Thursday Morning Cupcheck - Ze, How You Say, Wacky Montreal Canadiens

by Todd Maternowski

Top of the morning, hockey fans! Last week, we calmly and intelligently discussed how joyless proles would like to suck the emotion out of the sport of hockey by outlawing fighting: this week, I was planning on writing my weekly 2008-09 Trash Talking Primer (Colorado Avalanche? More like Bolorado Bavalanche! Zing!), when the ever-dignified, regal press corps of Montreal decided to throw out a trade rumor involving the Dallas Stars.

No, I'm not referring to a possible "do-over" on the second-most lopsided trade in franchise history. Apparently, there's some talk of trading Brad Richards and Matt Niskanen to the Habs.

To those of you who would say that Montreal's economy is largely reliant on trade rumors involving American teams' superstars because they can't seem to home-grow any of their own --well, true as that may be, it's still intriguing. Should the Dallas Stars trade Richards?

First, a primer for you non-hockey fans out there. The Montreal Canadiens are the New York Yankees of hockey, except with class, aplomb and an actual, non-complete-joke salary cap. Since the Dawn of Civilization, when first Man scored his first Hat Trick Against the Flyers, did the Montreal Press clamor and froth and spread irresponsible rumors regarding other teams' star players. And so it was.

For what seems to be centuries now, the French-Canadian would-be nation has had to wipe the drool off their goateed chins when the thought of Vinny Lecavalier in a Habs uniform rose up from the subconscious depths of their psyches. Evidently, tired of what's known as the reality of the situation, star-starved Canadiens fans have turned to the next-best Tampa Bay Lightning player of 2004.

And why wouldn't they? In 2004, that Cup-winning Lightning team stomped Montreal like a bunch of defenseless baby frogs.

Acquiring Richards would make tons of sense for Montreal, who just lost their own second-line center Robert Lang for the season. But would it make any sense for the Stars? Richards has begun to turn it on as of late, scoring 23 points in the last 20 games, and leads the team in scoring despite having a revolving-door cast of wingers for most of the season. Trading Richards now would be an admission of giving up on a suddenly-promising season, wasting a terrific effort by the team in the past two months and possibly a window of opportunity that the team might never get back. For a fan, blowing up the team = terrible idea, especially with the playoffs in sight and Morrow's return a real possibility.

Then again, that $7.8 million a year cap hit kinda hurts....

Frankly, the Stars are a business, and it would be prudent for a business to consider any deal, depending on what's being offered. Cowboys fans cried in their Schlitz when supermegaultra-star Herschel Walker was traded for worthless draft picks. Three Superbowls later, every Dallas fan claims they thought it was a good idea from the get-go, and Walker re-signed with the 'Boys a few years later anyways making the loss a moot point.

So what's the Montreal Rumor Mill, er, press saying the Canadiens would offer in return? Some combination of Andrei Markov, Mike Komisarek and/or Jaroslav Halak. Andrei Markov --motherfarkov!!-- is the most tantalizing of the three, as the Russian defenseman leads his team in scoring with 40 points, controls the point on the powerplay, is only 30 years old and makes $5.75 million a year through 2011. Komisarek --the undeserved All-Star-- is not a scoring machine, but a tremendous physical presence on the ice and team leader off the ice, is just 27 and making $1.9 million through next season. Halak --a Czech goalie!-- is 11-8-1 with a 2.89 GAA, .904 save percentage, is just 23 years old and making $800,000 a year through 2010. Trading our second-line center and team scoring leader for The Next Zubov, The Next Hatcher and/or The Next Turco can be pretty tempting, and if this trade is really going down, that's probably exactly the same language Canadiens GM Bob Gainey is using to sell this.

What Gainey is probably not selling is the fact that the Stars have all those "Next" guys right here on their farm teams: Ivan Vishnevskiy, Mark Fistric and Richard Bachmann are all potentially closer to Zubov/Hatcher/Turco than anyone Montreal can throw at us --not to mention cheaper, younger and home-grown. Still, having a back-up goaltender the team trusts would be a nice change of pace.

Ultimately, what it always comes down to with any trade is Value: specifically, whether the player you're considering trading is justifying his salary. Richards makes a hefty $7.8 million a year, far more than anyone else on the team. Yet, with Richards last year the Stars were able to win two more playoff series than they have in seemingly forever. Two series = 8 additional wins = $8 million in salary. If I'm doing the math right, that's roughly $1 million in salary for every extra playoff victory. Is that worth keeping around? Tom Hicks probably thinks so.

If the trade goes down, it will most likely be one that benefits the Stars --after all, Les Jackson historically rarely gets screwed over in trades-- and the Stars are dealing from a position of strength rather than necessity. My prediction? The bagel-eating Montreal press is full of perfumed crap, as usual, and this rumor will go the way of all those 'Zubov to the Rangers' rumors so prevalent half a decade ago.

That's it for this week's Cupcheck. Tune in next week when the Montreal press castigates me for writing in English, "the language of dogs."