Fools Gold

[Stoner]

It's amazing how many versions of the DB CD stories are out there. It's the proverbial ink blot test.

[carpandean]

Same goes for DB.

I agreed with you on the other two (at least to some degree; I'm a firm believer in the truth being somewhere in the middle), but I don't think they screwed up their negotiations with DB. They chose to keep CD and let DB walk. They threw a weak 5 x 5 (or somewhere around there) offer to DB at the end when it looked like CD might leave, but they never really made a play to keep him. At least, that was my understanding ...

[stenbaro]

I agreed with you on the other two (at least to some degree; I'm a firm believer in the truth being somewhere in the middle), but I don't think they screwed up their negotiations with DB. They chose to keep CD and let DB walk. They threw a weak 5 x 5 (or somewhere around there) offer to DB at the end when it looked like CD might leave, but they never really made a play to keep him. At least, that was my understanding ...

I heard it from Mr Orpik who is a college buddy of Chris Drurys agent..My story is third person believe if you will if you dont oh well..He could BSd me but I doubt it..The offer was agreed upon in October the contract was sent to ownership for review and approval. It was never sent to Chris's agent until after the season and at that time his agent advised him to see what offers came his way and there might be a nice surprise for him..ANd the rest is history..I have heard that version many times from different people over the past 3 yrs so I gotta think there was some merit to his statements to me..

[...]

Yup. Grier left because he didn't like the direction the team was heading. He saw problems in the organization, and he bounced out.

 

 

 

Excuse me, but we re-hashed that statement of Grier's when he resigned. It was a one-time statement and it was after the fact.

 

The news at the time tells a different story:

 

http://www.niagara-gazette.com/sports/gnnsports_story_179210904.html

[JujuFish]

Excuse me, but we re-hashed that statement of Grier's when he resigned. It was a one-time statement and it was after the fact.

 

The news at the time tells a different story:

 

http://www.niagara-gazette.com/sports/gnnsports_story_179210904.html

No, the news at the time does not tell a different story. The Sabres let him go to free agency, but they also matched the offer that San Jose gave him. He turned Buffalo down. Even Grier's agent acknowledged the fact that Buffalo wanted to resign him. Take, for example, our own thread on Grier's signing. You'll notice the same arguments in that thread that I said earlier.

 

http://forums.sabrespace.com/topic/5077-grier-to-san-jose/

[matter2003]

http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20091127/SPORTS0101/911270330/tbd

 

The current issue of ESPN The Magazine includes a short article called "Money Players: NHL Teams Need to Get the Most for Their Bucks." Four players were in the "Fool's Gold" category, and Drury (making $8.1 million with the New York Rangers this season) and Briere ($8 million with the Philadelphia Flyers) are two of them.

 

Drury has 2 goals and 5 assists for 7 points in 19 games this season, with a minus-3 plus-minus rating.

 

Briere has 10 goals and 6 assists for 16 points in 17 games this season, but he has a minus-3 plus-minus this season and is minus-29 in his two-plus seasons with the Flyers.

 

this was definitely a situation with Drury and Briere that the sum of the parts is better than the whole...ie, them both together are better than either is on their own...

[SDS]

Is this hearsay, speculation or verifiable fact? That OSP had the offer and sat on it?

 

Well "my guy" works for the Sabres and that is his story. I am one of the verbal accounts Taro is referring to.

[nfreeman]

No, the news at the time does not tell a different story. The Sabres let him go to free agency, but they also matched the offer that San Jose gave him. He turned Buffalo down. Even Grier's agent acknowledged the fact that Buffalo wanted to resign him.

While I think this is true, it doesn't change the fact that it was a terrible move by the Sabres not to lock him up when they pretty clearly had the opportunity to do so at relatively low cost.

[TheChimp]

All three of them, Briere, Campbell, and the Weasel, had good chemistry here. They no doubt understood the possibility of not having that type of chemistry where they were going, but to them, obviously, the money was way too good to bother with that minor detail. Gomez, when he went from NJ to NYR, was another perfect example. Havlat in Minnesota? Nightmare. Gaborik in New York, perfect example of a guy slotting right in and having GREAT chemistry with his new club.

 

Obviously, taking on a huge salaried player is a huge crap shoot. The odds of the guy panning out are probably alot like the example above, somewhere close to one in 5 or 6 that the guy's going to succeed on the new club. At least right away.

[Stoner]

While I think this is true, it doesn't change the fact that it was a terrible move by the Sabres not to lock him up when they pretty clearly had the opportunity to do so at relatively low cost.

 

I always ask myself why a player on the cusp of free agency, sometimes for the first time in his career, wants to do the team a favor and sign at "relatively low cost"? And what his agent would say about it, or the players association.

 

And, of course, as we've seen in Buffalo, there's a risk to locking up players.

 

It's tricky eh? There's no doubt, though, that whatever the Sabres have been doing since '06 or so hasn't worked too well.

[spndnchz]

I always ask myself why a player on the cusp of free agency, sometimes for the first time in his career, wants to do the team a favor and sign at "relatively low cost"? And what his agent would say about it, or the players association.

 

And, of course, as we've seen in Buffalo, there's a risk to locking up players.

 

It's tricky eh? There's no doubt, though, that whatever the Sabres have been doing since '06 or so hasn't worked too well.

IMO, the Sabres have changed much in their way since then. Maybe not the perfect players but they committed, early on, to sign their core group and build around it. We'll see what happens this year with many guys becoming RFA's UFA's after this season which ones they choose.

[nfreeman]

I always ask myself why a player on the cusp of free agency, sometimes for the first time in his career, wants to do the team a favor and sign at "relatively low cost"? And what his agent would say about it, or the players association.

 

And, of course, as we've seen in Buffalo, there's a risk to locking up players.

 

It's tricky eh? There's no doubt, though, that whatever the Sabres have been doing since '06 or so hasn't worked too well.

Well, he signed for only about $500K more per year than he had been making with the Sabres. I don't think anyone had any expectations about a huge contract for Grier. My point was simply that the Sabres didn't bother to make him an offer or make him feel wanted, and that doing so, coupled with a modest raise, probably would've been enough to get him to sign an extension.

 

You are certainly right that it's much easier to judge those decisions in retrospect than it is to make them at the time.

[Sabre Dance]

Did I just fall into a time warp? This topic has been pretty much beaten to death. Maybe someone out there is still harboring a grudge against the team for trading Danny Gare to the Red Wings.....??

 

Let it go.......