This Sucks: Weber Signs Offer Sheet With Flyers
As you've probably already heard, the Flyers signed noted head-basher Shea Weber to an offer sheet:
The Philadelphia Flyers and Nashville Predators star defenseman Shea Weber have agreed to a 14-year offer sheet "upwards of $100 million," giving Nashville GM David Poile a week to match the contract terms. The news was first reported by TSN's Darren Dreger.
Now it's up to the Preds to match, which I think they'd be stupid not to. Apparently the Wings were interested in trading Weber, but it never got to that:Dreger also reported that prior to Weber's signing, the Red Wings, San Jose, the New York Rangers and Philadelphia were involved in trade talks with the Predators for the 6-foot-4, 232-pound defenseman.
Once again, someone else was a little more aggressive, ready to take a little more risk than Holland's, it'll come to me approach. Why trade when you can potentially get the man for only draft picks.They may have landed one of the best defensemen in hockey without surrendering a single player from their roster via trade.
God, this is so freaking true. There was so many ways for the Wings to do something with this, but they failed again.I'm trying to think of anything good that this does for the Wings, some way to spin this so that it isn't horrible, but I can't. Weber's either going to Philly or Nashville for 14 f'ing years while Holland was worried about signing Kyle Quincey.
This sucks.
Even if NASH matches (and that's a big if), Weber will collect his two signing bonuses ($26 mln) and requests/demands to be traded in a year. I don't him staying in Nash for 14 years with no cup and damaged relationship w/management.
I've heard Detroit was also a big time player in trade talks for weber. But again, what were the odds a central division team would trade their franchise cornerstone to another central team. I still trust Kenny.
I've heard Detroit was also a big time player in trade talks for weber. But again, what were the odds a central division team would trade their franchise cornerstone to another central team. I still trust Kenny.
What makes me sick the most about this is that they structured his contract so that he gets paid 56M for the first 4 years! What a total joke. I love how the NHL just let's people shit all over the integrity of the rules they decide to operate by.
I'm wondering if Nashville will match it and trade him next year. They'd have to fork out like $27M for the privelage but they could get more for him next year than they could now. I imagine they would have done that willingly if Detroit made the offer.
Still wish Kenny had made the ofer himself, but it is what it is I guess...
@DetCapC19 Why would they do that? They've already have paid the majority of the painful part of the K.
@moorecha My thinking behind that is:
1. They didn't want to pay him $7M for 3 years last year, so doing so over 14 years (or 10 years before it falls off) would appear to be worse - although I am aware that their mindset has changed over this past year.
2. There's still a lot of up front money coming Weber's way for the next 6 years ($13M for the following 2 years following a potential trade and $8M for each of the 2 years after that) which they may not be comfortable paying.
3. They need to get to the cap floor so overpaying for Weber probably makes more sense than overpaying for guys who may require deals in the 2-3 year range.
4. If they match and trade, they could probably get a better package than 4 late 1st rounders.
5. From a business standpoint there's a lot of goodwill built up with the fans. Losing your 2 biggest stars for nothing tangible would sting. For $27M, you may be able to recoup some of that this year vs spending similar money on several players to fill out the roster and cap space.
This is all just me thinking out loud but to me this makes the most sense.
Geez whiz Philly throwing out long term contracts, this ALWAYS ends well... He'll be asking for a trade in a year, or just staying with Nashville hah
Geez whiz Philly throwing out long term contracts, this ALWAYS ends well... He'll be asking for a trade in a year, or just staying with Nashville hah
I'm not sure why some people are freaking out about Holland and this summers free agency... I think he's been pretty level headed and has a plan in place, one that over zealous fans might not agree with. Lidstrom retired and Stuart was traded (which we both knew were coming eventually), so we have defensive holes to fill. We, like many other teams, lost out on the Suter sweepstakes, which sucked, but it happens. We also didn't jump for Carle or other less proven defensemen by throwing huge contracts at them. However, we have Smith coming up, Quincey was signed to a contract (and has a better chance at proving his worth on a healthy squad of wings), and there is still a chance we land someone in a trade (perhaps Jay Bouwmeester or Yandle). Now that Shea has accepted an offer sheet, some people *ahem* are freaking out even more. For this I point you to this article:
- We wouldn't have been able to sign Shea Weber to an offer sheet, the Preds would not have let that happen. Holland is not failing at his job because he didn't land a huge free agenct to a ridiculous contract.
Keep in mind that Hudler also signed elsewhere, a hole in which Holland plugged by signing Sammy and Brunner (for much much less than Hudler's contract). Brunner has the chance to be an incredibly low risk goldmine, and Sammy is a decent enough replacement for Hudler. We also addressed our lack of grit / pest by signing TooToo, another at first unpopular decision that people seem to be taking a liking to now. Remember, our problem hasn't been not scoring enough goals, but it seems like the fans just want us to sign a big name forward because... well because we can. Wait until Doan and Semin sign somewhere before you go crazy, because that's who everyone is waiting for. This summer wasn't a Free Agency goldmine, there are a few prized assets and then some decent filler, but it wasn't overloaded with available talent.
Also remember our backup goalie issue, tactfully solved by signing Monster.
I haven't lost faith in Kenny, mainly because my expectations aren't ridiculous and I understand that there are 29 other temas in the league trying to put together the best squad possible to win a cup. Be patient, wait and see what happens with Doan and Semin (who is also a wildcard and a risk...), and remember to trust in Kenny.
@Encryption001 The biggest issue is that we are all watching Holland throw offers that are too low on the pieces we need. We are not a better team as of right now than we were last year. I argue we are worse than last year. We haven't addressed needs that can win a Cup.
I get that most teams are waiting for Doan before looking at Semin but is Holland going to be half a mil too low for those guys as well? My guess is yes. I bet Doan signs with Phoenix again and Semin ends up elsewhere.
I bet we start the season looking much like the roster does now.
@magnum9 I don't know how many offers we truly lost out on by being "half a mil" too low, and how many of those offers / players would have actually plugged our defensive holes.
In reality, which players would actually fill our defensive void to the extent of making the fanbase happy. If the answer is "Weber, Yandle, Suter", well... much easier said than done. If the answer is "Bouwmeester or Carle"... I think you're putting a lot of faith in those players. Kenny is clearly more comfortable with putting more faith in his homegrown talent than overpaying for unproven defensemen or losing out on All-Stars that are incredibly hard to land.
Our homegrown talent is incredibly thin due to the success of the last two decades. We rented and borrowed with our high draft picks (which is great because it won cups).
The only way we keep up the success is to draw players in through free agency or trade. You can't rely on draft picks when your picks are near the bottom every year and you have given up a lot of first rounders.
We either need to get the superstars or start rebuilding and making our own with high draft picks.
I think Nashville is way more likely to match the offer sheet if it were from the Red Wings or another division rival than from an Eastern team like Philly.
What I don't understand is, why would Shea Weber agree to that contract and risk being stuck in Nashville for 14 years?
David the Wings did pursue some him from what I have heard. Sadly there really isn't much chance of seeing what their offer sheet looked like since he didn't sign it.
David the Wings did pursue some him from what I have heard. Sadly there really isn't much chance of seeing what their offer sheet looked like since he didn't sign it.
We might have put an offer in David. No one says we didn't but Philly just screwed Nashville over, either take their top d-man or put them in a hell of a cap situation.
Agreed. Kenny was way to passive on this one. Should have went for an offer sheet right from the get go.
After reading this, I got a sour feeling in my mind.. I really am questioning why the heck we didn't pursue this guy. Was it because of the Zetterberg incident?
On the brightside, if he goes to PHI we won't have to see more than once or twice a year. He'll dominate the Pens (also good) and the players who won't be injured by blocking his shots will mean we'll have a healthy roster (esp. Dan Cleary and Patrick Eaves).
OKAY I'M TRYING TO FIND THE BRIGHTSIDE HERE!
I think Holland has jumped the shark. He's had the worst offseason possible, and its not luck. His approach is absurd.
@AnthonyC I keep thinking that Holland has a plan and that's what I'm holding onto... but I'm really starting to believe there is no plan and he can't figure out why players don't want to be here "because its the Red Wing's".
We have a significantly worse team than we had last year at this point. And we only won 1 playoff game.... but it's ok, we should like the pieces we have in place.
I don't get it. We don't even have prospects worth a shit other than maybe Smith/Nyquist, so it's not like he can feed us the line that we can "get better from within". It ain't happening.
They use to excel even more at drawing players in through free agency.
You can't expect 3rd-7th rounders to become superstars. It isn't going to happen often.
He hasn't signed with anybody yet he just has an offer sheet thats all. This will force Nashville's hand to sign him
This is so bad on many levels.
The best thing that can happen now is that Nashville lets Weber walk so that the Wing's divisional rival is weaker without Weber.
I don't see any way the Wing's can be great defensively for a long time coming.
I know nobody likes people saying this but I think the Wing's are screwed. Its time to either rebuild or completely shift our focus to becoming and offensive minded team.
This isn't going to look like Red Wing's hockey.
