Speculation: Ownership/Management negotiates in bad faith?

[BatherSeason]

The best example of bad faith here may have been Dzingel.

Blame the players....yawn.

 

[stempniaksen]

They went right down to the wire, Stone said so himself, to try and come up with the money Stone wanted. They failed. How is that bad faith? The best example of bad faith here may have been Dzingel.

If the reports of the Senators not being willing to offer a NMC/NTC for the duration of the deal are true, wouldn't that be considered dealing in bad faith?

 

[Do Make Say Think]

If the reports of the Senators not being willing to offer a NMC/NTC for the duration of the deal are true, wouldn't that be considered dealing in bad faith?

That is a harder one, these types of clauses really, really screw over teams as poorly run as the Senators. I'm ok with being super stingy on them, not to the point of losing everyone of course but we simply cannot have many of those so you gotta be picky.

The best example of bad faith is how none of the money that was supposedly ear-marked for all our big players will be used anywhere else.

Just like *someone who cannot be named*, Melnyk is all about optics. All the talk about contract negociations was only to protect his ego; he said it himself when he admitted that dumping everyone always was the plan (while not even remembering the name of the GM!!)

 

[stempniaksen]

That is a harder one, these types of clauses really, really screw over teams as poorly run as the Senators. I'm ok with being super stingy on them, not to the point of losing everyone of course but we simply cannot have many of those so you gotta be picky.

The best example of bad faith is how none of the money that was supposedly ear-marked for all our big players will not be used anywhere else.

Just like *someone who cannot be named*, Melnyk is all about optics. All the talk about contract negociations was only to protect his ego; he said it himself when he admitted that dumping everyone always was the plan (while not even remembering the name of the GM!!)

Mark Stone and Erik Karlsson are the definition of guys you make that exception for.

We're on the same page though, it's just that the lack of trade protection in the teams "serious offers" are the most identifiable reason why the offers were in bad faith, imo. Definitely agree with not handing them out like candy.

 

[topshelf15]

We dont negotiate at all ,we just never sign guys ..

 

[BonHoonLayneCornell]

You can run around thinking you get to set the market and make hard rules like Melnyk with the no NTC, bonus money, and aav, but then you're just going to lose players like we've seen. He doesn't get to set his own rules because he thinks its unfair

The market is what it is and you just have to play the part and do a better job of managing your overall budget. Pretty ridiculous to say you can't afford star players when you have like 30-40 million in dead money and spent on overpaid replacement level players.

 

[BondraTime]

Ah sorry, I understand now. I thought he was referring to players available in this draft. My bad!

I thought the same on first glance, that's how it's framed

 

[coladin]

If the reports of the Senators not being willing to offer a NMC/NTC for the duration of the deal are true, wouldn't that be considered dealing in bad faith?

I don't think so. Ottawa just could not give what Stone wanted. It happens. They tried with the term, dollar amount , bonus money that they felt they could afford. Stone wanted what he wanted, and I don't blame him.

Dzingel, on the other hand, as far as we know, was never offered anything, while Dorion said he wanted to sign all three. It turned out that they ponied up for only 2. I would see that more "bad faith", but even then, they may have simply told Dzingel that he did not factor in their plans, which is not bad faith. But I never heard anything about offers for Dzingel as we did with the other two.

 

[Sensung]

I don't think so. Ottawa just could not give what Stone wanted. It happens. They tried with the term, dollar amount , bonus money that they felt they could afford. Stone wanted what he wanted, and I don't blame him.

Failing to offer market value to star players and then publicly describing their sub par offers as "fair" is not negotiating in good faith.

Expecting star players to take less AAV, lower/no bonus money and not offering NMC's is asking them to commit to the team while failing to commit to the player. That is the very definition of not negotiating in good faith.

 

[OttawaSenators11]

Full of liars - They'll never get a penny from me again.

feel sorry for Chabot and Brady playing for these idiots.

 

[coladin]

Failing to offer market value to star players and then publicly describing their sub par offers as "fair" is not negotiating in good faith.

Expecting star players to take less AAV, lower/no bonus money and not offering NMC's is asking them to commit to the team while failing to commit to the player. That is the very definition of not negotiating in good faith.

I'll stick with my definition. You obviously haven't been in any serious negotiations to know what bad faith is. But I will give you a clue : Lebreton.

 

[Sensung]

I'll stick with my definition. You obviously haven't been in any serious negotiations to know what bad faith is. But I will give you a clue : Lebreton.

Yet ANOTHER time Melnyk negotiated in bad faith.

Thanks for pointing that out.

 

[coladin]

Yet ANOTHER time Melnyk negotiated in bad faith.

Thanks for pointing that out.

Your welcome, but that (Lebreton) has nothing to do with what the discussion is about.

 

[Sensung]

Your welcome, but that (Lebreton) has nothing to do with what the discussion is about.

Part of a long established pattern of behaviour. Therefore quite germane to the discussion.

 

[aragorn]

I guess the other option was to publicly state they couldn't afford the player(s) & how would fans respond to that? Wouldn't they complain as much as they are now? IMO the decision was made to rebuild at some point around the EK trade, if that is correct than why would they re-sign all of those very expensive players? They came close when they went to the conference final against the Rangers & thought bringing in Duchene would get them to the next level. But unfortunately that didn't work & they have imploded since then. Do you keep fixing the old car or do you buy a new one to stop the bleeding with the old car & hope the new one gets you where you want to go?

Clearly they have handled it terribly & should have been honest from the beginning & said, look we can't afford these expensive players in this market & in this environment whereby the team is losing & attendance is dropping. We haven't been able to win with these players so now may be the time to rebuild with younger, cheaper players. The owner certainly takes a lot of criticism & deservedly so with his big mouth but at the same time rebuilding this team may have been the right decision at the right time. However, we won't know that until this new group of players get into the cup final if they ever do. Regardless, I doubt this owner will ever get back any good faith he has lost, I doubt anyone trusts him again no matter how good the team does.

 

[RaMai]

I guess the other option was to publicly state they couldn't afford the player(s) & how would fans respond to that? Wouldn't they complain as much as they are now? IMO the decision was made to rebuild at some point around the EK trade, if that is correct than why would they re-sign all of those very expensive players? They came close when they went to the conference final against the Rangers & thought bringing in Duchene would get them to the next level. But unfortunately that didn't work & they have imploded since then. Do you keep fixing the old car or do you buy a new one to stop the bleeding with the old car & hope the new one gets you where you want to go?

Clearly they have handled it terribly & should have been honest from the beginning & said, look we can't afford these expensive players in this market & in this environment whereby the team is losing & attendance is dropping. We haven't been able to win with these players so now may be the time to rebuild with younger, cheaper players. The owner certainly takes a lot of criticism & deservedly so with his big mouth but at the same time rebuilding this team may have been the right decision at the right time. However, we won't know that until this new group of players get into the cup final if they ever do. Regardless, I doubt this owner will ever get back any good faith he has lost, I doubt anyone trusts him again no matter how good the team does.

Don't disagree with you, but to have something like this work out you still need at some point the resources to see it through.
Be it at hiring the right personnel for the stage of the rebuild you are in or just being able to sign your star players...I don't see any of this happen with EM as an owner. He can financially not compete with the other teams in this league, even Phoenix is able to offer contracts with bonuses, nmc and such.

 

[danielpalfredsson]

I don't think so. Ottawa just could not give what Stone wanted. It happens. They tried with the term, dollar amount , bonus money that they felt they could afford. Stone wanted what he wanted, and I don't blame him.

Dzingel, on the other hand, as far as we know, was never offered anything, while Dorion said he wanted to sign all three. It turned out that they ponied up for only 2. I would see that more "bad faith", but even then, they may have simply told Dzingel that he did not factor in their plans, which is not bad faith. But I never heard anything about offers for Dzingel as we did with the other two.

According to Garrioch, Dzingel was offered 5 years "in excess of" 20 million dollars. He "thumbed his nose at it" (Garrioch's phrasing, not mine).

Only 24 hours after Ottawa sent centre Matt Duchene to the Columbus Blue Jackets on Friday morning in a huge deal, the Senators showed the 26-year-old Dzingel the door and sent him packing after he thumbed his nose at a five-year contract extension that was worth in excess of $20 million.

I don't blame them for not signing Dzingel to that contract, but in their shoes if I knew Stone and Duchene weren't signing, I might have held on to him even if it took a slight over payment. The only exception would be is if our plan is actually to finish last next year, and it's just something we can't say publicly.

Dorion got a decent return on Dzingel at the deadline, which I think some people are overrating a bit due to Duclair's strong offensive game and Dzingel not replicating his Sens success in CBJ, but it has to be accounted for that if we sign Dzingel to a contract, he's still a UFA in the final year of the deal, and the door would still be open for us to eventually get a draft pick for him as a rental. Maybe it doesn't end up being two 2nds, but we'd still get something along with benefiting from having Dzingel for another few seasons.

 

[Gil Gunderson]

Full of liars - They'll never get a penny from me again.

feel sorry for Chabot and Brady playing for these idiots.

They won't be for long.

Keith is probably counting down the days until the offersheets come in for Brady.

 

[danielpalfredsson]

I for sure think the Karlsson contract was made in bad faith. I think they opened a huge can of worms with the fan base, backed themselves in a corner when they realized how soft the trade market was with Karlsson, so they wanted to offer him a contract because if he accepts they could flip him later on for a greater return due to Karlsson being under contract, and if he rejects they then can get on with trading him and have an excuse for trading Karl for a soft return. "He didn't want to stay, we couldn't risk it, etc".

The funny thing is, with what is being reported by Kypreos and Friedman about teams being apprehensive to go 7 years with Karlsson, if he suffered the same level of injuries after re-signing in Ottawa, the Senators probably would not have been able to move him. I'm not sure if I believe that there aren't teams aren't there willing to go 7 years, but if it is true, no team would be trading for him at that term either if he were already signed.

I think they knew a deal wouldn't get done with Stone and Duchene, but they held on to them down the stretch because they felt it was important to sell season tickets, and also not to hand COL Jack Hughes because of the negative impact it would have on their fan base. I don't think it was a situation where they don't want Hughes to go to COL because they look bad, I think they just thought the negative PR would have direct financial ramifications to the team via further lowering fan interest and ticket sales. Unless they were waiting on a sale, or they were waiting on Melnyk getting more cash somehow, it doesn't make sense to me that they have to resort to a 1 year contract only a few months before trading Stone if they actually had an intention to sign him. Unless the wait was driven by Stone wanting to see where things went, they should have been able to bridge the gap in the summer.

 

[aragorn]

Don't disagree with you, but to have something like this work out you still need at some point the resources to see it through.
Be it at hiring the right personnel for the stage of the rebuild you are in or just being able to sign your star players...I don't see any of this happen with EM as an owner. He can financially not compete with the other teams in this league, even Phoenix is able to offer contracts with bonuses, nmc and such.

I think my point was that maybe EM will pay & add these clauses in the future with these young players who are part of the team's future when they are progressing towards becoming contenders. He has done it before with some players but he didn't want to do it with the ex-players who were going to be too expensive on a team that wasn't going to contend anyway. Doesn't that seem like a waste of money as well as an anchor for a non-contending team to spend it on players when the team is not contending anyway? I do agree that EM is definitely a problem for this team & for this fan base & for this city & may not be able to afford to it in future anyway but that remains to be seen.

 

[coladin]

According to Garrioch, Dzingel was offered 5 years "in excess of" 20 million dollars. He "thumbed his nose at it" (Garrioch's phrasing, not mine).

Only 24 hours after Ottawa sent centre Matt Duchene to the Columbus Blue Jackets on Friday morning in a huge deal, the Senators showed the 26-year-old Dzingel the door and sent him packing after he thumbed his nose at a five-year contract extension that was worth in excess of $20 million.

I don't blame them for not signing Dzingel to that contract, but in their shoes if I knew Stone and Duchene weren't signing, I might have held on to him even if it took a slight over payment. The only exception would be is if our plan is actually to finish last next year, and it's just something we can't say publicly.

Dorion got a decent return on Dzingel at the deadline, which I think some people are overrating a bit due to Duclair's strong offensive game and Dzingel not replicating his Sens success in CBJ, but it has to be accounted for that if we sign Dzingel to a contract, he's still a UFA in the final year of the deal, and the door would still be open for us to eventually get a draft pick for him as a rental. Maybe it doesn't end up being two 2nds, but we'd still get something along with benefiting from having Dzingel for another few seasons.

I missed that, thanks. That was never going to work at 4M yr...just a little more than Zack Smith. Sounds closer to bad than good faith!

 

[danielpalfredsson]

I missed that, thanks. That was never going to work at 4M yr...just a little more than Zack Smith. Sounds closer to bad than good faith!

I mostly agree in that I think the Senators felt they were selling high on Dzingel, didn't really want to pay him, and would have rather take the picks. I'd imagine they offered him what they did and leaked it through Garrioch so that they can say they offered Dzingel a fair deal and wouldn't have to bear the burden of justifying valuing the picks (and cash saved) more than Dzingel @ 5 million.

Unless he takes a discount to stay in CBJ where he has roots, I could see him getting 5 million from somebody. I don't get why he would sign in Ottawa for 4 x 4 when everybody else is leaving and even if he faltered in CBJ (which he did) he's likely to have multiple suitors in that price range (give or take a few 100k). So yes, I think they made the offer knowing it'd be rejected. Very similar to when they stuck at 5 years on Turris (IMO) to buy time to get the Duchene trade done (which was predicated on the Senators (or the Avalanche w/ Sens permission) moving Turris for assets).

 

[Do Make Say Think]

I'll stick with my definition. You obviously haven't been in any serious negotiations to know what bad faith is. But I will give you a clue : Lebreton.

Yeah everyone was out to screw Eugene

The NCC, the City of Ottawa and Rudy all combined their forces to make sure this massive project failed.

 

[coladin]

Yeah everyone was out to screw Eugene

The NCC, the City of Ottawa and Rudy all combined their forces to make sure this massive project failed.

Don't know what you are getting at

 

[The Lewler]

According to Garrioch, Dzingel was offered 5 years "in excess of" 20 million dollars. He "thumbed his nose at it" (Garrioch's phrasing, not mine).

Only 24 hours after Ottawa sent centre Matt Duchene to the Columbus Blue Jackets on Friday morning in a huge deal, the Senators showed the 26-year-old Dzingel the door and sent him packing after he thumbed his nose at a five-year contract extension that was worth in excess of $20 million.

I don't blame them for not signing Dzingel to that contract, but in their shoes if I knew Stone and Duchene weren't signing, I might have held on to him even if it took a slight over payment. The only exception would be is if our plan is actually to finish last next year, and it's just something we can't say publicly.

Dorion got a decent return on Dzingel at the deadline, which I think some people are overrating a bit due to Duclair's strong offensive game and Dzingel not replicating his Sens success in CBJ, but it has to be accounted for that if we sign Dzingel to a contract, he's still a UFA in the final year of the deal, and the door would still be open for us to eventually get a draft pick for him as a rental. Maybe it doesn't end up being two 2nds, but we'd still get something along with benefiting from having Dzingel for another few seasons.

Ok so 1 out of the 3 actually rejected a legit offer. I'll reasonably accept that.

I also don't care about Dzingle.