What actually happened?

[Chef de Cuisine]

A lot of us young guys don't know the details of how we got put into the abyss we were in since 2006. Whenever the subject hits we kinda default to just saying 2006 management was just *******.. so can anyone please explain, including details about each guy that was traded from the 06 team and any moves of significance in the years after?

Thanks guys, love you all

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[McFlyingV]

A lot of us young guys don't know the details of how we got put into the abyss we were in since 2006. Whenever the subject hits we kinda default to just saying 2006 management was just *******.. so can anyone please explain, including details about each guy that was traded from the 06 team and any moves of significance in the years after?

Thanks guys, love you all

Pronger trade demand had a trickle effect on a lot of guys not re-signing. The team was built around a lot of guys on rental/last year of their contracts (Samsonov, Peca, Spacek). The team invested heavily in players like Horcoff and Pisani who got overpaid based off short samples of great play. As time went on more players got dealt who were underperforming/not going to re-sign. The team was no powerhouse even in the 2006 run. They were a team that caught fire and clicked at the right time carried by an elite #1D in Pronger and a hot clutch goaltender in Roloson. We had no real #1C. We had no real superstar forward. Just a bunch of guys who worked their ***** off and had enough skill and chemistry to come together as a group.

Pronger demanding a trade was the beginning of the end for the team. As I said slowly guys either left or were shipped out and the team did a horrible job in drafting and in identifying prospect talent when they did trade away roster players for futures.

All in all the team lacked high end talent to begin with, and without Pronger just couldn't cut it and the cupboards were pretty barren to begin with. They tried to fill those holes through desperate moves like offer sheets but it proved no use so they had to hit rock bottom accumulating high 1st round picks to start building any sort of high end talent within the organization as Edmonton was not very high on any high profile free agents list either.

 

[Mcnotloilersfan]

So much of the blame for me goes to Craig MacTavish. The only good thing that he did for this organization was draft Leon Draisaitl.

During the decade of suck, Edmonton gained a reputation for 'ruining prospects'. I blame that reputation solely on Craig.

It starts with Sam Gagner (and the kids around him in Nilsson, Cogliano, Smid). Craig did right by him in his rookie year and let him do his thing in the NHL. But then he immediately sucked the life out of these players and tried to turn them into something they weren't. They couldn't play his style, but weren't allowed to play to their strengths and eventually lost confidence.

We began to head in the right direction in the Tambo/Renney/Kreuger era. Hall, RNH, Yak, Ebs, Schultz. These players were being allowed to play to their strengths while slowly having the 2 way part of the game taught to them. Kreuger had them all looking like future stars in the lockout year (Gagner too).

Then for no damn good reason, MacT gets put in charge, fires our wonderful coach and puts his clone in Eakins in. Fortunately for Hall, he was too far in to be ruined, but the rest fell apart. Once again, they were forced to become players that they weren't and lost all confidence.

I'm not a fan of Torts, but early in this big win streak he said that he had to learn to let players play to their strengths, and boy is it working (including for our old friend Sam Gagner).

Johnston in Pittsburgh came in and told players to play to their strengths, look how well Schultz is doing.

I'm not sold that Mclellan is the perfect fit here, but he's letting McDavid and Draisaitl play to their strengths, and its fun to watch! (I honestly think Nelson would have been a better fit for this team)

 

[Mr Sakich]

to me, a lot of the blame was with katz. the minute he decided to build his new barn, the org committed to full scale tear down. This was the first time any team deliberately tanked multiple seasons. It seemed like they did not care about the on ice product at northlands and were saving the glory for the new rink

they had a rabid fan base who would support that if they thought they were building to something truly special. If it wasn't for lucking out on connor, the process would have been a complete failure

 

[Mr Snrub]

IT WAS IN
tbh it was definitely in pronger, but idgaf since he's just a player nor a person

 

[BoldNewLettuce]

-prongers wife
-an organization of smart hockey minds who suffering from OBC promotion (the Peter Principle)
-a decade of flawed reactionary leadership and circle jerking at the first sniff of potential success.
-toby petersen
-smittys tears
-Katzs giant genetically engineered ginger son.
-two grown men seriously considering renting a barn to fight in.
-linus Omark spinorama
-paajarvi, yakupov, Gagner, MAP, brule.
-Doughty, Thornton, Getzlaf, the Sedins
-Bettman
-injuries
-trash
-concussions
-Ralph Kruger skype firing
-Yakupov cellys and sideshow
-Norris Schultz
-petry, Schultz, dubnyk, Gagner, yak, mps for scraps.
-mcdavid lottery
-nicholson, chiarelli, mclellan, lucic,..
-katzs smug face

 

[Jumptheshark]

A lot of us young guys don't know the details of how we got put into the abyss we were in since 2006. Whenever the subject hits we kinda default to just saying 2006 management was just *******.. so can anyone please explain, including details about each guy that was traded from the 06 team and any moves of significance in the years after?

Thanks guys, love you all

In detail? It would be longer then war and peace! Management and ownership did not embrace the rebuild and didnot develop the picks we got. They tossed ten years of first rounders into the deep end and let them sink. Management wad egotistical in the belief they knew best

 

[tiger_80]

Pronger trade demand had a trickle effect on a lot of guys not re-signing. The team was built around a lot of guys on rental/last year of their contracts (Samsonov, Peca, Spacek). The team invested heavily in players like Horcoff and Pisani who got overpaid based off short samples of great play. As time went on more players got dealt who were underperforming/not going to re-sign. The team was no powerhouse even in the 2006 run. They were a team that caught fire and clicked at the right time carried by an elite #1D in Pronger and a hot clutch goaltender in Roloson. We had no real #1C. We had no real superstar forward. Just a bunch of guys who worked their ***** off and had enough skill and chemistry to come together as a group.

Pronger demanding a trade was the beginning of the end for the team. As I said slowly guys either left or were shipped out and the team did a horrible job in drafting and in identifying prospect talent when they did trade away roster players for futures.

All in all the team lacked high end talent to begin with, and without Pronger just couldn't cut it and the cupboards were pretty barren to begin with. They tried to fill those holes through desperate moves like offer sheets but it proved no use so they had to hit rock bottom accumulating high 1st round picks to start building any sort of high end talent within the organization as Edmonton was not very high on any high profile free agents list either.

They also traded Ryan Smyth in early 2007. So the reasons for the dark decade basically boil down to 1) Losing several key players (Pronger, Peca, Spacek, Samsonov, Smyth).
2) poor drafting going all the way to the early 2000s. Mikhnov, Hemsky, Pouliot, Dubnyk, Schremp, Cogliano, Chorney, Petry was the prospect pool they had to work with.
3) Poor professional scouting--the players they brought in were of varying quality but in general didn't amount to much. Moreover the few good players they did acquire (Cole, Visnovsky, Souray) did not stay or were soon traded for downgrades. E.g. Visnovsky acquaired for Greene and Stoll was soon traded for Whitney, who fizzled out.
4) flawed team conception--building the team around a core of speedy small forwards without adequate defense and good goal-tending.
5) Not enough quality veterans to support the rebuilt. I.e. the not so talented Horcoff and Staios (not Jagr or Thornton) were expected to provide leadership to a group of not so talented youngsters (Hall, RNH and Eberle) rather than Crosby, Ovechkin or McDavid.

 

[Staghorn]

In detail? It would be longer then war and peace! Management and ownership did not embrace the rebuild and didnot develop the picks we got. They tossed ten years of first rounders into the deep end and let them sink. Management wad egotistical in the belief they knew best

I think after the Pronger debacle, Katz's ego desire to hang out with the Kevin Lowes and MacTavishes Old Boys Club instead of listening to anyone else on earth and / or evaluating results and getting REAL hockey minds in is what cemented this team in a decade of futility... It is all on Katz being a failure as an owner, and everything else spins from that.

 

[CantHaveTkachev]

the Oilers traded two key franchise players...Pronger and Smyth....for PEANUTS

-Pronger for "magic beans" ie. Smid, Lupul, 1st rounder traded and Jordan Eberle

-Smyth was traded for Nilsson, O'Marra, 1st rounder becoming Alex Plante


again, they traded two franchise players for basically Eberle...those are franchise crippling moves

then after that it was Lowe/Tambo chasing the dream with Hossa and Heatley instead of building a competitive team
then one mistake after another including poor trades, poor UFA signings and poor coaching hirings and firings

it takes a lot of poor decisions to be awful for 10 years but the Oilers managed to do that

 

[Mr Positive]

2007 and 2008 weren't horrible. That was still a good team with Horcoff, Roloson, Smith, Souray, Vishnovsky, etc.

Good management might have turned it around with that decent core. Also, ownership at that time didn't spend money on the team, especially in terms of development and scouting. When Katz took control, spending improved (which takes time to show it's value btw), but Lowe convinced him to sewer the team after Quinn failed as coach, seeing it as a good opportunity to rebuild through the draft. A big issue there is that they say you build from the goalie out, and they weren't good drafts for D during the early years of the rebuild. Dubnyk was still a pretty high end prospect at that if I recall so him being our future goalie was okay to assume from them, I guess. However, a good goalie with poor D won't do jack so we basically were throwing a young goalie to the wolves, albeit sharing the job and us sheltering him as much we could in favour of Khabi, etc.

A lot of our assets evaporated. Buffalo had the fortune of trading guys like Vanek and Miller. Horcoff got a shoulder injury that cut his performance. Hemsky could not stay healthy and lagged in production as a result. Souray got injured before we could trade him. Vishnovsky became Whitney, who quickly descended into injury problems. We walked away from Roloson, who was old but still had a few good years left in him, but replaced him with the oft-injured Khabi. I recall Gagner getting a serious ankle injury that hurt his production pretty bad. No one will pay up for a player who is damaged goods. No one. The one major asset we got back was trading Penner for Klefbom, but of course that was a future asset so that trade only hurt us in the short term.

 

[oilinblood]

To be honest... during the SCF i had a long chat with my friends about trading Pronger.
06 was the first full season of the cap and we had a bunch of players who were UFAs and RFAs. There was no way we were going to keep everyone.

My pitch to my friends was that we should trade Pronger. He was at the top of his game but for some reason he was never the leader in the room. guys just didnt look up to him the way you would think.

For UFAs i wanted to retain Peca, Samsonov (chemistry with Hemmer), Roloson and Spacek. RFAs we had to resign i think were Hemsky Stoll Horcoff

UFAs i was prepared to see walk were guys like Pisani, Harvey, bit players

Trading Pronger (before anyone heard of a trade request through the media) would have netted a big return (out the window when the media got wind of the request and that he wanted the trade to be to Cali).

I just didnt see the Oilers succeeding to keep Pronger (proven to be good prediction)


Spacek-Samsonov-Peca all left for the east. 3 of the 4 important assets i wanted to retain.

Pisani was re-signed for predictably far more than he was worth. We managed to keep Roli which gave us better results than we deserved on most nights.

worst of all...Igor Ulanov left *shakes head in sadness*

basically we had an exodus in 06 after game 7. guys cleaned out their lockers and wanted to go east.

---------------
just for example but i was pitching the idea of trading Prong to Philly(Richards main piece), Bos (Bergeron main piece) or MTL... MTL i obviously felt Price (05 draft asset) would need to be part of the package. Obviously i would never think to trade him inter-conference. I also expected a BIG package...nothing like what we got.
The big reason the return was so low for pronger was him controling where he went AND the media reporting the trade request and the limited locations CP was willing to report to.

i was genuinely shocked to hear the trade request so soon after our elimination. i knew right away the return would stink. the fact the ORIGINAL request happened in january was when i started getting angry. if that was the case than there should have been more communication with prongers reps (the reason CP camp brought the request to the media was lack of communication). if lowe had continued to dialogue with CPs reps i believe the return on a Pronger trade could have been 3X or 4X what we got. he had the best contract in the league and was the most dominant player imho.


---------------------------

Also Lowe has a tracck record of taking things waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too emotionally as a manager. Part of the future offer sheets and UFA shenanigans was Lowe trying to give the finger to teams he felt took advantage of the oilers and perhaps interfered with their assets.

Penner was good here though. i was not happy to see him leave.

 

[tiger_80]

To be honest... during the SCF i had a long chat with my friends about trading Pronger.
06 was the first full season of the cap and we had a bunch of players who were UFAs and RFAs. There was no way we were going to keep everyone.

My pitch to my friends was that we should trade Pronger. He was at the top of his game but for some reason he was never the leader in the room. guys just didnt look up to him the way you would think.

For UFAs i wanted to retain Peca, Samsonov (chemistry with Hemmer), Roloson and Spacek. RFAs we had to resign i think were Hemsky Stoll Horcoff

UFAs i was prepared to see walk were guys like Pisani, Harvey, bit players

Trading Pronger (before anyone heard of a trade request through the media) would have netted a big return (out the window when the media got wind of the request and that he wanted the trade to be to Cali).

I just didnt see the Oilers succeeding to keep Pronger (proven to be good prediction)


Spacek-Samsonov-Peca all left for the east. 3 of the 4 important assets i wanted to retain.

Pisani was re-signed for predictably far more than he was worth. We managed to keep Roli which gave us better results than we deserved on most nights.

worst of all...Igor Ulanov left *shakes head in sadness*

basically we had an exodus in 06 after game 7. guys cleaned out their lockers and wanted to go east.

That's probably not supported by evidence. Pronger was maybe the best defenseman in the world at the time and the Oilers got him for peanuts (Brewer, Lynch, and Wojwitka). The equaivalent today would be getting Weber (Pronger was actually quite a bit better than Weber) for Klefbom, Gryba, and Simpson. That's the trade you make every day.

 

[Topkatz]

I started following the Oilers in 2005. I didn't grow up with hockey but i've followed a number of different sports and there are recurring important things in all of them.

The number 1 problem that the Oilers have had is that their organizational planning was very poor. There was an obsession with the 'Detroit model' of development. This never planned out simply because there was not the quality of personel with the Oilers than there was with Detroit at the time. And since some of those people in Detroit have left where are they now? This was the biggest mistake and I think most of this can be leveled at Kevin Lowe.

Number 2 is the defence. The defence was terrible after Pronger was traded. We had Smith and a couple of others but Pronger left a gaping void that was never filled. Pronger did EVERYTHING really really well. The Oilers did not have the depth of D to pick up the slack and seemingly did not take this seriously until Chiarelli was hired.

Number 3 was the lack of experience in the team. Other teams develop young players alongside vets. They Oilers have had fewer vets to bring the young guys along and ultimately the young players were straddled with too much expectation too soon. Also there was not the level of experience needed to get the team out of a hole and the whole team cascaded as soon as something didn't go their way. Hall was actually part of the problem in this.

Number 4 is bad luck. This is not talked about very much but the Oilers actually have been unlucky (as well as bad, see next point!) in the draft. When the Oilers have picked #1, it has been a player who really a lot of years might not have gone #1 in others. Not the case with McDavid and maybe Hall (although there was Seguin which in hindsight was probably a better pick at the time). Also forwards have been available when defencemen were needed.

Number 5 is scouting. Scouting in general has not been good.

Number 6 is goalies. Rollie was the last goalie before Talbot that the team could rely on. Again there never seemed to be a focus on going out and getting a good goalie

Number 7 is unreliable coaching. This is tricky because I think there have been coaches on the Oilers who have been good but just not given the time to succeed. Ralph Kruger for instance.

Number 8 is the Old Boys Club. Guys getting jobs because of who they were rather than what they knew. If you are a successful organization this is forgivable because there is a culture of winning already there, not when you are a bottom of the standings team.

Number 9 is the focus on pure skill over physical players. Especially in our divisions. See number 1.

But yeah I think there have been many many problems on the Oilers which has been why it has been so hard to fix. I believe we have taken the right steps to fix a lot of these though recently so I am a lot happier with the direction of the team.

 

[Cawz]

Pronger bailing on the team should have forced a full tear-down, but management went on the ban-aid approach instead, trying to sign Heatley, Nylander, Hossa, Chara, as well as offersheeting Vanek and Penner.

Once the rebuild was forced on management, they didnt have any good veterans to support the kids. Horcoff was probably the only person who was good in that role, but becasue of his contract and mis-use, that was always hanging over his head.

They went all-in on Schultz, thinking he would be the Neidermeyer clone that he was projected to be by the media hype. They also continued the coach carousel by signing Eakins, thinking he would be a progressive forward-thinking coach that he was projected to be by the media hype. Dont believe the hype.

Edmonton is a tough sell. They made an offer to Chara, but instead of coming to a team fresh of the SC Final in Edmonton, he signed with a non-playoff team in Boston. Most players either want to play in the east or somewhere warm, so chasing free-agents to come to a destination like Edmonton is a tough assignment. And once the team started missing the playoffs a few years in a row, it makes it an impossible assignment.

Weird luck. This team either has the best of luck (Gretz, McDavid, lottery wins, 5 cups) or the worst of luck (high-profile injuries, big-name players leaving, 1st overalls not panning out).

So at first, I'd say it was the inability to realize that the team was not good, and more than ban-aid approaches were needed, but thats the approach that was applied. Recently, I'd say Schultz is the main reason why the team didnt take that step forward. They banked on him being the main cog on d, and it didnt work out. So with the d being so poor, the forwards dont reach their potential, goalies are hung out to dry, and depth defensemen are played over their heads. And of course thats not Schultz's fault. Thats on management.

And the coach carousel, which of course is also on management.

 

[Jumptheshark]

I think after the Pronger debacle, Katz's ego desire to hang out with the Kevin Lowes and MacTavishes Old Boys Club instead of listening to anyone else on earth and / or evaluating results and getting REAL hockey minds in is what cemented this team in a decade of futility... It is all on Katz being a failure as an owner, and everything else spins from that.

It went wrong after the Oilers screwed up the package they got for Pronger

we got
Smid--a 4-5-6 D-man
Lupul-who was slowed down due to injuries but still topped 20 goals 4 times
Eberle(pick) who has top 20 goals 3 times

here is where things go sideways--we had to other picks
We also got the the 53rd pick--which we traded for allan rouke(I think) NYI took Hamonic
We then traded the 30th and 36th pick for the 21st pick and took Riley Nash and it became obvious by that fall something had happened behind the scenes where Nash was never going to be an oiler---throught several other trades we have Gryba to show for that pick.

Oiler could have used the Pronger trade as the starting point for the rebuild and the capitilized on it more with the Smyth trade the next March. In March the Oilers traded Smyth for a first, Robert Nilson and Ryan O'Meara. With the pick they used it for Alex Plante(who is playing in Japan I think)--I did not know much about Plante--but most said he was taken about 20 to 30 spots to early--His selling point was his physical nature--but he could not skate. We had 3 first rounders in the 2007 draft and we wasted them all-Gagner. Nash and Plante. While is was not a draft for superstars, the draft exposed the Oilers drafting problem and it continued for many many years.

Then we had the problem about the rebuild. When did it start. For me it was Feb 27th 2007 at about noon Edmonton time when Smyth stood crying before the cameras.

Many and I do mean many trades and moves we made after that shot ourselves in the foot.
Stoll and Green for Visnovsky--While Stoll and Greene went on to be key parts in the Kings cup runs--Visnovksy had problems staying healthy. If the Oilers had embraced the rebuild they do not do that deal
The Erik Cole for Pitikenen trade- Cole was a stand up guy and a pro--problem was he never wanted to be an oiler and when I heard he was living on the Hotel across that set of alarms for me. That is not where the Oilers usually stay long term, they get put there for only a short time and then either get an apartment or share with someone. Cole was there for his entire time as an oiler.

Then we had two signings that are the road signs of the Organisation not not wanting to admit that they needed a rebuild. Sheldon Souray and Dustin Penner--Souray local boy who came home--During the 08/09 season a poster came on here and posted that Souray had asked for a trade and we tarred and feathered him/her/it. I exchanged PMS with the poster and he stood his/her/it ground and finally gave up the source--it came from Souray's father--there was problems in the oilers--we saw how the Oilers dealt with Souray--we can argue about who was at fault all we like--but it should the future of how the oilers were going to do things and skid further off the road

Then we have the signing of Dustin Penner--good news is we have Klefbom to show for him--but what we gave up to sign him, 1st, 2nd and 3rd --those players were Tyler Myers, Justin Schultz and Kril Pretov.. the fact we have Klefbom is the only thing that saves this move. Oiler also got Colten Teubert for Penner--a player no one in the oilers organization had seen play--if they had they would have known the Teubert was injury prone an often a health scratch.

I could go on more and get more people mad at me,


But what happened?

Oilers management and ownership thought they knew what they were doing but did not and refused to admit it even after it became obvious they were lost.

Then we have Steve Tambolini--I started a thread where I suggested that there was problem with him and his ability to communicate not only internally but externally to the point were other teams called and Tambo did not call back leaving other teams confused. I got ripped pretty hard in that thread. But as we now know that was the case--it is a family trait that the entire family has had for generations

I could go on--but the team and organisation has moved on and it is time for the fans to move on

 

[Cawz]

Oiler could have used the Pronger trade as the starting point for the rebuild and the capitilized on it more with the Smyth trade the next March.

Yup. If they embraced the rebuild, maybe they do these trades differently. Its all about asset management and they did not get full value for those assets. Although Smyth's return would always be muted due to him being a rental, they should have been able to get some nice assets for him to supplement what should have been a haul from trading Pronger. Its tough to sell a rebuild on a fan base though, fresh off a cup run. I guess it was tough for management to sell the rebuild on themselves as well.

 

[iCanada]

06-07 wasn't horrible. We weren't good but we were competitive. I think the Smyth trade hurt the team a lot.

We were a relatively competitive team before we traded Smyth. After the trade we lost like 19 out of 24 games in regulation. Smyth was the whole team, the room was shattered after that. And it was a fractured team already; Pronger, Peca, Spacek, and Samsonov basically ****ed off in the off-season because reasons.

Stoll got hurt, Pisani's career got sidelined by colitis. And now Smyth was gone. Basically half the team got gutted and replaced with nothing.

Then we traded Greene with Stoll. All the leaders were gone and we tried to bandage it, and then our management was just really really awful. Those that were left were overpaid, we lost trades, we made poor aset management decisions. We made enemies with other GMs.

 

[Jumptheshark]

06-07 wasn't horrible. We weren't good but we were competitive. I think the Smyth trade hurt the team a lot.

We were a relatively competitive team before we traded Smyth. After the trade we lost like 19 out of 24 games in regulation. Smyth was the whole team, the room was shattered after that. And it was a fractured team already; Pronger, Peca, Spacek, and Samsonov basically ****ed off in the off-season because reasons.

Stoll got hurt, Pisani's career got sidelined by colitis. And now Smyth was gone. Basically half the team got gutted and replaced with nothing.

Then we traded Greene with Stoll. All the leaders were gone and we tried to bandage it, and then our management was just really really awful. Those that were left were overpaid, we lost trades, we made poor aset management decisions. We made enemies with other GMs.

how long was the losing streak after we traded Smyth? Fancy stats have yet to address how that affected the dressing room

 

[iCanada]

how long was the losing streak after we traded Smyth? Fancy stats have yet to address how that affected the dressing room

16 straight games winless. Then we won a shootout against the Avs, then lost the rest.

We were a few points away from a playoff spot then went 2-19-1 to finish the year. LOL.

We beat the flames on the last game who played their backup and had their top 6 all healthy scratched.



Slid from 30-24-6 to 32-43-7.

 

[Cawz]

16 straight games winless. Then we won a shootout against the Avs, then lost the rest.

We were a few points away from a playoff spot then went 2-19-1 to finish the year. LOL.

We beat the flames on the last game who played their backup and had their top 6 all healthy scratched.



Slid from 30-24-6 to 32-43-7.

Wow, I think I must have drank away those memories of how bad that was...

 

[iCanada]

Yeah, probably the most futile stretch of 22 games in league history, LOL.

To think it was over 250k and we proceeded to overpay Horcoff by 2 million.

LOL.

 

[HockeyGuy1964]

It's been alluded to a few times here but players didn't want to come here & player that were already here really didn't want to be here because of the way management put out these little rumors against players on the way out the door. They did it with Comrie, they did it with Pronger, they did it with Souray. They even tried to a certain extent to try & make Smyth the bad guy on the way out. It's what they do.

 

[iCanada]

It's been alluded to a few times here but players didn't want to come here & player that were already here really didn't want to be here because of the way management put out these little rumors against players on the way out the door. They did it with Comrie, they did it with Pronger, they did it with Souray. They even tried to a certain extent to try & make Smyth the bad guy on the way out. It's what they do.

Yeah... them trying to tar and feather Smyth killed this team.

Lowe's ego too big. The rest of the era was real bad, but the Smyth trade really sent us over the edge. Took a guy that wanted to be here and loved the team and loved the colours, and just tried to ostracize him. Prongs was the beginning of the end, the Smith / Souray stuff was pretty bad, but Smyth is what broke the camels back.

 

[Jumptheshark]

It's been alluded to a few times here but players didn't want to come here & player that were already here really didn't want to be here because of the way management put out these little rumors against players on the way out the door. They did it with Comrie, they did it with Pronger, they did it with Souray. They even tried to a certain extent to try & make Smyth the bad guy on the way out. It's what they do.

Mike Peca did not want to be here and went on record as saying he would have no problem being traded.

The Management style and ownership interference was a large problem