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'He's a moron, first of all'


lazy26

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To play devils advocate here a bit more (Sorry Kozed :P )

I agree with Lowe on this one. He (Lowe) isn't responsible for the inflated contracts he just helped them become the norm with thier use.

The real culprits of this came from deals like Kovalchuk, Dipietro etc. These after all were the first in this line and until Lowe made his offer sheets they were just abnormal decisions made by another GM.

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To play devils advocate here a bit more (Sorry Kozed :P )

I agree with Lowe on this one. He (Lowe) isn't responsible for the inflated contracts he just helped them become the norm with thier use.

The real culprits of this came from deals like Kovalchuk, Dipietro etc. These after all were the first in this line and until Lowe made his offer sheets they were just abnormal decisions made by another GM.

Kovalchuk and DiPietro were 1st overall draft picks, are franchise players, and already had 3+ seasons in the NHL prior to the lockout. Not comparable at all with Penner & Vanek.

Top stars getting big bucks was never the problem. The lockout was the result of years and years of salary inflation to 2nd tier players, which raised the League's average salary to ridiculous heights and put most of the teams around the league in a financial hole.

So the League goes into a lockout to sort it all out, manages to lower the League's average salary and what does Lowe do? it all up by offering 4.25 to a 2nd tier guy coming off an average rookie year; and 7+ per season to a guy that only had 2 seasons in the league. That's 3+ more millions per year than Koivu, Kovalev, same salary as a perennial all-star and league elite Iginla, more than League MVP and Art-Ross winner Martin St-Louis, etc.

That's where real, league-wide inflation comes from. Ridiculous contract offered to 2nd-tier, unproven players.

And I'll repeat my example; which no one yet commented: because of those two offer sheets, the scale for 2nd contract players was raised and instead of having Andrei Kostitsyn signed for under 2 M, we have him at 3.25. That's the direct effect of Lowe's doing.

Dont tell me Lowe didn't up the League with the Penner/Vanek offers when you see the effects in your own backyard.

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I agree with everything KoZed said 100%. The Higgins/Plekanec/Kostitsyn comparison is perfect evidence. Kostitsyn didn't do anything that warranted nearly twice the money that Higgins, Plekanec, and Komisarek got on their second contracts. I won't argue with the deal because that is the current climate, but that climate was started by Lowe. :clap:

Lowe himself compared the Penner deal to those of Rick Nash and Ilya Kovalchuk, who tied for the Richard trophy before negotiating their second contracts. Penner had 52 points in a season and a quarter before huge money was thrown at him. That's not normal, that's not inflation, that's asinine. It is not normal to offer 4 million dollars to unproven youngsters with only one full season under their belt.

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To play devils advocate here a bit more (Sorry Kozed :P )

I agree with Lowe on this one. He (Lowe) isn't responsible for the inflated contracts he just helped them become the norm with thier use.The real culprits of this came from deals like Kovalchuk, Dipietro etc. These after all were the first in this line and until Lowe made his offer sheets they were just abnormal decisions made by another GM.

Maybe I wasn't clear enough?

Try re-reading the bold again.

BTW, for a mod, you should set an example and control your language more.

Edited by Habitforming
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In addition to what KoZed mentioned, Brian Burke is right when he says that the "second contract" has been eliminated, players now go from their entry-level contract straight to not only the big money, but also long term contracts (except players like Andrei Kostsitsyn who are still unproven and will resign for 2-3 years).

Before, it could be several years before a player could negotiate such contracts. For example, Michael Ryder scored 25 goals and ended up with 63 points during his first season, yet he resigned for only a million. He followed that up with consecutive 30-goal seasons, and yet resigned for only 2.2 and 2.95 millions. If this all started this year, Ryder could have gotten at least 3.5 millions after his rookie season.

And this was very recent, only one year before the lockout.

Is Kevin Lowe entirely to blame for this, probably not… however his offer sheets to Penner and Vanek last summer have forced many GMs to sign their best young players to high salary long-term contracts even though many of them are still unproven. For example, Paul Holmgren couldn’t know for sure whether Mike Richards is the real deal offensively after a break through season (after all he looked mostly like a high-quality 3rd or perhaps 2nd liner before), but he sure didn’t want to risk Richards becoming a RFA.

The results: Richards and Carter went from very good young players with great potential to great young players who will get paid over 5 million a season to fulfill all that potential…

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Ha. Looks like Bettman has ordered a "cease and desist" with the two. Too bad.

And it took for Lowe to speak up. Bettman should've told Burke to shove it way before now.

It really shows and Bettman has no balls.

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And it took for Lowe to speak up. Bettman should've told Burke to shove it way before now.

It really shows and Bettman has no balls.

Good point, I never even thought of that. Nice to see that Bettman is consistent with his inconsistencies. :blink:

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Good point, I never even thought of that. Nice to see that Bettman is consistent with his inconsistencies. :blink:

speaking of morons's bettman takes the cake and the pie and the muffins too. :lol:

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I don't think the young player inflation has much to do with Lowe. There is a sea change taking place with the new CBA where young guns get long contracts and money. The older players in free agency are getting much less, unless they are true stars.

While I am sure that Lowe's offer had a small trickle down effect, it is pretty clear to me that GMs are paying a lot more for potential and a lot less for history.

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Ya, its all Lowes fault. :rolleyes: That damn Lowe held a gun to Burke's head and forced him to sign Perry & Getzlaff both to 5+ mil a year over 5 year contracts.

Ironically all 3 are in their 3rd year of NHL and the lowest pad out of the 3 is the guy who was stolen away from the Ducks with a ridiculously high RFA offer. :wacko:

Nice try Burke, blame everybody else but yourself. It so obvious Burke was so mad at inflation that he ran out and did his own part to raise NHL Tier 2 contracts.

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People are confusing "inflation" with the mere act of poaching RFAs. While there's obviously some linkage, I don't accept that hockey salaries have to be like law, governed by precedent. Lowe was the first to break the unwritten code against poaching RFAs, and that has clearly opened the floodgates; once one guy does it, the dominos fall for fairly logical reasons (i.e., "if I don't poach this guy, someone else might;" or, "why should I be the only sucker who doesn't do this?"). Loew bears the responsibility for the fact that RFAs are now in play, although the CBA was structured so as to make this inevitable in any case.

What I have a harder time with is the idea that because Lowe dished out a ridiculous contract to Penner, every other GM is bound by "precedent" to dish out ridiculous offers to their own RFAs. Balderdash. When DiPietro got a 15-year deal, I didn't see anyone else rushing to follow suit. Everyone agreed that that was stupid and moved forward. There is no reason in the world for things to be any different with salaries and terms for RFAs. GMs dish out those offers because they are idiots caught up in frenzies of signings, pure and simple. Nothing to do with Lowe.

As for the Lowe-Burke feud, I think it's a blast, but I wouldn't want it to start becoming a normal NHL pattern. Whatever talk show radio hosts might say, the crassness of the NBA and the "badass" criminality and idiocy of the NHL are the last thing the NHL needs. Let this be like Cherry - the amusing exception to the general rule of The Code.

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Kovalchuk and DiPietro were 1st overall draft picks, are franchise players, and already had 3+ seasons in the NHL prior to the lockout. Not comparable at all with Penner & Vanek.

Top stars getting big bucks was never the problem. The lockout was the result of years and years of salary inflation to 2nd tier players, which raised the League's average salary to ridiculous heights and put most of the teams around the league in a financial hole.

So the League goes into a lockout to sort it all out, manages to lower the League's average salary and what does Lowe do? ###### it all up by offering 4.25 to a 2nd tier guy coming off an average rookie year; and 7+ per season to a guy that only had 2 seasons in the league. That's 3+ more millions per year than Koivu, Kovalev, same salary as a perennial all-star and league elite Iginla, more than League MVP and Art-Ross winner Martin St-Louis, etc.

That's where real, league-wide inflation comes from. Ridiculous contract offered to 2nd-tier, unproven players.

And I'll repeat my example; which no one yet commented: because of those two offer sheets, the scale for 2nd contract players was raised and instead of having Andrei Kostitsyn signed for under 2 M, we have him at 3.25. That's the direct effect of Lowe's doing.

Dont tell me Lowe didn't ###### up the League with the Penner/Vanek offers when you see the effects in your own backyard.

Yes, but I believe that it is also in connection with the increase of the salary cap. Before, the 2nd tier players negociated a certain % of the money the teams were allowed to spend by the owners.

Now with a raise of nearly 8M$, it is normal that the 2 or 3 2nd tier players per team decide to say "Hey, i'm gonna have my part of the cake and ask for 1.5M more than before".

No ??

I think you guys are wrong to think that Kostitsyn would have sign the same contract that Higgins and Komi signed before the cap raised...

Edited by JoeLassister
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Yes, but I believe that it is also in connection with the increase of the salary cap. Before, the 2nd tier players negociated a certain % of the money the teams were allowed to spend by the owners.

Now with a raise of nearly 8M$, it is normal that the 2 or 3 2nd tier players per team decide to say "Hey, i'm gonna have my part of the cake and ask for 1.5M more than before".

No ??

I think you guys are wrong to think that Kostitsyn would have sign the same contract that Higgins and Komi signed before the cap raised...

You're right to a certain extent as well. the problem in this thread is that there are so many "right" theories that nothing can be proven or agreed with entirely.

This whole thing started as a Lowe bashing for 2 contract offers and "changing the NHL salary landscape for 2nd contract players" I called BS on this and cited some other previous contracts that I feel accounted for it. Rick Nash and his contract may be THE contract that changed the thinking of GM's.

The Columbus Blue Jackets gave Rick Nash a five-year deal only two weeks after the lockout ended, in which he was paid $7-million in the final year of his pact. That final year would have been his first year of eligibility for unrestricted free agency.

This was the first in a long line of deals that set the scale for 2nd contracts.

Edited by Habitforming
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Allow me to borrow this thread to talk about another GM... Jay Jeyster is out of Tampa.... Let me get this straight... he retires on his own accord and he still gets paid the 3 next seasons FULL?? damn what a sweet contract I wanna a contract where I can retire the next day and still get my money!

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This whole thing started as a Lowe bashing for 2 contract offers and "changing the NHL salary landscape for 2nd contract players" I called BS on this and cited some other previous contracts that I feel accounted for it. Rick Nash and his contract may be THE contract that changed the thinking of GM's.

The Columbus Blue Jackets gave Rick Nash a five-year deal only two weeks after the lockout ended, in which he was paid $7-million in the final year of his pact. That final year would have been his first year of eligibility for unrestricted free agency.

This was the first in a long line of deals that set the scale for 2nd contracts.

I still don't think the comparison is valid. Nash was coming off a season in which he won the Richard trophy and was the team's franchise player. One of Lowe's targets, Vanek, may now be the Sabres franchise player, but he wasn't heading into free agency. Drury and Briere were Buffalo's franchise guys. I think even Campbell and Miller would come before Vanek. Second, his contract averages the money Nash makes in the 5th year of his deal. Nash's deal averaged only 5.4 million. And then Penner barely belongs in the same paragraph as Nash and Vanek. He came off one full season with 48 points. Penner barely deserved half the money that was thrown at him. 4 million for Dustin Penner was completely outrageous. In no way was it reasonable. I'm not saying Lowe is single handedly responsible, but I think he is a big reason.

Allow me to borrow this thread to talk about another GM... Jay Jeyster is out of Tampa.... Let me get this straight... he retires on his own accord and he still gets paid the 3 next seasons FULL?? damn what a sweet contract I wanna a contract where I can retire the next day and still get my money!

This was more of a forced retirement. Brian Lawton was hired by Tampa in late June as the Vice President of Hockey Operations. For all intents and purposes, though, he was hired to run the team. He and the new co-owners have been the ones calling the shots lately. Feaster saw the writing on the wall and got out. It was either get out now or be fired at some point in the near future. It was about the same situation the Cincinnati Reds had earlier this year. They hired Walt Jocketty to some bogus position in the organization and just bided their time until it seemed like the right time to fire their GM and replace him with Jocketty.

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Allow me to borrow this thread to talk about another GM... Jay Jeyster is out of Tampa.... Let me get this straight... he retires on his own accord and he still gets paid the 3 next seasons FULL?? damn what a sweet contract I wanna a contract where I can retire the next day and still get my money!

Well in reality they forced him out in a strange way. right now the owners are running the club and they apparently do not need a gm. So they have been busy doing his job and he figured out he was not needed. Seen it before we will see it again , it very seldom works out. However they were nice enough to pay him what they owed him so give them credit for having some honour.

I think that whole situation will turn into a complete zoo before long.

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