If the Oilers pull this off, if they win the Cup with Stuart Skinner in net a year after Vegas won it with Adin Hill, you tell me: Do the Rangers need to pay $12 million a year to ensure that Igor Shesterkin remains in New York for the next 5-8 years?
This wasn’t going to be a Shesterkin column, I promise. It was going to be about how Connor McDavid has ascended to the rarefied air of skating in a league of his own. It has been decades since an individual owned the uppermost tier unto himself without room for reasonable debate.
Maybe, I think, since Wayne Gretzky towered over the league in the early ’80s, before Mario Lemieux joined The Great One for the elite red carpet ride later in the decade.
Until this tournament, you could kind of pretend that Nathan MacKinnon or Nikita Kucherov or Auston Matthews or maybe teammate Leon Draisaitl belonged in the conversation. There is no pretense anymore.
But let me get back to Shesterkin, who owns a mountain of leverage entering the final season of his contract and whose camp is aiming for a record contract for a goaltender after having already established the record for a second contract for an NHL goaltender three years ago at his current $5,666,667 annual average value.
I’m not getting into stats here. There will be time for that. There is a larger issue, though, for GM Chris Drury and the ownership to consider. The Oilers’ goaltender carries a $2.6M cap hit. The Golden Knights’ goaltender a year ago carried a $2.175M cap hit. Who won the year before? Right, Colorado with Darcy Kuemper at a $4.5M cap charge.
Now, listen, maybe Sergei Bobrovsky, at $10M, will have the game of his life in Monday’s Game 7 in Sunrise, Fla., skate away with the Cup and Conn Smythe, and you’ll say — and maybe I’ll even say — you see!
But there’s this: The 2011 Bruins are the only team to win the Cup in the cap era with a goaltender who won the Vezina. That would have been Tim Thomas.
There is no reason to question Shesterkin’s value to the Rangers. If not for him, they would have … maybe lost to the Panthers? But there is a lot to consider here before the hierarchy dives headfirst into the deepest end of the pool. Skinner, Hill, Kuemper inevitably will become part of the conversation.
Or at least it should.
The NHL and NHLPA are having ongoing discussions about the contract status of the four active players who were charged with sexual assault for their alleged actions in June 2018 and face trial at a still yet to be determined date.
The Devils’ Michael McLeod and Cal Foote, the Flyers’ Carter Hart and the Flames’ Dillon Dube were all placed on non-roster leaves of absence after surrendering to the authorities in late January. They all, though, are pending restricted free agents and are due qualifying offers by June 30.
Slap Shots has been told that the league originally proposed freezing their contract status until the legal process is complete. That would place the players in limbo while allowing the teams to retain their rights without qualifiers.
We’ve learned that the union — in consultation with the players’ respective agents — initially rejected the offer but is continuing to engage with the league on the matter.
There are obviously cap implications if qualifiers are extended and accepted. There are free agent implications if qualifiers are not extended.
Keep in mind, though, that Gary Bettman has essentially unchecked power to suspend these players under the authority granted under Article 18-A of the CBA and thus grant teams cap relief.
A decision is required by the end of the week.
Monday there will be Game 7 of the Cup Final. Tuesday, the Hockey Hall of Fame selection committee meets. Wednesday, the Hall announcement will be made in the afternoon, hours ahead of the NHL awards show. Friday and Saturday are the draft. A week from Monday free agency begins.
Insanity now.
Here’s the rule for all video reviews: If it is not visible at full speed, the challenge is rejected. That’s it.
We don’t watch frame-by-frame. We don’t process frame-by-frame. Why on earth has sports taken video review to this entertainment-killing degree?
The excuse for endless replays is that getting it right is paramount, regardless of the tangential damage it does to the experience.
But if that were the case, why limit the number of challenges available to a coach? So what if a coach is wrong one time if it’s obvious he would be correct the second time?
Oh … because games would go on for hours and hours.
They say they want to get offside correct, but there are probably dozens of missed offside infractions every night, because, who can tell? There are multiple incorrect calls on a nightly basis that, by rule, can not be challenged.
It doesn’t make any sense.
Full-speed replay.
Full stop.
The Devils not only have their goalie in Jacob Markstrom, GM Tom Fitzgerald still has the 10th-overall pick in the draft that, we are told by multiple sources, he is aggressively using as barter.
The ongoing Hall snub of Alexander Mogilny should shame every member of the selection committee who has found excuses not to vote for this groundbreaking, all-time Russian winger. Yes, Russian winger.
We’ll find out, won’t we, if Pavel Datsyuk does not gain induction in his first year of eligibility.
Finally, I guess under the terms of their purchase agreement, the guys at CapFriendly weren’t allowed to tell Caps management that Pierre-Luc Dubois still has seven years left on his contract at an annual $8.5M cap hit?