[bluejays]

Originally Posted by Ped

Sorry, but take off the homer glasses. First of all, he doesn't even have a contract yet. There's a reason for that.

Secondly, if this team flames out again, then how do you keep him? You coudl argue it's the coach, but it's his coach that he's stuck with. You could argue it's the core, but it's his core that he's defended and coddled.

He's overpaid his top 6 and Rielly and they have yet to find another gear when most needed. He's had to give up quality assets to make the money work, when he coudl have traded any one of htem for a haul and gotten cheaper talent. Instead, he's had to hodgepodge a bunch of guys to try and make the bottom 6 and blueline pairings work, and they often don't.

Murray's not even a free agent this summer. He's got another year left. Everyone knew it was an unnecessarily risky trade for a guy making almost 5 mill, that had little chance of working out.

Samsonov was pretty good, but he's RFA this summer, so he's looking for a raise. Up front, Kampf and Acciari and O'Reilly and Bunting are all UFA, so need replacing or re-signing. They probably can't afford Kerfoot. Is Bunting going to sign dirt-cheap again? Is O'Reilly going to come back under market?

If Holl doesn't re-sign, you have to replace him too, and there doesn't appear to be a lot of internal options. Robertson keeps getting injured,

If they go down early, absolutely heads are going to roll.

Not a homer take at all. They're set up alright for the future. Sure there are a bunch of contracts that come off the book but he will likely break up the core to make other deals to retool this off-season regardless of the outcome. I honestly believe given their core is in their prime that he's giving them every chance to succeed. Murray will be an IR guy. I look at the Flames by comparison and there is no comparison. Toronto has the agility to do a ton this off-season.