Sunday, June 10, 2007

I can only hope Darren Dreger is not lying to me

But, given my past issues with him, not to mention his horrid rumour-mongering and past career decisions, I don't hold out much hope.


Bryan McCabe still has four years remaining on a deal that averages $5.75
million per year. He also has a "no movement" clause which some suggest he
would waive for one team, the New York Islanders. If the Islanders can't
re-sign Ryan Smyth or Jason Blake, they'll need to make a splash. The
Maple Leafs won't initiate a discussion, but with 8 defensemen soon to be under
contract they might listen. Freeing up valuable cap space to enable the
Leafs to be a contender for top free agent players is very appealing. This is a
distinct possibility.



Now, McCabe certainly isn't, you know, TERRIBLE or anything, but I've never approved of his contract. For the caliber of defenseman he is (you know, worse than the much more affordable Kaberle), I want him either a lot cheaper or not on my team. I like the guy and all, but I'm not comfortable with Bryan McCabe the player for damn near six million a year. Like Dreger mentions, there's a lot of benefit to the team by trying to dump McCabe. We free up a ton of cap room and have the opportunity to pick up more players, such as a better defenseman (I'll take either Timonen or Hannan, thank you very much).

The bottom line, to me, is that without his breakout offensive first-half of the year last season, McCabe isn't staring at all that money because he not only isn't good enough defensively or consistent enough offensively (i.e. just not fucking good enough) for that kind of money, but he's not nearly the crowd favourite that other guys who've gotten ridiculous contracts (Tucker's $3 million, Domi's $1.5 million back in the day) are. The only reason he has that contract is because he has a big shot and was picking up lots of points on the powerplay at the start of 2005-06. He petered out after his injury, and he hasn't been the same "league leader" player since... well, no shit. He never was. Then again, when have the fucking Toronto Maple Leafs ever been known for their fiscal sanity?

I'm in favour of moving him, but I want as much as possible in return. He's not a terrible player, just really overpaid. And really stupid. Who can forget his pre-lockout comments? Yeah Bry, I hope you're able to get by now that Toronto's paying you out the ass. Fucking 'tard.

No comments: