MS
1%er
For a long time, going back to the Sbisa signing and then the Sutter extension, and continuing since then, it has seemed to me that management has succumbed to magical thinking. Sbisa is a top four defender. Sutter is a foundational player. Teves and Rafferty are future NHLers. What's the proof? Well, just look at their contracts!
I'm often reminded of a scene in Michael Moore's "Roger and Me," where a committee attempting to boost the economy of Flint tries to build a tourism industry by offering tax incentives to a major hotel.
All the big tourist destinations have a major hotel, so if we have one too, we'll attract tourists. All the good NHLers have big contracts, so if we give these players big contracts, they'll be good NHLers.
"That Ben Hutton contract will look pretty good when he's scoring 40 points."
Posted this the other day and will re-post it as it basically summarizes how Jim Benning thinks and does business :
Decisions should be based on most likely outcomes, not 'maybe ifs'. And what this management team has constantly done is get tunnel vision on a 'maybe if' that has a 10% chance of happening and then pay full value for that maybe assuming it's a certainty. And then, predictably, 9 out of 10 moves turn out bad when the most likely outcome actually comes through. It's the single biggest failing of management that permeates every single thing they do.