Andy Sutton to Ottawa!

Cap'n Clutch wrote:Sutton will be replacing Kuba so we get to enjoy more of butter boy.

How long is Kuba out?

SpezDispenser wrote:

Cap'n Clutch wrote:Sutton will be replacing Kuba so we get to enjoy more of butter boy.

How long is Kuba out?

No news yet.

Devo wrote:

cloverleaf wrote:Andy Sutton's playoff career since the age of 16
10 games of playoff experience to draw from
His team has 1 win and 9 losses in those 10 playoff games.
10 GP, 0G, 1A, -7, 35 PIM

Awesome, what a proven winner. 35 penalty minutes in 10 playoff games. He will be a huge help.

Big Freaking deal....

Kovalchuk's playoff numbers

8 GP 1 G 2 A 19 PIMS...

I guess you're saying that making a move for him is a waste as well?

I see you conveniently left out his playoff seasons from 1999-2000 and 2000-2001 where he had 23 GP, 14 G, 14 A for 28 points and led his team the 2 championship titles. Understandable, no big deal, i will forgive you.

make up your own minds though, i welcome your analysis on his play for the rest of this season. not just his first game where he will fight and make a couple big hits.

cloverleaf wrote:

Devo wrote:

cloverleaf wrote:Andy Sutton's playoff career since the age of 16
10 games of playoff experience to draw from
His team has 1 win and 9 losses in those 10 playoff games.
10 GP, 0G, 1A, -7, 35 PIM

Awesome, what a proven winner. 35 penalty minutes in 10 playoff games. He will be a huge help.

Big Freaking deal....

Kovalchuk's playoff numbers

8 GP 1 G 2 A 19 PIMS...

I guess you're saying that making a move for him is a waste as well?

I see you conveniently left out his playoff seasons from 1999-2000 and 2000-2001 where he had 23 GP, 14 G, 14 A for 28 points and led his team the 2 championship titles. Understandable, no big deal, i will forgive you.

Kovalchuk and the Thashers have a grand total of 4 playoff games to their names. Not sure where these numbers come from.

ddt wrote:

cloverleaf wrote:

Devo wrote:

cloverleaf wrote:Andy Sutton's playoff career since the age of 16
10 games of playoff experience to draw from
His team has 1 win and 9 losses in those 10 playoff games.
10 GP, 0G, 1A, -7, 35 PIM

Awesome, what a proven winner. 35 penalty minutes in 10 playoff games. He will be a huge help.

Big Freaking deal....

Kovalchuk's playoff numbers

8 GP 1 G 2 A 19 PIMS...

I guess you're saying that making a move for him is a waste as well?

I see you conveniently left out his playoff seasons from 1999-2000 and 2000-2001 where he had 23 GP, 14 G, 14 A for 28 points and led his team the 2 championship titles. Understandable, no big deal, i will forgive you.

Kovalchuk and the Thashers have a grand total of 4 playoff games to their names. Not sure where these numbers come from.

From the internet. i used stats from sutton since the age of 16 and then devo tries to use kovalchuk starting at the age of 18 conveniently leaving out successful playoff years.

rooneypoo wrote:

hemlock wrote:

rooneypoo wrote:

hemlock wrote:

rooneypoo wrote:

hemlock wrote:

N4L wrote:

stempniaksen wrote:If we get 4-5 home games in the playoffs it's worth it from Melnyk's perspective. People forget this a business.

Seriously. If Sutton and Cullen help bring in MILLIONS of dollars for Melnyk, I think he takes that over a 2nd roudner as well. You beat me to this comment.

Both of you aren't suggesting we wouldn't make the playoffs without these moves are you? Or that Cullen and Sutton will get us through an extra round of the playoffs?

Wow. These are DEPTH moves. Nothing more.

Yeah, those depth moves are awful ones. Stuart to DET. Gill to PET. Those hardly ever pan out. The big moves -- Tkachuk to ATL, Guerin to SJS -- those are the ones that work wonders for a team.

Teams that are going strong and need tweaks, not overhauls, add depth and don't tear the team apart to add it. Teams going for the long bomb and/or in need of an injection because they're fading go for the big names.

I will be totally unsurprised when Kovalchuk does next to nothing for NJ this year, in spite of all the hype.

Yep, like Colorado with Roy, and Bourque, Hossa to the Pens paid divends and brought them within inches of the Cup.

There are plenty of examples to counter your claim, not to mention you took my post out of context. I was merely responding to the claim that these two players will put us over the top, or even fetch us an extra round.

I hope you are prepared to eat those words about Kovalchuk should he prove you wrong. That's a bold statement to make.

2 of the 3 instances you cite were from almost 10 years ago or more.

Name me 3 big-time trade deadline acquisitions since the lockout (after Hossa) -- and by "big-time," I mean guys who cost 1st rounders, and/or significant roster players / prospects -- who actually worked out, putting up big points and helping to carry their team deep into the playoffs.

For every Hossa deal, there are 10 Tkachuks, Guerins, Campbells, etc., etc. Big deadline deals are sooooooo overrated. Teams that win cups almost invariably make middling tweaks and additions, not huge pickups. You look at the cup winners for the last 5 years or so, and it's always the same story. PIT adds Kunitz and Gill. DET adds Stuart. CAR adds Recchi. Organizations who tear their team apart to make the big move almost never win. Hossa is the exception who ironically proves the rule, and with a vengeance -- PIT did NOT win the cup that year.

I did name you 3. Now I have to cite more examples using your stipulations?

I clearly showed that not all teams who make big splashes at the deadline are fading as you said. In any event, I am not arguing with you about good teams making minor tweaks, and I'd agree with you that "organizations who who tear their team apart to make the big move almost never win". But it's not always the case as I said.

My original point, the one you responded to, is that Sutton and Cullen are depth moves, so I don't quite understand what you are hoping to "prove" here.

Maybe I'm misread you, but you seemed unhappy with the moves, both in that post and previously, and were using the phrase "depth move" in a derogatory fashion, suggesting that we gave up too much.

My contention is the Sutton and Cullen are totally appropriate pickups for this team, and that the cost for each, while inflated (thank you, Habs, for giving up a 2nd for Moore and getting this ball rolling), is acceptable to this team going forward.

Still, tho'... I challenge anyone to name me three or more significant trades (involving 1st+, etc.) since the lockout (after Hossa) that contributed heavily and helped carry their team deep into the playoffs. The reason I discount trades before the deadline is because we weren't dealing in a cap era then, and so the comparisons really aren't fair. You never used to have to give up salary to fit in big-name players, and now you do. That's key.

My unhappiness with the Sutton deal (I'm not thrilled with the Cullen deal either) isn't personal. It's the bringing in yet another defensive d-man at the cost of a nice pick. The scouting staff has done some incredible work over the past two seasons to unearth some real gems with those types of pick.

Bottom line for me is that with the addition of Sutton (again it could have been just about any defensive d-man), even factoring in Picard leaving, we still have too many d-men (including Lee). That means we basically spent a 2nd to have someone in the press box. I don't necessarily know if Sutton is a huge upgrade over anything we already had. In my opinion, we already had enough depth, and I was willing to let the group we had run with it. That's why I am against these two deals. It's really nothing against Sutton personally. The Cullen deal however, I don't think he's anything special, and his production is just a product of being "a fit" in Carolina. He was so underwhelming in New York after signing a FA deal that Sather practically gifted him back to Carolina before he even completed his first season in New York.

Your point about post-deadline trades is certainly valid and I agree with it.

We didn't have nearly enough depth before Sutton. Tomorrow night we would have had to call Derek Smith back up if we hadn't obtained Sutton. There is still a chance we can miss the playoffs and we were unable to sustain another injury on the backend. Like it or not Murray and Clouston have zero faith in Brian Lee and I get the impression that they would prefer to never have to see him again.

RobbyJ wrote:We didn't have nearly enough depth before Sutton. Tomorrow night we would have had to call Derek Smith back up if we hadn't obtained Sutton. There is still a chance we can miss the playoffs and we were unable to sustain another injury on the backend. Like it or not Murray and Clouston have zero faith in Brian Lee and I get the impression that they would prefer to never have to see him again.

And yet, he remains after the deadline.....

We'll agree to disagree about the depth. I distinctly remember the vast majority of the posters on this site agreeing that we needed to move a d-man for the first several months of this season.

hemlock wrote:

RobbyJ wrote:We didn't have nearly enough depth before Sutton. Tomorrow night we would have had to call Derek Smith back up if we hadn't obtained Sutton. There is still a chance we can miss the playoffs and we were unable to sustain another injury on the backend. Like it or not Murray and Clouston have zero faith in Brian Lee and I get the impression that they would prefer to never have to see him again.

And yet, he remains after the deadline.....

We'll agree to disagree about the depth. I distinctly remember the vast majority of the posters on this site agreeing that we needed to move a d-man for the first several months of this season.

And his name was Brian Lee.

RobbyJ wrote:

hemlock wrote:

RobbyJ wrote:We didn't have nearly enough depth before Sutton. Tomorrow night we would have had to call Derek Smith back up if we hadn't obtained Sutton. There is still a chance we can miss the playoffs and we were unable to sustain another injury on the backend. Like it or not Murray and Clouston have zero faith in Brian Lee and I get the impression that they would prefer to never have to see him again.

And yet, he remains after the deadline.....

We'll agree to disagree about the depth. I distinctly remember the vast majority of the posters on this site agreeing that we needed to move a d-man for the first several months of this season.

And his name was Brian Lee.

I'm with you there. I've never been a big Lee supporter.

Yeah really, why is Brian Lee still an Ottawa Senator? Damn would I ever like to have turned him into someone good this deadline. I'll take Martin Skoula as the 7th D-man instead of Lee.

I will falsely fill myself with hope and believe we can get a 3rd rounder for him at the draft.

Ah who knows, maybe they turn Lee into an early 2nd rounder from Minnisota or something or some kind of forward prospect that might be a top 9 guy some day, from someone.

N4L wrote:Ah who knows, maybe they turn Lee into an early 2nd rounder from Minnisota or something or some kind of forward prospect that might be a top 9 guy some day, from someone.

Or not because Brian Lee is a dime a dozen, literally. Good enough to have a cup of coffee in the NHL, but nothing that screams long career to me. But, hey, I hope you're right.

You might be right to be honest, I dont see a lot of teams wanting Lee for anything. That's the kind of guy that will be in the minors for a long time coming. Hell, guys that arnt even out of jr and college are ahead of him on the depth chart.

I think he ends up being swapped for a struggling forward who's in the same boat (similar to the Latendresse-Pouliot swap). Maybe a guy like Jack Skille?

stempniaksen wrote:I think he ends up being swapped for a struggling forward who's in the same boat (similar to the Latendresse-Pouliot swap). Maybe a guy like Jack Skille?

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. We could take a project forward, we need one of those more than a project D-man right now.

stempniaksen wrote:I think he ends up being swapped for a struggling forward who's in the same boat (similar to the Latendresse-Pouliot swap). Maybe a guy like Jack Skille?

Exact player I would have said.