Player Discussion Alex Burrows

[God Says No]

There is a reason Ottawa doesn't do buyouts ............ they do not have the higher revenue streams that Large Markets do.

Too many people see teams, in big markets, buying out players, and assume that Ottawa can do the same. They can't.

When you compare the rates charged to advertisers and sponsors in big markets and compare them to what Ottawa can charge, you'd see the difference.

A thirty second ad on a Rangers or Leafs broadcast, brings in probably 6 to 10 times more, for a similar ad broadcast during a Sens game.

Advertisers are charged more for the number of eyeballs that watch or listen to games, and Ottawa does not attract enough eyeballs to play in the "big leagues" with the Rangers and Leafs in relationship to advertising rates.

So, please think a little when you complain that Melnyk is to cheap to buyout a contract "because other teams do it".

Huh? Did you even see a reference to Melnyk in my post. I think I did have the letters "m", "e", "l", "n", "y" and "k" in my post so I guess there is that.

Someone is touchy.

 

[Sens of Anarchy]

Big markets like Buffalo, Dallas, New Jersey, Florida, and Tampa....

top on my list for ... not worthy of any responses ...

 

[FolignoQuantumLeap]

Picking the low hanging fruit is easy ....... and then venting on Burrows as the reason the team is in the dumpster is all too easy.

There are a number of reasons this team is where it is now.

One thing (that I thought at the time) that may have started this ball rolling, has Phaneuf refusing to waive his NMC for the expansion draft.

Everyone knew there was no way the VGK were going to select him, and this was proven during the draft when PD tried to move him, and failed ........... no one wanted his contract.

IF Phaneuf waived, I suspect someone like Wideman would have been selected ......... and our defense would have been fine, team chemistry would have been fine as well, and I think there is a lot of unspoken resentment in the locker room that blames Phaneuf for the popular Methot being left exposed.
I know a lot of people here think that Ceci should have been exposed over Methot, but luckily these people were not the GM, as these same people who berate Boucher and Dorion for favouring vets over youth, don't see the logic in protecting youth (Ceci) over a vet in Methot.

Its possible to say Burrows is terrible without blaming all the poor results on him. He's just part of a larger symptom of our old, slow and suck mentality and how our management values players who no longer fit into the league. We suck because there's SO MUCH dead weight on this team. Burrows is just one.

 

[FolignoQuantumLeap]

he can still play at an NHL level

 

[TheBradyBunch]

Eh, I disagree. You tend to overblow these things. He's an offensive blackhole but he's pretty good with his stick defensively and makes safe, quick plays. Play him in 4th line minutes and your fine.

He's be a disappointment and is often invisible out there but there are plenty of guys who bring just as little and hurt their team more out there. No one has looked good for us this year.

Not to mention, we know for a fact several teams were interested in him as a rental about 6 months ago. He looked alright in the playoffs. Unlikely that teams have soured on him that hard.

 

[FolignoQuantumLeap]

Eh, I disagree. You tend to overblow these things. He's an offensive blackhole but he's pretty good with his stick defensively and makes safe, quick plays. Play him in 4th line minutes and your fine.

He's be a disappointment and is often invisible out there but there are plenty of guys who bring just as little and hurt their team more out there. No one has looked good for us this year.

Not to mention, we know for a fact several teams were interested in him as a rental about 6 months ago. He looked alright in the playoffs. Unlikely that teams have soured on him that hard.

He's an awful defensive player for the same reason he's an offensive black hole, he can't skate. He can't keep u p with the play and someone almost always has to help him cover his area of the ice which leads to countless breakdowns in defensive coverage.

Its simple, if you can't skate at this level you do not belong unless you have some special abilities elsewhere to hide your faults. Burrows has no skills to apply. At least a guy like Phaneuf can shoot and slash the crap out of guys. Burrows brings absolutely nothing to the table. 4th lines shouldn't have guys like him. They should be a staging ground for guys breaking into the league and specialists who are all cheap so you can spend on the top end of the roster.

 

[Filatov2Kovalev2Bonk]

It was an impulsive trade and the contract was idiotic. We simply could have filled that hole internally and saved millions. He can't skate, can't score, can't pass, can't defend and Boucher is in love with him. Not the hot steamy love of Teacher's Pyatt, but still love. This guy needs to go, and fast.

 

[TheBradyBunch]

He's an awful defensive player for the same reason he's an offensive black hole, he can't skate. He can't keep u p with the play and someone almost always has to help him cover his area of the ice which leads to countless breakdowns in defensive coverage.

Its simple, if you can't skate at this level you do not belong unless you have some special abilities elsewhere to hide your faults. Burrows has no skills to apply. At least a guy like Phaneuf can shoot and slash the crap out of guys. Burrows brings absolutely nothing to the table. 4th lines shouldn't have guys like him. They should be a staging ground for guys breaking into the league and specialists who are all cheap so you can spend on the top end of the roster.

I personally agree, but that isn't "the norm". Many teams do it to some extent but no team does it exclusively.

I would be happy to move on from Burrows and replace him with a young player on the bottom line and on the PP (I actually think Paul could do really well in Burrows' spot) but that doesn't change my view that some team would be interested in him were he available.

 

[God Says No]

I personally agree, but that isn't "the norm". Many teams do it to some extent but no team does it exclusively.

I would be happy to move on from Burrows and replace him with a young player on the bottom line and on the PP (I actually think Paul could do really well in Burrows' spot) but that doesn't change my view that some team would be interested in him were he available.

You're right, not every team does it. The successful ones do. Look at the teams on top, and look a their 4th line.

 

[TheBradyBunch]

You're right, not every team does it. The successful ones do. Look at the teams on top, and look a their 4th line.

Absolutely. Doesn't change the fact that it's relatively rare.

I'm not arguing the validity of it, but lots of GMs target players like Burrows for their bottom lines. A vet who they believe can step right in and adapt to a system is considered less of a risk than an unproven youngster.

All I'm saying is this - if the Sens try to trade Burrows, I think they will find some takers. Burrows NTC requires him to submit a 10 team no-trade list, so we would have a decent amount of flexibility in terms of potential trade partners.

I'd also be happy to trade Burrows and let White/Paul/Chlapik/Perron/Dido/Dumont/Rodewald battle it out over the last two forwards spots and top call-up standing.

 

[FolignoQuantumLeap]

No team will want Burrows. You overestimate how dumb most nhl GMs are. Most of them aren't Pierre Dorion.

 

[Pierre from Orleans]

Absolutely. Doesn't change the fact that it's relatively rare.

I'm not arguing the validity of it, but lots of GMs target players like Burrows for their bottom lines. A vet who they believe can step right in and adapt to a system is considered less of a risk than an unproven youngster.

All I'm saying is this - if the Sens try to trade Burrows, I think they will find some takers. Burrows NTC requires him to submit a 10 team no-trade list, so we would have a decent amount of flexibility in terms of potential trade partners.

I'd also be happy to trade Burrows and let White/Paul/Chlapik/Perron/Dido/Dumont/Rodewald battle it out over the last two forwards spots and top call-up standing.

Why would you want these guys taking up roster spots? They have no future with the team and we're not battling for a playoff spot.

 

[TheBradyBunch]

Why would you want these guys taking up roster spots? They have no future with the team and we're not battling for a playoff spot.

Ideally, they would be extras or call-ups. If we dealt Burrows right now, we'd likely have 5 or 6 of those 7 guys on the roster. For the last game before the break, we had Chlapik, Paul, Dido and Dumont up so it's not much of a stretch if we trade away a forward. Someone has to play, after all, and it's unrealistic to expect that those other 5 guys (especially Perron and Rodewald) will all consistently deserve a spot in the lineup above those other guys. The last thing you want is a bunch of important young players spending 20+ games in the NHL where none of them can get it going.

 

[Sensfanatic]

Absolutely. Doesn't change the fact that it's relatively rare.

I'm not arguing the validity of it, but lots of GMs target players like Burrows for their bottom lines. A vet who they believe can step right in and adapt to a system is considered less of a risk than an unproven youngster.

All I'm saying is this - if the Sens try to trade Burrows, I think they will find some takers. Burrows NTC requires him to submit a 10 team no-trade list, so we would have a decent amount of flexibility in terms of potential trade partners.

I'd also be happy to trade Burrows and let White/Paul/Chlapik/Perron/Dido/Dumont/Rodewald battle it out over the last two forwards spots and top call-up standing.

Problem is that most of the other NHL teams actually send out scouts to assess the status of a player in a possible trade. This makes Burrows untradeable.

 

[BondraTime]

I'm positive we could trade Burrows.

We would get like a 6th/7th at the deadline, so I'm not sure Dorion would eat the bullet after what he gave up for him.

 

[Langdon Alger]

Ok so what then... We do nothing???You seem to think PD or BM had it easy trying to build a winner,while having nothing to spend???PD took a chance to try and rebuild his terrible bottom 6 it worked well last season..This year the top 6 can score to save its life,but hey lets blame the bottom 6 for not being able to carry the big names

I never said they had it easy. Maybe when you’re a budget team you don’t hand out dumb contracts to average players.

Michalek 3 years 4 million after a 39 point season
Phillips 2 years 2.5 after looking like a 7th defenceman at age 36
Anderson’s extension at 9.5 million that doesn’t kick in until he’s 37.
Burrows 2 years 2.5 at age 36

Those aren’t smart moves.

I could go on, but you get the point. This whole “they have nothing to spend” thing is bullshit. Do you see what they are spending on the team this year? They’re close to the cap. They’re not spending wisely, that’s the problem.

People act like we’re the Oakland A’s of hockey. That we spend nothing on our roster. Bullshit. We’re much closer to the cap than to the floor. We have the money to re-sign our top players. Alfie, Hossa, Heatley, Spezza, Karlsson etc. We didn’t have to trade them when they wanted big bucks or lose them for nothing in free agency.

Maybe if we had a f***ing competent GM we would be better, but we haven’t had one since Marshall Johnston.

 

[topshelf15]

I never said they had it easy. Maybe when you’re a budget team you don’t hand out dumb contracts to average players.

Michalek 3 years 4 million after a 39 point season
Phillips 2 years 2.5 after looking like a 7th defenceman at age 36
Anderson’s extension at 9.5 million that doesn’t kick in until he’s 37.
Burrows 2 years 2.5 at age 36

Those aren’t smart moves.

I could go on, but you get the point. This whole “they have nothing to spend” thing is bull****. Do you see what they are spending on the team this year? They’re close to the cap. They’re not spending wisely, that’s the problem.

People act like we’re the Oakland A’s of hockey. That we spend nothing on our roster. Bull****. We’re much closer to the cap than to the floor. We have the money to re-sign our top players. Alfie, Hossa, Heatley, Spezza, Karlsson etc. We didn’t have to trade them when they wanted big bucks or lose them for nothing in free agency.

Maybe if we had a ****ing competent GM we would be better, but we haven’t had one since Marshall Johnston.

I never said they had it easy. Maybe when you’re a budget team you don’t hand out dumb contracts to average players.

Michalek 3 years 4 million after a 39 point season
Phillips 2 years 2.5 after looking like a 7th defenceman at age 36
Anderson’s extension at 9.5 million that doesn’t kick in until he’s 37.
Burrows 2 years 2.5 at age 36

Those aren’t smart moves.

I could go on, but you get the point. This whole “they have nothing to spend” thing is bull****. Do you see what they are spending on the team this year? They’re close to the cap. They’re not spending wisely, that’s the problem.

People act like we’re the Oakland A’s of hockey. That we spend nothing on our roster. Bull****. We’re much closer to the cap than to the floor. We have the money to re-sign our top players. Alfie, Hossa, Heatley, Spezza, Karlsson etc. We didn’t have to trade them when they wanted big bucks or lose them for nothing in free agency.

Maybe if we had a ****ing competent GM we would be better, but we haven’t had one since Marshall Johnston.

You are like most around here .......Great at looking at things with the 100% clarity that hindsight and only hindsight brings.........Let me guess you were one of those fans that thought BM handed out NMC like candy because he was just stupid and senile??

 

[Langdon Alger]

You are like most around here .......Great at looking at things with the 100% clarity that hindsight and only hindsight brings.........Let me guess you were one of those fans that thought BM handed out NMC like candy because he was just stupid and senile??

Dude, I hated all those deals at the time. They were awful.

I don’t think Murray was stupid, but I think he was too loyal to long time Sens players. Sometimes you need to move on from guys who’s best days are behind them. We haven’t been good at that here. The one guy who should have been kept was Alfie and he left. He was actually still good when he left.

Phillips was awful in 13-14. He gets a 2 year extension. Why? Cuz he’s Chris Phillips. He’s a nice guy. He’s been here forever. Great, I like him, but it was time to move on.

 

[topshelf15]

Dude, I hated all those deals at the time. They were awful.

Thats nice ...but again who could we have gotten as a replacement for these players and at the dollars we paid for them???

 

[Langdon Alger]

Thats nice ...but again who could we have gotten as a replacement for these players and at the dollars we paid for them???

The problem with giving multi year extensions to average players is that it’s hard to get rid of them if they don’t perform, and as you know, this team doesn’t buy players out very often.

Look at Burrows right now, most agree he’s pretty bad and we want to get rid of him. How can we though? He’s still got another year on his deal. Unless we throw a pick in the deal or something of value you can’t get rid of him.

There needs to be more foresight shown. If you couldn’t see that giving Burrows a two year extension at 36 and looking at his numbers in Vancouver was a bad idea, I’m not sure what to tell you.

I’m not sure who to replace those players with, but in the case of Phillips and MM9 you could have given their spots to younger players or tried to sign a free agent at a reasonable price. Bringing in a top 9 guy to replace MM9 on a one year deal is better than committing to him for 3 years. Maybe that player doesn’t produce as much offence, but at least you’re not stuck with him for 3 years making 4 million a year.

They made the Phaneuf deal because they had 3 bad contracts no one wanted, so they trade for another guy with a long term, big money contract, which filled a need because we needed a top 4 d, but now a lot of people want to get rid of him because he’s slow and makes too much money.

 

[topshelf15]

Thats the entire point ,Michalek was resigned in hopes he could turn it around and be a legit top 6/9 winger,Anderson was a fine goaltender for us a early as lasts season...Burrows and Phillips were decent nhl veterans that have and were overplayed by their coaches...

This nonsense about us spending money foolishly needs to end ,none of these guys were on any real earthshattering types of deals...With proper funding maybe we dont have to spend and hope these guys still have something in the tank,and maybe we could make a deal for player with far more substance.Say trading away something else rather than our first line center for a LW that can play center

 

[topshelf15]

The problem with giving multi year extensions to average players is that it’s hard to get rid of them if they don’t perform, and as you know, this team doesn’t buy players out very often.

Look at Burrows right now, most agree he’s pretty bad and we want to get rid of him. How can we though? He’s still got another year on his deal. Unless we throw a pick in the deal or something of value you can’t get rid of him.

There needs to be more foresight shown. If you couldn’t see that giving Burrows a two year extension at 36 and looking at his numbers in Vancouver was a bad idea, I’m not sure what to tell you.

I’m not sure who to replace those players with, but in the case of Phillips and MM9 you could have given their spots to younger players or tried to sign a free agent at a reasonable price. Bringing in a top 9 guy to replace MM9 on a one year deal is better than committing to him for 3 years. Maybe that player doesn’t produce as much offence, but at least you’re not stuck with him for 3 years making 4 million a year.

They made the Phaneuf deal because they had 3 bad contracts no one wanted, so they trade for another guy with a long term, big money contract, which filled a need because we needed a top 4 d, but now a lot of people want to get rid of him because he’s slow and makes too much money.

To any player period....Think paying EK 13 mil per and hoping he returns to his form isnt without huge risk??

 

[Langdon Alger]

Thats the entire point ,Michalek was resigned in hopes he could turn it around and be a legit top 6/9 winger,Anderson was a fine goaltender for us a early as lasts season...Burrows and Phillips were decent nhl veterans that have and were overplayed by their coaches...

This nonsense about us spending money foolishly needs to end ,none of these guys were on any real earthshattering types of deals...With proper funding maybe we dont have to spend and hope these guys still have something in the tank,and maybe we could make a deal for player with far more substance.Say trading away something else rather than our first line center for a LW that can play center

If you couldn’t see Michalek was trending in the wrong direction, I don’t know what to tell you man. How did it work out then? We’re you happy with his play for the next year and a half? I was fine with him coming back, but not at that price. 2 years and 3 million per year is the most I would have given him. 4 million for a 40 points player who had bad knees? Yeah, no thanks.

This nonsense about is not spending any money on our roster is what needs to stop because it’s a f***ing lie. This attitude that we have no chance to compete unless we spend to the cap is bullshit. We’ve competed in the past not spending to the cap and so have other teams. We won the f***ing presidents trophy the same year we filed for Bankruptcy protection with the New York Rangers missed the playoffs spending all the money in the world.

We’re a small market team. We know it. We’ve always known it. We won’t outspend every other team. That’s why every dollar counts. We need to spend wisely. If we have a couple of guys who are overpaid, ok, every team does, but there have been too many over the last few years.

Ryan, Phaneuf, Cowen, Burrows, Greening, Michalek etc.

It adds up.

 

[Langdon Alger]

To any player period....Think paying EK 13 mil per and hoping he returns to his form isnt without huge risk??

Dude, I’d rather give a multi year contract to a proven player. Crosby, McDavid, Kane, Matthews etc. They’re proven players in this league. They deserve a multi year deal.

Not every Tom, Dick and Harry needs a 2-3 year contract.

 

[topshelf15]

If you couldn’t see Michalek was trending in the wrong direction, I don’t know what to tell you man. How did it work out then? We’re you happy with his play for the next year and a half? I was fine with him coming back, but not at that price. 2 years and 3 million per year is the most I would have given him. 4 million for a 40 points player who had bad knees? Yeah, no thanks.

This nonsense about is not spending any money on our roster is what needs to stop because it’s a ****ing lie. This attitude that we have no chance to compete unless we spend to the cap is bull****. We’ve competed in the past not spending to the cap and so have other teams. We won the ****ing presidents trophy the same year we filed for Bankruptcy protection with the New York Rangers missed the playoffs spending all the money in the world.

We’re a small market team. We know it. We’ve always known it. We won’t outspend every other team. That’s why every dollar counts. We need to spend wisely. If we have a couple of guys who are overpaid, ok, every team does, but there have been too many over the last few years.

Ryan, Phaneuf, Cowen, Burrows, Greening, Michalek etc.

It adds up.

Just stop ....Ryan made 5.5 we we traded for him..most knew we had to overpay to get him resigned..Phanuef is a product of ownership not wanting to spend a dime to get out of what most teams would consider minor contract issues with under preforming players.We sat on Greening for how many years ???instead of buying him out??Really 1.9 mil a season we cant buy out think about that??