simonus

http://www.thefourthperiod.com/pit70.html No offers for Kovalev TheFourthPeriod.com Alex Kovalev, who finished the 2003-04 season with Montreal, still has not received an offer he deems worthy of serious consideration, reports the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. "Nobody has really said anything," Kovalev told the paper. "I talked to my agent [scott Greenspun] the other day and he said everything is quiet. I guess everybody is just focused on what's going to happen [with the collective bargaining agreement talks]." For much of last season, Kovalev appeared to be high on the Penguins' wish list for this summer, but bringing him back doesn't look like a priority anymore. Kovalev told le Journal de Montreal recently that he doesn't expect the Penguins to compete for his services. The Canadiens are believed to have offered Kovalev a contract worth about $4.2 million annually; that's well above what the Penguins likely would be willing to pay him, albeit less than Kovalev seems to feel he will get eventually. Whether Montreal will sweeten its proposal remains to be seen. But while Kovalev has no way of knowing now where he'll be playing when the NHL returns, he isn't concerned about being out of work. "One thing I know is that someday I'm still going to play for somebody," he said. "I know I'm not going to lose my job. I'm still going to play somewhere. Why should I be worried?"

are you talking about the tzachuk goal? Mike Modano threaded the needle on that.

you really have to include hossa in your lineup, he's gonna spend at least the beginning of the season with the habs. I see no reason to separate koivu and zednik. I don't think dowd is coming back, I dont think sundstrom is gonna play center. Zednik - Koivu - Kovalev ? - Ribero - Ryder Bulis - Bonk - Hossa/Sundstrom Sundstrom/Hossa - Begin - Ward That empty spot on the second line could end up belonging to Hossa and if it doesnt, then its about time to abort the experiment. That hossa moving up or leaving opens up your roster space for higgins (you could easily alternate him and begin in the 4th line center and wing positions, especially for faceoffs), plekanec, or try AP or Kostitsyn in that 2 spot. As long as that 2 spot is open we've definitely have a huge hole on the team. perhaps you put bulis in there to stopgap and add some defense, but i personally think he was made for the bonk line. Perreault could fill some time in on the wing, alternateing to center for important draws (which seemed to work only so well last season), but one must wonder about his defense, speed, age, and salary. Frankly, at his price there are other price/performance choices to make, and throwing a rookie at one of the spots would not be the dumbest thing.

anybody know the exact nature of the injury? Broken nose? Minor concussion? Any word on how long he's out for?

communism is neither left-wing or right-wing. To equate a totalitarian dictatorship with a social democracy is misleading and baseless. I've never heard a democrat push for requiring abortions. they are libertarians on this issue - do as thou wilt. Of course, everybody knows that nobody has to work in canada to acheive their dreams. We just hand everything to everybody on a silver platter. That is why nobody in canada has ever acheived anything. By the way - how do you like that jet you fly in, that subway you ride on, that graphics card that you are using to view my post and all those canadian athletes that you have written about. Of course American athletes have to work in some respect to get their scholarships, but it is the government, not 3M and Nike, that give it to them.

i was not aware that australia was so much more right-wing than canada... they have a public medicare system. Although they allow for private care, if you are rich they charge you a levy tax for the privilege. This is less socialized than canada, but much more left wing than the US system. Their prime minister is a member of the liberals. They have mandatory voting. China is left wing like I'm a leafs fan. Per capita medal acquisition is much higher in australia than in the USA. I definitely agree with Mr. O'reilly that the US should adopt many of the government reforms extant in Australia. Out of curiosity, how does the general funding for olympic athletes in australia work? BTW - the US government drops a ton of cash on training americans, none the least of which is giving them athletic scholarships at public universities such as UCLA and UMich to get a constant training in their disciplines. [Edited on 8/26/2004 by simonus]

i missed all this... why did this dude's posts get erased?

there is a difference between draft rights and restriction. In other leagues, once you are a free agent you are a free agent. If someone wanted to pay me $750,000 so that they could make $8 million dollars off me, I would be pissed to shit, even if I loved what I was doing. Zowpeb, I completely agree with you that habs need the panthers and thusly shared revenue makes a whole bunch of sense. Even though we should encourage the continued competition from other teams, we do not have either the right nor the responsibility to demand that they properly run their organization. Perhaps a couple of dead franchises will teach some owners to be careful in their signings. Are many players overpaid? Sure, but are those same players wrong to take the contracts that are provided to them? I don't think so. If my boss came over to my desk and offered me a $40,000 raise I would take it even if I thought he was stupid for giving it to me. In a good marketplace idiots weed themselves out. Kovalev will go to the team that offers him the best deal according to his priorities - money, team organization, quality of life, fan adulation, chance to win - in whatever order. If he decides to leave, that sucks... we go and get someone else. Perhaps Mr. Gainey will curse himself for a second for shipping out Balej, but he will then go out and get what he needs somewhere else, or grow it at home.

well.. im in the process of moving to the california bay area, so this sucks for me I guess. I was looking forward to seeing Vinny live.

how about instead of a salary cap they have a luxury tax or revenue sharing or both? Doesn't that make more sense than some arbitrary absolute limit that handcuffs teams? Argument against hard cap: let us say that the canadiens win the stanley cup next year. Let us say that this team cost $40 million. Quite understandably, many players in the organization would be in for bonuses and raises and since the habs just sold out like 15 playoff games and have new sponsorship and TV deals they are in a perfect position to resign the team and give out bonuses. In fact, they would be smart to do so, because this is a high quality team that brings in fans and sparks community and national interest. In fact, they could spend maybe $50 million on next years team and make more profit - a smart business decision. Too bad the salary cap is hard set at $41 million. Certainly some combination of the 25 players on the roster have an increased total value of over 1 million and thusly the league is basically forcing the habs to break up their team against their wish. This screws the habs, it screws hab fans, it screws the players who want to come back to montreal but can't logically make that decision when boston is offering that same player 2.5 - 3 mil more. In fact, it turns out that the salary cap has just done what caps are restriction are supposed to prevent - players switching teams and thusly dilluting team loyalties. More players will per force be unloyal because the cost will be higher. The phrase cost certainty has as many meanings as "Weapon of Mass Destruction" or "tax reform" and the players accept many forms of relative cost certainty (PS no other industry in the western world has true cost certainty, certainly in the way the owners mean it). Players have offered many impressive un-greedy and unselfish systems to the owners who rejected them. They have offered 5% pay reduction, luxury tax, and revenue share. The owners haven't budged. They offered to leave restriction (which I think is basically illegal...) alone as a concession and the owners say you. The owners are convinced that by holding still and ignoring the players and turning on their pr machine they can sweat them out. And judging NHL history they are correct. The NHL has historically hads the worst labor relations and conditions of any sport in US history. I too liked it when the divisions had names, but read just a little about adams, norris (any of them), Patrick, or that bastard smythe and maybe it wasn't such a good idea to honour them in the first place.

Looking at this most recent poll and many of the postings to this site I see an all too common trend of player bashing, especially in reference to the business side of the game. Why do people hate players so much? Because they are well paid? I see some logical disconnect - we watch many of these players give up their bodies on a regular basis, perform feats that can truly only be motivated by pride, desire and heroic perfectionism, only to turn around and call those same players greedy. Why arent the owners ever bashed for being greedy? How many site members have bought a ticket to see George Gillett? How many goals has he scored? Isn't he very greedy? Here is what the players desire that pisses us off so much: 1) Freedom of movement. Players want to be able to switch teams at the end of their contract. Players in any other major sport can do this with no problem. Now, I obviously want Michael Ryder playing in Montreal, but it seems very mean to force him. What would you say if you had to work at your company for the next 4 years and if you ever decided to quit, no other company in the country would hire you? Basically, players want to have the same freedom that we all enjoy and would litigate the out of it were ever taken away. 2) Freedom of market. This one astounds me more than anything else - people are angry at players for wanting freedom to negotiate a contract with their employer. Just like you, I, or any basically any other professional athlete has the right to do. Why should we prevent the Rangers from spending like idiots? Why should we help the florida panthers? Basically, owners are being crypto-communist in their desire that players should receive proximate salaries in a fixed market - it is simply un-american. It is simply un-western. If you believe in capitalism you must allow freedom of market movements. Why should we help the Florida Panthers? Because the rich teams need other teams to play against. Keeping the Florida Panthers in business in a poor economic climate is tantamount to New York City rent control, it keeps cronically unable ownership in the market and reduces supply of hockey players (the supply of nhl talent must be spread to one more team, eating up ~25 players). This raises prices because resources are scarce and forces more teams into economic crisis because they are forced to compete in an artificially crowded market. Contraction should be seen as no more sad than any other medium sized bankruptcy. Oh well, they couldnt compete, la vie c'est dur. Honestly, I hate to be a mean capitalist (Im actually an NDP'er), but em. So please respond, why do you side with ownership, why do you display an essential dislike of players? Where is my reasoning faulted?

does anybody have a stat on how frequently a restricted free agent changes teams? I know that it took almost a decade for Scott Stevens to be the first player to do it after restriction was introduced... This is all my way of saying everybody who you see restricted on the habs free agent list will be back.

it screws up stuff like that all the time. I really like it when im on the PK and it talks about my powerplay record or the opposing teams PK. Even better is when they tell you that your fourth line wing with 3 goals is an offensive dynamo. NHL 2004 commentators are far too obsessed with faceoff ratings for my taste.... being good at faceoffs is a good thing for a team, but perhaps they could say something about the offensive or defensive level of the team. Some very simple code could allow them to say stuff like: whether a team's average goals per game make a comeback likely. Whether a teams lead is safe based on the goalies GAA. If you wanted to get only slightly more complicated they could talk about easy to compile stats such as a team's record in 1 goal games, division strength, season record against opposing team. All this would probably add a lot to the sound allocation on the DVD, but probably not much to the actual software. Some stuff like that would really improve the game experience for me. Also, it would be kind of cool if you could sign coaches. They already have some coach skins and their names stored. It might be interesting if your coach had a skill rating and some attributes that would affect your teams ability to apply offensive or defensive strategies. Probably annoying and unworkable, but I thought it might be interesting.

i got nhl 2004 for ps2 andI got the network adapter, but my network cable does not reach to the room with the tv! It sucks, but hopefully this can eventually be fixed. NHL 2k5 is coming out pretty soon - I wonder how good it will be. I could never decide if i liked the 2Kx series or not.

it might be a little much to say that dowd is as good a faceoff man as perreault...

sorry about the double post, but i thought people might be interested by this article - http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/columns/story?id=1852318

if i were a player, the only way I might accept a salary cap is if they removed the option clause (also known as restricted free agency) and started revenue sharing.

1. since no club releases their financial records we don't really now how much money is beind made or lost. 2. Why shouldn't the players get as much money as irresponsible bussiness owners will give them? If a guy is too stupid to check his spending, he doesnt deserve to own a team. If teams go bankrupt buying overpriced players, then the total number of available hockey jobs will decrease and thusly so will hockey salaries - ensuring that smaller teams that resist the urge to pay too much for a player will be rewarded by the resultant market. 3. I go to the arena to see hockey players, not hockey owners. I don't give a wild crap who owns the team that I am watching as long as the players are entertaining. I find it weird that hockey fans seem to hate hockey players so much - these are the people who entertain us and on whose backs our dreams of glory rest. George Gillette aint done nothing for me except seek tax rebates and subsidies from the Quebec government and be american. BTW - the thought that the Canadiens are losing money with a strong canadian dollar, a lucrative multilingual cable and broadcast deal, a full arena just about every night, and 2 playoff rounds is ridiculous. I won't belive it until the CH releases their books, which they'll never do because they are a bunch of unrepentant liars, like all sports bussinessmen. Hockey has been pleading insolvance since before the beginning of the league, it has almost never been true and the fact that these teams have lasted for so long is basic proof.

you can test me on this, but I think it would basically be illegal for the NHL to honour AHL suspensions. The NHL is quite obviously a hockey monopoly league but in order to give at least the veil of plurality in the market they must show that a hockey player that wishes to ply his trade has places to go in the North America that is outside the league. If the NHL were to say that they refused entrance to AHL players who were deemed unacceptable by the AHL they would basically be saying that the NHL and the AHL share an oligarchy and thusly would make themselves quite liable in an anti-trust suit. Not that I think Perezhogin would file one, but it would set bad precedent for a future case.

i think that makes less sense than your earlier translation. Perhaps they mean that montreal has never drafted a foreign-born goalie before the sixth round? [Edited on 7/30/2004 by simonus]

the terms are not released because the NHL doesn't want people to know the relative salaries of players because it assists them in bartering. The NHLPA releases the value of the contract once it is registered in their offices because it helps players in bartering. The NHL would prefer that nobody knew anything about thier operating practices, because if they did it would be more difficult for them to make claims of poverty every year since the beginning of the league. They don't mind sooo much the release of salaries nowadays because they feel (apparently correctly) that giving the impression that athletes are overpaid and greedy lends them the support of the genreal public. Is it not amazing that almost no team ever folds considering how poor they all are? Is it not amazing that once a team is put on the block there is always a group willing to purchase the team. btw - usually when you hear that a team is on the block but nobody is buying it is because the team falsely puts itself up for sale (it usually dismisses all offers as unstable) in order to devalue the apparent value of the franchise so that they can claim tax loss.

it should be noted that the Montreal Neurological Institute is one of the best neurological treatment centres in the world. It is where Lindros and Roenick go to get their heads done.... perhaps mentioning lindros doesn't inspire the most confidence, but hey - the guy doesnt drool or anything after 96 concussions, so I'd say the MNI is doing a pretty good job.

a brisebois-hainsey line could be an interesting way for brisebois to pass on his experience to a likeminded defenseman... hopefully he can transfer only his good habits. I really hope beauchemin challenges, I've always thought of him as an incredibly interesting experiment.

while worth nowhere near 4 mil, brisebois had a pretty solid year last year and earned the right to escape much of the bashing that has dogged him for the last little while. This said, if we can buy him out at 1 mil, save three mil and in the best of all worlds throw hainsey in his place - do it.

such a severe salary cap will be difficult to impliment no matter how long they delay. They will need to do a progressive salary cap if they want a chance. Make the first year almost meaningless except to the top couple of teams - 65 mil or something. Then bring it down the next year to 50, etc.. You need to have a system where teams have places to unload their cap burdens. Really they should have a severe soft cap, that would make more sense. The best system would be revenue sharing, but the greedy owners will never go for it, because they dont really want cost certainty. They want cheap players, they want weak unions, they want to pocket the money that hockey players earn and give a swift kick to every fan and expect them to thank them for it. Players are not bad for wanting as much as the market will bear. Fans are not bad for wanting to pay less for tickets, owners are vile for tricking fans into hating the players that entertain and amaze them. Owners are vile for union breaking. Owners are vile for lying and lying about finances and economics and "the glory" of taking it in the ass for the team. It should be noted that these systems do not really benefit montreal all that much, they are in the upper third of salaries. Most likely they will have to cut payroll. Edited for spelling [Edited on 2004/7/16 by simonus]