Congrats/thank you to Sens' GM

[Kellogs]

There is no doubt in my mind that he cost us a cup.

What cost us the cup was the lockout and new CBA. What that top picture shows me is that our biggest mistake was letting go of Chiarelli.

 

[dpw]

Brian Lee was drafted 9th overall.

It's pretty much the only early pick I've ever really had an issue with as a Senators fan.

So it could be a lot worse.

How can it be worst? We drafted a non NHLer instead of a one of the best forwards in the world.

 

[Qward]

Murray makes mistakes too. Lundin, butler, kovalev, auld, signing JOB, etc

 

[HavlatMach9]

How can it be worst? We drafted a non NHLer instead of a one of the best forwards in the world.

I think he means other drafts could have flunked too like Lee.

 

[Sensinitis]

Murray makes mistakes too. Lundin, butler, kovalev, auld, signing JOB, etc

All except Kovalev were cheap and low risk.

 

[God Says No]

The only thing that bothers me about BMurr trades is that we usually pay full value. There are maybe a couple trades that we 'won'.

 

[Xspyrit]

Stillman, Commondore for Corvo and Eaves

Good trade in value and good attempt to right the ship, but nothing could have that year. Unfortunately, we didn't keep Stillman but we probably should have. Personally, I didn't mind one bit to get rid of Patrick Eaves, overrated and injury prone

Whatever we traded for filatov

A 3rd round pick for a chance at a high-end prospect is not a very big price, very cheap everybody thought. Problem for the Sens is that Filatov didn't have the "time" to become a NHL player. he needed money right away

Leclaire and dont give me that bs that we knew wed get lehner

Leclaire was a good goalie, but injuries really got the best of him. We were in salary cap situation that we needed to choose between Fisher and Vermette at some point. Got a started and a 2nd round pick. Value is there but Leclaire busted. Thank God, Murray and his staff are magicians at the draft and got us Lehner

Mezaroes trade was terrible considering he was a top ranked RFA at the time

We dodged a bullet instead of paying him 4.0 as a RFA (it was almost Perry/Getzlaf/Spezza/Heatley/Kessel money for Christ's sake). We got a very good return in Kuba (good contract for a #3 D-man in his last good years who produced fairly well for us), a 1st and Picard

imo buying out Emery and butler was also unnecessary

??? ya it would have been better to keep an on and off ice problem with the team... Butler's buyout is irrelevant, just to get a rid of a contract and create a roster spot.

Losing volchenkov was kinda bad too

Really? Volchenkov makes 4.25 per season, people here would have whined non-stop that he is overpaid. Great move by Murray to not re-sign him. Unfortunately for the Sens, the weakness between Mucklet and year 2/3 of Murray was the weak prospect pool and the fact that we never had young guys to replace older expensive guys. Not sure you really understand this.

So easy to post things without context or any further thought

I already went through this a thousand times but just going to put a few comments to counter most of those arguments (still having fun)

In summary :

Stillman/Commodore for Corvo/Eaves was bad because we didn't keep Stillman

Leclaire/2nd for Vermette was bad because of Leclaire injury-proneness, we easily salvage that trade with the Lehner selection

Other questionable trade is Campoli/Comrie for 1st (26th overall)/McAmmond

But even then... we had Campoli at the best of his career on very cheap contracts (we were very tight to the cap back then) for 2.5 years. We paid a late first to get him but got back a mid-2nd (difference isn't that huge) and Potulny who was key for the 1st Calder Cup in our organization. Comrie for McAmmond was a wash, although a slight avantage for the Sens

Murray makes mistakes too. Lundin, butler, kovalev, auld, signing JOB, etc

Lundin = decent 7th D-man on a cheap short term deal, insurance policy on a very young squad, no idea how it could be a "mistake"

Butler = "free wallet", those guys signed out of college are try-outs. Butler had a very good NHL start but unfortunately he couldn't keep up. Again, no idea how it could be a "mistake", no assets spent

Auld = back-up goalie that worked well in his first time. Murray traded him for a 6th and we drafted Mark Stone with that pick IIRC. Mistake?

JOB = signing JOB was a no-brainer, he was a very decent 4th liner at least. but something "happened" obviously. Victim of the team's depth now. Hardly a mistake or very very minor if.

Kovalev = personally, I still like the signing. Didn't work well in his 2nd year here but he was KEY for the Sens to make the playoffs in 2009-10 and was also the reason why Fisher had a career year and we got a good return for Fisher (1st + 3rd) without getting any salary back... Don't think it's a mistake at all, athough he was a bit overpaid (should have been 4.0). But signing UFAs isn't an easy thing to do for Ottawa because of taxes, weather, small market, not a cup contender, etc. We can't get stars through UFA, only stars on their decline and we have to overpay...

You have listed those but IMO they're not mistakes. His worst signing might have been Jason Smith because he was broken and not exactly what the Sens needed at the time. Don't see any other to be honest, certainly not Gonchar.

No, I still think Murray biggest mistakes are still his first 2-3 coach hirings. Took him a bit of time to fix goaltending (our other major weakness back then) but he finally did it in a very strong way

Jason Spezza, Erik Karlsson, Bobby Ryan, Kyle Turris, Milan Michalek, Jared Cowen and Chris Phillips I think? Maybe I'm missing someone.

Zibanejad. And well, Robin Lehner looks like a top-10 pick value as well, IMO.

Lazar, Ceciand maybe Puempel should join that group very soon

We also had Jim O'Brien lol who looks like an intruder on that list.

The only thing that bothers me about BMurr trades is that we usually pay full value. There are maybe a couple trades that we 'won'.

Sorry but this is based on what? We have no idea of player's real value, only our speculations. We are just hockey fans on a message board. lol

 

[Minister of Offence]

Murray makes mistakes too. Lundin, butler, kovalev, auld, signing JOB, etc

Aside from Kovalev, who cares about those.

Muckler made it impossible to stay competitive when **** hit the fan. And he may have helped **** hit the fan.

Murray picked up the pieces, and it's easier to make mistakes when you're cleaning up a mess. Notice how the trade he's made has improved over time, directly related to how many assets are in the organization. Muckler didn't put them there. And when Muckler made deals, he usually didn't make them with assets he put there either.

Regardless of Muckler, Murray's done a pretty good job...and now he's spending **** all.

 

[Back in Black]

Regardless of Muckler, Murray's done a pretty good job...and now he's spending **** all.

We went from Stanley Cup contenders to a first round Playoff Team under Murray!

But now knowing that Melnyk put a clamp on the salary Cap, I can't blame Murray!

 

[Benjamin]

I liked the Kovalev signing at the time and still like it. The problem was Clouston and his ability to not know how to use players or communicate with them.

 

[enviro61]

Murray has done a great job for the most part. His trade deadline pickups and UFA signings leave something to be desired but overall I am very satisfied with his performance.

 

[guyzeur]

Stillman, Commondore for Corvo and Eaves
Whatever we traded for filatov
Leclaire and dont give me that bs that we knew wed get lehner
Mezaroes trade was terrible considering he was a top ranked RFA at the time
brian lee's development
imo buying out Emery and butler was also unnecessary
Losing volchenkov was kinda bad too
He's made some mistakes but in the end he's turned most of them into positives.

By far he's not the worst gm but we did miss the playoffs under his watch for the first time in like 10 years or something. My major issues were with the moves that went on with our back end. I was not happy with the departures of corvo and mezaroes. Imo it made us alot weaker. Volchenkov was a good player in ottawa which is the reason why he got such a good contract from the devils. As a rebuilding team i'm sure we could have at least gotten some sort of return. Leclaire's numbers were weak in columbus and he wasnt known for is health, we knew what we were getting into.

Emery had his issues but he only had one bad season before being bought and imo he was better then gerber, elliott and leclaire. Career wise Emery's numbers have been consistently ok outside that one year.

You can possibly question his decision in hiring paddock, Hartsburgh and clouston too.

By no means am i calling him a bad gm but i'm certainly not giving him a 10/10.

When did I say he was a 10, I didn't. All I said was that his last 5 trades were fantastic.

But you come back with bad things that have so little value in the end.

Ask NJ what they think of Volckenkov and the ******** of money he received.
How much money did we spent to Emery and Butler?

Murray is a risk taker,
Risking a 3rd round pick on a possible top 50 talent in the world is the right thing to do. Same thing with Leclaire, our goaltending was broken, he had to try something but he had no asset to get anything better.

The Turris' trade was a risk same as Leclaire's & filatov; Turris didn't have any significant stats to back up that risk either but hey what do you know, this one turn out ok. You have to look at the asset we gave in the Turris and Ryan trades vs those in Leclaire and Filatov. The return got better because was we sent the other way was also better. In his first 3 years, Murray had nothing, NOTHING to trade to improve the team.

If Murray had to hire bad coaches, I'm happy it happened during those years. We were not going to win the SF during that time.

McTache is a top 5 coach in the NHL and is he still learning.

Do you think keeping Emery would have been the right thing to do?

You are not calling him a bad GM but the way you picture him with those little things, you think he would get a 4/10.

 

[SilverSeven]

By far he's not the worst gm but we did miss the playoffs under his watch for the first time in like 10 years or something. My major issues were with the moves that went on with our back end. I was not happy with the departures of corvo and mezaroes. Imo it made us alot weaker. Volchenkov was a good player in ottawa which is the reason why he got such a good contract from the devils. As a rebuilding team i'm sure we could have at least gotten some sort of return. Leclaire's numbers were weak in columbus and he wasnt known for is health, we knew what we were getting into.

Emery had his issues but he only had one bad season before being bought and imo he was better then gerber, elliott and leclaire. Career wise Emery's numbers have been consistently ok outside that one year.

You can possibly question his decision in hiring paddock, Hartsburgh and clouston too.

By no means am i calling him a bad gm but i'm certainly not giving him a 10/10.

Emery was bought out to keep Jason Spezzas career on track. We needed his friends gone.

 

[PoutineSp00nZ]

I liked the Kovalev signing at the time and still like it. The problem was Clouston and his ability to not know how to use players or communicate with them.

Kovalev was brought in for a couple of reasons. One was to help with the loss of Heatleys offense, and the other was to bring in a marquee name to help with ticket sales.

The signing made a lot of sense, I don't think anybody was expecting a point per game Kovalev. He played exactly the way he always did with the Sens.

 

[Filatov2Kovalev2Bonk]

We're a mediocre team.
Thanks for...being average?

I'll fall over myself thanking Murray when a championship is delivered, or at the very least a first-place team in the standings that goes on a very, very, very deep playoff run. He's done well in some areas but has anyone forgotten four coaches, countless bad contracts, one playoff round won in close to ten years?

I love Murray as a scout/youth analyst (though I prefer Tim in that capacity) but as a finisher? Not so much.

 

[Vesa Awesaka]

When did I say he was a 10, I didn't. All I said was that his last 5 trades were fantastic.

But you come back with bad things that have so little value in the end.

Ask NJ what they think of Volckenkov and the ******** of money he received.
How much money did we spent to Emery and Butler?

Murray is a risk taker,
Risking a 3rd round pick on a possible top 50 talent in the world is the right thing to do. Same thing with Leclaire, our goaltending was broken, he had to try something but he had no asset to get anything better.

The Turris' trade was a risk same as Leclaire's & filatov; Turris didn't have any significant stats to back up that risk either but hey what do you know, this one turn out ok. You have to look at the asset we gave in the Turris and Ryan trades vs those in Leclaire and Filatov. The return got better because was we sent the other way was also better. In his first 3 years, Murray had nothing, NOTHING to trade to improve the team.

If Murray had to hire bad coaches, I'm happy it happened during those years. We were not going to win the SF during that time.

McTache is a top 5 coach in the NHL and is he still learning.

Do you think keeping Emery would have been the right thing to do?

You are not calling him a bad GM but the way you picture him with those little things, you think he would get a 4/10.

A little defensive dont you think? I'm not giving him a ten. I never said anything about you. Guy made what i perceive as some moves that set the organization back, particularly at the back end. Made me sick that we had to hear about how we lacked a PMD and seeing how we were hemmed in our own end after moving mezaroes and Corvo. Then panicking and trading for campoli. Despite what people say imo LeClaire was never good. If we had no intention of resigning volchenkov we should have traded him off the sinking ship that was our team at the time. Helping Emery with his problems would have been the right thing to do rather then giving up on him after 6 years in the organization.

Do you think the team would have been better had we kept mezaroes and corvo over campoli or had we kept emery over leclaire. IMO we would have.

Murray's mistakes led to us missing the playoffs for the first time in 11 years imo. I give Murray tons of credit for successfully rebuilding the team but i also am not happy with some of the moves related to why we had to rebuild the team.

 

[MtRundle]

Murray came into a hard situation as GM I say...

Melnyk was pushing to win now but the core was no longer there- Redden was a shell, Emery was a loose cannon, Heatley quickly deteriorated and Alfie (and Spezza to some extent) missed time due to injury.

Until 2011 where Melnyk finally bought into the fact that they needed to retool/rebuild/buyabombandblow it up, Murray had to add pieces (commodore/stillman/cullen/kovalev/ruutu/lapointe) to make it look like we were trying, when we really were 1st round fodder for better teams.

Now we have the guns hopefully with a few FA's to actually make a run. Imagine if Karlsson was 100%...

 

[Herping Derps*]

As poorly as Muckler did with drafting his tenure coincided with our best years as a franchise in terms of results: I don't think we missed the playoffs while he was the GM

He gets too much hate; he wasn't ALL bad

Oleg "what the f@k do you mean this is our deadline deal" Saprykin.
And that was the cup run if I'm not mistaken.
Thats Muck's tenure as GM in a nutshell.

Oh, and don't forget trading for a washed up Bondra (giving up prospect Brooks Laich). Screw hindsight is 20/20, that man was straight blind.

The team did well in spite of the man, and then the house of cards crumbled.

 

[guyzeur]

We're a mediocre team.
Thanks for...being average?

I'll fall over myself thanking Murray when a championship is delivered, or at the very least a first-place team in the standings that goes on a very, very, very deep playoff run. He's done well in some areas but has anyone forgotten four coaches, countless bad contracts, one playoff round won in close to ten years?

I love Murray as a scout/youth analyst (though I prefer Tim in that capacity) but as a finisher? Not so much.

So much hate and so much wrong in the same post, wow.

3 coaches + McTache
Please list all the bad contracts, I expect you give out at least 20.
One playoffs round, he was hired as a GM in 2007, I think that's about 6 years not 10.

What exactly do you personally know of Tim as a scout/youth analyst?

 

[Punchbowl]

A little defensive dont you think? I'm not giving him a ten. I never said anything about you. Guy made what i perceive as some moves that set the organization back, particularly at the back end. Made me sick that we had to hear about how we lacked a PMD and seeing how we were hemmed in our own end after moving mezaroes and Corvo. Then panicking and trading for campoli. Despite what people say imo LeClaire was never good. If we had no intention of resigning volchenkov we should have traded him off the sinking ship that was our team at the time. Helping Emery with his problems would have been the right thing to do rather then giving up on him after 6 years in the organization.

Do you think the team would have been better had we kept mezaroes and corvo over campoli or had we kept emery over leclaire. IMO we would have.

Murray's mistakes led to us missing the playoffs for the first time in 11 years imo. I give Murray tons of credit for successfully rebuilding the team but i also am not happy with some of the moves related to why we had to rebuild the team.

This is an pretty superficial way of looking at the situation.


If someone smokes for 40 years and quits at the age of 60 to replace the habit with Nicorette and then is diagnosed with lung cancer, what should the doctors conclude?

"Huh, the cancer must be from the nicorette. Doing something unhealthy for years and then quitting won't have any lasting consequence."


We didn't feel the negative effects of Muckler's regime until years later. The 2010-2011 team that hit rock-bottom was in a downward spiral due to injuries, Muckler's lack of foresight, the loss of a superstar (Heatley), and a poor coach. How many of those factors should we pin on Murray? I count one - the coach.

The dive in the standings was the after-effect of years of poor drafting. Take a look at the prospects thread and scroll down to Muckler's picks:

http://hfboards.mandatory.com/showthread.php?t=1494213

Not many of them there. No one's saying you have to change your opinion, feel free to give Murray whatever ranking you want. I'm not giving him a '10' either, but people are disputing what you've said because many of the trades that you listed as 'bad' were far from bad deals. Really, you wish we had kept Volchenkov? Muckler did some great things in his time as well, culminating in a SCF appearance.


Thus far, none of Murray's moves have proven to be franchise-crippling, and in fact, he's laid a very solid foundation for us to build on (Karlsson, Turris, Zibanejad, Ryan, Lehner, Anderson, Methot, etc.). Maybe you can count Heatley, but the guy turned into a pylon about two years later and it ended up being a blessing in disguise. I know Muckler isn't entirely to blame for the loss of Chara, Hossa, and Havlat, but I can't help but shake my head when I hear those names and think about what might have gone differently if they'd stuck around.

The real villain to blame here: the salary cap. Could not have been worse timing.

 

[Sun God Nika]

Four words: BRIAN LEE FOURTH OVERALL

The man was a master idiot at the draft, Brian Lee being the epitome of his stupidity. Despite everyone in the room steering him towards Marc Staal if they wanted a D-man, he decided to go off the board and select a string bean from a weak collegiate base.

i wouldnt be on this board if that was the case

 

[Xspyrit]

Made me sick that we had to hear about how we lacked a PMD and seeing how we were hemmed in our own end after moving mezaroes and Corvo. Then panicking and trading for campoli...

If we had no intention of resigning volchenkov we should have traded him off the sinking ship that was our team at the time...

Do you think the team would have been better had we kept mezaroes and corvo over campoli or had we kept emery over leclaire. IMO we would have.

Murray's mistakes led to us missing the playoffs for the first time in 11 years imo. I give Murray tons of credit for successfully rebuilding the team but i also am not happy with some of the moves related to why we had to rebuild the team.

Thing is you have to stay in touch with reality to evaluate the contexts... Kuba more than replaced Meszaros (not Mezaroes lol) and Corvo wanted out.

NHL teams don't trade key players when they are playoffs contenders. We made the playoffs in 2009-10, Volchenkov was NEVER on the trade block.

We missed the playoffs for various reasons but probably not the ones you are saying. Inappropriate coaching, weak goaltending, Heatley's fiasco, Alfie's decline and no prospects to inject quality in the line-up are by far biggest reasons than what you are claiming

Weak prospect pool (thanks to Muckler's drafting) forces you to rebuild eventually, of course.

countless bad contracts.

Name them? Our contracts are good and have always been for the most part. But I don't expect you to be a capgeek or NHLnumbers expert...

People are quick to say "bad contract/player X is overpaid!" but you'd have to at least be a bit aware of the market, and frankly, not everyone on HF is,o r maybe just don't have the ability to properly understand it.

We went from Stanley Cup contenders to a first round Playoff Team under Murray!

I guess people are just happy being short sighted, it must be a lot less complicated.

 

[John Holmes*]

We go over this almost yearly

Almost everybody agreed that, if we had to choose, Redden was the keeper between him and Chara. Redden just happened to stop caring about hockey sometime after the decision was made; rumour has it that Chara wanted to be captain etc... Saying that it's all Muckler's fault is being disingenuous: there were a lot of factors that came into play.

Hossa basically forced us into trading him since Muckler had been very clear that he didn't want to pay him 6 million at the time. I agree that sign'n'trade was a poor decision but we got Heatley who was dynamite for us for the following two years

So much fail in one post.

Impressive.

 

[Minister of Offence]

We went from Stanley Cup contenders to a first round Playoff Team under Murray!

But now knowing that Melnyk put a clamp on the salary Cap, I can't blame Murray!

If you attribute the Heatley debacle to no one, the fact that there was nothing developing in the system made it hard to compensate.

If a GM takes over and it goes to crap right away, good chance the guy before had a lot to do with it.

 

[BonkTastic]

As poorly as Muckler did with drafting his tenure coincided with our best years as a franchise in terms of results: I don't think we missed the playoffs while he was the GM

He gets too much hate; he wasn't ALL bad

He literally contributed NOTHING to the Sens though, he rode the coattails of a team built nearly entirely by Marhsall Johnston/ Pierre Gauthier.

He took a team with Championship potential, and added almost literally nothing to it over his entire 6-year tenure. He had a deplorable draft record, his trades were almost all flops, he screwed Hossa - which in turn gave Ottawa a horrible rep around the league for years...

Dude. When the only good thing about a GM was that they guys who were there before he got there, who were brought in by his predecessors, played up to expectations... I dunno man. That's pretty bad. That's almost "ALL bad".