The Mess in Toronto

While we all wonder what the heck is going on in Toronto, it is important to note that some good can come out of the circus for the New York Islanders.

In case you haven't heard, last week the Anaheim Ducks denied a request by the Leafs to interview Ducks' GM Brian Burke for the same position in Toronto. Burke's all-but-coronation had been all the talk in Canada for weeks and many considered it to be a foregone conclusion that Burke was going to land there.

Of course, no one had officially asked the owners of the Ducks. Now Burke is allegedly trying to hammer out a longer-term deal with Anaheim and is going to work through the last year of his contract.

What does this mean for the Islanders? Well, speculation was that Burke had already made noise about buying out the remainder of defenseman Bryan McCabe's contract; just as the Isles did with Alexei Yashin last summer.

McCabe as a free-agent would lead to more "he's returning to Long Island" talk since his wife is from the area and her family is all on the island. Every time the TO media needed to move McCabe and his suffocating contract, they always speculated that Bryan would be good with returning to the Islanders because he got his start there.

Would this be a good move for the Islanders? Well, I suppose it would.

McCabe has developed into a dangerous power-play defenseman with a hell of a shot and a bit of a nasty streak. He had one great season where he was scoring goals like a bigger Paul Coffey and the Leafs decided to drop a bank safe full of teachers' pensions onto his lap. So he signed a long-term deal for like $5m a year like anyone should. This money--and the stranglehold the fans thought it put on the Leafs' salary cap--made him a bit of a whipping boy in Toronto. Hey, remember, these are the fans that booed Larry Murphy out of town and to Detroit where he won a Stanley Cup!

If I am Garth Snow--and I am not--if McCabe is bought out and expresses a desire to come back to the Islanders, I think he can expect a bit of home-town discount. He may have been making over five million bucks a year to get his pride stepped on up north but on the Islanders, I think a three-year deal is ok to make. There is no way that Bryan McCabe should make more money than a warrior like Brendan Witt so for 3 years I am thinking between eight- and 9.5 million is about right. He is younger than Witt and is tough player but Witt means more to the leadership core you're developing with the young guys.

My wife asked me if there were any other former Islanders that I hoped would find their way back to the Islander. I guess it is worth noting is that Calgary defensemen Adrian Aucoin will be unrestricted pretty soon (after next season) as well and he may want to return to where his career took off. Of course, Chicago signed him to a four-year, $16m deal as a free agent when he left NY but I doubt that he is going to see that kind of scratch again. Aucoin has been hassled by injury since leaving the Isles and worse, he was exposed as being a much better player when paired with Kenny Jonsson on the Isles. Jonsson had a way of making the heavy-lifting look easy, didn't he?

Mike Milbury didn't think Aucoin was worth what the Blackhawks gave him and even though I was a fan of Aucoin's, I didn't either. If he wants to play for the Islanders again, I'd give him just over $2m a year. Someone else might give him more but as much as I like Aucoin's game--it's similar to McCabe's but perhaps less nasty--we already have younger guys who are ready for bigger roles on the Islander blueline. Another year of development for the guys next season and the Isles will know what kind of players they have for the future. We see guys like Bruno and Campoli who are regulars when healthy. Andy Sutton is still a young guy and so is Radek Martinek. Aaron Johnson is young and proved himself capable at times last season as well.

Mike Peca will be unrestricted this summer, too, you know. Don't think he should come back.

Tonight at 8:00PM on the NHL Network is a show I have been waiting to get for a while: Classic Series 1993--Penguins vs Islanders. Two words: David effing Volek. Make sure you check it out. They're also playing the 1984 playoff game vs. the Rangers where Ken Morrow won it in OT on a little snap shot toward the net. Just like Pierre McGuire says, you don't always have to drill it.

Also worth nothing is that beginning May 16 the NHL Network will be broadcasting games for this year's Memorial Cup. Having never really seen too many Junior games aside from stuff online, I am really looking forward to this.

Rumour du jour; Caps tonight

Well, as we know, the NHL GMs are in Florida to meet and talk about the game and to make trades, etc. Seriously, it's probably an excuse to go somewhere warm and golf and pound a few with other guys who have similar job titles.

Today there are a lot of articles online about shrinking goalie equipment. I guess the prevailing thought is that the league made some changes and rules regarding the size of some of the equipment goalies are using, there are still guys out there cheating or flaunting the rules because the NHL has not been cracking down on a lot of the infractions as much as they should. Who better that our own GM Garth Snow to talk about how he used the equipment to his advantage when he was an active player? Most of us can recall Snow looking like he had a refrigerator box under his sweater when he played for the Flyers back in the day. (When he was on the Islanders, I thought his pads fit him just fine.)

Martin Brodeur had what I thought was a great point in one of the articles I read on the Toronto Star website. He said that smaller guys are using the maximum-sized pads (38 inches) even though they aren't physically as big as Brodeur and Roberto Luongo are. (For whatever reason, I thought immediately of Dubie when I read that remark.)

Brodeur says that the equipment was to fit the guy better. Smaller guys shouldn't be wearing big huge pants and maximum-length pads unless they are big dudes to begin with. Makes sense. You don't see skinny ballplayers wearing stuff from David Wells' closet because there is no inherent advantage to wearing pants that are way too big unless you're trying to take up more space in the net.

Regarding the impending Toronto fire sale, Bruce Garrioch in the Ottawa Sun is the big winner as the one millionth writer to break the news that the Leafs have "talked to" the Islanders about Bryan McCabe. Show him what he's won!

Listen, the facts are all out there and we have read them over and over for years. McCabe has a no trade clause in his contract and the media thinks he will waive that clause to go to the Islanders because his wife is from Long Island and he still has a home there. The fact that the Isles' defense corps is dropping in numbers like AARP loses members only adds to the speculation.

Look, the one thing no one considers is that McCabe makes a lot of money. A LOT of money. Like 5 million a year. Wouldn't adding a salary like that throw the Isles pay scale out of whack? Guys like Brendan Witt--who are arguably more valuable and who make less than that--may feel affronted. I don't know about you, but for what Witt brings to the Islanders in terms of guts, toughness, leadership, and by the way, more guts and toughness, I think he may be underpaid if you compare his game to McCabe's.

Also, let's take into consideration that as currently constructed, the NHL does not allow for on team to take on part of a traded player's salary as is allowed in other sports; most notably, the NFL. Anaheim GM Brian Burke has been talking about this very amendment for years. If Toronto wanted to say pay a portion of McCabe's salary--essentially admitting they made a mistake by over-paying for his services--and have that amount count against their salary cap and not the Islanders' cap, then I would be all for it.

For instance, if McCabe makes 5 million a year and is traded to the Islanders, the Isles are on the hook for a contract that they didn't have a hand in writing. If Toronto traded McCabe and said that they'd give the Islanders 2 million per year of the remaining deal, that would mean that McCabe would be "only" costing the Islanders 3 million a season and that 3 million would apply to the Islanders' salary cap. The 2 million dollars of "dead money" would go against the Leafs.

Again, until this Burke Provision becomes law, there's no real sense for the Islanders adding a guy like McCabe that someone else made a mistake with. Sure, he is a good player and he is quite capable and he also probably is a victim of that contract that he signed with Toronto, but without the Leafs helping out with the salary, it just doesn't add up to be a prudent move in the fiscal sense. Like it or not, that is the world we live in now in the NHL. Trades and signings have to make sense to the bottom line as much as they have to make sense in a hockey way as well.

Caps tonight, in DC. A great article on Alex Ovechkin can be found here: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com