Who do you re-sign?

[dlbalr]

I don't know why we should feel this way. The Rangers are willing to eat Redden's contract - and he his contract commitment is about the same as Gomez. Edmonton is weak on defense and even though they are a small market team, are willing to eat Souray's contract. So I really don't understand why sending Gomez down isn't an option. I do agree he is untradable.

Those teams have owners who are willing to bury contracts. The Habs, based on what happened with Dustin Boyd earlier this year, showed that barring a change of heart, they're clearly not willing.

I'll share a rumour I heard around the time of Boyd's second waiving, one that didn't hit the media so I kept it quiet at the time. There was a lot of speculation that a few teams were going to be interested in Boyd since they had inquired about him. Turns out it may have been the opposite, the Habs were calling teams and trying to convince them to take Boyd since they really, really didn't want to pay a 1-way deal in the minors. It was only after they worked out a deal with Hamilton's owner (part owner of the Habs as well) to take on some of the salary that they sent him down. Again, this is the rumour that I had heard at the time.

I also consider the fact that the Habs waited until the absolute last second to acquire Drew MacIntyre for Hamilton as further evidence. He's on a 1-way deal (why Atlanta structured the contract that way I'll never know) but Gauthier chose to wait until the deadline to save money, choosing to let Mayer nearly single handedly kill the Bulldogs' playoff hopes instead.

If they're pleading with teams to take on a $650k salary (Boyd) and choosing to risk the farm team's playoff chances to save a week or two of a league minimum salary (MacIntyre), I have no confidence in believing that they are willing to bury any sort of contract in the AHL, especially Gomez.

[hab29RETIRED]

Those teams have owners who are willing to bury contracts. The Habs, based on what happened with Dustin Boyd earlier this year, showed that barring a change of heart, they're clearly not willing.

I'll share a rumour I heard around the time of Boyd's second waiving, one that didn't hit the media so I kept it quiet at the time. There was a lot of speculation that a few teams were going to be interested in Boyd since they had inquired about him. Turns out it may have been the opposite, the Habs were calling teams and trying to convince them to take Boyd since they really, really didn't want to pay a 1-way deal in the minors. It was only after they worked out a deal with Hamilton's owner (part owner of the Habs as well) to take on some of the salary that they sent him down. Again, this is the rumour that I had heard at the time.

I also consider the fact that the Habs waited until the absolute last second to acquire Drew MacIntyre for Hamilton as further evidence. He's on a 1-way deal (why Atlanta structured the contract that way I'll never know) but Gauthier chose to wait until the deadline to save money, choosing to let Mayer nearly single handedly kill the Bulldogs' playoff hopes instead.

If they're pleading with teams to take on a $650k salary (Boyd) and choosing to risk the farm team's playoff chances to save a week or two of a league minimum salary (MacIntyre), I have no confidence in believing that they are willing to bury any sort of contract in the AHL, especially Gomez.

well that certainly sounds disheartening!! They have a bit of window with nucleus of young players like Price, Subban, MaxPac, Eller, Desharnais, and White. I'd even include Pouliot in that pool as I think he deserves a chance to play a full year with offensive players to see if he can take the next step or not. The habs gave up to early on Sk74 and Grabs who are now both playing on the #1 lines on their teams. We also have a good group of veterans in Pleks, Gionta, Cammy and AK46. IMO the weak link has been Gomez, along with the old, slow Defense and the smallish size and the lack of physicality from the bottom six forwards. We have an oppertunity to have a better mix of mobility and toughness on defense, as well as adding more size up front in our bottom six forwards. Unfortunately, the only way we can really do that and stay under the cap, is eating a bad contract like Gomez's and finding a creative way to unload the last year of Spacek's contract to another team.

It really is disheartening that with all the rhetoric of the Moslon's to wanting a return to glory for the habs, upon repurchasing the team, they aren't willing to do whatever it takes, like the new owner of the Sabres seems willing to do, in order to put together an elite team - and no, I don't consider being a team that finishes 10 to 16 in the league or 6-8 in the conference as a real commitment to wanting to win it all.

Edited May 2, 2011 by hab29RETIRED

[dlbalr]

It really is disheartening that with all the rhetoric of the Moslon's to wanting a return to glory for the habs, upon repurchasing the team, they aren't willing to do whatever it takes, like the new owner of the Sabres seems willing to do, in order to put together an elite team - and no, I don't consider being a team that finishes 10 to 16 in the league or 6-8 in the conference as a real commitment to wanting to win it all.

A new year presents a new opportunity and with one of the loans now paid off, maybe they change their stance. I think the loans played a large role in their hesitancy particularly with the one being due pretty quickly, at least I hope that's why. I didn't buy the Boyd rumour at the time but with the MacIntyre deal happening as it did (and that was speculation on my part in my previous post) it sounds a little more believable.

[BlueKross]

Give Gomez a decent winger who can finish and suddenly all will be well, I mean Gomez basically assisted on all of Gio's goals so add another 30 goal man and Gomez will suddenly be "producing".

That's so LAME. Not only do we have to pay Gomez 8M or 7M, whatever it is this year, but we got to bring in a decent winger @ 5,6,7 M so his assists can be justified. I just shutter when I think what we paid to get him. I was a loyal Gainey fan for years, but this trade is a BUST.

[saskhab]

Uh, that Boyd rumour doesn't prove anything, sorry. The Bulldogs playoff drive might make one of the minority owners of the Habs literally a couple of dollars. If Gauthier believes that dumping Gomez this summer in the minors will help the Habs go deeper into the playoffs than those extra costs will be offset in the end.

Honestly, though... tell me where this Gomez needs to go to save our next season crap comes from. Whether we have the cap room or not, it is absolutely bonkers of us to re-sign all of our d-men. There is absolutely no reason we should be in cap trouble heading into next year with Gomez on the team.

Dumping Gomez only makes sense if we are pursuing someone who is currently not in the organization, either as a free agent or trade target. No one here has offered a single suggestion to that front, other than someone mentioning Alex Tanguay who probably will be re-signed by the Flames.

The summer of 2012 is the more likely 'Gomez must be dumped' date. New contracts for Price, Subban, Eller, its Kostitsyn's and Gorges' first UFA year... that looks like it has the potential to be an expensive summer. This year, the re-signs aren't even that expensive all things considered... Gorges could be in line for a good raise if we go long term on him, Kostitsyn I think will probably only get a modest one year raise, and Wisniewski could be a decent ticket if we sign him offset by Hamrlik's expiring contract. When you consider the cap going up by a couple of million dollars, that means we enter next year with pretty much the same group without any issues at all. The math is incredibly simple.

[SOOPAVILLIN]

That's so LAME. Not only do we have to pay Gomez 8M or 7M, whatever it is this year, but we got to bring in a decent winger @ 5,6,7 M so his assists can be justified. I just shutter when I think what we paid to get him. I was a loyal Gainey fan for years, but this trade is a BUST.

So please list me playmakers who gather points when you only have one winger who finishes your passes.

I'm not saying Gomez is full value for his contract , but very few in the league who make over 5 million are.

Is Luongo worth his contract, Is lecavalier, the Sedins? Heck Dion phaneuff makes more. My point is everyone has a overpaid player. Some people talk about other teams being ruthless to do what it takes to win, but las time I checked the rangers or Edmonton are far from being winners, they are they only teams who have done this I think. Edmonton will be good one day due go tanking it for many years and stockpiling draft picks, not because they dumped Souray. The rangers have yet to show that dumping Redden did anything either.

My point Gomez is just one of many many overpaid players around the league, he is here to stay for now, he is valuable to this team and he cares, so let Gauthier worry about the numbers we should just be ready for a very promising season next year.

[dlbalr]

Uh, that Boyd rumour doesn't prove anything, sorry. The Bulldogs playoff drive might make one of the minority owners of the Habs literally a couple of dollars. If Gauthier believes that dumping Gomez this summer in the minors will help the Habs go deeper into the playoffs than those extra costs will be offset in the end.

The Boyd thing has nothing to do with Hamilton's playoff run since it happened at the beginning of the year. Their hesitance to send him down after he cleared waivers the first time shows that they didn't want to be saddled with a 1-way deal in the minors, that they weren't (at the time) willing to spend the $650k savings on the cap to replace Boyd on the NHL roster. If you're calling teams encouraging them to take a player off your hands so that they don't have to pay him in the minors, that, to me at least, is a pretty telling sign. To offset the extra money if Gomez were to be buried, they'd have to be convinced they can win 2 extra rounds with him being gone. That's a bold leap of faith for anyone to make, which is another reason I think he'll be with the Habs next season barring a trade.

[saskhab]

The Boyd thing has nothing to do with Hamilton's playoff run since it happened at the beginning of the year. Their hesitance to send him down after he cleared waivers the first time shows that they didn't want to be saddled with a 1-way deal in the minors, that they weren't (at the time) willing to spend the $650k savings on the cap to replace Boyd on the NHL roster. If you're calling teams encouraging them to take a player off your hands so that they don't have to pay him in the minors, that, to me at least, is a pretty telling sign. To offset the extra money if Gomez were to be buried, they'd have to be convinced they can win 2 extra rounds with him being gone. That's a bold leap of faith for anyone to make, which is another reason I think he'll be with the Habs next season barring a trade.

If Gomez is worth negative value to the team, than other players brought in would have to be positive value. So, if Gomez at his contract actually costs the team wins, getting rid of Gomez's contract and replacing him with value added players would be a whole new ballgame. You'd take the Habs out of the playoff bubble for one, so the risk of the team as a whole would be less. Whether that translates into actual dollars is another thing.

Of course they were calling people asking them to take him on. Sending a one-way deal to the minors is always the last resort... you'd rather another team took him on. There was still a roster spot he could occupy in the meantime, so it may not have been that pressing. After a while, they saw no reason to keep him and every reason to call up their top AHL players so they did it.

It doesn't mean they were 'desperate' to save money, they just preferred not to do so. As we all would be. Sending him to the minors not only kills the asset completely, but means you're still sinking money into a failure.

[BlueKross]

So please list me playmakers who gather points when you only have one winger who finishes your passes.

I'm not saying Gomez is full value for his contract , but very few in the league who make over 5 million are.

Is Luongo worth his contract, Is lecavalier, the Sedins? Heck Dion phaneuff makes more. My point is everyone has a overpaid player. Some people talk about other teams being ruthless to do what it takes to win, but las time I checked the rangers or Edmonton are far from being winners, they are they only teams who have done this I think. Edmonton will be good one day due go tanking it for many years and stockpiling draft picks, not because they dumped Souray. The rangers have yet to show that dumping Redden did anything either.

My point Gomez is just one of many many overpaid players around the league, he is here to stay for now, he is valuable to this team and he cares, so let Gauthier worry about the numbers we should just be ready for a very promising season next year.

Martin has already said that he thinks in pairs but I will indulge you

Sedin,Sedin,Burrows

Marleau, Thorton, Setoguchi

Clowe, Couture,Heatly

Datsyuk,Franzen,Holstrom

Stalberg,Toews,Kane

Ovechkin,Backstrom, Chimera

Stamkos,Malone, Thompson

Dubinsky,Prospal,Gaborik

[fromage]

gomez should retire this off season.. nulling his contract

than resign with the habs at half price or less.

[The Chicoutimi Cucumber]

gomez should retire this off season.. nulling his contract

than resign with the habs at half price or less.

Ha ha, that's a great idea! But it'd probably be cancelled by the league office as a violation of the spirit of the CBA - c.f. the Kovalchuk imbrolgio.

[dlbalr]

Ha ha, that's a great idea! But it'd probably be cancelled by the league office as a violation of the spirit of the CBA - c.f. the Kovalchuk imbrolgio.

That would be illegal, yes. If he were to retire and come back, he'd be obligated to play under his current contract.

[BCHabnut]

Gomez is going to have a great year next year. His exit time is 2012, if he doesn't. Get used to him being on this team because he's not going anywhere. I would keep Gomez and have him mentor Larry for at least one more year.

[Trizzak]

Here's on offseason thread that I hope will generate some good discussion. IIT we opine on re-signing players - who is worth coming back and who is worth letting go. No trade discussion, no outside UFA replacements named... just who should come back of those that could go.

*sigh* Apparently I should have added, "No Gomez bitching." It's invaded every other thread though, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

[dlbalr]

*sigh* Apparently I should have added, "No Gomez bitching." It's invaded every other thread though, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

This is the theme of the 2011 offseason. Last year, it was Price vs Halak where talk of that invaded every nook and cranny of this site.

[BTH]

*sigh* Apparently I should have added, "No Gomez bitching." It's invaded every other thread though, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

Well, there are only two big questions this offseason: Gomez and the D.

How much can we speculate on Halpern, Auld and Picard?

[Trizzak]

Well, there are only two big questions this offseason: Gomez and the D.

How much can we speculate on Halpern, Auld and Picard?

In this thread, as much as is necessary until the the thread dies.

But I'd rather a thread that dies after a few weeks and maybe gets resurrected if a signing happens, then a thread that sticks around with constant off-topic Gomez/Spacek bashing. It really makes the forums less interesting when you can't escape what is basically trolling.

Poster 1: I wonder who will backup Carey Price next season.

Poster 2: Won't matter if Gomez is still on the team!

[BrenDittero]

Not sure that there is any way to police a thread like this. The conversation of any year end thread will naturally gravitate to the hot topics of the moment.

For what it's worth, I'm finding the discussion pretty interesting for the most part.

[BlueKross]

Not sure that there is any way to police a thread like this. The conversation of any year end thread will naturally gravitate to the hot topics of the moment.

For what it's worth, I'm finding the discussion pretty interesting for the most part.

What I am hearing here is you can't express your opinion if it is in disagreement with the popular view. Too bad. Gomez should be booed he earned it.

[BrenDittero]

No BK, what your hearing is that the Gomez discussion will filter into any post season thread and there is no point in trying to discourage comments either for or against.

[hab29RETIRED]

No BK, what your hearing is that the Gomez discussion will filter into any post season thread and there is no point in trying to discourage comments either for or against.

How can there possibly be a thread about who to resign or changes for next year, without gomez's name coming up????? Any resigning or new UFA pickup is limited by the cap. Who is the worst cap hit on the team - or actually in the ENTIRE league. Scott Gomez. Who's contract limits what we can or can not do, Scott Gomez. Who was the worst player on the Habs, Scott Gomez. Who is the worst value on the Habs, as well as the league, Scott gomez. So again, how can you not expect Gomez to be discussed in any thread dealing with who should be resigned, what changes should be made, or what went wrong this year.

Similarily, on D, who is the worst contract on the team - Spacek. From signed players, who should absolutely not be back- Spacek.

Why WOULDN'T you expect Gomez and Spacek coming up again and again?????? Finally, why SHOULD a thread on changes or signings be policed from mentioning the two salary cap anchors on this team??????

Gomez sucked offensively, defensively, has a lousy plus minus, doesnt hit or backcheck, doesnt drive to the net, was lazy on most nights and talked a lot, but could never walk the talk. What I don't get is that there are still people defending the bum.

Spacek showed why you shouldn't sign someone over 35 to a three year deal unless that player is a truly elite player, or you are getting him at a major discount. He'll even Lidsteom, the best defenseman of his generation has been signing one year deals, foe what, the last 4 years or something????

[BrenDittero]

How can there possibly be a thread about who to resign or changes for next year, without gomez's name coming up????? Any resigning or new UFA pickup is limited by the cap. Who is the worst cap hit on the team - or actually in the ENTIRE league. Scott Gomez. Who's contract limits what we can or can not do, Scott Gomez. Who was the worst player on the Habs, Scott Gomez. Who is the worst value on the Habs, as well as the league, Scott gomez. So again, how can you not expect Gomez to be discussed in any thread dealing with who should be resigned, what changes should be made, or what went wrong this year.

Similarily, on D, who is the worst contract on the team - Spacek. From signed players, who should absolutely not be back- Spacek.

Why WOULDN'T you expect Gomez and Spacek coming up again and again?????? Finally, why SHOULD a thread on changes or signings be policed from mentioning the two salary cap anchors on this team??????

Gomez sucked offensively, defensively, has a lousy plus minus, doesnt hit or backcheck, doesnt drive to the net, was lazy on most nights and talked a lot, but could never walk the talk. What I don't get is that there are still people defending the bum.

Spacek showed why you shouldn't sign someone over 35 to a three year deal unless that player is a truly elite player, or you are getting him at a major discount. He'll even Lidsteom, the best defenseman of his generation has been signing one year deals, foe what, the last 4 years or something????

Wow... re read my posts RETIRED, what I'm saying is that discussions about Gomez are fair game.

Believe me, I watched all the games along with you guys, I'm fully aware of Gomez's short comings this year.

[BlueKross]

Wow... re read my posts RETIRED, what I'm saying is that discussions about Gomez are fair game.

Believe me, I watched all the games along with you guys, I'm fully aware of Gomez's short comings this year.

What he is saying is he takes offense to somebody telling what he should say or how he should feel. I do too. We are not swearing at him or calling him nicknames or discussing his ancestry. We are accurately depicting how we feel he played on a thread that calls for what the habs should do going forward. I get incensed when somebody tells me we got to keep him.

[hab29RETIRED]

My response was to the comment about the need to police the thread.

[hab29RETIRED]

What he is saying is he takes offense to somebody telling what he should say or how he should feel. I do too. We are not swearing at him or calling him nicknames or discussing his ancestry. We are accurately depicting how we feel he played on a thread that calls for what the habs should do going forward. I get incensed when somebody tells me we got to keep him.

Exactly.