What the Hell is Going On In Dayton??? (Part Two)

The morning of July 9th was a bright, clear and comfortable time to be outdoors. As Musicmen General Manager Bill Corfield cycled along the Great Miami River Recreation Trail, his mind reviewed the 'Men's roster that would be going into the 17-18 preseason. The CCHL had finally reached the start of "Summer shut down," which allowed other issues to be the focus over the day to day operations of the league.

Centers: Sid - a top 5 player in the CCHL at almost $11 Million a year. He was worth it. Bergeron - an elite 3rd line center who seemed lost in much of the 16-17 campaign and had one year left on a $8.8 million dollar contract. Almost certainly gone after this season barring something wholly unexpected. Antoine Vermette, who returned to Dayton for the third time in the last six seasons, but was now a depth defensive centerman. Also entering the final year on his contract, his time with the team was likely drawing to a final chapter. Only Sid was permanent, well, nothing is permanent in hockey, but a core player. The rest of the guys were solid pros and Corfield wanted to make sure Vermette wound up somewhere he liked, if possible... Mattias Janmark was also a part of our future but wouldn't be on the next disk due to an injury. We wouldn't see him until the 2018 training camp.

Forwards: Panarin and Pavelski were core guys but Pavelski was getting up there in age. Artemi Panarin was coming off two strong seasons and was seventh overall in that time span in scoring. Surely, Corfield thought, Artemi Panarin wasn't going anywhere. Then there was Phil Kessel. Despite his unfairly low defensive rating every year, Kessel was a valuable member of the team. Defense and backchecking was never Phil's game but he did what we asked him to do. In the last two seasons combined, Kessel had played in 163 games, scored 60 goals, 106 assists and was a plus 142. In APBA, with the right guys, Kessel was big money. He was signed to a four-year deal after the playoffs and all sides were happy.  Nikolay Kulemin, the leader of the team's 3rd line was also looking forward to a strong season in 17-18.

Defense: Some big names... Shea Weber, Brent Burns, TJ Brodie, Andrei Markov, Francoise Beauchemin, Alec Martinez along with Mark Stuart were the returning seven blueliners. Weber was solid as hell like he always seems to be, plus Burns had turned in a Norris Trophy year and had been Dayton's UFA resign. They were expensive too, totaling over 40 Million dollars for the group. Weber and Burns were the top guys and the rest filled in nicely behind them.

Goaltending: Devan Dubnyk seemed to be on his way to an elite season until the All-Star break after which he seemed not himself. Finishing with a .923 save percentage was still very good, but hopes for a plus .930% number faded quickly. There's a huge difference between a .923 and a .930+ save percentage and Corfield had been troubled by Dubnyk's inconsistency since last January. Was he the real deal or was he a good but not great netminder benefitting from a great system. Behind him was Brian Elliot, a solid backup. Both guys were going to be UFA's after the coming season.

AS CORFIELD RODE through the Ohio countryside, he strained for ways to improve his team for the coming season. Teams like Georgetown, Calgary, Rejkjavik and Fort Erie were always good it seemed and newcomers like Hamilton, Siberia and Minnesota had all been hoarding high upside talent the past few years and everybody knew that they were going to be major factors going forward. Every year there were also a few "surprise teams" that most didn't see coming.

Dayton had virtually zero draft picks from the next two drafts. Dayton's elite prospects were all gone and those that remained were B prospects at best. Most weren't that good. Financially, Dayton was at its lowest cash reserve level of $78.4 since the late 1990's, when the league was in a very different financial place. The Musicmen had always had a LOT of cash available but it had come time to pay the hockey piper.  They'd lost $14M last season and the payroll didn't look to be that different this year.

No picks or prospects to swap for important pieces and the money was looking rough.

Bill took a break by the Taylorsville Dam on Route 40, just North of Dayton and sat on a bench. He sat there for about an hour playing different scenarios out in his mind. Did he trade a big fish to get 2-3 lesser fishes that might produce a net gain? He had a good goalie but not a great one and his 3rd line needed major work, Bergeron and Vermette, while good defensively, brought almost no offense for the coming year. His top line would be unstoppable, but after that - there were holes and questions all throughout the lineup.

He thought back to the Summer of 2012 after Dayton had won their third Cup. While different, there were similarities to this year's situation. Aging team core, payroll sky high, big name prospects and draft picks shipped out to win then. Win they did. That off-season, Corfield developed a plan to blow it all up in the first half of the 2012-13 CCHL season. Which they did. Move anybody and everybody out the door to the highest bidder for the sake of the future.

Dayton had drafted well in the 2013 draft after the fire sale, grabbing eight kids who would be future NHL-ers. That retooling had set the table for his recent success.

It worked then...

It could work again...

BACK on his bike, about 15 miles from his home, it was decided the pros outweighed the cons and the decision had been made. After the disc was released, Dayton would first put Shea Weber on the block and see who was interested. Then, after that, they would send out a larger trade block with everybody else except Panarin. Even that was flexible.

"I've always said be willing to trade anybody if the return is right..."

The new APBA disk was released in the first week of August.

On August 6th, Dayton sent out an email to the league alerting them that defenseman Shea Weber was available.

On August 13th, Shea Weber, Antoine Vermette and $10,000,000 were traded to the Calgary Chinook for Sean Monahan, a few role players and six late round draft picks.

On August 13th, the larger and second trade block went out to the league with everyone on it.

In the afternoon of August 13th, Dayton traded Sidney Crosby, Andrei Markov and $3.75M to CGY for Alex Barkov, Ivan Provorov, Jonathon Drouin and a 6th round draft pick.

Also on the 13th, Brent Burns was traded to the Fort Erie Falcons for Nate MacKinnon.

Next, Artemi Panarin was moved to the Chinook for Dylan Larkin, Travis Sanheim and the rights to DAY 2nd in the 2019 CCHL Draft.

Dubnyk and Bergeron were then moved to the Minnesota Norsemen for Jake Guentzel, prospect Dante Fabbro and Blake Comeau and Jimmy Howard.

Joe Pavelski and a 3rd was traded to Calgary for former 19th over all pick Evgeny Svechinov and several additional mid round picks from CGY.

Next, Martinez and Kulemin were dealt to the Hammerheads for a 2nd and 3rd rounder.

Howard was sent to the Chinook for prospect and former 2nd round pick, defenseman Marcus Pettersson.

In all, over a dozen current Musicmen were traded away that week. The roster virtually turned over, the only players remaining from the Cup championship team were Brian Elliot, Phil Kessel and reserve forward Mattias Janmark.

Reaction was swift. Most people tipped their hats to Eugene Yip, GM of the Chinook who walked away with most of the core of Dayton's Cup team and when layered onto what Yip already had in house, people just shook their heads. Calgary has to be the clear favorite to win the Cup next Spring.

A few GM's whispered that Calgary had certainly gone all in with these moves, but has sent away a ton of youth with elite upside. In the end, it was a price he felt comfortable paying and the guys from Dayton will perform and produce. Does that mean a championship? Maybe...

PART THREE

Fans explode, young players arrive for camp and Phil keeps his bags packed....

(Part three will be published August 29th, 2017)

Georgetown Millers: The Week That Was

After a hectic day 2 weeks ago of moving out depth players with expensive contracts to acquire depth players with cheaper contracts (and backup G Peter Budaj) things were a bit quieter in the Miller’s front office this past week. The week’s transactions are summarized below:

GEO trades B. Lovejoy & GEO 10th-18, GEO 11th-18, GEO 12th-18, GEO 10th-19, GEO 11th-19 & GEO 12th-19 to DAY for Yan Pavel Laplante-p…

Lovejoy had lost his starting job with the emergence of Brett Pesce, and his inability to play any position aside from RD made him unsuitable for the 7th Defenseman role. He was packaged along with several late round picks (so Dayton would take on his complete salary) for a long-shot Winger prospect in Yan Pavel Laplante. YPL scored a bit in juniors but not in his first pro season, but his size, skating ability and willingness to mix it up make him a potential bottom 6 NHL forward.

GEO signs M. Barberio to a 1 yr., $700K contract…

Barberio was signed to replace Lovejoy. He will compete with earlier signing Ben Chairot for the 7th Dman slot. A decent showing could see him re-signed as an RFA at season’s end.

DAY trades B. Comeau to GEO for GEO 4th-18 & GEO 9th-18…

Looking for more depth in their bottom 6 forwards and on the penalty-kill, GHC sent a couple more mid to late-round 2018 draft picks to Dayton for Blake Comeau. Although his days of occasionally popping 12 to 20 goals a season are gone, Comeau is still a reliable checking forward and will supplement the club’s penalty kill unit.

The club has taken some flack recently for not bringing in bigger names to keep up with Calgary and other teams. GM Chris Kash spoke to reporters to address the criticism.

“I understand the concerns of our fans but I want to reassure them that we are staying true to our vision of how we want to keep this club competitive in the short and the long term. We are blessed to be breaking in 4 exceptional young talents this season in Teravainen, Faksa, Pesce and Orlov. To properly give these guys a chance to grow and develop we felt it necessary to remove any internal hurdles and just let them play. With Brock Boeser expected to play a role next season, and other young guys like Anders Bjork, Janne Kuokkanen, Samuel Girard and Filip Hronek being ready in 2 to 3 years, we are transitioning to a younger team. We’ve spoken to the veteran players about it and they are on board. We will of course reassess our progress at defined points during this upcoming season and if it improves the team enough we have plenty of payroll room to add more players.”

Recently traded Winger Gustav Nyquist responded to reports that he was dealt partly because he came to camp overweight and out of shape. Nyquist said “ Once the trade to Georgetown was done, I came down to look for a home and get to know the area. No one prepared me for Hot Browns and Burgoo being on every restaurant menu, and a trip to northern Kentucky introduced me to Goetta and Grippo’s potato chips, plus the craft beer scene here is amazing. So yeah I gained a few pounds, and now I’ve got to find a way to get Dad’s Beer Cheese sent to me in Ontario, but I regret nothing.”

Victoria Selling Off?

Victoria selling off ?

The local fishwrap lead story in the sports section is all about the Ronin and how high level talent seems to be heading out the door. Gone are the top six center D Krejci, starting netminder B Holtby and now A Wennberg another top level pivot is joining the rush out of the lockeroom. Season ticket holders are up in arms, especially when with the increased seat license fee scheduled for this upcoming season.

The leader of the Ronin fan club has recently gone to Twitter saying he was going to step down after next season. Many are thinking of joining him and supporting other teams. Prices are up, yet the team is trading off key assets. Its not a very promising situation.

“Few teams have a better overall win loss record than the Victoria Ronin over the years,” the owner was quoted as saying. “Our past efforts of high profile spending have cost the team especially when it comes to the bottom line. A closer look at the financial situation of the team does seem to indicate a trend of losing money, yet the team has never even been to the finals, let alone won one. So I decided to take a less active roll on the hockey operations side and stop forcing things,” he said.

“Starting a season ago the front office made the decision to part ways with more expensive players on the wrong side of their careers in favor of younger players who are not only more affordable but on the upswing,” said an unnamed official. “The feeling was that the culture had to change, which starts at the top.” Gone are players like Rick Nash, Tyler Myers, Paul Stastny & Captain Canada Sidney Crosby just to name a few.

Looking closely at the situation Victoria has refrained from bidding on any high priced free agents for the past few UFA seasons. Instead shoring up holes with reasonably priced free agents while waiting for kids to brew. The team now boasts some reasonably talented kids with more in the pipeline. This years M designations include William Carrier, Tyler Graovac who both changed NHL teams. Gustav Forsling, Brett Kulak, plus former Dayton farmhands Scott Mayfield and Juuse Saros. “Most of these kids are not world beaters,” a league official said “but they could find themselves with a full time job and who knows where they take their careers from there.”

Core players like Esa Lindell, Jacob Trouba, and Evgeni Kuznetsov have very high ceilings. They are now joined by former Puffin Ryan Nugent Hopkins and Vlad Namestnikov. The most recent deal landed former Ronin Victor Rask from the Norsemen. The team has also picked up some additional quality draft picks and are hopeful that Keiffer Bellows will get his act together in Portland, hopefully playing top line minutes there.

The old guard anchored by J Benn, C Kreider and T Hamonic will now be asked to take more of a leadership role and indeed Jamie Benn has been named team captain, with Hamonic wearing the A. Kreider reportedly passed on the other A in favor of former Falcon Wayne Simmonds. Simmonds was out of town and was rumored to involved in trade talks with a few teams. “Still a Ronin and looking forward to next season,” he wrote via twitter.

The trouble is that the fans have been promised this before only to see the team turn around and trade off young promising talent in favor of a short term fix. “Those days are gone,” said a league analyst. “The team now features a much lower payroll and younger players. The issue is if the team will be competitive this season which unfortunately comes with the increased ticket prices.”

“If the team can make the playoffs, turn a profit and continue to benefit from some good luck, then things could be very different in a season or two,” a spokesman said. “The jury is out on that while the team fine tunes its efforts in the preseason. It should boil down to Steve Mason getting the job done or if the situation requires the calling up of former Musicman Juuse Saros.”

“We like our chances going forward,” the GM said. “It hurts having to lose such quality players but the plan is to come back even stronger. Kind of like the tide. The team is deeper and from top to bottom has good quality talent that will improve over the coming seasons.” When asked for a comment about the situation in nets the GM said “we have every confidence in Steve Mason and look forward to seeing him helping us make the playoffs like we usually do.” Ticket prices are scheduled to go up in September.

What the Hell is Going in Dayton??? (Part One)

 

  PART ONE: IT WAS THE MORNING after the Dayton Musicmen had defeated the Georgetown Millers in a thrilling game seven at the Soundstage in Dayton, OH. The parade was scheduled for the the following evening as GM Bill Corfield sat quietly in his home office, enjoying a quiet moment to reflect on the season.

 The phone rang, and it was Head Scout for the Musicmen, Baz Bastein.

Bastein congratulated Corfield on adding a 4th Cup to his resume but then told him something he didn't expect to hear.

"Bill, you have to break up the team..."

Corfield said nothing.

Bastein repeated his comment, "You heard me, you have to break up the team...and do it before next season starts. If you don't, it'll be a cold day in Dayton before you ever win another one my friend."

Corfield took a drink from his glass and ask why would he need to do that before next season began let alone at any time in the near future?

"Look at your contracts. Burnsy is your UFA resign this year... that's easy. Next year is when it gets dicey. Bergeron, Dubnyck, Elliot, Pavelski and Weber are all UFA's after next season. Guys know you can only keep one. Their value drops a ton the further you go into the season."

"You're getting old fast... Sid's the best player in the league, but once his production starts slip - and it will sooner or later - his salary will make him almost untradeable unless you cover a big chunk of his salary, and you can't really afford that, can you?"

Corfield paused a moment and said, "Don't I have a history of figuring these things out? We're still fucking good, Baz..."

"Yes, yes we are boss, but look at our prospects. It wasn't that long ago we had more prospects than anyone other team in the league, now we're near the bottom. We have zero top notch prospects, they've all been traded away."

"Face it, Bill... if you don't act soon  these assets you see on our team today will bring you pennies on the dollar. The league's too good...guys have been around awhile and Matty's only lining up strong new guys to come on board.

Financially, we're also in a different place than we usually are... all these debts are coming due soon. It's my opinion, if we don't act aggressively soon - in the next few months - it's going to get really bad."

Corfield paused a moment and sighed, "I know Baz...I've known it since Christmas. Everything you just said is spot on and true. I've been thinking about this for  a while."

Once the new disk comes out, I need to start marketing these guys to the correct teams and getting the most we can for them while they're still really good. The fans will shit themselves, but I'll take the heat. We've given them four championships and almost a fifth back in the first season of the league but Dave beat me."

"Thank God, I wasn't looking forward to fighting with you all summer about this..."

"No problem" Corfield said with a laugh...

PART TWO

"Here's my plan..."

(Part two will be published August 22nd, 2017...)

CCHL Battle Royal 2017!

This offseason has been busy for a number of teams.  Most notably, last year's defending Kehler Cup champions, the Dayton Musicmen, have opted to rebuild rather than try to defend their title.  This would normally be great news for the top teams in the league, but the problem is that going into this upcoming season, the battle for the cup will be like a WWF Battle Royal!  So many teams have loaded up in the hopes of capturing the Kehler Cup.  Some of the top teams are looking to capture the Kehler Cup for the first time!

One team that made significant moves are the Calgary Chinook (or should we say the Musicmen West).  They have gone on a shopping spree of former Musicmen.  Calgary acquired Shea Weber, Antoine Vermette, Sidney Crosby, Andrei Markov, Artemi Panarin and Joe Pavelski.  GM Eugene Yip is poised to try to repeat the success of the Musicmen with their players!  Eugene has built a large surplus of talent to allow him to make such moves.  They very well could be the team to beat.

Another team with a recent busy offseason is another contender for the cup, the Hamilton Tigers.  GM Chuck Taylor made significant moves earlier in the offseason, and is continuing to tweak and upgrade his roster.  With depth at C, GM Taylor traded Evgeni Malkin for Patrick Kane, providing some help at RW.  The Tigers also acquired some depth at D by acquiring Brayden Coburn from Georgetown.

Never to be outdone in terms of the number of trades, GM Matt Young made a number of key moves to push his team back into cup contention by acquiring key assets like Jordan Eberle, Brent Burns, Alex Gogligoski (who did not even get a chance to take a breath as he was immediately traded again), Evander Kane, Gustav Nyquist and Blake Wheeler.  GM Young is always tweaking his roster and he is hoping that with Copenhagen retired and Dayton rebuilding that this may finally be his year!

Former champions, the Reykjavik Puffin, have made a few significant moves.  They had made a big splash in acquiring stud dman, Victor Hedman earlier in the year.  GM Chris Wolter then used some of this ridiculous depth at RW to acquire MVP candidate Evgeni Malkin.  GM Wolter is hoping that Malkin's leadership can help the Puffin recapture their glory.

The second best team in the league last year, the Georgetown Millers, have not made any significant moves this offseason, but have fine tuned their roster.  GM Kash acquired some goaltending depth with Peter Budaj and Anton Khudobin, and signing Ben Chiarot to replace the traded Brayden Coburn.  GM Kash is counting on his existing team to capture the Kehler Cup with his nemesis Musicmen seemingly on the decline.

The Minnesota Norsemen also vaulted themselves into not only playoff contention but possible cup consideration by acquiring arguably the best 2-way forward in the CCHL, Patrice Bergeron, and Vezina tropy candidate Devan Dubnyk.  Minnesota has a young,  and up and coming young team that will certainly make some noise this year.  Bergeron's leadership will help bring along the wealth of young talent that the Norsemen have, namely Anders Lee, Sebastian Aho, Mitch Marner and Brandon Carlo.  The success of this team all depends on how well those youngsters do.

Finally, we have another up and coming team, the Siberia Icecats.  GM Saouaf has been stockpiling picks and talent and has not been afraid to use it this year to give the team a shot at the cup.  Anchored by generational talent, Connor McDavid, GM Saouaf has put together a solid team.  We spoke with GM Saouaf and this is what he had to say.  "I have seen what the other top teams in the league have been doing and I knew that if the Icecats were going to be successful, I had to improve our roster.  My goal has been to not simply be a top heavy team, but to build a team from top to bottom that can match up with anyone in the league offensively and defensively.  I want to create a matchup nightmare for the other teams."  Indeed, it appears that GM Saouaf has done that.  His recent acquisitions of Alex Steen, Mark Stone and Adam Lowry has allowed the Icecats to roll out 3 solid scoring lines, while helping to improve the team's penalty killing.  Upgrading Tyson Barrie with Jared Spurgeon has provided the Icecats with a formidable defensive roster also.  GM Saouaf continued, "I hated having to trade away key, young talent and picks, but you have to give to get.  I wish Tyson, Brett, Nick and the others well in Ottawa and I hope they flourish there".

Well sports fans, this upcoming season may be one that is unparalleled in terms of competition in the CCHL.  Who will outlast the others and be crowned the Kehler Cup champion?  Time will tell, but get that popcorn ready and bring it on!

Written by Silvio Saouaf/GM of the Siberia Icecats...

Multiple blockbuster trades shake up CCHL in preseason

The Chinook Central

(This weekly column focus on the Calgary Chinooks weekly update as well as other tidbits around the league)

Multiple blockbuster trades shake up CCHL in preseason
August 13th, 2017

Several teams wasted no time in preparing for this season chase for the cup.  Some of the major trades were made between the Calgary Chinook and the Dayton Musicmen.

DAY trades S. Weber, A. Vermette & $10M to CGY for S. Monahan, F. Tyutin, T. Purcell, J. Pominville & CGY 10th-18, CGY 11th-18, CGY 12th-18, CGY 10th-19, CGY 11th-19 & CGY 12th-19...

DAY trades S. Crosby, A. Markov & $3.75M to CGY for A. Barkov, I. Provorov, J. Drouin, & CGY 6th-18...

DAY trades A. Panarin to CGY for Dylan Larkin, Travis Sanheim-p & DAY 2nd-19...

DAY trades J. Pavelski & DAY 3rd-19 to CGY for Evgeny Svechinov-p, CGY 7th-18, CGY 8th-18 & CGY 9th-18...

Four of Dayton's best players that help the Musicmen win the cup last season were traded to the Chinooks for up and coming youth and prospects.  The Chinooks added arguably the best two way center in Crosby, Russian elite sniper in the making Panarin and seasoned veteran Pavelski to the fold.  They had combined for 396 points in 82 games last season.  "Thank you for the Chinooks organization in allowing me the flexibly in making trades like this" said GM Eugene Yip when introducing the new players in yesterday press conference.  "The organization and I have consent that our cup winning window is now, and this should be something that show our fans that this team wants to bring the cup home for the first time to Calgary."

"Crosby despite in the league for over 10 seasons, he is only 30 and in his prime.  Sidney has improved his game tremendously this few seasons, he is the best two way center in the league right now period."  replied Yip "For the last few drafts we have great track records in identifying players like Larkin, Monahan, Provorov, Svechinov, Pastrnak. That's why we have assets in making trades that can benefit us today. "

"This season is going to be fun for CCHL fans.  Powerhouse like the Puffins got better over the summer by getting Malkin and Hedman to their already strong roster.  Teams like the Fort Erie getting Sequin, Burns, Gibson, Hamilton Tigers getting Patrick Kane, Joe Thornton. The Norsemen went from a basement team last year to a playoff team by getting Bergeron and Dubnyk.  The Siberia Icecat's McDavid led team that would be the cup contender soon.

We can sense that the balance of power has shifted when the Musicmen started their fire sale.  It's (a) free for all for the cup this season and I am glad the Chinooks in being part of it."

DAY awards its position upgrade to....

AP SPORTS - DAYTON, OH

The Dayton Musicmen, reigning CCHL champs, have released a statement on how they will apply their ratings upgrade for the upcoming season.

 The Musicmen have a reputation for trying to keep the "big picture" in focus at all times. While we were thrilled to overcome a tough Georgetown team last Spring to win our fourth CCHL championship, we realized we had some cracks in our foundation.

  To build last season's team, we spent a lot of our youth and draft picks to acquire the guys we did. We also spent a ton of cash. Like we've done before, we've decided we need to take a step backwards this season,
retool and look to the future.

 We can announce this morning that Shea Weber has been traded to the Calgary Chinook for Sean Monahan. The details of the trade will be announced formally Sunday after the waiver draft, but its a package of multiple players changing teams and Dayton acquiring several draft picks, as well.

 Last night, we placed most of the high end talent under contract on the market. Everyone is available. Those of you who have followed Musicmen hockey for the last 15 years know that our philosophy has always been aggressive when it comes to making trades. Winning the Kehler Cup last year does nothing to change our core approach to how we run this franchise.

Given the interest in Sidney Crosby - and realizing that there were several options on how to best utilize our
ratings adjustment this season - we've submitted the paper work to the league elevating Crosby's defense on
this disk from a 2 up to a 3 rating.

We feel doing this will add further value to his marketability and benefit us should we decide to trade him.