KHL Trades, Rumors and Free Agent Talk Part 6

[TheWhiskeyThief]

It is, however, below most of the big Russian teams.

Jokerit’s budget is likely 3x the best budgets in Liiga.
Yet Finland’s GDP per capita is 5x Russia’s

 

[Section Netherlands]

So.. How is Shirokov nowadays? I saw that his points total went down this year.

 

[aonb]

Still no rumors about Filatov lol. He's going to miss second straight season at age of 30? Wtf is this Man, really

 

[SoundAndFury]

Still no rumors about Filatov lol. He's going to miss second straight season at age of 30? Wtf is this Man, really

He doesn't want to play in the VHL so he is basically retired.

 

[aonb]

He doesn't want to play in the VHL so he is basically retired.

It's a bit strange for me that nobody wants to give him a shot in KHL. Or i'm just a biased fan of him? In terms of pure skill he's probably still better than 80% of league.

 

[SoundAndFury]

It's a bit strange for me that nobody wants to give him a shot in KHL. Or i'm just a biased fan of him? In terms of pure skill he's probably still better than 80% of league.

I don't think nobody gave him a shot he just doesn't want to take it. As in he prices himself out of any reasonable deal. It's quite likely he simply rejected/would reject proposals from places like Cherepovets, Nizhnekamsk or Khabarovsk at this point or try-out offers.

 

[aonb]

I don't think nobody gave him a shot he just doesn't want to take it. As in he prices himself out of any reasonable deal. It's quite likely he simply rejected/would reject proposals from places like Cherepovets, Nizhnekamsk or Khabarovsk at this point or try-out offers.

Swiss NLA can offer good amount of $. But i guess he's not interested in moving from Russia. Such a wasted career.

On the other news, Andre Petersson joins Loko, so i guess Dynamo will try to bring back Kagarlitsky

 

[Atas2000]

So.. How is Shirokov nowadays? I saw that his points total went down this year.

All about attitude. If he ever had played to his talent he could be a star, not a superstar though. Just a little detail... saw him vaping in 2012 hiding behind the team bus. He is totally a likeable guy, he is just not that 100+% hard worker in my opinion.

 

[alko]

Still no rumors about Filatov lol. He's going to miss second straight season at age of 30? Wtf is this Man, really

Interesting. What was actually the breaking point in his career?

 

[Caser]

Another interesting "transfer" is Igor Eronko leaving journalistic work to join the Avangard organization in some sort of role (scout or analyst I guess). That's something unusual I'd say.

 

[Kshahdoo]

Another interesting "transfer" is Igor Eronko leaving journalistic work to join the Avangard organization in some sort of role (scout or analyst I guess). That's something unusual I'd say.

So RIP the most popular in NA KHL insider?

 

[Caser]

So RIP the most popular in NA KHL insider?

I guess it won't be easy to tweet that kind of info and be compliant to the new employer's code of conduct.

 

[Artorius Horus T]

Nail Yakupov joins Vityaz Podolsk - 2 year contract

 

[Atas2000]

Nail Yakupov joins Vityaz Podolsk - 2 year contract

We might as well wait a bit and start a cap reality thread. Those moves just show who was getting too much money.

 

[vorky]

We might as well wait a bit and start a cap reality thread. Those moves just show who was getting too much money.

Yeah

Btw. do you remember the stories by Russian journalists a few years ago? They all claimed that the hard salary cap will not work in the KHL because .... they say so. Now, the reality just confirming the league´s position. So, the conclusion - listen to the official statements by the league, not any stories started by media. Btw, it applies to the expansion talks as well.

 

[Kshahdoo]

So Borstrom is probably coming to Jokerit.

 

[DudeWhereIsMakar]

What KHL City is the worst to play in?

I just remember Lupul saying some places you could walk around and check out the city. Some places it was just best you stayed inside your hotel room with no Wifi.

This isn't me bashing Russian/KHL cities, just me being curious. A rank would be nice.

 

[Caser]

What KHL City is the worst to play in?

I just remember Lupul saying some places you could walk around and check out the city. Some places it was just best you stayed inside your hotel room with no Wifi.

This isn't me bashing Russian/KHL cities, just me being curious. A rank would be nice.

It depends on what makes it "worst". Players mostly hate to play in the far East due to extremely long flghts. As for the city itself, I think Cherepovets might be in the lead here, as it is relatively small industrial town.

As for Lupul, he only played 9 games in the KHL, so he has been in the following places: Yekaterinburg (definitely has something to see), Cherepovets (yep), Minsk (capital of Belarus, you know), Omsk (not exactly a perfect place for tourists, but still it is a city with 1M+ people) and Khanty-Mansiysk (not in the KHL anymore, but it is a rather small town too, so he might have not exactly enjoyed it).

 

[Barclay Donaldson]

What KHL City is the worst to play in?

I just remember Lupul saying some places you could walk around and check out the city. Some places it was just best you stayed inside your hotel room with no Wifi.

This isn't me bashing Russian/KHL cities, just me being curious. A rank would be nice.

Most of the ex-NHLers who played in the KHL and bash the quality of the cities 1. are bashing cities no longer in the KHL or 2. would bash any non-North American city that isn't with beautiful women, universal WiFi and beautiful scenery like Switzerland and Finland.

Any ranking is going to vary depending on what you quantifies as the "worst to play in." Khabarovsk and Vladivostok have to be high on any list because of the insane travel. But by North American standards, just about anywhere in the world isn't going to line up. The WiFi is not as widely accessible, places are more economically depressed, more isolated and the nightlife is not as active.

 

[DudeWhereIsMakar]

Most of the ex-NHLers who played in the KHL and bash the quality of the cities 1. are bashing cities no longer in the KHL or 2. would bash any non-North American city that isn't with beautiful women, universal WiFi and beautiful scenery like Switzerland and Finland.

Any ranking is going to vary depending on what you quantifies as the "worst to play in." Khabarovsk and Vladivostok have to be high on any list because of the insane travel. But by North American standards, just about anywhere in the world isn't going to line up. The WiFi is not as widely accessible, places are more economically depressed, more isolated and the nightlife is not as active.

I mean minus the travel Vladivostok and Khabarovsk are quite beautiful places. I read about how Vladivostok was the San Francisco of Russia.

 

[Barclay Donaldson]

I mean minus the travel Vladivostok and Khabarovsk are quite beautiful places. I read about how Vladivostok was the San Francisco of Russia.

This is part of the issue with your question and the ranking. If you look hard enough, every single KHL city has good and bad parts.

Vladivostok has parts of it that are very nice, especially along the cliffs, and compared to many places in Russia it is well-developed and has a higher average income. However, a huge section of downtown is a cesspool because of poor sanitation, which combines poorly with the endless blocks of Soviet-style apartment buildings which houses rampant crime and normalized corruption that is regularly ranked worst in the country despite the relatively small size of the oblast. And if you ever want to leave the city, your options are nonexistent because of the extreme isolation.

It is no different than ranking the worst NHL cities. There isn't really an answer.

 

[SoundAndFury]

What KHL City is the worst to play in?

In player polls, Nizhnekamsk comes in first year after year.

I know this is the hotel Lev Prague used to stay in Nizhnekamsk. You can understand why hockey players wouldn't exactly love it.

 

[Zine]

If you're good enough to play high-end professionally hockey, chances are you exist in a privileged hockey bubble. I reckon a lot of these guys aren't the most worldly individuals and are lesser equipped than most to deal with a huge deviation in their lifestyle norm.

Nonetheless... Keep in mind KHL funding is principally via sponsorship. For this reason, and unlike the gate-driven NHL, teams are able to be situated in smaller or poorer cities. It should be no surprise that most stories are/were coming out of places like Cherepovets, Magnitogorsk, Novokuznetsk, Nizhnekamsk, etc.

I reckon the equivalent would be if the NHL had teams in, say, Albuquerque, a smaller rust-belt or midwest city, or some of those places in the deep American south.

 

[aonb]

Pakarinen signed for 3 years with Jokerit. I'm not surprised its Jokerit, but 3 years? Rare thing in KHL

 

[vorky]

Pakarinen signed for 3 years with Jokerit. I'm not surprised its Jokerit, but 3 years? Rare thing in KHL

It is a hard salary cap mechanism´s effect. Sharipzyanov also signed for three years. But I agree it is a rare thing there.