(
)
It was the summer of 2006, and the only way for the Senators to keep impending free agent defensemen Zdeno Chara and Wade Redden was to get each at a hometown discount.
Redden, then 29, went for it, signing a two-year, $13 million deal that included a no-trade clause. Chara, also 29, did not, spurning Ottawa before signing a five-year, $37.5M contract with the Bruins and general manager Peter Chiarelli, hired approximately a month earlier after serving as assistant GM in Ottawa.
Chiarelli, in fact, was hired after Nashville assistant Ray Shero rejected a Boston lowball offer (What, from Jeremy Jacobs? Couldn’t be!) and signed instead to become GM of the Penguins. History was made those days, you could say, in Boston, Ottawa, Pittsburgh, New York and Hartford.
Chara stands tall as the greatest free-agent signing in NHL history, as tall as he stood accepting the Stanley Cup from Gary Bettman in Vancouver on Wednesday night during a ceremony sullied by the Canucks’ fans inside the arena while shameful rioting was just beginning on the streets of the city.
The Bruins earned their first championship since 1972 by grinding down a club that was exposed as mentally weak even in getting to Game 7, much as the 2001 Devils were exposed as psychologically unfit in blowing the 2001 Cup to Colorado in seven after preening over their own greatness on their way to the final round.
Boston was coached brilliantly by Claude Julien, the same man fired by New Jersey in 2007 with three games remaining in the season and the Devils in first place. Of course, he couldn’t have been the same coach, could he?
Goalie Tim Thomas was spectacular. The Bruins were deeper, tougher, more disciplined and more committed than the Canucks, who came to resemble a house of cards as the series evolved. Through 420:11 of hockey in the Final, the Bruins trailed for a total of 32:32.
The Canucks started the brawl on the ice by biting and the Bruins ended it by bringing the hockey equivalent of guns and knives to the fight, sending their opponents to their knees before the regular-season champions exited as losers with their organization’s and city’s reputation in tatters, despised it seems across Canada, and especially in agenda-setting Toronto.
Vancouver scored eight goals in the Final, four over the final five matches. Daniel and Henrik Sedin were massive disappointments, appearing to be the stuff of summer stock throughout their first run on the NHL’s big stage. Ryan Kesler had nothing. If he was hurt, so was just about everyone. Not an excuse.
But even as the Canucks brought next to nothing offensively to the party, Roberto Luongo’s epic meltdowns in all three games in Boston cost his team its credibility and its chance to win. It’s impossible to recall a goaltender of pedigree flaming out to the degree Luongo did in Boston, notably in Game 6.
If that wasn’t a choke job, it was the best imitation of one in Stanley Cup Final history.
And now Luongo has 11 years to go on his contract, representing an untenable situation for the franchise whose 117-point season ended in ruins and whose city disgraced itself in the aftermath of hockey defeat.
The Bruins are admirable champions. The organization handled every moment of adversity with equanimity and in stark contrast to way the Canucks went about their business. Credit the veterans in the room. Credit Chiarelli and credit Julien, who publicly and privately chastised Milan Lucic and Mark Recchi for their Game 3 finger-wagging. There were no whispers of conspiracy theories in Boston, that great American city.
All year we were fixated on the talent gap between the hard-working Rangers and the NHL’s elite teams, and it turns out the Cup was won by a team with good but not great talent. But, it was won by a club with size and toughness straight through the lineup.
Yes, it’s true, there’s room in the NHL for the little man, but let’s not kid ourselves, size matters as much now as it did the last time the Bruins won, the difference being that big men have to be able to skate now.
Boston’s victory will be celebrated across New England and in Parry Sound (Is there a hockey lover alive who doesn’t know Parry Sound?) while the Canucks’ defeat will be celebrated pretty much everywhere across the continent except for Vancouver.
The Bruins created history this year. So in fact did the Canucks, for a runner-up has never before come out of a season in such shambles.
History, however, was begun to be made in the summer of 2006.
*
The Rangers are in talks with winger Ruslan Fedotenko about a two-year deal aimed at preventing the impending unrestricted free agent from hitting the market on July 1, but a gap remains regarding the dollar figures, Slap Shots has learned.
It seems foolish for GM Glen Sather to grind Fedotenko, one of coach John Tortorella‘s go-to guys (with whom the Blueshirts were 39-23-4 when he was in the lineup, but 5-10-1 when he was sidelined with injuries) over what amounts to comparative nickels and dimes.
And especially when the club is going to need to spend a significant amount of additional dollars to be in position to receive full dispensation by placing Chris Drury on LTI at the start of the season.
There are a number of teams with interest in bringing Jaromir Jagr back to the NHL, including the Red Wings and Canadiens, as has been reported, but also including a couple of low-payroll clubs for whom No. 68 has no interest, Slap Shots has been told.
Montreal, though, seems the best bet. Can you think of a better idea than reuniting Jagr with Scott Gomez?