What was the rationale behind Kariya and Selanne going to Colorado in 2003?

Paul4587

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Jan 26, 2006
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Kariya was trying to exploit the rule where if he signed for under league average he would become UFA again. He figured he would have a huge year playing with so much elite talent but it didn’t work out.

Teemu was basically wanting to play with Kariya again. He was originally going to sign in anaheim until Kariya decided he wasn’t re-signing.
 

Terry Yake

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Aug 5, 2013
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wasn't there talk about roy coming out of retirement once they acquired selanne and kariya?

it's interesting to think how it would have worked out if selanne and kariya were healthy that season. selanne was basically playing on one leg. the 04-05 lockout saved his career
 

Price is Wright

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Feb 5, 2010
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essex
My memory is fuzzy but I recall trade rumours that summer involving Colorado and Ottawa for Patrick Lalime. Don't know how much of a difference that would have made but it never happened.
 

vadim sharifijanov

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Oct 10, 2007
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Kariya was trying to exploit the rule where if he signed for under league average he would become UFA again. He figured he would have a huge year playing with so much elite talent but it didn’t work out.

Teemu was basically wanting to play with Kariya again. He was originally going to sign in anaheim until Kariya decided he wasn’t re-signing.

i feel like the hockey gods didn’t just smite kariya and selanne for that one year, but continued to punish kariya for the rest of his career.

the lockout happens and it turns out kariya left untold tens of millions if dollars on the table, foregoing that hypothetical huge anaheim offer in the summer of 2003. in the wake of the lockout, he gets “just” two years at $4.5 mill from nashville, then when he hits free agency again spurns the ducks for the umpteenth time and grabs one last contract (three years at $6m) from st louis, finishing up as a bad team scorer on a bottom feeding blues team.

meanwhile, kariya watches teemu resurrects his career with anaheim, which was apparently his 2004 plan in the first place before his buddy and their agent got funny ideas; plays nine more years and retires as the most beloved player in franchise history; adds more than half of kariya’s career games, goals, assists, and points totals to his running tally; three more top ten years (two goals, one points); first ballot hall of famer questioned by no one; and of course he helps bring the stanley cup to anaheim.

and finally, when kariya gets one last chance to come back to anaheim, join his buddy, and go out on a positive note, his head forces him to retire. that same summer, selanne turns 40 and unfathomably goes on to finish 8th in league scoring.

please note that i in no way am taking joy in kariya’s difficult battle with brain injury or suggesting that he had it coming. but man, it’s hard not to look at his career and think, it’s good to keep on karma’s good side.
 

Brodeur

Registered User
Feb 27, 2002
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San Diego
Kariya cunning with deal

Article from 2003, nothing particularly interesting but it did jog my memory about:

The big question now is: Who will replace Roy in goal?

At the moment, the Avalanche goaltending is in the hands of untried David Aebischer, a 25-year-old Swiss-born netminder who played behind Roy for the past three seasons.

After having excellent an 13-6 record and a 1.88 goals-against average two seasons ago, Aebischer's play fell off last season, as he managed only a 7-12 record and 2.43 goals-against average.

Colorado has high hopes for 23-year-old Philippe Sauve, who spent the past three seasons in Hershey as an apprentice for the No. 1 job, but it is anyone's guess whether he is ready to play on a contending team.

I remember arguing with one particular Avs fan who was a big Sauve booster. I recall that he declared something along the lines of "you guys don't know how hockey works" when some of us expressed doubts that Sauve was a future #1.
 
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Merya

Jokerit & Finland; anti-theist
Sep 23, 2008
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Helsinki
Kariya was trying to exploit the rule where if he signed for under league average he would become UFA again.
I believe it was to get to UFA status first time, instead of being an RFA for couple more years?
 

vadim sharifijanov

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Oct 10, 2007
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I believe it was to get to UFA status first time, instead of being an RFA for couple more years?

yup. something like seven years of experience while making less than the league average in the year entering free agency. ironically, vinny prospal, whom the ducks signed to replace kariya as their top LW, was also a young free agent on the same loophole, though his wasn't planned.

obviously he did eventually maket he hall of fame, but one other thing about kariya maybe looking back at his career and wondering what could have been had he made a few different choices:

this is where i would ask myself: where does kariya fall on the marcel dionne to markus naslund spectrum? somewhere in between obviously, but how far to either side of "undeniable, despite..." and "you're fffing kidding me"?

lindros of course is undeniable. but the thing i don't like about him is if you give him back those two years he voluntarily didn't play, he almost certainly hits 400 and 1,000 and he would have been in years ago. ditto kariya: if he doesn't miss the first 32 games of the '98 season, he hits 1,000 points and 1,000 games.

but i think that was also symptomatic of the short term thinking plaguing the game at the time: by players, agents, owners, bettman, etc.-- always the short term score not the big picture. the suter hit probably happens anyway, but maybe not as bad? i remember as he was trying to come back from that concussion there was a little piece on his training on tsn where they showed him doing boxing exercises for neck strength, so his head wouldn't snap back when he gets hit. could missing training camp and however much other training from his contract impasse (losing access to team facilities, etc) have affected how he took that hit? but i digress: what endorsement opportunities did kariya miss out on not playing those two tokyo games, especially if the plan was to plant a seed for the olympics later on, knowing now that he very well could have been the difference maker and hero for canada, with a relatively thin, albeit still peak hasek-sized, margin between the bronze game and the gold? he wouldn't have been yao ming, but an agent looking at the long term and big picture instead of just the one contract in front of his nose would have recognized that an energized and fully trained and midseason form kariya could have made back those dollars from the lower contract and probably way more by being hockey's first crossover asia/pacific rim star (assuming, of course, that no one could have predicted the suter hit).

gretzky, for instance, always understood the larger ramifications of his actions to the game, and that if the game grows, he will make back his piece and more.

and an interesting piece of trivia: after the lockout, kariya played five seasons and made $27 million. selanne, who played nine seasons after the lockout, "only" made $25.5 million.

EDIT: apparently it's called group 5 free agency and it was 10 years of pro experience, while making less than the league average the year going into free agency. prospal had only played seven years in the NHL, but had another three (actually more like four) in the AHL. prospal and kariya were both drafted in '93 but prospal came over a year earlier.
 
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Merya

Jokerit & Finland; anti-theist
Sep 23, 2008
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Helsinki
obviously he did eventually maket he hall of fame, but one other thing about kariya maybe looking back at his career and wondering what could have been had he made a few different choices:

He only got in bcs getting in with Teemu was a great story.
 

mrhockey193195

Registered User
Nov 14, 2006
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Denver, CO
I try not to think of that season, but one thing I'll never forget is the Avs' 1st PP of the year - they came out with Selanne, Kariya, Sakic, Forsberg, and Blake. I had to change my pants.
Reigning Richard Trophy winner Milan Hejduk and PPG 24 year-old Alex Tanguay weren't high enough on the pecking order to be on the #1 PP...

Talk about an embarrassment of riches (that ended up being an actual embarrassment in April)
 

mrhockey193195

Registered User
Nov 14, 2006
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Denver, CO
obviously he did eventually maket he hall of fame, but one other thing about kariya maybe looking back at his career and wondering what could have been had he made a few different choices:
Made a few different choices? Or lucked into fewer head injuries?

Kariya, to me, is one of the biggest victims of injury in my (albeit short) lifetime. Up there with Lindros and Forsberg...maybe even a bigger what-if than those two since he wasn't a physical player who was "inviting" injuries with his style.
 

Terry Yake

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Aug 5, 2013
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He only got in bcs getting in with Teemu was a great story.

kariya 100% deserves to be in the HOF

you must have never watched him if you think otherwise. to be able to produce the way he did during the prime of the clutch and grab era is remarkable. he came into the league 20 years too soon
 
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