Speculation: 2013 Offseason: UFAs, Trades, What's Next? | Part VII

[BonkTastic]

-Lockout
-Kovy plays in SKA
-Lockout ends
-Kovy decides he liked playing at SKA
-Kovy realizes he earns more money at SKA while being in his own country
-Kovy retires to get of his contract and play for SKA
-Devils are ****ed and functionally lost Parise, Clarkson, and 2 first rounders for nothing.

Molto bene, grazie.

 

[BonkTastic]

Are people seriously going to continue to say there is no Russian factor?

Fair point.

Interesting to see if this will have any effect on the draft stock of Russians in future drafts, IMO. The issue before was mostly that non-1st round picks would rather stay in Russia. Now, even the elite guys are in question. If Kovalchuk can bail on a 15-year mega deal, anyone can.

 

[CanadianHockey]

So... if you had told me on draft day that Alfie would join Detroit, Ottawa would sign Corvo, and Kovalchuk would retire from the NHL...

 

[TheOriginalSilf*]

So... if you had told me on draft day that Alfie would join Detroit, Ottawa would sign Corvo, and Kovalchuk would retire from the NHL...

At this rate, Heatley will be a Senator by noon tomorrow.

 

[CanadianHockey]

At this rate, Heatley will be a Senator by noon tomorrow.

At this rate, free agents will want to play in Winnipeg and Edmonton.

 

[danishh]

2001 draft #1 and #2. You decide.

Player| Gp |g| a| tp| ppg| pim |+/- | gp |g| a| tp |ppg| pim | +/-
Spezza |611| 228| 393| 621 |1.02 |388| 80 | 56 |17 |35| 52 |0.93| 26 | -2
Kovalchuk |816| 417 |399 |816| 1.00 |516| -116 | 32| 11 |16| 27| 0.84 |31 | -8

 

[BonkTastic]

2001 draft #1 and #2. You decide.

Player| Gp |g| a| tp| ppg| pim |+/- | gp |g| a| tp |ppg| pim | +/-
Spezza |611| 228| 393| 621 |1.02 |388| 80 | 56 |17 |35| 52 |0.93| 26 | -2
Kovalchuk |816| 417 |399 |816| 1.00 |516| -116 | 32| 11 |16| 27| 0.84 |31 | -8

Based solely on this table, Spezza. Better PPG, better playoff PPG, appearance of better defence (far better +/-, though that stat is dubious at best), plays a more important position.

(this table also ignores injuries, so technically, I can ignore it for now ).

 

[Icelevel]

don't see what this has with retiring. he's just leaving the nhl for russia.

sign a russian player? hmmmmm, let me sleep on it

 

[Legend Killer]

At this rate, Heatley will be a Senator by noon tomorrow.

Hopefully they give him #11

 

[IranCondraAffair]

2001 draft #1 and #2. You decide.

Player| Gp |g| a| tp| ppg| pim |+/- | gp |g| a| tp |ppg| pim | +/-
Spezza |611| 228| 393| 621 |1.02 |388| 80 | 56 |17 |35| 52 |0.93| 26 | -2
Kovalchuk |816| 417 |399 |816| 1.00 |516| -116 | 32| 11 |16| 27| 0.84 |31 | -8

While I don't typically find +/- useful in evaluating two players because it is primarily a team based statistic, in this instance, I find it to be a telling difference in comparing the two players.

People complain about Spezza not being enough of a two-way player need to take note. Spezza is Michael Peca compared to Ilya Kovalchuk.

At even strength, the opposition has scored 196 more goals against Kovalchuk than Spezza. That's monstrous, it's almost 1 goal for every 3 games Spezza has played in his career.

You could argue that Spezza has had the better team in front of him over his career, but he hasn't exactly had monumental support the past 5 seasons in Ottawa either, which represents almost 1/2 of his playing career. Kovalchuk meanwhile hasn't been playing with chopped liver during that time and has been getting some CRAZY playing time on the PP in NJ.

Spezza's playoff stats are otherworldly as well AND he's a tremendous faceoff guy as well. Injuries definitely even things out for me though. Kovalchuk has been much healthier and I believe that should be factored into any comparison.

I'd pick Spezza though, in the end, retirement not withstanding.

 

[CanadianHockey]

don't see what this has with retiring. he's just leaving the nhl for russia.

sign a russian player? hmmmmm, let me sleep on it

If he doesn't retire, he can't leave the NHL for the KHL due to the Memorandum of Understanding the leagues have over contracts.

 

[Icelevel]

If he doesn't retire, he can't leave the NHL for the KHL due to the Memorandum of Understanding the leagues have over contracts.

exactly. they/he can call it whatever. he's leaving the nhl to play in the khl. point is, don't sign/trade for a russian player, it's not worth the risk.

 

[BonkTastic]

exactly. they/he can call it whatever. he's leaving the nhl to play in the khl. point is, don't sign/trade for a russian player, it's not worth the risk.

Well, I would say that you should be more worried about drafting Russians with high picks, or signing them to long-term contracts. Short term FA contracts are just fine.

At the end of the day, you can't take stuff like this personally. This is a business.

 

[krapsik]

But what if he, after 2-3 year in KHL, decides to come back ?
Can he ? Is he property of NJD or UFA then ?

 

[BonkTastic]

But what if he, after 2-3 year in KHL, decides to come back ?
Can he ? Is he property of NJD or UFA then ?

New Jersey is opting not to toll his contract, and they are mutually parting ways, so AFAIK he'd be a UFA, but we would need to technically apply for reinstatement with the NHL, because he's now technically a retired player. I think?

 

[Dionysus]

At this rate, Heatley will be a Senator by noon tomorrow.

That would be great news.

 

[SensPerpetualRebuild]

At this rate, Heatley will be a Senator by noon tomorrow.

That would be great news.

I respectfully disagree

 

[BonkTastic]

That would be great news.

No.



... no.

 

[danishh]

Based solely on this table, Spezza. Better PPG, better playoff PPG, appearance of better defence (far better +/-, though that stat is dubious at best), plays a more important position.

(this table also ignores injuries, so technically, I can ignore it for now ).

injuries are included. Note that spezza has 200 less games, 200 less goals, 200 less points.


also, salaries
spezza: ~$48,478,000
kovalchuk : ~$53,829,000

so if you had drafted spezza and kept him instead of kovalchuk, you save 5M at a cost of 200 games/200 goals.

 

[Sens Rule]

injuries are included. Note that spezza has 200 less games, 200 less goals, 200 less points.

He had an extra season of junior. Then Spezza played only a partial first season. That is the biggest part of the games played difference.

 

[WhiteLight*]

Can someone explain NJ's cap hit for Kovalchuk?

 

[BonkTastic]

injuries are included. Note that spezza has 200 less games, 200 less goals, 200 less points.

Yeah, but a table like that doesn't say why they didn't play as many games. If you showed that table to someone who had been living under a rock for 12+ years, they might think of things like Kovy started as an 18 year old, Spezza played out his junior eligibility (that's 164 potential games in difference right there), etc...

Also: what Sens Rule said.

I'm just saying: If I ONLY had that table as reference to look at, I might think of non-injury reasons why the games-played columns are so different.

 

[BonkTastic]

Can someone explain NJ's cap hit for Kovalchuk?

AFAIK, ~$250-300k/year for a bazillion years.


*EDIT*
Here's Bob Mckenzie's tweet about that:

Bob McKenzie ‏@TSNBobMcKenzie 5h
3. Kovalchuk doesn't get paid anything (by NJ) and Devils don't get cap hit other than a modest $250K/year penalty for each of next 12 years

 

[aragorn]

Well, I would say that you should be more worried about drafting Russians with high picks, or signing them to long-term contracts. Short term FA contracts are just fine.

At the end of the day, you can't take stuff like this personally. This is a business.

Crikey mate, I've been saying this for a while & taken all kinds of crap for it even called a racist. Fact is & has been for a while they are a flight risk & should not be pursued except as you say as a short term UFA. Don't draft them & certainly don't sign them long term, look how many draft picks Muckler wasted on them that could have turned into a player.

 

[BonkTastic]

Crikey mate, I've been saying this for a while & taken all kinds of crap for it even called a racist. Fact is & has been for a while they are a flight risk & should not be pursued except as you say as a short term UFA. Don't draft them & certainly don't sign them long term, look how many draft picks Muckler wasted on them that could have turned into a player.

I think that there is still a lot of racist attitudes about Russians on these boards (I mean HFBoards in general, not HFSens in particular - we seem to, except for the occasional outlier who doesn't last very long, have our heads on straight over here). Those old-school 1990's opinions that Russians "don't have the right attitude" or "can't win big games" or "aren't as good as players from ("x" country)" are all awful arguments. I'm not saying you have made those arguments in the past, I'm just saying that they are out there (on the Main boards, mostly), and that they are bunk.

I think if you look at it from a risk management point of view though, you're absolutely correct. When people use "The Russian Factor" in the context of a player being a flight-risk, they're on the money. Now, is "Russian Factor" sometimes exaggerated? Absolutely. But I think if anything, Kovalchuk's "retirement" is going to reinforce those ideas within the league.

The KHL makes sense for a lot of Russian-born players. Why wouldn't it? You can play at home, be close to your family, not have to experience any culture-shock, and still make the same money. I don't begrudge anyone who would rather play at home. I think Kovalchuk made the right decision for him and his family, and I support his move. As a Canadian who moved to Indonesia for the money, I can tell you with 100% accuracy that I would move back to Canada if my wife and I could find jobs doing what we are doing here for the same pay back home in Canada. Not a doubt in my mind.

All that being said though, the NHL is a business. GM's are probably not going to forget Kovalchuk's decision anytime soon, because Kovy's retirement only further proves the drawing power the KHL has on Russian players. If there was an attitude before in hockey circles of "It's only Radulov who went over, the KHL is not an issue", that attitude probably changed somewhat today.