Archive for Unrestricted Free Agents

Happy Canada Day!!

{ July 1, 2007 @ 8:02 pm } · { Columbus Blue Jackets, Unrestricted Free Agents }
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9:56 AM ~ Alright, and now for the free agent news. I am still hoping to be home before free agency hits but it’s not looking too promising. In this mornings Dispatch they put together a list of the free agents that we might be interested in. You can check it out here also, they did an article on our young talent which is pretty refreshing to hear. Check back for updates throughout the day.

10:48 AM ~ My good buddy over at Bleu Blanc et Rouge will be liveblogging throughout the day the entire Free Agent Frenzy so be sure to check him out for updates on the entire NHL…and check me out for all your Blue Jackets news!!

10:53 AM ~ Why am I so nervous?! This is ridiculous…I know the Jackets aren’t going to make a huge splash…well at least I don’t expect them to. I know I’m not going to get Gomez…but maybe just maybe we’ll get a good young blue liner….a girl can hope right….RIGHT?!

10:56 AM ~ I have the best HLOG sisters in the world…not gonna lie. Margee lets everybody know what is going on with these UFA’s.

2:23 PM ~ Well, I am back home…and well I didn’t miss much…if anything. The Sharks re-sign Big Joe. Flames will be extending Iggy. Thrashers sign Todd White. Thrashers re-sign Dupuis. Whitney is staying in Pittsburgh. Panthers sign McLean and Zednick. Tom Poti is a Cap.

2:39 PM ~ Blues re-sign Jackman…guess I missed that one.

2:57 PM ~ Mathieu Schneider is a Duck!!

3:03 PM ~ I guess this means Scottie is hangin em up…although I don’t want to think about hockey without him…I love him.

3:40 PM ~ Oilers sign Dick Tarnstrom and Denis Grebeshkov to one year contracts…and apparently Briere is close with the Flyers to signing a deal.

3:47 PM ~ Briere a Flyer and Gomez is a Ranger

10:45 PM ~ In case you didn’t notice I gave up…

5 Questions from Jibblescribbits

{ June 19, 2007 @ 11:08 pm } · { Adam Foote, Columbus Blue Jackets, Jibblescribbits, Scott Howson, Unrestricted Free Agents }
{ Comments (2) }

Jibblescribbits recently sent me an e-mail asking about the Jackets UFA’s and some other questions…thought I would post em up just to see what you guys think of the answers. He is doing it for all the teams in the League…so if you’re interested go to his blog :)

1)There is only one UFA that I could see the Avs having any possible interest in from the Blue Jackets 4, and that would be Berard. You mentioned in your blog you thought he was injury prone and blind, I am taking it you wouldn’t recommend signing him…at what price would he be worth it? And when healthy can he still play well?

*Berard had back surgery and since he came back he’s not playing well. Back in the day he was an offensive d-man. I do not recommend signing him at all. What price would he be worth honestly not a lot maybe $600,000. No more. He really is blind in one eye…I’m not kidding.

2)Since there’s not a lot to relate to the Avs here, I’ll just ask you about the Jackets. Eyeballing it for next season it looks like you guys will be able to sign one decent FA, What do you need? Defense, or forward? Goalie? Who are you eyeballing for FA?

*Honestly we need a lot a top line center, 2 top 4 d-men, and a goalie wouldn’t hurt. My guess is that we will go for a blue liner. I wouldn’t mind us getting Hannan or Preissing…but to be honest it’s really hard for me to think about who we should get when we don’t have a GM and I have no idea what style he wants.

3) (NOTE: asked before the hiring of Howson) The big story in Columbus isn’t on the ice, but management that they cleaned house (finally) and are hiring new management. You have been profiling potential GMs on your site… who do you want them to hire? and who do you think they’ll hire? (and why?)

*Well, if that Bryan Murray stuff was true I would say him, but since it’s not I think I would like them to hire Dave King. He was our first coach and knows the organization and is a very smart hockey man. Who do I think they will hire? Scott Howson, the Assistant General Manager for the Edmonton Oilers. Only because he is a salary cap expert. Next season we will have 2 of our most paid players become UFA’s and he will have a lot of room to work….so that’s my best guess.

4) What happened to Rick Nash. He was great one season, and seems to have disappeared, making a brief cameo in the world championships. Is it just an off season, or is he regressing? What about other potential goal scorers like Zhederev, Modin and Vyborny? shouldn’t they at least be scoring more goals.

*Rick Nash…he is a great player. At times he can be very lazy. This year with Hitch as his coach he is becoming a well rounded player. Playing on the power play and the penalty kill. Hitch developed Modano the same way. He is injury prone and so he hasn’t played as many games as we would like him to. But, mark my word he is not regressing he is progressing very nicely. Vyborny is our best player…he makes great decisions on the ice…and is an amazing play maker. Zherdev is a big cancer on our team, he is lazy, has no work ethic and is selfish. I honestly think he doesn’t want to succeed with our team…because Hitch doesn’t put up with his crap. Modin, has the potential to score more goals if he had more to work with…who knows what line combinations we will have next year. *honestly this past year was awful with injures and a new coach we didn’t really have a lot of flow*

5) Every Avs fan has a soft spot for Adam Foote. He is now Columbus captain, and deservedly so. How do you feel about him? He gets kinda lost there, does he still play well, or is the new NHL showing his weaknesses?

*Adam Foote I absolutely adore him. I love his style I love the way he acts on the bench cheering guys on. I love when he is injured in the press box watching the game. I think he plays well, and still plays his gritty style. You can tell that he is getting older but I still enjoy watching him play and besides how can you not love Foote?

What’s this feeling?

{ June 15, 2007 @ 2:12 pm } · { Adam Foote, Columbus Blue Jackets, Nikolai Zherdev, Restricted Free Agents, Scott Howson, Sergei Fedorov, The GM Search, Unrestricted Free Agents }
{ Comments (4) }

I don’t even know. The more this sinks in, the more excited I am to get Scott Howson in the building and get things going. The press conference is expected to start at 1 p.m. Once he enters the building he is got a lot to do. The draft, dealing with our UFA’s and RFA’s, Free Agent Signings, and Portzline even threw out the idea of buying out Fedorov and Foote.

I’ll start with talking about the Fedorov and Foote buying out option. I love Fedorov, always have, and always will, but my love for him doesn’t change the fact that he is not worth the money. However, when it comes to Adam Foote, I have no problem keeping him. Adam Foote is our Captain and I highly doubt that they will buy him out. But, then again, I had never even thought of buying these guys out as an option.

Then, there is the Draft, it’s a week from today. He’s going to check out what our Scout’s are thinking then he is going to figure out what he wants to do. By the way, expect my Draft Post up Sunday night, it will take me a bit to do and I have quite the weekend ahead of me.

RFA’s and UFA’s while I don’t expect any of our UFA’s to be back. I am pretty sure Howson will at least consider bringing back Eriksson. He will have to make qualifying offers to our RFA’s by July 1st.

Then there is his front office. I am expecting an entire house cleaning. We need better scouts. Howson has been given the reigns to do whatever he sees fit in the front office which is a great thing.

Then he has to deal with the always lovely, Nikolai Zherdev. While, I can see his potential I think he does more harm that good so I am hoping that a trade does take place at some point soon.

No matter what you have thought about the Jackets in the past…look out for us now. We have a new General Manager. Fans have hope. We have arguably the best coach in the NHL. And, we WILL be better come this October. So, Welcome to the Columbus Blue Jackets Scott Howson!!

RFA’s and UFA’s for the CBJ

{ June 12, 2007 @ 6:26 pm } · { Anders Eriksson, Brian Boucher, Columbus Blue Jackets, Curtis Glencross, Ole-Kristian Tollefsen, Restricted Free Agents, Unrestricted Free Agents }
{ Comments (5) }

Restricted Free Agents

  • Alexander Svitov ~ $800,000.00 Center he is a great two-way center. He seems to be a little lazy and hangs out with Zherdev quite a bit. TSN says he “needs to cut down on the number of bad penalties he takes.” I would say I would have to agree with that.
  • Jaroslav Balastik ~ $525,000.00 Left/Right Wing he only played 8 games this year but from what I saw I was impressed. TSN has his potential as a third line winger. I would have to agree with that.
  • Joakim Lindstrom ~ $700,000.00 Left/Right Winger needs to put on some weight before he will be successful in the league. Having met the kid…I won’t lie he is pretty small but is pretty impressive to watch…he has lots of potential.
  • Curtis Glencross ~ $665,000.00 Left Winger I have a thing for him. Watching him since his days as a Cincinnati Mighty Duck…he continues to progress and improve. He has a lot of potential and hopefully will be up with the Jackets soon.
  • Steven Goertzen ~ $450,0000.00 Right Winger to be honest I haven’t seen him as much as I would like to…or maybe I have and I just haven’t noticed. Either way, I don’t see him making it up to the big league for a permanent job anytime soon.
  • Ole-Kristian Tollefsen ~ $526,000.00 D-man We’d be stupid to get rid of him. Aside from him being one of the nicest players ever…he is also pretty talented. He is a defensive defenseman and is a ton of fun to watch play. He doesn’t take crap from anyone and is willing to stick up for his team.
  • Aaron Johnson ~ $450,000.00 D-man great player but he still needs some work to play up in the big leagues. But, I like to think he has a lot of potential.

Unrestricted Free Agents

  • Brian Boucher ~ $475,000.00 Goalie I seriously doubt we will be re-signing him. He was picked up off waivers from the Chicago Blackhawks and although he played decently for us, he’s not what we need. Although, I won’t lie, I like him a lot better than Leclaire.
  • Derrick Walser ~ $450,000.00 D-man I don’t think I can say anything about him…I have never seen him play. Anybody got anything on him?
  • Anders Eriksson ~ $600,000 D-man I have already made my opinion on him pretty clear…we need to re-sign him…he leads our team in +/- and is a great defenseman. It would be a bad decision not to re-sign him…he is cheap…and we need the help on the blue line.
  • Bryan Berard ~ $2,500,000.00 D-man See ya buddy! Has to many injuries, is blind out of an eye…and Hitch doesn’t like him. Yeah, you’re done.

CBJ Unrestricted Free Agents

{ June 9, 2007 @ 6:18 pm } · { Anders Eriksson, Brian Boucher, Bryan Berard, Columbus Blue Jackets, HLOG, Unrestricted Free Agents }
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We don’t really have a whole lot. In fact, we have four…Anders Eriksson, Bryan Berard, Brian Boucher, and Jamie Pushor. The only one I really feel that we need to re-sign is Anders Eriksson, who lead the team in plus/minus with a +12. Which, compared to other teams is good but not great. But, on my team, is AMAZING. Eriksson averaged 20:12 time on ice. In 79 games played he had 0 goals (hey he’s a defensive defenseman) and 23 assists. I really hope that we re-sign him but I don’t know that it’s going to happen considering we don’t have a GM. I’m not bitter.
Cross posted on HLOG

CBJ News

{ May 2, 2007 @ 3:03 pm } · { Columbus Blue Jackets, Defensemen, Scott Gomez, Sergei Fedorov, Unrestricted Free Agents }
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Well my friend Michael Arace over at his blog just wrote a great one talking about The Jackets and their future. You can view the blog here. A few things he talks about I kind of want to give my opinion on.

Fedorov moving back to center. Well that’s great. But let’s face the facts. His numbers were better when he was a defensemen. I actually took the time and figured it out. Now, being the Fedorov that I am I don’t care where he goes. But, as a Blue Jackets fan I honestly would rather see him on the blue line. So, with Fedorov moving back to center, that leaves us needing another top line center. In the UFA market this coming July 1st there is going to be a bunch of them…the one’s I think we should get…Scottie Gomez. He is an amazing playmaker and I think would do wonders for our team. Some other good centers that could potentially be available are Chris Drury and Daniel Briere. I don’t care for either of these players because I hate Buffalo so I don’t care if we get them or not. But, if we do have to get one I would choose Drury…I think he is a better playmaker than Briere.

He also talks about the fact that the new GM may not be willing to spend money on getting the correct players because right now they’re losing money, the fan base is dwindling, and well we need some direction. So, I don’t know that the new GM will spend the money on another $6 million dollar center. But, we have other needs that we do need two Top 4 Defensemen. I don’t know what they are going to do. But, we need help on the blue line and if we have to wait on the center that would be fine and I could deal with that if we could get a defensemen or two.


Anyway, that’s all I really have. Hopefully, our new GM will do something great for our team. I’m not asking for a Stanley Cup, I’m just asking for a playoff spot, because damn it I want to wave a towel around my heat and say Let’s Go Jackets!! So, hopefully that day will come soon.

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