Friday, February 20, 2009

The Trades Start


So Le Marquis de Snow just fired the first shot off the bow. Chris Campoli and Mike Comrie have been traded to the Ottawa Senators for Dean McAmmond and a first round draft pick that originated with the San Jose Sharks. This will be a late first round pick, but give credit to Garth for putting together a deal that garnered a first round pick rather than the expected second round pick that has been speculated for many of their trade bait players.

Salaries as commonly reported are as follows. Dean McAmmond is making $875,000 this season and will be an Unrestricted Free Agent (UFA) after this season. Mike Comrie is making $4,000,000 this season and will also be a UFA after this season. Chris Campoli is making $633,000 this season and is scheduled to make the same next season after which he will be a arbitration eligible Restricted Free Agent (RFA). The implications of this are that the Islanders may very well need to add payroll before the trade deadline in order to be above the "Salary Floor". Expect more trades and not just for draft picks.

So we traded a 24 year old defensemen and a 28 year old Center for a 35 year old Center and a draft pick. How does this fit in with our youth movement some might ask. NYI Five Hole's view is as follows. Mike Comrie though only 28 years old is on the downside of his career. Easy move to make as he will want a minimum of the $4 mil he made this season for future seasons. Chris Campoli, while he still has promise, is starting to show that he will at best be a team's top 4 defensemen, and maybe only a top 5. Chris Botta reported today that Campoli requested a trade a few weeks back. The first round pick will be late in that round, but could still be a huge acquisition depending on how it is used (anyone think Garth will trade up this time around...I do). Dean McAmmond is basically part of a tilted salary swap and will not be here next year. That being said, if he is a good faceoff man, this will help the Islanders from being completely blown out during the rest of the season. At best if he wins 40% of his faceoffs this will be an improvement for the team.

In summary, this seems like a can't lose deal for a team that is in last place of the entire 30 team National Hockey League.

2 comments:

  1. Okay, now why are we paying Comrie $4 million? I think they could pay me half that to look confused on the ice.

    PS: We shall see if McAmmond can rock out a face-off quite the way the unerring Brendan Witt can...

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  2. You know I almost talked about the fact that maybe Brendan Witt would not have to take faceoffs anymore

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