After having a few hours to calm down and and gain some composure, lets look some more at the signing of Marian Hossa. For whatever reason, the Blackhawks could not get a deal in place with Martin Havlat. So that left $6 Million that they had last year to play around with and 77 points to make up for. There are some good sides and some bad ones to the Hossa signing. So lets start with the positive.
The Good:
Hossa’s a hell of a replacement for Havlat.
A major concern for giving Havlat the long-term deal he was looking for had to be his reputation (well-deserved) for being fragile. In his eight years in the league, Havlat’s only averaged 59 games a year. That’s severly hurt by the 18 games he played in 05-06 and the 35 in 07-08 but he’s played over 70 games only 3 times in his career.
Compare that with Hossa, who since really joining the league in the 98-99 season has played 70 or more 9 times. He’s averaging 77 games a year and that’s brought down by the 60 he played his rookie year when he missed time with his only significant injury.
There’s also the production – both players are unstoppable when they’re on, Hossa’s just a little more “on” than Havlat. Havlat averages .84 points per game over his career, .95 over the past 5 years. Last year was his highest point total with 77 points. Hossa on the other hand averages .92 points per game over the career and over the past 5 years he’s been at 1.05 per game. That’s helped by his highest point total of his career in 06-07 when he broke into triple digits with 100 points.
If you were going to find a player to replace Havlat – congrats, you couldn’t get much better. Getting that for only a 5.2 million a year is a steal.
The Bad:
Well – the cap situation is even more of a mess. That shit ain’t good. I thought they’d only be offering a one-year deal to anyone since next year is going to be Salary Cap Doomsday with Toews, Kane and Keith all due hefty raises. With 5.2 due to Hossa now it’s going to make it a lot trickier to get all three of them signed. Sure it’s possible but all that money can’t go to just 6 players, they can’t play the whole game. Though Kane-Toews-Hossa with Campbell-Keith and Huet ain’t too bad if they could play 60 minutes.
There’s also the situation with Havlat. Like the Savard situation, it probably could have been handled better, though it’s also half Havlat’s fault for getting on twitter with his agent to confess his undying love for Chicago and the fans. It puts Tallon in a position of either signing a player he doesn’t want or letting a player walk and making him the bad guy in the eyes of the fans. Maybe all contracts should include a no-twitter clause from now on?
Lets also not forget the always the bridesmaid, never the bride aspect of Hossa. We’ve just given tons of ammunition to our enemies.. but fuck ’em.