The Leafs and Waiver Wire Limits

I don’t often agree with Leafs GM Brian Burke.

I find his stance on head shots deplorable, the majority of his UFA signings questionable, and his bluster tiresome.

The one area I do agree with him: the NHL should not limit the number of post-deadline player call-ups to four.

Sadly, with their loss to Tampa Bay, the Leafs’ season has all but come to an end. The Leafs have to win 10 of their next 12 to have a shot at the post-season. Sure, anything is possible but it’s not exactly probable.

And that’s where this call-up limit comes in.

Matt Lashoff has already cleared waivers and will be with the Leafs on their latest road trip. Rumour has it Nazem Kadri has been called-up from the Marlies to fill Colby Armstrong’s roster spot.

I’m sure a lot of Leaf fans, as well as Leafs management, would like to see how a few more of the Leafs prospects look against NHL competition.

But it won’t happen so long as the four call-up limit is in place.

I really hope this is addressed in the next round of the NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA). Even if it means sharing little to no common ground with the GM of my favourite club.

What's the going rate for Kulemin?

Nikolai Kulemin is a Restricted Free Agent (RFA) whose contract is up for renewal. There has been a great deal of speculation as to what it might take, in terms of dollar and term, to get Kulemin back on the Leafs.

Last season, Kulemin carried a cap hit of $1.48M with a salary of $850,000. Under the CBA, he automatically qualifies for a 10% raise, meaning the minimum salary he can earn is $935,000. He will of course, sign for a more substantial raise that reflects his potential and his relative importance to the team.

Now, I have to say that I have no idea what Nikolai Kulemin is worth. I mean, I’m writing this while drinking beer on a Monday afternoon – so consider the source - but I thought I’d take a stab at a few of the variables involved in his upcoming contract negotiations.

1. What contracts (cap hit and term) have other RFAs with similar stats to Kulemin signed; and
2. What are his arbitration rights? Can Kulemin (or the Leafs) go to a third party to set Kulemin’s salary?

Comparables

In order to get an idea of the compensation Kulemin might be in line for, I wanted to find players that have put up similar numbers.

I limited the field to players that were RFAs at the end of the 2008-09 season. By looking at players that put up totals that are in the same range as Kulemin, we can look at the resulting contracts that they signed to get a sense of the going rate for 30 to 40 point RFA.

In terms of production, Kulemin’s two years in the NHL have been pretty similar:

73GP 15G 16A 31Pts
78GP 16G 20A 36Pts

There aren’t many comparable RFAs from the 2008-09 season, but here are five RFA forwards with numbers that are somewhat similar to Kulemin’s most recent year. Here are their boxcars and the deals they signed back in 2009:

Brandon Dubinksy 82GP 13G 28A 41PTS 2 years, $1.85M/year
Ryan Callahan 81GP 22G 18A 40PTS 2 years, $2.3M/year
Chad LaRose 81GP 19G 12A 31PTS 2 years, $1.7M/year
Kyle Brodziak 79GP 11G 16A 27PTS 3 years, $1.15M/year
Kyle Wellwood 74GP 18G 9A 27PTS 1 year, $1.2M/year

Based on these numbers, I would think Kulemin is looking at a payday of $1.75M to $2.3 million per year. I’d guess – and this is nothing more than idle speculation – Kulemin inks a two to three year deal with a $2.1M annual cap hit.

That guess, and these numbers, don't take into consideration arbitration...

Arbitration Rights

By my reading of the CBA, Kulemin is eligible for arbitration. But of course, nothing with the CBA is that straightforward.

Arbitration eligibility is based on the age that a player signs his first SPC and his years of professional service. Kulemin signed his entry level deal in May 2007, when he was 20, but by the terms of the CBA he’s considered 21 years old:

As used in this Article, "age," including "First SPC Signing Age," means a Player's age on September 15 of the calendar year in which he first signs an SPC regardless of his actual age on the date he signs such SPC.

According to 12.1 (a) of the CBA, players who sign their SPC at 21 must have three (3) years of professional service to be arbitration eligible.

Kulemin has two seasons with the Leafs and one year with the KHL’s Metallurg Magnitogorsk (a team name that I want to load up with umlauts and claim is an ‘80s metal band). I have no idea if that season in the KHL counts as a year of “professional service” as there’s no definition of “professional service” in the CBA. Helpful, huh?

The CBA does define a “professional games” as:

any NHL Games played, all minor league regular season and playoff games and any other professional games played, including but not limited to, games played in any European league or any other league outside North America, by a Player pursuant to his SPC.

So if Kulemin’s time in the KHL counts as profeesional games, I’m going to presume that a year of professional games is a year of professional service. That means Kulemin has played three professional seasons, which means he's eligible to take the Leafs to arbitration. That means the Leafs don't hold all of the leverage in these negotiations and, in addition to the so-called threat of bolting to the KHL, Kulemin and his agent can also seek higher compensation by taking their case to a third party.

We should know by the first week of July where exactly Kulemin and the Leafs stand...

Burke, Kessel and the Long Term Injury Exception

There seems to be a commonly held perception that Brian Burke and the Toronto Maple Leafs hold the leverage in the on-going saga of Phil Kessel. I’m not so sure.

Kessel, a restricted free agent (RFA), is looking for a multi-year deal north of $4 million annually while the Bruins have just $2M in cap room to spare.

It sounds like the perfect scenario for the Leafs. They tender an RFA contract meeting Kessel’s salary demands, the Bruins are in tough to match, and the Leafs get a 21 year old, 30+ goal scorer for a 1st, 2nd and 3rd round draft pick. Not only that, but the Blue and White poach a key part of a divisional rival’s line-up.

Sadly for the Leafs, the Bruins’ cap situation isn’t quite that dire. Because of Kessel's off-season shoulder surgery, Chiarelli can use the CBA’s Bona-Fide Long-Term Injury/Illness Exception to park Kessel and his big shiny new contract on the long-term injury reserve list. Doing so not only permits the Bruins to go over the cap, they don't have to address how Kessel’s contract affects the salary cap until Kessel is ready to return.

Unfortunately for Burke and the Leafs, Kessel isn’t due back until late November or early December. which is more than enough time for Chirarelli to explore his options to find an additional million or two in cap room.

With the IR exception in mind, I can understand why Chiarelli is confident he can match any RFA offer and why the Kessel rumours have turned away from RFA offer sheets to a trade.

For those of you who hate plain language writing, the CBA explains it thusly:

50.10 (d) VII The replacement Player Salary and Bonuses for any Player(s) that replace(s) an unfit-to-play Player may be added to the Club's Averaged Club Salary until such time as the Club's Averaged Club Salary reaches the Upper Limit. A Club may then exceed the Upper Limit due to the addition of replacement Player Salary and Bonuses of Players who have replaced an unfit-to-play Player, provided, however, that when the unfit-to-play player is once again fit to play (including any period such Player is on a Bona Fide Long-Term Injury/Illness Exception Conditioning Loan to another league), the Club shall be required to once again reduce its Averaged Club Salary to a level at or below the Upper Limit prior to the Player being able to rejoin the Club.

The Frogren is also cursed (that's bad)

One last word on Jonas Frogren (sorry).

I wanted to assemble a bit of timeline of how this situation went from a dispute over the interpretation of the CBA to the loss of a 4th round draft pick some nine months later.

Here are the key dates:

July 7 - The Leafs sign Jonas Frogren to a 2-year, $2.1M contract
July 10 - The NHL rejects Frogren's contract (a must read piece by Kevin McGran at the Star that pretty much nails every step of the Frogren saga that was to come. Seriously good stuff.)
July 11 - Expectation that the case will be grieved and resolved by autumn
August 7 - The NHLPA confirms that are grievance the NHL's decision to reject the contract
August 10 - The Hockey News looks at the Frogren situation and sits on the fence, "both sides are right to an extent."
August 11 - Frogren allowed to play under contract while the grievance is underway
November 8 - ESPN reports that if the Leafs lose the arbitation hearing they can simply re-sign Frogren to an entry level SPC
November 14 - The Globe and Mail reports the Frogren greivance is settled prior to the hearing taking place
April 1 - NHL states Leafs must forfeit 4th round pick and pay $500K fine for Frogren signing

I understand how both sides interpreted the CBA and their relative positions, but what I don't understand, and what I'd love to know, is what agreements were reached at the mid-November settlement? I'd also love to know how, five months after reaching an agreement, the NHL can apply sanctions against the Leafs...30+ journalists following this team and all we have are more questions.

A layperson's look at Frogren and the CBA

Maybe the Leafs should just avoid players named Jonas.

The NHL has fined the Leafs $500,000 and a 4th round draft pick for signing Jonas Frogren to a contract that went over and above an entry level SPC.

To review, last summer, the Leafs signed Frogren to a creative contract that MLSE believed was in compliance with the CBA.

Based on my reading of the CBA, I'm pretty much guessing those sections are, Section 9.1 c:

a Player who at the time he was drafted was playing for a team outside North America or who meets the qualifications set forth in Article 8.4(a)(v) (a "European Player") who signs his first SPC at ages 25-27 shall be subject to the Entry Level System for one (1) year. A European Player who signs his first SPC at age 28 or older is not subject to the Entry Level System under any circumstances.

Section 8.4(a)(v):

a Player age 22 or older who has not been selected in a previous Entry Draft and shall be eligible to enter the League as an unrestricted Free Agent pursuant to Article 10.1 (d).

And section 10.1 (d):

Any player not eligible for claim in any future Entry Draft pursuant to this Agreement and not on a Club's Reserve List shall be an Unrestricted Free Agent. Further, any Player eligible for claim in the Entry Draft, but who was unclaimed, shall be an Unrestricted Free Agent subject to the provisions of Section 8.9(b).
(ii) Each Player referred to in subsection (d)(i) above shall, during the period of his Free Agency in accordance with Section 8.9(b), if applicable, be completely free to negotiate and sign an SPC with any Club, and any Club shall be completely free to negotiate and sign an SPC with such Player, without penalty or restriction subject to the provisions of Article 9 of this Agreement, if applicable, and without being subject to any Right of First Refusal, Draft Choice Compensation or any other compensation or equalization obligation of any kind.

As Frogren was indeed a European player, playing outside the NHL, who was 28 years old, without a previous SPC, it could be argued that he was not restricted to the limits of an entry level SPC. That's the position that the Leafs, the NHLPA and Frogren's agent Don Meehan took (and which the Leafs and Meehan stated to the media last summer).

Unfortunately for the Leafs, the NHL disagreed. From what I've been able to gather, the league argued that Frogren was to be considered a "defected player"

Under section 10.2 b of the CBA:

Definition of "Defected Player." For purposes of this Agreement, "Defected Player" means any Player not unconditionally released:
(A) who, having had an SPC with a Club, the provisions of which, including the option clauses in a 1995 SPC, have not been completely fulfilled, contracts for a period including any part of the unfulfilled portion of his SPC, with a club in a league not affiliated with the NHL or with any such league (both of which are hereinafter referred to as an "unaffiliated club") or with any other professional 32 hockey club to the exclusion of the said Club or its assignee; or
(B) who, never having been under contract to any Club, but as to who the NHL negotiation rights now or at any time hereafter shall reside in any Club, has contracted or shall contract with such an unaffiliated club.

I'm presuming that the NHL argued that Frogren had not fulfilled his contract with an unaffiliated club (in this case Färjestads) in an unaffiliated league (the SEL).

Unfortunately for Toronto, the NHL disagreed and the NHL won.

I think it's grossly unfair and incredibly simple to paint this situation as any type of incompetence on the part of the Leafs or Cliff Fletcher.

The Leafs, their lawyers, the NHLPA and Don Meehan all agreed and argued that given his age, draft status, and heritage Frogren was an unrestricted free agent who was not limited to an entry level deal.

Despite the findings and the punitive measures (the loss of the 4th round pick sort of stings, but really, what's $500K to MLSE?) I hope the Leafs continue in their efforts to be creative and to seek out alternative means of getting more draft picks and more talent into the organization.

**UPDATE**
This post attempts to explain the how, but I didn't touch on the why.

It should be noted that Frogren used the bonus money in his contract with the Leafs to buy-out his contract with Färjestads. Had Frogren not had contractual obligation to the SEL I'm presuming the NHL would not have sought sanctions against the Leafs.

Again, this is all just guess work on my part - if anyone finds some answers to this in the media, please put a link in the comments.

Me and the boys and our 50

As you likely well know, the Leafs have signed 22 year old prospect Christian Hanson out of the NCAA.

Clearly, the Leafs organization has an affinity for NCAA players with upwards of nine playing in their system, most of whom were drafted by the JFJ led Leafs.

The last signing of this type by the Leafs that I can recall is Mike Johnson who signed with the Leafs out of Bowling Green back in 1997. I'm not sure that's the most recent example, but it's certainly the only one that comes to mind - possibly due to my diminishing mental prowess and possibly due to the lack of innovative impact signings the Leafs have been able to pull off over the last fifteen years.

Rumours persist that Burke is pursuing a few more NCAA prospects, which brings up the issue of Standard Player Contracts (SPCs) and why it was so important for the Leafs to shed bodies at the trade deadline.

As I wrote about when the Leafs waived Bell and Kronwall, NHL teams are limited to having a maximum of 50 players signed to SPCs for any given season. the loss of Bell, Kronwall, Moore and Antropov put the Leafs at about 45 SPCs. Since that time they have signed Harrison (46), Hamilton (47), Berry (48) and now Hanson (49).

That means the Leafs have one more spot open to sign an NCAA prospect and one big loophole to play with.

According to the CBA section 50.8 (d), the Leafs can tender contracts to undrafted free agents that are post-dated to next season and so long as the Leafs don't exceed 50 SPCs for a given July 1 to June 30 period, they are in compliance with the CBA.

As the Leafs have 13 contracts expiring on June 1, Burke has lots of wriggle room to sign NCAA prospects for next year with one competitive disadvantage: anyone signed to a post-dated SPC can't play for the Leafs or Marlies this year.

For those of you who scratched your head when the Leafs dealt for Hollweg, you can add the possible loss of a NCAA prospect due to SPC limits to your list, along with that fifth-round pick that was spent to acquire him, in your hate email to Fletcher.

For an excellent summary of the various roster limits and exemptions you should read this; there's on-going discussion of the Hanson signing over at PPP and a nice piece from Alex Tran at Maple Leaf Hot Stove here.

The sun's not brighter here, it only sines on golden hair

In the past week, the Leafs have exposed Kronwall, Williams, Devereaux and Battaglia to waivers.

Kronwall was claimed by the Caps, Williams passed through to the Marlies (if he hadn’t, Canada might have been treated to the sight of Don Cherry suffering from a massive intraparenchymal hemorrhage on national TV during Coach’s Corner) and the fate of Devereaux and Battaglia will be known by noon on Friday.

Burke’s stated vision for the Leafs is to have six forwards that are offensive threats and six that can muck it up. If Williams can’t be in the top six (and it seems 29 other NHL GMs would agree with that assessment) he certainly doesn’t have the size, work ethic, or fists to be on the bottom six.

So what gives with the other three guys?

There’s a term in the CBA called the "Reserve List" which dictates the maximum and minimum number of players an organization can have at one time.

The Reserve List includes all the players a club holds the rights to, including all unsigned draft choices, all players signed to a Standard Player Contract (SPC) – even if they are not currently playing in the NHL – and all players who have signed an SPC but who have subsequently been returned to Juniors.*

An NHL team is permitted to have up to 90 players on their reserve list; however, only 50 of those players can be signed to a SPC.

With the Leafs carrying 22 players and the Marlies carrying 25, the organization has 47 players signed to SPCs. Add in goalie James Reimer (who for some reason isn’t on the Marlies web-page roster) and that makes 48. Kronwall would have put the organization at 49. With a max limit of 50, that doesn’t give Burke a lot of wiggle room at the trade deadline.

It’s been suggested that there’s some sort of altruism going on with Leafs management, that players are being waived so they can have one more shot at the bigs or they're being rewarded for their hard work and strong play with the Marlies.

That may be true, but my guess is the Leafs are exposing so many players in the hopes that one or two of these guys get claimed by another club, the Leafs SPC number drops by another body or two, Burke gets some room on the Leafs Reserve List and, most importantly, the organization has a bit more flexibility at the trade deadline.


*Players under 19 who have played 10 NHL games or less and are returned to Junior do not count against the first 50 on the reserve list, but do count as part of the organizational 90.

What's the strange title of this post all about? Click here.

If You're Gonna Stay Show Some Mercy Today

Sport was the main occupation of all of us, and continued to be mine for a long time. That is where I had my only lesson in ethics. – Albert Camus.

Perhaps it’s because the sub-text of all sports is about complying with rules and the notions of fair play, ethics and good sportsmanship that fans often develop the expectation that these same values and attributes can and should be found in the professional athletes themselves.

It would be nice to think that the athletes who show leadership, loyalty and courage on the field of play would demonstrate these same attributes off it.

Unfortunately, for me, there’s far too much evidence to the contrary to carry that expectation very far.

This leads me to Mats Sundin.

I think the main reason why there is such divergent views about Sundin’s future is that one-side of the debate is focusing on the explicit rules as found in the CBA, while the other half focuses on those implicit notions, characteristics and values of sport (e.g. doing what’s “right” for the team).

Further complicating matters is money (it’s always money).

Mats Sundin has led the Leafs in every significant statistical category for over a decade and is arguably one of, if not the greatest, player to have skated for the Blue and White. For this, he has been remunerated exceptionally – staggeringly – well.

But does the size of the pay cheque change the principle issue? Should an employee forgo a contractually bargained right and do something against his explicitly expressed desire because it’s in the best interest of his employer and a nebulous group of people called “fans” simply because he’s been well paid?

My answer is no (and clearly others disagree).

But while we’re on the topic of loyalty and what a player “owes” his team and the fans, I’d like to move away from Mats for a minute and propose something entirely new that I’m sure most Leaf fans can agree with.

I think MLSE should ask Jason Blake and Darcy Tucker to retire for the good of the team (and, let’s face it, the best-interest of many fans).

It certainly would be a “loyal” thing for Blake and Tucker to do. It would avoid the ugly spectacle of buy-outs or trips to the minors and the Leafs would be absolved of two hefty long-term cap hits.

Let’s face it, both of these guys have made millions upon millions of dollars for playing a simple kids’ game. Isn't it time Blake and Tucker put the good of the team before their personal best interests and wishes and just hung up their skates?

As long suffering fans, don’t they owe us that much?

Nine Tips for Media Types

I really appreciate the quality of the comments on this site, they often make me stop and think.

Case in point: The feedback on my Cox post deserved a response and my comment mushroomed into this (rather long) post.

I think we'd all agree that there certainly couldn't be much more Leafs coverage. There are upwards of 30 reporters covering the Leafs. To put that in perspective, the entire media contingent covering Queen's Park (the Province of Ontario's legislature) is just 31 journalists.

In addition to having their own TV channel, the Leafs are the lead item on each and every TSN and Sportsnet broadcast. Each paper has columnists and staff reporters covering the team. There are lunch time radio broadcasts devoted to all things blue and white. And then there's the comments at the Globe and Mail, filled by people who seem to spend more time complaining about the amount of Leaf coverage than they do cheering for their own teams.

So the quantity is unarguably there, but the quality side seems to be a bit lacking. How hard is it for a reporter or editorial staff to use a search function to scan the NHL CBA? How many times are reporters going to miss that both Tucker and McCabe have NMCs? If the media are unsure about a no-movement clause, why not phone the NHLPA, the agent or ask the player? Isn't that one of the benefits of being a trained professional with full access to sources?

That said, I do feel some sympathy for the media who cover the Leafs. There's so much media competition in this town (and with this team) that I can't imagine the pressure they're under from their editors and producers to cultivate sources and land big scoops.

I think this combination of editorial pressure and competitive media marketplace is the big reason that Cox has been publicly fellating JFJ in so many of his columns. Cox knows Ferguson will eventually land on his feet in the NHL and, if Cox has laid on enough adjectives, he may have cultivated an inside source in Ferguson - one that will be very helpful in fueling Cox with plenty of material for his faux-indignation-fueled tirades against MLSE.

That or Cox is looking to land his next book deal and has JFJ in his sites (admittedly, Cox did file a pretty solid piece in yesterday's paper).

Still, given the pressures and competition, it's hard to believe the amount of misinformation, poor fact checking and general lack of imagination that permeates so much of the Leafs media coverage. I'd like to think with their access, the reporters who file day in day out on all things Leaf might be able to come up with something more compelling then who's wearing the red jersey at practice, fake trade rumours or faux panic over the lack of formal job interviews conducted by MLSE.

Rather than just bitch and moan about the state of Leaf coverage and without much thought (like most of my posts) here are 9 ideas, off the top of my head, that I'd love to see followed-up by those who cover hockey and/or the Leafs:

1. More first person source reporting. This was one of my favourite articles last year - a Brian Burke first-person diary during the trade deadline. Could we get something similar from anyone at MLSE? Please? If not, I'd settle for any first-person insight at the GM level.
   
2. Use your access to really take readers behind the scenes. The consensus is the Leafs need to hold on to their draft choices and draft wisely. Can fans maybe get a profile (or two or three) of the Leaf scouts that will be helping make the decisions on draft day? What gems have they discovered? What do their peers on other clubs think of them? What's the hierarchy in the scouting department and how do draft day decisions get made? Maybe a day in the life of a Leaf scout...or a day in the life of a top OHL prospect. Gare Joyce's work on this was great stuff and surely demonstrated there's an audience for it. Wouldn't it be nice to get a bit more on these kids than Don Cherry and four or five of the top ranked 18 year olds passing around a microphone during a 45 second spot on HNIC?
   
3. Stop telling us what Leaf fans think. Leafs Nation is not a homogeneous entity and does not think with one mind. Even if Leaf fans did all agree, would anyone care? Moreover, it's a lazy literary device at best and completely misleading at worse.
   
4. Help the fans get insights from the coaches. The Leafs have the worst PK in the league and it's killing them. When was the last time anyone saw an interview with the special teams coach, or even with Maurice, where the Leafs approach to the PK was analyzed? What's working, what's not? Compare and contrast the Leafs' approach by interviewing special team coaches on more successful clubs. (And it doesn't have to be just the PK. There's the whole issue of zone v. man-to-man defence; team toughness/ use of enforcers; the shoot-out; power play; adapting to opponents; etc.)
   
5. Less of the trade rumour BS. Before the trade deadline there were, what, maybe 4 trades in the NHL? Yet every columnist weighs in with trade rumour after trade rumour, none of which come true and none of which advance a story of any relevance. (And can someone fine Dreger every time he uses the questionable at best "Sources are saying..." approach. If he had to put a twoonie in a jar for every time he used it he could make a hefty-donation to a worthy cause.)
   
6. More long form player profiles please. Joe O'Connor has being doing this masterfully with retired players over at the National Post, why not do it with the current or retired Leafs? (Or how about an update on Boyd Devereaux's record label?)
   
7. Help demistify the CBA. This is one of the best posts I've seen on the matter, it's by a blogger and it's over a year old. Why can't newsrooms create similar content? How about top 10 CBA myths (e.g. players with NMC can't be bought out; injured players don't count against the cap; etc.). Since the signing of the CBA has the frequency of offer sheets to RFAs increased? What steps can clubs take to protect their RFAs (e.g. team initiated arbitration)? With Wellwood and Stajan as the Leafs main RFAs, what odds do agents and other insiders give that another club will tender them a contract? How does the fact that the Leafs traded their second round pick to Phoenix for (gulp!) Perreault, limit their ability to tender RFA offer sheets?
   
8. More on the Big Picture. Where does Leafs management sit on the the Moneyball vs. "Intangibles" spectrum? I've read great stuff about the San Jose Sharks and Columbus Blue Jackets innovative use of statistics. What are the Leafs up to? What do they make of this? On another topic: how does player development work, why is Buffalo so amazing at it and what are the Marlies doing to help develop Leaf prospects?
   
9. More on the Business of Sport: What has the impact of moving the farm club to Toronto been? What do players who played both in St. John's and at the Ricoh think of the move? Crunch the numbers - what has it meant for the salary cap being able to send guys across the street? Has it had any impact on the Leafs ability to recruit and retain management? With precedents in Chicago and Philadelphia is this a model we should expect to see more of? How does the Leafs system compare with clubs that don't have their own AHL affiliate? On-glass advertising, are the Leafs for or against? Same goes with advertising on jerseys, where does MLSE stand?

As Leaf/hockey fans, I'd love to know what stories do you think we're missing out on and what type of coverage would you like to see more of?

If you were the editor/producer for a day what would you tell your reporters to work on?

Are there any guys out there who stand out? Anyone a must-read for you?

Waivers v. Buy-Outs (with a small update)

I thought I was watching NHL Classics last night, a repeat from last January when the Leafs beat the Bruins 10-4. (As an aside, I actually managed to see that that game via sopcast whilst eating paranthas and drinking chai at a very early breakfast in Hyderabad, India. It's a very odd feeling when an NHL game finishes at 9 AM.)

Here's a bit of a quirky factoid: the same day that the Leafs pasted the Bruins 10-4, the Canadian Juniors beat the US in the semis when Carey Price stopped Peter Mueller in the shoot-out.

Fast forward 14 months and on the night that the Leafs paste the Bruins for a second time, Price bests Mueller again in their first match-up since that World Junior shoot-out game.

Buyouts? Really?!?

I'm not sure why there's been so much talk about the Leafs buying out various players. Wharnsby was guilty of this in yesterday's Globe, it's a talking point in Cox's most recent mailbag and it was a featured element of Steve's (otherwise great) blog entry on how he'd re-build the Leafs.

Buy-outs have become bit of a zombie issue to me - no matter how many times you think you've killed them, they just keep coming back.

So long as there's such a thing as the waiver wire, there's no reason to buy-out anyone on this team - with the exception of players with a NMC.

Full stop.

There's no reason for the Leafs to take any type of long-term cap hit to dispose of Blake, Bell, Raycroft, Kubina (take your pick of 90% of the roster) when those players can be placed on waivers (obviously, a trade would be the preferred method but if a guy won't waive his NTC, the waiver wire it is.)

Here's how the waiver wire works:

If another club claims a player off the waiver wire, that team takes on 100% of the salary and 100% of the cap hit. The Leafs are free and clear of the player, the salary and the cap implications.

If the player goes unclaimed, the Leafs then have two options:

1. Pay the player their salary to play in the AHL (or ECHL if it's Raycroft).

Under this option, the Leafs do have to pay their salary, but if the player is playing in the minors, the team takes zero cap hit (zip; nada; zilch). MLSE has deep deep pockets so I don't think this will be too much of a problem.

2. The Leafs can also recall an unclaimed waived player with the rather large caveat that the player has to clear waivers a second time (re-entry waivers). Under this option, if the player is claimed on re-entry by another team, the Leafs are on the hook for 50% of their salary (and 50% of the cap hit) for the duration of that player's contract. This is what Pittsburgh did with Recchi (now with Atlanta) and Chicago did with Samsonov (now with Carolina).

So waivers or buy-outs?

Let's take Raycroft as an example.

If the Leafs buy-out his contract, under the CBA the Leafs must pay Rayzor 2/3rds of his remaining contract, paid out over twice the remaining length of the deal.

Raycroft, with one year remaining on a $2 million contract (nice work JFJ!), would be paid $2MM x.66 /2 or $660,000 for two years with the Leafs carrying that $660K cap hit for two seasons as well.

Factor in a replacement back-up goaltenders salary - say Pogge at $638 - and the Leafs are stuck with a cap hit of $1.3M for back-up goaltending.

The buy-out creates $700K in cap space.

If they waive Raycroft, the Leafs pay $638K for back-up goaltending and take a cap hit of $638K for back-up goaltending.

The waiver wire creates $1.36 million in cap space.

Seems like a no-brainer to me.

***Update***

As I was on my way to a lunch meeting it struck me that buy-outs vs. waivers might just be the key to understanding this franchise.

Consider: a buy-out hinders the Leafs by saddling the team with a multi-year cap hit, but it ultimately saves MLSE money and funnels more dollars towards their bottom line.

A waived player makes things better for the Leafs but costs MLSE a lot more dough.

Based on that very basic and rather simplistic viewpoint, I'll go out on a limb here and suggest that if this club waives players, MLSE may not be the greedy, bottom-line first franchise as so many detractors claim.

Conversely, if they pursue buy-outs instead of waivers, it certainly suggests that the bottom line comes before doing whatever it takes to help the Leafs win.

A White Sports Coat

Once you told me long ago, to the dance with me you'd go. Now you've changed your mind it seems, someone else will hold my dreams...

I have to say I’m really tired of all the talk surrounding Mats Sundin. If people want to blame a player for not waiving a no trade clause, look no further than Pavel Kubina.

Kubina allegedly agreed to waive his NTC, only to renege after the Senators game. Fletcher speaks to it in his news conference (available here) and again during his phoner with Bob McCowan, Steven Brunt and Neil Smith on the Fan590 (available as an MP3 here - full warning, this link has crashed my computer so please proceed with caution).

Kubina has since come out and claimed it was all a misunderstanding - perhaps he thought Fletcher was talking about a fantasy hockey trade in their keeper pool...gotta think Kubina is the first man traded when the window opens in his no-trade clause on July 1.

Want another black hat or two to vent on? I'll see that Kubina and raise you a JFJ and MLSE. I’m not sure who was the architect and who was the general contractor of this mess (and I’m not sure that it matters) but if either had an ounce of competence the re-build would have started as early as the end of the lock-out and certainly no later than last year’s trade deadline.

Had Tucker and McCabe been dealt when they were impending UFAs, Leafs Nation would be talking about the up and coming kids in the system and whether or not Mats would be sticking around to play with the emerging young talent.

Instead, Sundin’s reputation has been questioned, the team is still saddled with four NTCs, four more years of 11 goal scorer Jason Blake at $4M a year and nearly $5M tied up in Raycroft and Bell* never mind the number of picks that have been burned to find a competent goalie.

Bottom line: managerial incompetence, not Sundin, is the real issue here and Leaf fans shouldn't lose sight of that.

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My thoughts on the Leaf Trades (in 35 words or less) have been posted over at Slap Shots in the NYT. You can find the Belak deal here and the Kilger and Gill deals here.

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Best trade deadline print coverage is hands-down in the Globe. Brunt files a great piece on the absurdity of JFJ, and Shoaltsy follows with a good summary of Fletcher's remarks and what it might mean for the Leafs.

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With the trade deadline out of the way, I thought I’d address what’s really important for the Leafs – the Odds of winning the draft lottery.

As per Exhibit 4 in the CBA, the NHL holds a lottery for all 14 teams that do not qualify for the post-season. The lower a team places in the standings, the greater their odds of winning the lottery.

Team 1 (Last place overall) has a 25.0% chance of winning the #1 pick
Team 2 has an 18.8% chance of winning the #1 pick
Team 3 has a 14.2% chance of winning the #1 pick
Team 4 has a 10.7% chance of winning the #1 pick
Team 5 has an 8.1% chance of winning the #1 pick

While all 14 teams do have a chance of winning the lottery (the 14th team has a 0.5% chance of being selected) teams can only move up four (4) places in the draft and can only drop one spot.

So if the #6 team wins the lottery, the draft order would be:
1st pick to the team in last place overall
2nd pick to the 6th team (lottery winner)
3rd pick to the 2nd worst team
4th pick to the 3rd worst team
5th pick to the 4th worst team etc.

Currently, the Leafs are 26th in the NHL, which gives them an 8.1% chance of winning the first overall pick in the draft lottery.

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*Here's the big question: will Raycroft and Bell be waived the day after the Leafs regular season ends - that's the last day to waive a player; Or will they be waived in mid-September when the waiver wire re-opens? I'm going to guess Raycroft goes on the last day of the year and Bell is left twisting until that whole prison-thing is sorted out (there's a sentence I never thought I'd type).