First off we would like to congratulate Chris Wolter and his Puffin for a tremendous series. He has worked carefully building his team over the past several years into the offensive powerhouse it is now. Kudos. After our loss to the Puffin management locked itself away to review what went so wrong this year and what are the next steps for the franchise.
Q: Explain how the Offseason started the issues that plagued the team all year.
We attempted to make one last push for another championship, but this year was a challenge from the beginning. Senior management missed a rule change (actually an enforcement of an existing rule) that cost the team a number of roster players to Unrestricted Free Agency when they mistakenly thought that they had an additional resign available. For this error Senior Management deeply apologizes to our fan base.
Management quickly identified that it had a weakness on the wings and on Left D and went into the free agent market to address these areas. We landed a number of veterans to fill holes in the roster (Vrbata, Iginla, Hartnell, Dupuis) on the wings but struck out on landing a capable Left Dman and had tyo settle for Visnovski. Even the though we acquired a number of forwards we were never able to get the forward group to gel or find consistent chemistry
Q: You made a number of moves during the regular season can you provide your rational
Hindsight being 20/20 we moved away from a trade discussion that had the potential to land a premier shutdown dman and an elite tender and this may be why we are not still playing. We were not happy with the overall output of the squad and felt we needed to bring in some more pieces to round the team out. We mortgaged a lot of our future to land Hedman, Datsyuk and Parise. All were deemed to be quality individuals that would push this group over the top.
Q: Why didn’t it work, on paper you seemed strong in all positions
Unfortunately it just never worked out, the team went into a tailspin after the acquisitions and then the infighting started. As you know we went from 1st in our conference at the trade deadline to 4rth. The coaching staff made numerous line changes but could not find any real chemistry. A rival GM, indicated that he did not remember a Crusader squad that played so inconsistently within a game as this squad that they seemed to squander leads regularly. The dressing room become fractured and well you know the rest of it.
Q: So now what: you are bleeding money, your prospect pool is depleted after years of runs at the cup.
We have spent the time looking at where we go from here. It is obvious that we need to address our salary items to ensure the long term fiscal viability of our club.
We lost $50 Million this season and our payroll was around $150 Million. We will be walking away from over $20 Million in contracts plus we will investigate moving some additional salaries.
Q: You allude to moving players, have you identified any players yet?
The players that will be made available are Datsyuk, Iginla, and Parise. Others may be identified at training camp but for now that is who we are looking to move.
Q: Why Iginla and Datsyuk?
They were promised a run at a championship, we see no reason to force them to sit the final years of their respective careers sitting through a retooling.
Q: Parise is a UFA do you think that there is a market for his services?
We strongly believe that Parise brings a complete 200 foot game and fills a special position on the left wing as one of the elite LW in the game. He has lots of miles left on the odometer. There will be interest
As a UFA, we are willing to sign and trade him if a team wants to use their UFA resign on another player.
Q: Any other information that you would like to share?
We are confident that the knowledgeable fans in Denmark will be patient as we go through the required process. We do not anticipate a long process and our plan is to be back in the elite within 2 years.
more good stuff, thanks
ReplyDelete