The winds of Trades

by John Fontana on Dec 1, 2006 9:52 PM EST in Media

The Edmonton Journal insists that the Lightning might like to move Marc Denis, who is losing his spot to Johan Holmqvist, but his contract (which still has two years and $5.8-million remaining) makes it unlikely. The paper names Vaclav Prospal, Ruslan Fedotenko and Cory Sarich as more likely cost-savings trade candidates. Lightning GM Jay Feaster has already made it known that the club's payroll is too high to be playing .500 hockey, so either moves are made to cut those costs, or the Lightning need to have more wins.

Sarich and Fedotenko are both in their contract year and while Jay Feaster publicly stated he wants to keep Fedotenko, it's understandable if Rusty moves on.

Vaclav Prospal has been nothing special in his second stint with the Bolts. In fact, this season's 15 points in 26 games (3 g, 12 a, -9 +/-) puts him on a pace for 47 points for the season. The only good thing about that? I predicted he'd end up with 46 points in a charity contest on SunSportsTV's message board before the season.

Money for charity while Vinny P. under-performs. Something for nothing, I guess.

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2004 Stanley Cup champions getting gutted by the new CBA

by Greg Ballentine on Dec 5, 2006 7:34 AM EST reply actions

2004 stanley cup champions — almost three years after the fact Greg.

I know you’ll jump up and down on this and post on your blog about it but remember two key facts — 3 YEARS removed, and the roster not performing. Lets blame the cap for that? Not entirely.

by John F. on Dec 5, 2006 11:32 AM EST reply actions

Three years later its exactly where I said things would be. They couldn’t keep things together with the new CBA.

The team is now average. The CBA took away our chance of seeing if they could have been a dynasty. It took away any reasonable chance to repeat.

What should Tampa do now? Try to remain average (or slightly above average) because nobody gets better than that under this CBA. And hope they can get hot come playoff time.

by Greg Ballentine on Dec 6, 2006 9:20 AM EST reply actions

Anyway, there are some suits running the NHL who would argue that the league is better off for now letting Tampa stay good too long. Hopefully a bigger market will fill the void and that means better ratings (unfortunately Carolina won last year).

by Greg Ballentine on Dec 6, 2006 9:23 AM EST reply actions

“Vaclav Prospal has been nothing special in his second stint with the Bolts.”

Prospal was second on the team in points last season. Surely that counts as a small contribution during his second stint in Tampa.

The idea of trading Denis is absurd. What does it say about the front office if a team signs a guy for three years, then decides after thirty games that it thinks the backup was better all along?

I like what I’ve seen of Denis.

by Bob on Dec 12, 2006 11:53 AM EST reply actions