Breaking news: Tarasenko signs with Blues 8 Years/$60M
And now for something completely different...Offer Sheets....
I don't know if there's anything more "emperor's new clothes" than the NHL offer sheet... It's been used as an excuse, it's been used as a threat, it's been used to cover up bad management, it's been used to baffle player agents, and more...and yet, the reality remains.. it barely exists, and the fact of the matter is, it might not be the worst thing in the world if it did exist for the team losing the player.
For years we've heard the idle threats from the other team's General Manager saying," go ahead and put an offer sheet on our player, we will match anything." Meanwhile, that same GM is taking a hard-nosed stance while negotiating a contract with that player's agent... That part is always hilarious to me.
We've also heard General Managers say they aren't afraid of the offer sheet, that in actuality they never happen. And for the most part they're right. In fact I once talked to a team who told me the putting together an offer sheet alone would cost them $100,000, and the amount of legal work was extremely prohibitive. And while one hundred thousand dollars is a lot of money, I am sure some agents would pay that in a heartbeat if they could to get their player an offer sheet.
Shea Weber happened, but it was an extremely unique situation. Just before the Shea Weber offer sheet I was told the Flyers and Rangers were negotiating with the Predators a trade for Shea Weber. When the Flyers realized the Rangers might get him they put an offer sheet together which assured Weber would either be a Flyer or a Predator for life. The Preds of coarse matched the deal and the rest is history...
And this year we've seen the next evolution of this ridiculous myth called the "offer sheet." People saying they had to trade a player because they were going to be offer-sheeted. That is the word behind the Bruins trade of Hamilton after all. And yet when you look at it, the Bruins may have gotten more for Hamilton by not matching an offer sheet... Time will tell.
But a GM or anyone saying that they are afraid of an offer sheet is a very new thing. What happened to all the tough talk of "We will match any number put out there?"
So my question to you is this:
Do we need to revamp the way offer sheets happen or just get rid of them altogether?
Or do we just leave them as a mythical boogie man for teams to use the threat of an offer sheet as they see fit..to cover mismanagement of the cap, etc.
I will be updating the players remaining on the Rumor Chart this evening as talk is picking up again on those remaining players and possible trades this summer.
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