so 8 games into the season, kipper gets his first yank at the hands of mike keenan. i wonder how it felt.
i was listening to sutter on the radio the other night, with peter maher and rob kerr, and they were discussing kiprusoff's contract negotiations. sutter admitted they were ongoing, that he was talking to kippy's agent pretty much daily, but that the 'tender had to start showing up to games before sutter would entertain the big numbers (i'm paraphrasing).
what it sounded to me was twofold;
1. kipper won't re-sign until he knows the climate of the keenan era (i've said this before, and i'll say it again).
2. sutter wants a bonafide starter from game 1, and is using it as leverage to get a better deal
i think if this team is not a clear playoff contender by xmastime, kipps might get left on the side of the road in buffalo, ference-styles. i have no idea who we might get to pick up that slack (bless 'em, but krahn/mcelhinney ain't lookin' ready and keetley/irving are a couple of years away), but the cap's gonna have to go up significantly if we want to pay him the dough he wants... personally, i look at this team and think the urgency (and dollars) should be better spent getting dion inked longterm...
everybody thinks i'm crazy on this one, and that kipper should get any dollar amount he wants, but i think we should take a couple of years to build on what we have. we all know we'll lose most of our top two lines next year, and will probably have to pay more to replace them with good players.
what we need to do is get phaneuf under contract (so as to avoid the upcoming offer sheet that i guarantee will happen if we don't) and then trade kipper/langkow/huselius at the trade deadline to bring in some young'uns like philly did with forsberg. my fear is, of course, that phaneuf will be the juiciest tradebait....
i'm also interested in moving tanguay ASAP, before his stock plummets any further. i'm not excited about his 2 remaining expensive years, though i'm not suggesting kovalev is the answer (mind you, kovalev would line up nice with langks and is 800K cheaper...). i know tanguay CAN be good, but dang !! where is the goodness ?!?!?
these are the things i've been thinking while watching my team stink up the joint against the sharks. again, kudos to the opposing team for watching a shizeload of tape on all of our hottest moves. and, again, kudos to the sharks scouts/management for using their 2nd round pick in 2005 to pick up a guy i think will be a norris candidate down the road...
one final thought: why does every single godard goal get reviewed ???????
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why does every single godard goal get reviewed ???????
Because nobody can believe that he was the last one to touch a puck before it went into an opposing net...
And that call on his no-goal last night was pretty close. Yes, he did move his shoulder into it a little bit, but Smyth gets those kind of goals all the time...
Oh well, the boys have to get ready for the Wild tomorrow night...
Can't say I agree about moving Tanguay. The guy just had a career year, he's a point per game player (and pretty consistent at that). He's an asset to this team, and I don't consider him overpriced in the slighest.
As for Kipper, I don't think he should just name his price. But we need to have a certifiable #1 goaltender, and Kipper is that -- no one else in our system can compete with him, so signing Phaneuf and Kipper (in that order) are priorities.
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