There was a time when Bryan Murray had a trade deal all set up to bring this man to Ottawa.So far this year, Dustin Penner has scored eight goals and seven assists in the span of 11 games in a resurgent season with the Edmonton Oilers. He would have been playing here, alongside Ladislav Smid and up-and-coming second line centre Andrew Cogliano.
Boy were those heady days. Well all know what's happened since then.
Instead, Dany Heatley used no-trade clause on the contract he fucking signed to veto that deal. He arrived at training camp and basically told Murray he would somehow manage to make himself an even bigger asshole in the Sens dressing room if he wasn't traded to San Jose before the end of the week. Murray, you can understand, incredulously believed him.
Only now are we realizing what could have been.
Michalek is at least producing some goals. Cheechoo, where the fuck has he been?
Meanwhile, the one thing that everybody knows but nobody wants to talk about is that Heatley wanted to go to San Jose all along. There's got to be something wrong with this system where a player can basically veto every trade until he gets to go to the team he wants to go to. What is there to prevent a GM (let's say, for argument's sake, oh I don't know, Doug Wilson) from enticing someone like Heatley that they would be better off playing on the west coast?
Now maybe this is just sour grapes because Cheechoo has basically been a season-long bedshit so far this year and is this close to watching the next game in a suit and tie while Penner tears it up in Edmonton.
But seriously, there's not a single person in this league that would believe that Ottawa got the upper-hand in this colossal cluster-fuck. I mean, how could you? Heatley demanded a trade from Murray and then went public with it, thus putting him in a position of weakness at the bargaining table. Then, when Murray overcame those odds to come up with a deal that would work, he fucking vetoed it.
Obviously, I don't have any "actual" evidence to back me up but, for fuck's sake, the fact that this situation is rife for Ottawa getting hosed should be clear to everyone.
I had no doubts about Michalek, being the key piece to the SJ deal. Cheechoo's abilities being the question mark. It's easy to look at the Penner deal and say we would have been better off but he may have shat the bed under CC's system as well.
ReplyDeleteCompare Cheechoo's skating now to his 56g season, and it's amazing the difference. He wasn't a fantastic skater then but it looks like he's lost a gear and a half. Hell Matt Carkner looks as fast.
If CC figures out a PP that works, i.e a shooting PP, maybe the Caboose can be planted in front of the net and Alfie can bounce 20 goals in off him ...