When Walter O’Malley was given the option of moving his baseball team from Ebbets Field to a new stadium in Flushing Meadows, the imperious owner sniffed that moving the Brooklyn Dodgers to Queens would destroy the franchise’s identity, anyway, so he took the beloved Bums to Los Angeles.
Now, more than a half-century later — with the Islanders dying on the vine in Hempstead, with political machinations stalling plans to build a necessary new arena on Long Island — Charles Wang’s team has been presented with the option of moving to a new facility in Flushing Meadows, with perhaps another option to move to Brooklyn just as viable.
It is time for the owner to announce his commitment to keeping the Islanders home, which is here, arbitrary geographical boundaries aside, unless he believes that moving the team to Queens or Brooklyn is no different than taking it to Kansas City or Quebec.
It is time for Wang, who for the most part has kept his silence while refraining from issuing public ultimatums, to speak up and assure the fan base that he has no intentions of ever trying to take the team farther away from the Island than across the county line.
On one hand, there is no urgency to the situation given that Wang repeatedly has pledged to honor the Islanders’ lease at the Coliseum that runs through the 2014-15 season.
But there is urgency for the Islanders to stabilize their situation and to reaffirm their intention to remain here as a signal to the fan base that is enduring yet another rebuilding program and as one to prospective free agents seeking a place to play.
These fans — who have supported their team through the ownerships of charlatans and swine and through the management of a self-styled mad man who decided the team would be better off with Alexei Yashin and Rick DiPietro rather than Zdeno Chara, Marian Gaborik, Jason Spezza and Roberto Luongo — these fans have a right to know if they will get to see the fruits of this rebuilding program.
The Islanders have not won a playoff round since 1993. This represents the longest drought of any existing NHL franchise that has been in place at least that long. The payroll last year reached the mandated league minimum of $40.8 million only because of the inclusion of Yashin’s $4.755 million buyout charge, with the roster featuring 10 regulars earning $1 million or less.
It’s not that Wang is cheap, it’s that no upper-echelon free agent with options would ever consider coming to the Island, given the disrepair of the home arena and uncertainty surrounding the future.
General manager Garth Snow bristled on Friday when it was suggested that he had been reluctant to spend money to accelerate the building process.
“I beg to differ,” he told Slap Shots. “We gave $20.5 million to Mark Streit. We gave $5 million to Dwayne Roloson.
“As you know, anyone can spend money. Anyone can spend money. We just want to get value for the contract.”
Speaking of which (or not), there is the matter of DiPietro, whose presence, or lack thereof, remains a storyline as constant and as exhausting as the Lighthouse/Coliseum saga. The goaltender, who made a personally triumphant return from injury at midseason before suffering an almost immediate setback, has 11 years to go on his 15-year, $67.5 million deal.
And there is, Snow said on Friday, no thought to cutting ties with DiPietro, even as the general manager admitted he doesn’t know if the goaltender will be able to compete for the No. 1 job in camp.
“I’ve never even considered buying out Ricky. It’s never been a consideration,” Snow told Slap Shots. “I don’t have a crystal ball where I can tell you what his condition is going to be in September, but this is a big summer for him.”
With nearly $30 million in cap space, this could be a big summer for the Islanders, too, but it won’t be. It won’t be because no important player with choices will come unless he’s wildly overpaid. It won’t be, because the franchise’s future is in flux.
To a certain degree, politicians have held Wang hostage. But even as the lifelong Long Islander suffers through a process that has become a cruel maze, he has the ability to take immediate control. He can announce tomorrow that he is taking up Jeff Wilpon’s offer and is moving the Islanders to a new facility in Queens the moment the lease at the Coliseum expires.
The owner can announce that. He does not need approval from the league, which would view an Islanders’ move into the five boroughs no differently than the Devils’ move from the Meadowlands to Newark. He can re-energize the franchise, and transform it into a destination location. Wang can do that any time he wishes.
Unless, of course, he believes that once he takes the Islanders off the Island, moving to Queens is no different than moving to Kansas City or Quebec.
If Wang believes that, now is the time to let everyone know.
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Several individuals close to the scene in Montreal tell Slap Shots that assistant coach Kirk Muller is owed much of the credit for the Canadiens’ stunning success in knocking off Washington and Pittsburgh, so much so in fact, that he may well be a candidate to become the Devils’ next head coach.
Next!
Muller, who was New Jersey’s first star player after the franchise got him second overall in 1983 as the door prize when Pittsburgh shamelessly dumped games to get into position to select Mario Lemieux, has been a Canadiens assistant for four years. In addition to running Montreal’s formidable penalty-kill unit, Muller is widely recognized as the guy behind the bench on whom the players rely and trust.
Muller was head coach of the Queen’s U. (Kingston, Ont.) Golden Gaels for the 2005-06 season, but it remains to be seen whether Lou Lamoriello believes that constitutes adequate experience, one summer after the general manager bypassed John MacLean to hire Jacques Lemaire because the longtime New Jersey assistant lacked a head coaching background. MacLean took over the Devils’ AHL club in Lowell this season and led the team to the playoffs.
Muller and MacLean have been best friends since they were teenaged teammates with the Devils more than a quarter-century ago. Their families are inseparable during the offseason. It would certainly be a twist if Lamoriello were to offer the job to Muller rather than MacLean.
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Donald Fehr, we’re told by a well-placed source, was so disturbed by the way the NHL attempted to ramrod through its blindside hit rule without giving the players reasonable opportunity to conduct their due diligence, that it heightened the former MLBPA leader’s interest in assuming control of the NHLPA in order to lead the union back to credibility.
The PA is expected to select an executive director no later than mid-July, after adoption of a constitution that would restore power to the executive branch. Unless there is an unforeseen development, Fehr will be elected as the power on the throne.
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Jordan Staal is a very good player, and Pittsburgh has had a fair amount of success since selecting the center second overall in 2006, but can you imagine what the Penguins would be if they’d used that pick to select Jonathan Toews instead of leaving him on the board for Chicago to grab next?
It would, by the way, be insane for the Penguins to trade Evgeny Malkin unless they’re getting back Zach Parise in the deal. Which they are not.
Parise, you should know, is regarded as a Top Five player by essentially every general manager in the league. With restricted free agency looming next summer and unrestricted free agency just a year later, this is the time for Lamoriello to give this Devil his due.
Now that we have had some time to let the issues marinate, a) Philadelphia GM Paul Holmgren will not be dismissed for signing Chris Pronger to that over-35 contract; and, b) Montreal GM Pierre Gauthier did rather well by sending a second-round pick to Florida for Dominic Moore, one of the prime forces in Montreal’s playoff run.
What Gauthier did, in essence, was exchange a second-round pick for a minimum of nine playoff home games plus a shot at the Stanley Cup.
Not a bad day’s work.
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Roberto Luongo, as much along for the ride behind good teams as Chris Osgood most of his career behind powerhouse clubs in Detroit — and please, is there a more ridiculous concept than Osgood as a Hall of Fame goaltender? –has allowed five goals or more in five of the 12 conference semifinal games against Chicago over the last two years, so it’s fair to ask whether the captain is as much a part of the problem in Vancouver as he is part of the solution in Vancouver.
It’s a little late for GM Mike Gillis to be asking that question, however, given that Luongo has 11 years to go on the contract he signed last summer.
Garth Snow wants to know if Gillis has considered buying out Luongo.
No excuses necessary, but with Pittsburgh and Detroit both knocked out in Round 2 after consecutive trips to the Finals, no NHL team has made it as far as the third round following at least two straight appearances in the Finals since the 1985 Oilers defended the crown they won in 1984 after losing the 1983 Finals to the Islanders.
The 2002 Devils lost in the first round, the 2000 Stars lost in the second round, the 1999 Red Wings lost in the second round, the 1993 Penguins lost in the first round and the1989 Oilers also lost in the first round.
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This just in. Ted Leonsis blogs that Dan Bylsma was outcoached by Jacques Martin, too.