If Dean can't unload Brown, Lucic is leaving. I don't see why another GM would take Brown unless it is a young team that might buy him out a couple of years down the line, and Dean includes a young roster player like McNabb or Pearson in the deal. I don't see anything in the Kings farm system that I would want to take on the Brown contract.
Again, the Kane and Toews deals were done when Bowman expected cap inflation to continue, so you may have an argument there. The Kopitar deal just got done with the GM knowing that the cap will be stagnant or go down. I never said Kopitar should take a hometown discount. I said his cap number should reflect the economic reality that exists today.
I also said that Bowman was making a big bet on the COME, and he is going to lose that bet. The Kopitar contract is one of the three richest contracts in the league based off a salary cap assumption that proved to be false. How the hell is that market value? Is Kopitar one of the three top players in the NHL? No, he isn't even the best player on his own team.
Read Dreger. Dean didn't want to pay it, then AEG came in and said give it to him. Dean's his own man, but why do I have the sense that this might have someone else's fingerprints on it just a little?
