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Habs sign Sebastian Aho to offer sheet


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Maybe I’m crazy or just haven’t given up on the dream - but HAVE they matched the offer or just said they WOULD match the offer. 

 

I mean, if I’m Carolina and want revenge - no matter how petty - maybe I say I am matching, hoping the Habs screw themselves with the cap only to never match. 

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26 minutes ago, Link67 said:

I find it hilarious that people are scoffing at the attempt in our own market, this was the best form of an over payment we can handle, structured in a way that was least convenient for the opposing team to handle. Any offersheet always has a way better chance of failure than success unless you make a ridiculous offer that will hurt you more than your counterpart. You honestly think us giving 10mill+, with the important players we have to sign in the next 2 years was the way to go? Let's go on and be a cap strapped team by 2021, making sacrificial lambs out of who knows who to try to make it work, while also having no important draft picks left to alleviate some of the debacle? Yeah great idea guys, lets just keep on going with the irrational, not big picture oriented plans of attack. I'm sure that won't make the situation a boatload worse than coming out of this empty handed and no worse than we were June 30th, right?

 

Trying to say we didn't make the poison pill poisonous enough is a flawed statement in its every form. What is the use of making the poison pill so vile, that when they refuse to take it, and force you to take it, you're the one who dies? There is a reason why all offer sheets have been matched, except for one, and that one worked out about as well as leaving the steaks on the table while the dog is unattended, for the team who took it. We took a measured approach which would have allowed us to get the player without messing with our cap to catastrophically in the coming years, while also tightening the vice in the area which we felt they were weakest, organizational dollars. 

 

It didn't go our way, oh well, a nice try none the less, let their owner puff his chest about money not being an issue while getting 21 million arena gate all year long. Let him act like he doesn't already owe millions elsewhere and that he won't need to likely get a loan in the next few days to deal with the first 11+million dollar cheque they owe to the kid who wanted to go elsewhere and signed a contract elsewhere, like that's not going to sting. We move on, an attempt at an improvement was made and it didn't pan out, there are still many avenue's available to improve this team, none will likely impact the roster as much as the addition of Aho, but improvements are still within reach.

Frankly, if we need to make tough choices because we offered a 21 year old like Aho $10.5m, I’ll take that contract any day and try and move Weber for a young dman instead.  

 

Id move Drouin or try and do what the leafs did with Marleau to entice someone to take that useless Alzner off our hands, if you need to clear cap space later.

 

Finally, id rather pay a bona fide #1C $10.5m than a goalie $10m.  Who was the last winning cup team that had a goalie as their highest paid player, or even close to being their highest paid player?

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15 minutes ago, revvvrob said:

Maybe I’m crazy or just haven’t given up on the dream - but HAVE they matched the offer or just said they WOULD match the offer. 

 

I mean, if I’m Carolina and want revenge - no matter how petty - maybe I say I am matching, hoping the Habs screw themselves with the cap only to never match. 

 

They're going full out with their marketing and media on matching the offer. If they don't, that will be a bigger "#### you" to their own fans than it would be to Montreal. 

 

They're just going to wait the whole 7 days to do it so they can a) inconvenience the Habs on a rather minor scale, and b) have more time to scrape together an extra 11 million for Aho's bonus that they'll owe him 5 days after officially matching the offer. 

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13 minutes ago, Trizzak said:

 

They're going full out with their marketing and media on matching the offer. If they don't, that will be a bigger "#### you" to their own fans than it would be to Montreal. 

 

They're just going to wait the whole 7 days to do it so they can a) inconvenience the Habs on a rather minor scale, and b) have more time to scrape together an extra 11 million for Aho's bonus that they'll owe him 5 days after officially matching the offer. 

 

I'll take #2 for $500, Alex. They have about 10 days to shake out all their piggy banks for that bonus cash.

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12 minutes ago, Scott462 said:

I can already see the Canes GM trying to cut corners on the staff in there arena next year. Gotta pay Aho somehow! 

The players doubling as ticket takers and concession workers.

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Unlesssss.....Carolina is bluffing

 

If Bergevin does nothing else they wait until the last minute to match.

 

Or....in the ultimate FU.....if he DOES do something...they don't follow through......   Then the Habs are in cap hell!

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14 minutes ago, tomh009 said:

I'll take that cap hell any day.

 

Yup, I would gladly take that cap hell of Aho's 8.5m contract.  I think there is zero chance that Carolina doesn't follow through. Even if MB had offered 10.5m I  bet Carolina would still match.  Teams don't like to have their good players taken away. It's also a pride/ego thing "what you don't think I can afford to match? "  Sports owners have big egos.  RFA's offers rarely if ever work.

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2 hours ago, Metallica said:

We need to figure out why  it is that big name players in the  prime of their careers don't want to sign here.

The team hasn't own cup in 25+years.

Located in Quebec with Anti-English laws.

Taxs are bad in Quebec.

Cold winters.

Most fickle press coverage in NHL.

 

2 hours ago, Metallica said:

 Then we need to fix it.

Chicken or Egg, need a winning contending team with at least 1 All star forward first (last one was 9 years ago) to help attract UFAs.

Till then, it will be through trade or draft to add quality.

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34 minutes ago, tomh009 said:

Once we have a contending team, the legacy will become a positive.

Not really we had contending teams before and players still didn't come or stay, Vanek walked and radulov both left when we had good teams

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1 hour ago, DON said:

The team hasn't own cup in 25+years.

Located in Quebec with Anti-English laws.

Taxs are bad in Quebec.

Cold winters.

Most fickle press coverage in NHL.

 

Chicken or Egg, need a winning contending team with at least 1 All star forward first (last one was 9 years ago) to help attract UFAs.

Till then, it will be through trade or draft to add quality.

:blink:

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Looks like Aho stiffed Dundon and Waddel in an arranged conference call today. Technical difficulties.....

 

I don’t think MB was lying when he said Aho wants to play for Montreal, they are a young up and coming team with a bunch of talent and the Finn connection.

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3 hours ago, hab29RETIRED said:

Frankly, if we need to make tough choices because we offered a 21 year old like Aho $10.5m, I’ll take that contract any day and try and move Weber for a young dman instead.  

 

Id move Drouin or try and do what the leafs did with Marleau to entice someone to take that useless Alzner off our hands, if you need to clear cap space later.

 

Finally, id rather pay a bona fide #1C $10.5m than a goalie $10m.  Who was the last winning cup team that had a goalie as their highest paid player, or even close to being their highest paid player?

 

Being the highest paid player on the team as a goalie has nothing to do with the equation, it is like you are trying to say you can't win a cup unless a forward is your highest paid player? Let me flip this on you and ask, did very good to great goaltending not play a significant role in L.A's multiple cup wins? How about Fleury and Holtby's performances to take both their teams to a cup final with .920+ SV%? How about Rask and Binnington's performances to help carry their team's to a cup final, Jesus, would the cup winners have even made it to the playoffs if not for their goalie!? Easy to discount the importance of a goalie just because you feel like dumping on ours, based on his salary, but guess what, he gets paid the most on our team because he is the best and most important player on it at the same time. 

 

Bottom line is, you would struggle to find a team who has made a cup final in the last several years who's goalie wasn't putting on great performances and had great numbers to back it up throughout the playoffs. Price is capable of all of that and more, i'm not sure what you have to gain trying to dispute that fact. Lets just have a look at the importance and stats of the goalies during these playoffs, and note the teams who were supposed to be contenders vs those who ended up being contenders. Now look at the goaltenders and their performances, then you can keep telling us about how insignificant the goalie position is in today's NHL, and how we are fools for having invested in one of the best ones.

 

Teams who were supposed to do well                                                 Teams who did do well

 

Tampa - Vasilevskiy - .856SV%                                                       St.Louis - Binnington - .914SV%

Nashville - Rinne - .905SV%                                                             Boston - Rask - .934SV%

Vegas - Fleury - .909SV%                                                                 Dallas - Bishop - .933SV%

*Washington - Holtby - .914SV%                                                     Colorado - Grubauer - .925SV%

San Jose - Jones - .898SV%                                                           *Carolina - Mrazek - .894SV%

 

 

There is only 1 exception to the trend on each side of this, and ultimately what this shows us currently is, regardless how good your team may be, it cannot contend during the playoffs with sub par goaltending. Flip side, great goaltending can carry you to a deep run, a final, or even a cup win regardless if you are one of the best teams entering the playoffs. Goaltending still matters, a great deal in fact, investing in that position is not a mistake, and what other choice do you have other than invest in your best players, regardless of position. 

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1 hour ago, Link67 said:

 

Being the highest paid player on the team as a goalie has nothing to do with the equation, it is like you are trying to say you can't win a cup unless a forward is your highest paid player? Let me flip this on you and ask, did very good to great goaltending not play a significant role in L.A's multiple cup wins? How about Fleury and Holtby's performances to take both their teams to a cup final with .920+ SV%? How about Rask and Binnington's performances to help carry their team's to a cup final, Jesus, would the cup winners have even made it to the playoffs if not for their goalie!? Easy to discount the importance of a goalie just because you feel like dumping on ours, based on his salary, but guess what, he gets paid the most on our team because he is the best and most important player on it at the same time. 

 

Bottom line is, you would struggle to find a team who has made a cup final in the last several years who's goalie wasn't putting on great performances and had great numbers to back it up throughout the playoffs. Price is capable of all of that and more, i'm not sure what you have to gain trying to dispute that fact. Lets just have a look at the importance and stats of the goalies during these playoffs, and note the teams who were supposed to be contenders vs those who ended up being contenders. Now look at the goaltenders and their performances, then you can keep telling us about how insignificant the goalie position is in today's NHL, and how we are fools for having invested in one of the best ones.

 

Teams who were supposed to do well                                                 Teams who did do well

 

Tampa - Vasilevskiy - .856SV%                                                       St.Louis - Binnington - .914SV%

Nashville - Rinne - .905SV%                                                             Boston - Rask - .934SV%

Vegas - Fleury - .909SV%                                                                 Dallas - Bishop - .933SV%

*Washington - Holtby - .914SV%                                                     Colorado - Grubauer - .925SV%

San Jose - Jones - .898SV%                                                           *Carolina - Mrazek - .894SV%

 

 

There is only 1 exception to the trend on each side of this, and ultimately what this shows us currently is, regardless how good your team may be, it cannot contend during the playoffs with sub par goaltending. Flip side, great goaltending can carry you to a deep run, a final, or even a cup win regardless if you are one of the best teams entering the playoffs. Goaltending still matters, a great deal in fact, investing in that position is not a mistake, and what other choice do you have other than invest in your best players, regardless of position. 

When did I say goaltending is important, it that the goalie isn’t the most important positions?  Hell, two of my top 5 all time habs are goalies (Dryden and Roy).  

 

You made the comment of not wanting to handcuff the team by a high $10.5m contract (paraphrasing in exact wording because I’m on my iPhone).  The #1 centre position is where you absolutely have to pay to get an elite player.  

Name me one cup winner who had a #1 equivalent centre than anyone we’ve had in the past 10 years at centre.

 

even though the goalie is the most important position in hockey, on very few few teams is the goalie the highest paid player and I can’t recall a single cup winner being constructed where the highest paid player was a goalie.

 

my original post was not a shot at Price.  Hell, until carbo got announced as a HOF’er, I always figured the next Hab to be in the Hall would be Price.  Having said that, if I had to make a hard choice in where to cut dollars, it would be Weber and Price.  I would much rather build a team around a top #1 centre than on a goalie. 

 

From the trqms you mentioned, the following are the centres:

Pitts: Crosby, Malkin, (Stall for the first one)

LA:  Kopitar, Brown

STL: O’Reilly, Schenn, 

Nash: Johansen 

Wash: khuznetsov, Backstrom

Carolina: Aho, Stall 

Colorado: McKinnon 

dallas: seguin

SJ: Couture, Hertl, Thornton, Pavelski

Vegas: Karlsson, Stasny

 

have even had a centre comparable to any of these teams in the past 10 years??  You absolutely have to have goaltending.  But you aren’t going anywhere without a stud at centre.

 

Lastly, how many of the goalies have you listed make even close to Price, or is even in the top 2 in salary on their teams??? Maybe Fleury is close to top 2, but on all the other teams they aren’t even close in the top 3 or 5.

 

 

 

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18 minutes ago, hab29RETIRED said:

When did I say goaltending is important, it that the goalie isn’t the most important positions?  Hell, two of my top 5 all time habs are goalies (Dryden and Roy).  

 

You made the comment of not wanting to handcuff the team by a high $10.5m contract (paraphrasing in exact wording because I’m on my iPhone).  The #1 centre position is where you absolutely have to pay to get an elite player.  

Name me one cup winner who had a #1 equivalent centre than anyone we’ve had in the past 10 years at centre.

 

even though the goalie is the most important position in hockey, on very few few teams is the goalie the highest paid player and I can’t recall a single cup winner being constructed where the highest paid player was a goalie.

 

my original post was not a shot at Price.  Hell, until carbo got announced as a HOF’er, I always figured the next Hab to be in the Hall would be Price.  Having said that, if I had to make a hard choice in where to cut dollars, it would be Weber and Price.  I would much rather build a team around a top #1 centre than on a goalie. 

 

From the trqms you mentioned, the following are the centres:

Pitts: Crosby, Malkin, (Stall for the first one)

LA:  Kopitar, Brown

STL: O’Reilly, Schenn, 

Nash: Johansen 

Wash: khuznetsov, Backstrom

Carolina: Aho, Stall 

Colorado: McKinnon 

dallas: seguin

SJ: Couture, Hertl, Thornton, Pavelski

Vegas: Karlsson, Stasny

 

have even had a centre comparable to any of these teams in the past 10 years??  You absolutely have to have goaltending.  But you aren’t going anywhere without a stud at centre.

 

Lastly, how many of the goalies have you listed make even close to Price, or is even in the top 2 in salary on their teams???

 

 

 

 

 

Please tell me more about how well Edmonton and Buffalo have been doing with franchise top Centers they have heavily invested in and no goaltending to speak of? How has Florida been doing with 2 top Centers and no goaltending to speak of? How much do you think that is about to change with a 10 million dollar goalie now?

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19 minutes ago, Link67 said:

 

 

Please tell me more about how well Edmonton and Buffalo have been doing with franchise top Centers they have heavily invested in and no goaltending to speak of? How has Florida been doing with 2 top Centers and no goaltending to speak of? How much do you think that is about to change with a 10 million dollar goalie now?

Edmonton and buffalo’s problems start with their front office and coaches that have instilled a rotten culture into their teams.  Their problems go much deeper and beyond player personal.  Do you think either of those teams would magically become elite with simply  better goaltending???  Doubt it.

 

and again. When did I say goaltending isn’t important??

i think Florida will be much better, better goaltending will help, but better coaching will turnaround their D and their overall defensive structure.

 

floridas top player will still be Barkov and he will be the highest paid player in his next contract.

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Sounds like Aho wants to come here and Carolina is forcing him to stay. 

 

Bergevin may have succeeded in throwing a monkey wrench into the Canes dressing room. Who knows, they may have to trade him after the year is up; but Wadell will probably refuse to trade him to us on principle.

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1 hour ago, The Chicoutimi Cucumber said:

Sounds like Aho wants to come here and Carolina is forcing him to stay. 

 

Bergevin may have succeeded in throwing a monkey wrench into the Canes dressing room. Who knows, they may have to trade him after the year is up; but Wadell will probably refuse to trade him to us on principle.

 

Every player signs an offer sheet knowing there's two teams they want to play for. Nobody signs an offer sheet wanting to leave.

 

If he wanted to leave, he wouldn't sign anything. 

 

No doubt Don Waddell got very cocky and not only admitted he expected the offer sheet to be more money, but also that he was prepared to fight him on a contract all summer. Not a good look at all. But they also have to fluff feathers because the deal was primarily designed for a big market to try to take advantage of a small market. Same thing happened when Philadelphia sent the offer sheet for Weber in Nashville.

 

Aho might have a problem with Don now but I don't believe he had a problem one iota playing in Carolina. He just wanted the five year term. Around the league are young players no longer bending to seven and eight year deals and losing out on free agent years and now asking for four and five to become UFA's sooner. GM's hate these deals. The players know that this is why their NBA counterparts have more control. This is why Marner is fighting the Leafs. They want him for eight years. He's not budging on five. That's the real fight, and Bergevin handed Aho an easy way out of the fight at a cap hit that actually helps the Hurricanes all because Bergevin didn't want to sacrifice too much on the offer sheet.

 

https://montrealgazette.com/sports/hockey/nhl/hockey-inside-out/hurricanes-say-canadiens-got-played-by-sebastian-ahos-agent

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25 minutes ago, Machine of Loving Grace said:

 

Whether Bergevin got played by the agent or not, we lost nothing on this. Bergevin actually looks stronger having actually dared to issue an offer sheet, even if nothing came of it.

 

Aho gets a decent contract with the five-year duration he wanted. In 2024, he can choose who he wants to play for. And he didn't have to drag out the negotiations into the fall.

 

Canes, on the other hand, end up with a shorter contract than they wanted, for more money than they wanted, with more up-front bonuses they wanted. A player that may be unhappy with the owner, especially after the owner bragged how easy it was to write a big cheque, after having refused to budge in the negotiations earlier.

 

So who is the winner and the loser here?

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20 minutes ago, tomh009 said:

 

Whether Bergevin got played by the agent or not, we lost nothing on this. Bergevin actually looks stronger having actually dared to issue an offer sheet, even if nothing came of it.

 

Aho gets a decent contract with the five-year duration he wanted. In 2024, he can choose who he wants to play for. And he didn't have to drag out the negotiations into the fall.

 

Canes, on the other hand, end up with a shorter contract than they wanted, for more money than they wanted, with more up-front bonuses they wanted. A player that may be unhappy with the owner, especially after the owner bragged how easy it was to write a big cheque, after having refused to budge in the negotiations earlier.

 

So who is the winner and the loser here?

 

Aho is the winner. He got the contract he wanted.

 

This isn't team versus team. This is a player wanting the contract he wants and forcing the GM of his current team to either agree to it or let him move on. That's the point of restricted free agency.

 

Montreal looked good when the offer sheet was first announced and then everyone saw that Bergevin was too conservative and didn't want to give up more than a single first round pick for Aho. Once the details came out everyone was convinced Carolina would match it, except the few in Montreal media and Habs fans who thought Carolina was this struggling soon to be moved to Quebec team because their billion dollar owner lost a couple dollars on a secondary football league.

 

Carolina looks fine. They didn't get the eight year deal they wanted but they still got Aho for five years. They are coming off of a conference final appearance. The jerks are fine.

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42 minutes ago, tomh009 said:

 

Whether Bergevin got played by the agent or not, we lost nothing on this. Bergevin actually looks stronger having actually dared to issue an offer sheet, even if nothing came of it.

 

Aho gets a decent contract with the five-year duration he wanted. In 2024, he can choose who he wants to play for. And he didn't have to drag out the negotiations into the fall.

 

Canes, on the other hand, end up with a shorter contract than they wanted, for more money than they wanted, with more up-front bonuses they wanted. A player that may be unhappy with the owner, especially after the owner bragged how easy it was to write a big cheque, after having refused to budge in the negotiations earlier.

 

So who is the winner and the loser here?

How does he look stronger, almost every analyst has ridiculed the amount offered by Montreal.  Craig Button called it laughable and there was no way that it won’t be matched by Carolina.  Any logical person would have known there is no way in hell a NEW owner of a hockey team is going to lose his best player who is 21 years old for a 1st, 2nd and 3rd round pick - regardless of how front loaded the deal was.

 

the amount offered was less than what most elite  RFA’s want and is significantly less than what Marner wants and what Mathews got for the same term from THEIR teams that OWN their rights.  If you want the offer sheet to be successful you have to be willing to pay significantly more than what that team wants to pay then AND ensure that team feels they are getting decent compensation. The three picks the canes would get would have made them look horrible to their fan base.  It was great that MB got off his ass and took time off doing bicep curls to finally try and get an elite centre, but he fxcked up and lost an golden opportunity to finally get a true first line centre to start the year.  So the habs did lose.  

 

The canes win, they don’t have to worry about a holdout and got a player for what is probably less than market cap hit (just less than the Draisaitl contract that was for 8 years, but was signed 2 or 3 years ago and Draisaitl did not put up the same numbers back than at the same age).  Aho wins.  Someone made the dumb comment that Aho accepted the deal, so  why would MB offer more than that??  Obvious answer is that, of course Aho accepted the deal - he gets a ton of up front cash and regardless of whether the canes match or not, he gets a huge raise next year and even if he was looking for a higher annual average, with time value of money, he is ahead.  But the important point is that this was not a UFA offer sheet.  This an RFA offer, so it’s even more important that the offer be an amount that not only the player will accept, but it needs to be high enough, with enough compensation given up, so the other team DOESN’T match.  That is the simple thing that MB being the moron he is, was either to dumb to consider, or to arrogant to overlook.  Listening to the press conference after the offer sheet was signed he was extremely hostile and sounded like a jackass to the reporters who were asking him why he didn’t offer more money.

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2 hours ago, The Chicoutimi Cucumber said:

...and meanwhile, the Habs are no better a team now than we were a week ago. <_< Sigh

I don't want Gardiner, but if you could get him for 6.5  (even though Montreal is not on his list of destinations, apparently) and Gusev for 4 million, the powerplay and D Corp get better....

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