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| "It's called rugged handsomeness." |
Saying Ilya Kovalchuk’s $100-million contract is to blame for the New Jersey Devils’ struggles is like saying the unprotected sex you had with a prostitute is the reason behind the new burning sensation you get when you pee. That’s the number-one reason why former New Jersey Devil Bobby Holik speaking out on TSN about the signing is funny (link here).
The second? Holik, who retired in 2009, is the last person that should be talking about ill-advised contracts that have crippled organizations. In 2002, he signed a five-year, $45-million contract with the New York Rangers that led to his buy-out after the 2004-2005 lockout.
Of course, Holik really wasn’t singlehandedly responsible for all those overpaid, underperforming Rangers teams of the early-millennium, but he was the poster child for what was wrong with the league entering into the work stoppage that led to the re-worked collective bargaining agreement. Keep in mind that Holik was a defensive stalwart with a little offensive flair. That’s it. Paying him $9 million per season is like paying, well, a 41-year-old Kovalchuk $4 million to play on the fourth line.
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| "Really. I'm serious." |
So, when Holik appears on TSN’s Off The Record (no idea why the show is named that, seeing as every time a guest of some significance makes an appearance the network rehashes the material on all of its other programs as if the Dalai Lama had paid a visit), as he did on Tuesday, and says that the Devils should not fire head coach John MacLean because he was put in a bad position because of management’s decision to sign his former teammate to such an absurdly excessive contract, it’s cause for much hilarity to ensue. How’s that for the pot calling the bong a means of getting high?
Additionally, talking to Hockey Night in Canada in late October, Holik had this to say as well: “If you want to talk about team first and everybody [playing] for the team, why do you sign [a] player who’s not exactly known for that? If I want to [take] my team to the next level, that’s not the player I’m going to go after.”
Now, I’m going against my better judgment discussing this for the simple reason that I feel like reporting anything OTR passes off as news might be seen as encouraging them to keep doing what they’re doing. But this was clearly too good an opportunity to pass up discussing how bad the Devils are. In fact, so bad are they that the Toronto Maple Leafs called and said “thanks”. So ludicrous was the Kovalchuk contract that Rangers enforcer Derek Boogaard had immediate second thoughts about his four-year, $6.5-million deal and wanted to null and void it just so he could sign with Jersey too.
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| "Who am I kidding? I'm hideous!!!" |
That isn’t even taking into account the recent bad news that the team’s actual star player, Zach Parise, will be out three months with a knee injury. The good news is that the cap relief that will result from placing him on long-term injured reserve will undoubtedly help in the short term for a team that is right up against the cap (if you can call substituting one awesome player for presumably average one(s) good). But, in the long term, Kovalchuk’s contract may even rob them of the Stanley Cup contender they envisioned themselves being for the next decade when Parise’s restricted-free agency kicks in next off-season. Given the opportunity to match an offer sheet, a non-financially handicapped Devils team would surely do just that, but how about one that just committed an average of $6.66 million to a player about as effective as a Devil as Martin Brodeur’s back-up of the week as a legitimate starting goaltender in the NHL?
At the end of the day, the injury to Parise will give the 3-9-1 Devils the chance to see what life is like without him and realize that they likely essentially traded a superstar selfish to the point that he can’t put the team before himself for one that was potentially a future captain that would have led them to the promised land time and again... without the former.
Eight years ago the Devils wisely let one player go. This summer they got him back and are now paying the price.
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