I used to think Sutter was a genius for the Kipper deal, but man, he has give out some Kevin Lowe type contracts and just traded Phanuef and Jokinen away....Ouch....
Essentially they traded a 1st, Lombardi and Jokinen for Kotalik and Higgins....Omg.
I said it last summer and I'll say it again: Burke is trying to circumvent the rebuilding process and it's not going to work. His little free agency science experiment was an epic failure this year and I doubt much will be different next year. He essentially traded away his position of strength (his forward corps wasn't bad this year) to marginally fill a position of weakness (D and goaltending) with two massive contracts tacked on to underachieving whiners.
Maybe it's just the inner Sabres fan in me, but I love watching the circus that has become the Maple Leafs continue to fall all over themselves.
Toronto's plan for the next two off-seasons is to grab free agents, draft well in rounds 3 and beyond, and pray. It's basically the polar opposite of how DL approached the Kings rebuild.
Calgary - who knows. Iginla and the rest of the team has to feel like they just received a lobotomy. I don't care how poorly Phaneuf was performing... trading him away is pretty tough for that locker room to stomach I wouuld think. It's going to take a few games for that team to snap out of the funk they are in. They looked listless last night.
New York... they'll continue to be an oil and water team until Sather gets the boot.
__________________
"In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened." - Vin Scully being clairvoyant in 1988.
The Los Angeles Kings - 2012 Stanley Cup Champions
"Now if you are a Calgary Flames or a Toronto Maple Leafs fan and you didn't like your team's roster, you had much in common with your general manager - because it's clear they didn't like their teams either!"
I think the Flames won personally. They retained defense and got a nice player in White and gained quite a bit of offense in the process.
__________________
"It has not been a good day. I lost my glasses early this morning and I had to go buy a pair of 79 dollar reading glasses today. 79 bucks. You can literally get them at Costco, three-for-20." - Darryl Sutter's response to going up 2-0 in the series.
The Flames did well with what they got for Phaneuf, but as to the Jokinen move I have no idea. I would have just let Jokinen walk in the offseason and look towards resigning White and Stajan. Now Kotalik is on your team. Yucky.
