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Cronenbergfan wrote:I agree! Burke has never truly impressed me; considering,as you said, what he has done with that stacked Anaheim team he inherited from Murray!
I would LOVE to have Kunitz, but as you said, it's a long shot, but there's no denying that Burke has some SERIOUS wheelin' and Dealin' to do in order to get his team cap-friendly and ready to go. Great article by the way, thanks for the link.
I just had a thought. If it's a foregone conclusion that Mezie has NO intention of bolting to Russia, then really unless a team comes out of nowhere and submits an offer sheet, his only options are to sign or sit out. Knowing this, if Murray has a back-up or plan or 2 in place to snag a D man to replace Mezie should he sit (Beauchemin or Schneider, for instance) then since this has been going on and on, I really don't care one way or the other if he sits or cracks and signs for whatever the amount. Of course, this is all banking on Murray making not just a stop-gap solution, but acquiring a solid D man to replace Mezie.
I'd say it's all but guaranteed that Murray has a backup option for Mesz siting. I think they would be a) Schneider and b) Aucoin, for starters -- two guys widely speculated to be available because of the cap situations of their current teams.
I'm optimistic -- say, 80/20 -- that Mesz will sign, tho', sometime in the next 3-4 weeks. We need to remember that, as a RFA, his situation isn't all that uncommon, and that the most common solution to his situation is usually results in a contract settlement somewhere in the middle between what the player originally wanted ($4-4.5 mil?) and what the GM wanted to give him ($2.5-3 mil?). I wrote this elsewhere, but I'll go on the record and prognosticate a contract annoucement for Mesz in the next 3-4 weeks for
a) $3 mil / 1 yr,
b) $3.25 mil / 2 yrs, or
c) $3.5 mil / 3 yrs.
If Murray can save a few dollars or tack on an extra year for those amounts, super, but I expect the final deal will look something like one of those 3 options.
out!
