>
So here is todays news, we have a total of 81 people coming to the Summit
If you have not paid for your tickets on paypal yet, do so right away.
We have 6 tickets that have not been paid for, so who ever wants them, get in touch with myself or Robert ASAP.
Now that we know how many people are going this year, we will need to know who will need discounted hotel rooms, who will want to go on the Bell Center tour, who will be attending the pre game dinner (where we will auction off stuff, like a pair of season tickets, donated by Vicky, set of Gretsky hockey cards donated by Robert and much more that Chuck is getting from the Club) and who will be attending the after game get together.
Each Summit officer for each event will need this info so as to reserve a spot for you at each event. Stay tuned
IAN
E-mail me before 5 PM. I'm at work after that time.
I know I am reposting this, but I would love to hear some more opinions about Plan B centres for the upcoming year, as these guys will be free agents, and trade bait:
Best
Henrik Sedin - 76 Points
Keith Tkachuk - 58 points
Victor Kozlov - 54 points
Patrick Marleau - 48 points
OR- If NY wants to get rid of a 28 yrd old 70 point centre for a 37 year old 78 point older centre who will only last 2 yrs max, great,
Lets Free up some room and TAKE SCOTT GOMEZ!
Next best
Robert Lang - 54 points
Mike Cammalleri - 47 points
Mike Comrie - 49 points
T. Connolly - 40 points
Mike Peca - 34 points
_________________________
"ITS NOT EASY BEING GREEN...FOR A SUPERSTAR"
Is this plan B for the Leafs or the Canadiens?
I don't know about all this sudden focus on Sundin having migrated into the Habs need to trade someone. The Habs don't need to trade anyone. The team needs to get better, and by gosh it has.
The Habs would have been stupid not to make Sundin an offer. The Habs were smart to sweeten the pot to TO for an early chance. For whatever reason that got out. But frankly, all an agent has to do is buy a couple promo slots in a paper or two, and us Habs fans are screaming that we have to, absolutely have to, get Fantastic Puckshooter from the Russian Superior Supper League before someone else grabs him.
Look at last years "oh if Emelin comes over we'll be ok" example. Who is Emelin and why are they saying such nice things about a guy who has never dominated anything?
Then guys like Shawn Belle slide into town, and no one notices. Here's a young man with all the tools, who if given the chance, might make this team. BGL rolls in and everyone says "The Habs will play two inches taller." but do we really realize his value. This man can play hockey. He doesn't have to fight people. But the next time some @****** punches Carey Price in the face as he passes through the crease he should figure out that 18 other players have his number, and that BGL backs them up. Look at Tanguay. He is a really good hockey player, not an average player on good teams, he is a really good hockey player.
This is going to be a different team. Denis has had a rough go, but is a NHL goalie. Kovalev proved something last year, and SK showed a flash of something great. Price and Halek will work it out. Higgins is going to explode, if he's physically able. Lats should show us what he will be at age 27, and then we'll finally know. Look at Boone's favorite defenseman, Gosh Georges :), he got a chance, got motivated instead of scared, and look what he did.
And the Habs should easily, but might not make the playoffs.
It's gonna be a ride.
So if the right deal comes along the Habs are one of the few teams who have the assets to make it happen. But throwing away those assets for third line centers who are retiring in a couple years isn't necessarily the best course of action.
Lang .. slow as molasses ... NO THANKS. Now , if I am trying to fill a void at Center ... which I believe we are ...
Oy obvious # 1 target is Mats Sundin ... my plan B is
Viktor Kozlov ...
Can he be had ... I would say, YES ... Washington is over the cap ... @ Center they have, in NO particular Order, Federov, Nylander, Backstrom, Kozlov and a couple of Defensive Centermen ...
Kozlov is affordable at 2.5M$ and he gives you flexibility at seasons end, as he doesnt decimate your cap space .. he has good size at 6'4" , in or around, and his game has come around ... he isnt Sundin, but he is definitely a player .. still young wnough to contribute, and he will feel right at home here with the Kostitsyn's , Kovalev and Markov.
yes but you forget one thing ... Koslov doesn't move koivu to our # 3 centerman .... Sundin does therefore .... Anyone that isn't better than koivu doens't get consideration ex: lang, lombardi , marleau , and god know who else
thats a very good point .. but what it does do ... is it allows you to not over extend Koivu during the season. As we have seen playoff after playoff ... our playoffs go as Koivu goes ... and if he goes down ... we are in trouble ..
Another thing I like about this move, is come Feb ... you still have loads of room to pick up that "rental" that can take you to the next level .. ( conference final ... cup final ... ??? )
You are right tho, he certainly isnt above Koivu ... not like Sundin ...
Where did this Schneider nonsense come up? The entire board has been thrumming with calls for a big centre all summer long. Was it bordeom? Was it the fact that Maple Leaf issued a recall, making us all switch to Schneider?
We have enough D. One thing that makes us KILLER right now is that we have the league's highest scoring team from last year still intact, with a great new forward (Tanguay) and the league's best muscle (GL) to boot, AND we've got 6 million to play with. This is not money we NEED to spend on an aged Dman. This is money to get that big centre... or fill in holes in February.... or resign/extend key guys.
The whole Schneider idea is bad bad BAD.
me thinks its an okay move. who knows.he has always had a quick first pass, efficient, experienced snd still makes our D even stronger and more balanced taking pressure off the others.
Good points Chorske. But this is all in the realm of speculation at this point. We have a pretty good consensus going here that Sundin is a good fit for Montreal. But we have been guessing about him for 2 months now. The comments by BG have caused a few of us to cast our eyes elsewhere, even if we haven't completely given up hope for landing Sundin. And there has been plenty of speculation about who we could bring to Montreal that could play first or second line centre, that has the size, the scoring, and the faceoff ability, etc. There aren't many that fit the bill and it is unclear how BG could bring them here.
Now after first or second line centre, probably our other weakness is a top 4 D. Yes, we have Markov, Komi and Hamrlik. And I think Gorges, Obyrne and the Cube bring a lot to the rink, but another top 4 puck moving D would be an upgrade.
True enough - we have enough D. But we have enough C as well. Its a question of upgrading. So if you have some more great ideas about who would fit the profile at centre ice, how much it would cost to trade for him, and what it would cost salary wise, I'm all ears. But I hope you won't object if I comment on some of the rumours that are out there, even if they are from bs sources.
I guess my thinking is that you can't TEACH someone to be a nasty net crasher, but you can teach someone to play decent D (and them let them gain experience the hard way, by making mistakes). Our young Dmen need to step up, end of story. There may be weaknesses, but none that need a 5 million dollar fix, using a stopgap stalwart whose best years are behind him. We have experienced guys on D in Markov and Hamrlik. That's enough. Let the young guns learn from them.
Is everyone assuming the Schneider rumour is true? Isnt it Eklund who said it or is there another sports source your hearing it from??
Cause I wont believe a word eklund says and if any of his rumours ever do happen to come true, well he'll still have to work on getting them right more than once every 50 rumours...
"If I wanted to hear from an ass, I would fart..."
True, the source does make it rather doubtful. But I think e4 means that he didn't completely fabricate it. So perhaps he was talking to the second cousin of Brian Burke's barber, and he thinks Schneider is going to Montreal. LOL Hey, its august. What else is there to talk about?
Schneider: 39 y/o Under contract until July '09 with cap hit of $5.625M. I like that he would only be under contract for this season. And let's face it, compared to Chelios, he's a youngster.
He missed 13 games last season due to an ankle injury, then 2 more games with a hip injury, then 2 more games due to a wrist injury. In spite of missing 17 games, he still put up 12G 27A 39Pts +22. So last year he was a bit injury prone, put he still put up decent numbers.
His +/- was third best on the team last season. He contributes on the pp with 5G last season. His average TOI was 22:18 so it sounds like he was a top 4 D with Anaheim.
He's only 5'11" and 191 lbs, so he doesn't seem to be a bruiser, but some guys hit above their weight class, like the Cube. And his +/- suggests that he gets the job done at both ends of the rink while doing pp duty.
Okay, I like him, and I think it is a big plus that he would only be under contract for one year, since we have some major negotiations coming up at the end of the season. If I am not mistaken, the Ducks are $1.313 above the cap right now, and they need to get Selanne signed. So the Ducks need to get rid of him and it might not cost us too much. Since they have cap issues, they will likely be looking for a prospect or a pick.
Could be a decent plan B. We could use some top 4 help on defense while our prospects mature in Hamilton. And he would likely help replace Streit on the pp.
Forget about Sundin, Lang, Conroy. Lombardi would be good especially as he is a local guy (Hudson) and his speed fits well with our team. Would be willing to take a chance on Marleau as last year's stats are not reflective of his career and he is still young. He would be a great addition to the team. San Jose would dump his salary as Thornton gets all of the first line ice at centre.
Failing Marleau or Lombardi how about Sergie Kostitsyn a centre? He is a great playmaker, responsible defensively, has guts and I think would flourish in the role of centre. All of our guys, including Sergie, will play bigger with Laraque on the team so give him a try. Lapierre is not really a centre and would be better on the wing.
Carbo mention that at his golf tournament yesterday about trying S.Kost at center .... he also mentionned Ben Maxwell and that he couldn't wait to see him at training camp
Lombardi doesn't have as many goals in his 4 years in the NHL as Sundin had last season.... We need someone on the FIRST LINE.
The reason being he has been on 3rd or 4th line his whole time in Calgary, he is being held back on the Flames, He will breakthough once he leaves that team...
"If I wanted to hear from an ass, I would fart..."
If anything, the Canadiens need to target a top line asset that will with them four or five years down the road. Why not make a pitch for Jeff Carter?