10:03 pm: As my Sunday night is winding down, I just checked out IslandersPointBlank. There you'll find two different lists of possible UFAs. They are well thought out lists with detailed pros and cons. I'm glad this should only last a few days, unlike the Draft that went on for months.
So check out the lists beginning with Ville Leino and ending with Sean Bergenheim. Mr. Point Blank admits, the last one was just a joke.
12:50 pm: And this is what happens when you walk away from the computer and try to go do some housework. SOB!! As per Katie Strang, "The Isles extend qualifying offers to six: Josh Bailey, Blake Comeau, Micheal Haley, Jesse Joensuu, Dylan Reese and Ty Wishart; Not Jack Hillen."
Well, there goes my theory about Comeau. And I am sort of surprised about Hillen. They were always very happy with the fact that he came cheap out of college but did have that bad spot there while his wife was pregnant. Jack picked up his game in the second half, but his fate may have been sealed.
Also surprising is the QA to Jesse. But then again, during his clean-up day remarks, that was all he cared about was getting a new contract to stay on the Islanders. Big body needs to use it more.
Ty Wishart; I really don't know why Garth likes him so much, but he does as he has told me repeatedly while I looked at him like the RCA dog Nipper.
Michael Haley had to be a keeper because anyone who will beat down Sean Avery needs to be in an Islanders sweater. Sorry. That's a personal opinion. Back to cleaning the house.
10 am: The afterglow is lovely isn't it? The NY Islanders are receiving accolades for their 2011 draft choices and it's a thing of beauty. Now, with all this depth in the organization can we PLEASE be stuck drafting WAY down the list next season? Please? Thanks. I'd like to have to wait until at least like 8:30 next June to watch Garth Snow and Doug Weight walk up to the podium to announce the newest draft choice.
However, chosing in the top five AGAIN has given the Islanders another excellent piece to a winning puzzle. I was chatting with Stu Honig last night after the draft. Stu has been around this business far longer than he'd like to admit and sometimes is known as Stuie Stats in the Press Box. His take on the Isles drafting this year was as follows:
After doing some early homework on today's activity and based on talking around plus scouring the internet for info, early conclusion: Isles did really REALLY
good with their picks. In a typical draft year with the usual amount of picks, a team can expect an average of 2 picks emerge to become regulars. Islanders will probably be above the average for the last 3 drafts prior to this season and I fully expect that their draft this season will yield at least the average, maybe more. I know all teams figure that they get 7 star players out of 7 draft picks, but reality says that expect 2 regulars, anything above 2 is a bonus. I am going to be analyzing the whole draft a bit more before I decide just who was the biggest winner. And before I go further, no one loses on draft day
No, no one loses on draft day. And in less than one week we hit July 1st and the Free Agency Frenzy. I wonder if the GMs wished there was a little more time between the Draft and July 1st. Just a question.
So the new question at hand is: How do the Isles meet the new Cap floor with the very young roster? With the help of the fine folks at SB Nation's LightHouse Hockey, assuming that Bailey and Haley being signed (PS: They will both be at the Team Store signing on Tuesday!) and with Trevor Gillies already being signed, the Isles are still under the new Cap floor.
KCNYI assumes that Blake Comeau will be signed as well. Call me a pessimist, but I am not so sure. I'm thinking if there was anyone that would be tradeable for the Isles, Comeau would be the one piece Garth may be willing to give up. But that is just me.
This leads us to free agency and finding not just a player that fits the current need, but the current personality of the NY Islanders locker room. To me, that will be the hardest thing to find. As Stu Honig said, there are not that many teams up against the cap now that it has risen, so trying to find a deal and steal won't be easy. Nor do we want to take someone's problem child off their hands. But still, there is at least $4.5 mil that needs to be spent.
The Islanders are expert at creative cap manuevering while leaving them room for March deadline time. In the article by KCNYI on LighthouseHockey (http://www.lighthousehockey.com/2011/6/25/2243557/gm-101-reaching-the-salary-caps-floor-poll-inside) the suggestions are as follows:
Trade for Jay Bowmeester, attempt to sign Bieska or Ernhoff from Vancouver, and three, trade for Coburn ($3.2 million), Carle ($3.5 million), or Meszaros ($4 million) from the Flyers.
All interesting and all would work financially. It's the locker room fit I'm not sure of.
What say you HBers? What's next on the Isles agenda for the roster? Mind you, Nino Niederreiter will more than likely be on that bench come October.
Sidenote: It truthfully annoys me that while I'm writing these things, Tweets from the other writers come over my phone letting me know they've already covered the subject before I have. I really have to get a better head start on these things or just not have their Twitter feeds come directly to my phone so that I get pissed off on a beautiful Sunday morning! UGH! Bloggerfail!
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