Wednesday, July 2, 2008

NHL goes insane

Well, we all expected the flurry of action we saw in the NHL yesterday, but how about these prices that are being paid? $3.5M per season for some guy named Jeff Finger? Seriously, how many of you knew Jeff Finger was an NHLer before yesterday? He's 28 years old and has played a total of 92 games in the NHL but he's worth $3.5 million a year.

That's just the most ridiculous (IMO) of the moves yesterday.....how about the Rangers giving Wade Redden $6.5M per year - which is crazy enough - but for SIX years. This is a guy who has been on the decline the last two seasons in Ottawa. In six years, what's he going to be like? Or $5M a year for Michal Rozsival? I like the guy, but five million bucks? $3.75M a year for Mike Commodore? $7.1M a year for Brian Campbell? For EIGHT years? On the positive side there, Campbell should still be quite healthy in eight years seeing as how he never hits anybody. $4.5M for Jose Theodore, a guy who had a decent year last year after two horrible years before it......that money will buy a lot of Propecia though. $4.2M for Cristobal Huet? What has he ever done in the league? And the Canucks have apparently offered Mats Sundin $10M a year for two years. Sundin's got some good gas in the tank yet but should he be the highest-paid player in the league?

I know there's a salary cap in place but how can the league sustain this kind of salary growth? As a fan I have no problems with the true stars of the game, the guys who play 25-30 minutes a game and bring in the fans, getting big bucks. But why should 3rd-pairing defencemen get $3.5 million a year?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Huet actually got 5.6 million, which is especially insane considering they already have a goalie being paid fairly high in Khabibulin.

Anonymous said...

Does Campbell decapitating Umberger in the playoffs a couple of years ago count as a hit? Yeah, his are few and far between but he sure did get all of Umberger.