Why didn't we give Hasek another shot?

[jbeck5]

i remember hearing that after hasek recovered from his olympic injury he wanted to be handed the starting job that he had pre olympics but the team told hasek that he would be backup first and have to earn the starting job back since emery was playing well then, which did not sit well with hasek

I never heard this, but you never lose your job due to injury. Only performance. As great as emery was playing he wasn't anywhere near hasek. When playing hasek was a top 5 gaa, top 5 sv%,top 5 w type of goalie. You pay top dollar for that let alone near league minimum.

For younger people, it's like brodeur 2-3 years ago when he was still a top goalie wanting to play on your team for near league minimum but you say no due to attitude or whatever issues and instead you sign a less proven jose theodore a to a 4 yr 12 million.

The decision at the time was mind numbing. Now, its beyond Pejorative Slured.

 

[Spez]

We wouldn't have beat the ducks even with Hasek. The wings were a way better team than we were that year and they still lost to the ducks which just goes to show you how much of a powerhouse they were that year. The scores in the series really flattered us because the series was more lopsided than you'd believe not to mention the ducks just sat back against us once they had the lead and did a great job at it.

 

[Burrowsaurus]

We wouldn't have beat the ducks even with Hasek. The wings were a way better team than we were that year and they still lost to the ducks which just goes to show you how much of a powerhouse they were that year. The scores in the series really flattered us because the series was more lopsided than you'd believe not to mention the ducks just sat back against us once they had the lead and did a great job at it.

hossa and chara and hasek probably turn that into a seven game series

 

[jbeck5]

hossa and chara and hasek probably turn that into a seven game series

We had havlat and smolinski the year before too. A 70 and 45 point players.

 

[SuperDuper101]

I can't believe people didn't know this...From Alfredsson down, no one in the locker room wanted him back.

One day, the guys will speak their mind but til then...

This. It's been widely confirmed the team told Hasek it was time to lace them up and he let them down. Ottawa believed he was healthy enough to play and he refused. Players felt it was a cop out and so did management. He really should have just gritted through it and played. Worst that could have happened was he plays 1 game and looks terrible so the team decides he was right about not being ready to go.

That was how it was spoken of at the time and despite some of the standard "hindsight" posters on HF most of you at the time most likely said you didn't want him back either.

 

[Busboy]

But if Gerber was our plan a, why couldn't we sign Gerber and hasek. Gerber was 3m a year and hasek would have been 1m a year or less.

I was advocating signing him at the time. We were always a big time goalie away from winning.

We were signing Gerber expecting him to be better than Osgood. So we could have brought back hasek and still had a better plan b...its only with hindsight that we knew Gerber would be so bad. But we could have planned better by bringing back hasek.

Hasek wasn't signing to be a backup to Martin Gerber for the Sens, that's just unrealistic, especially whe you consider Emery's status with the organization at the time.

The Gerber signing was a bad move in hindsight since he played poorly, this is indisputable. Hasek leaving can not be simplified down to a "this or that' situation when you're revising history nearly a decade later.