Revisiting some of the NHL's most painful breakups

It’s almost Valentine’s Day, and after the year we’ve all been through, it presents a nice chance to refocus on what really matters by asking ourselves important questions like “Am I currently going out with someone” and “What was going out like, I can’t remember” and “Wait, does this person live with me because that would explain who’s been eating all my food.”

Then you could break up with them. That part’s optional, and not necessarily recommended based on your personal circumstances. But it’s how a lot of relationships end, both in the world of romance and in the NHL. This is called tying your sports story into a current event. I am a professional writer.

Years ago, I put together a list of ten of NHL history’s ugliest player/team breakups. It wasn’t an exhaustive list, because it couldn’t be, because this sport is constantly tossing new examples onto the pile. Just recently, we’ve seen the Pierre-Luc Dubois drama play out in Columbus, and it may not be long before the Patrik Laine sequel gets good. We saw the end of long-term relationships like Zdeno Chara in Boston and Joe Thornton in San Jose. And we’re still not sure what exactly happened with John Chayka in Arizona. This league and its soap operas, am I right?

So today, let’s remember a few more bad breakups from NHL history. My first piece covered names like Patrick Roy, Dany Heatley, Eric Lindros and Pavel Bure, but we’ve got plenty more ground to cover. After all, it’s the NHL, where everything ends badly and nobody should ever get too attached.

Sergei Fedorov and the Red Wings, 2003

Happier times: Fedorov is one of the greatest players in Detroit history, a supremely skilled Russian star who won a Hart and two Selkes while providing the dominant two-way play that helped finally tip the Red Wings from regular season monsters to Stanley Cup champions.

But then: In 1998, after a lengthy RFA standoff that dragged well into the season, Fedorov signed an offer sheet with the Hurricanes that was ridiculously front-loaded with bonuses designed to make it unmatchable. The Wings matched anyway, and Fedorov stuck around for five more seasons, but a relationship that had been rocky from the start never fully recovered.

How it ended: Fedorov finally left for good in 2013, signing with the Ducks in free agency, and the bad feelings lingered for years. Even after his induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame, the team still hasn’t retired his number. But time heals some wounds, and there have been recent signs of a thaw in the relationship, especially with Steve Yzerman running the Wings now. There’s even been talk of Fedorov joining the organization in some capacity.

What kind of breakup it was: The couple that’s always on the verge of breaking up but ends up holding on a lot longer than everyone thought before the inevitable final straw.

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Grab Bag: Is your terrible NHL team secretly the next Blues? Take the quiz and find out

In the Friday Grab Bag:
- A handy quiz to figure out if your terrible team is secretly this year's Blues
- A debate about retired numbers and honored players
- An obscure player from a Mickey Mouse team
- The week's three comedy stars
- And a YouTube look back at the early days of the Flyers' Sign Man

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Revisiting the golden era of the three-way blockbuster

NHL fans had plenty to talk about over the weekend thanks to a major trade involving the Senators, Predators and Avalanche. The deal finally ended the long-running Matt Duchene saga, sent pending UFA Kyle Turris to Nashville with an extension in hand, and signaled a major change in direction for all three teams involved.

While it’s rare to see a trade of this significance go down so early in the season, the deal was notable for another reason. It resurrected a concept that’s all but disappeared from the NHL over the years: the blockbuster three-way trade.

Fans love the concept of the three-way deal. In theory, they should be more common in the modern NHL, where we’re constantly told that good fits and cap space are tough to find. Adding another team to the mix seems like an ideal way to address those issues, and it’s not surprising that so many hot-stove rumours inevitably see speculation about a third team getting involved.

But it rarely happens, at least on any sort of significant scale. We’ve seen a few in recent years, like last year’s Mark Streit deal and the whole John Scott thing, but those were relatively minor moves. The Kyle Quincey deal from 2012 was bigger, but hardly earth-shattering.

(And yes, we’ll pause to acknowledge that technically, three-way NHL trades don’t exist. A trade can only involve two teams, so a three-way deal is actually a series of discrete two-team trades. Settle down, comment-section pedants — you know what we mean.)

So what happened? Where did the three-way blockbuster go?

Maybe modern-day GMs are right when they tell us that trading is just too hard. Maybe today’s front offices, clogged with assistants and analytics experts and consultants and a dozen other voices, just aren’t built for creativity. Maybe three-way deals are meant to be a relic of the past, when a table full of impatient GMs could order a few pints and then swing a deal or two.

Or maybe — now that the Senators, Predators and Avalanche have reminded us how it’s done — we can hold out hope that the concept will come back into style.

So today, let’s head back to the 1990s and revisit the golden age of the three-way blockbuster. Here are five significant three-way NHL trades from a decade when NHL GMs often found that three heads were better than two.

1) Nov. 2, 1993: Acquiring an iron man

The background: By the time the 1993-94 campaign arrived, Steve Larmer had spent 11 full seasons with the Blackhawks. And they had been full – Larmer had never missed a game over that time, playing 884 straight to get within range of Doug Jarvis’s all-time iron-man record. But Larmer’s streak ended on opening night, not due to an injury or a benching, but because he was holding out to force a trade.

One month into his holdout, with Larmer holding firm on his demand for a change of scenery, the veteran winger got his wish.

The deal: The Blackhawks sent Larmer and Bryan Marchment to Hartford for Patrick Poulin and Eric Weinrich. The Whalers then flipped Larmer along with Nick Kypreos, minor-league defenceman Barry Richter and a draft pick to the Rangers for James Patrick and Darren Turcotte.

The move was part of the Rangers’ push to build a contender around Mark Messier, one that would see them add veterans from around the league as the season went on. It was also part of the mid-’90s Whalers’ apparent attempt to have every star player of the era show up on their roster and then immediately leave.

The winner: Larmer. He’d play only two years in New York, retiring after the lockout-shortened 1995 season, but he’d arrive just in time to be reunited with Mike Keenan and help the Ranges win the 1994 Stanley Cup. Weinrich and Poulin were fine for Chicago, but didn’t exactly represent a windfall, while Marchment, Turcotte and Patrick all lasted less than two years in Hartford.

(Kypreos ended up doing OK for himself, too.)

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet

Five more surprising players who haven't had their numbers retired

Last time around, we covered five somewhat surprising players who've yet to have their numbers retired by the team (or teams) they'd starred with. That led to plenty of debate over who was deserving and who wasn't, and what sort of standards teams should use to determine who gets to see their number go up to the rafters.

But I also heard from plenty of fans who wanted to make the case for players that their own teams hadn't honored yet. For a few of those. I was stunned to find out that a particular franchise hadn't honored a star player years ago. I had to go and double-check that, yes, these guys are still waiting.

So today, let's go back to the well for a look at five more players whose numbers haven't been raised yet, but maybe should have been.

Peter Bondra – Washington Capitals

Bondra was the name that came up most often from readers reacting to the original post, and I'll be honest: I'd always assumed his number had already been honored. After all, surely a member of the 500-goal club who scored almost all of those with Washington would be an obvious choice.

But apparently not, because Bondra is still waiting. He certainly has the qualifications, trailing only Alex Ovechkin in franchise history in both goals and points, while also ranking second in games played. No, he never won a Stanley Cup, but neither has anyone else in Capitals history, so we won't hold that against him.

The Capitals have only retired four numbers in their 43 seasons, and it's a weird mix. There's Mike Gartner, which you'd expect given he had 700 goals in his career (although Bondra has better numbers as a Capital). There's Rod Langway, a Hall of Famer and two-time Norris winner, and that makes sense, too. There's Dale Hunter, a very good player who fans loved.

And then there's Yvon Labre, who you may not even have ever heard of. He was a defenseman who played seven seasons for the Capitals back in the bad old days when the team was awful, including two as team captain. By all accounts he's a great guy in the community and he's remained with the team in various roles over the years, but in hindsight the decision to retire his #7 back in 1981 seems like an odd one.

Clearly, the bar here has to be a little higher than just being better than Yvon Labre, but the Capitals' recent reluctance – they haven't honored anyone at all since 2008 – seems like an over-correction. There's a good case to be made for Olaf Kolzig, too, but Bondra's been waiting for years and seems like the guy who should be first in line.

>> Read the full post at The Hockey News

Which holdovers could make the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2016?

The Hockey Hall of Fame announced its class of 2015 yesterday, and it’s a big one. The Hall will welcome seven new members this winter: five players and two inductees in the builder’s category.

The big name is Nicklas Lidstrom, the seven-time Norris Trophy winner who’d been considered an absolute first-ballot lock since well before he retired. He’ll be joined by former teammate Sergei Fedorov, who also gets in on the first try. Fedorov wasn’t quite a slam dunk, but he was close, and certainly deserves the honor.

Two other picks will cause at least a little bit of discussion, although for very different reasons. Phil Housley finally gets the call after waiting since 2006. He’s the fourth-highest-scoring defenseman of all time and had nearly 400 points more than the next-highest-scoring blueliner who wasn’t in, but his defensive shortcomings had hurt his candidacy — he’ll be one of a very small group of HOF defensemen with a minus rating over the course of his career.

And then there’s Chris Pronger. On merit, there’s no doubt Pronger belongs in the Hall — he was arguably the best non-Lidstrom defenseman of his era, and is the only blueliner since Bobby Orr to win the MVP. He’s also technically still an active player, despite suffering a career-ending injury in 2011, and that’s where this gets messy. He’s still under contract, and was even traded just a few days ago. But the Hall had already ruled him eligible months ago, so he was going to get in.

The Hall also welcomed three other inductees: builders Bill Hay and Peter Karmanos Jr., and longtime Team USA defenseman (and gold-medal winner) Angela Ruggiero, who becomes the fourth woman honored.

The seven honorees will be inducted in November. In the meantime, it’s time to start picking through the snubs and near misses as we try to figure out who has the inside track on the class of 2016. There aren’t any especially impressive candidates coming into the pool next year, which opens up the field for some players who missed the cut this time.

Here are 10 players who were passed over this year who may have the best case for induction in 2016.

Mark Recchi

Eligible since: 2014

The numbers: 577 goals and 1,533 points over a 22-year career. He won three Cups, played in seven All-Star Games, and was a second-team All-Star once.

The case for: The 1,533-point total ranks 12th all time, and everyone else in the top 25 is either already in or will go in on the first ballot as soon as they’re eligible (Teemu Selanne and Jaromir Jagr). Offensive production has always been the key criteria for induction, so seeing a guy with Recchi’s massive career totals left out seems bizarre.

The case against: Recchi is the classic example of a player who was good for a long time but was never really considered elite. He was very good in the early ’90s, and was a consistent producer well into his forties, but he was never in the conversation for best player in the league, or even close to it.

If I had a vote: If we were picking between guys with a high peak vs. guys who were very good for a long time, I’d take the peak over longevity. But Recchi’s top years were pretty good, and there does come a point when a guy’s career numbers get so high that he has to get in. I think Recchi is right around that zone, so while I don’t mind seeing him wait a bit, he’d get my vote to go in eventually.

Bottom line: Everyone seems to assume Recchi will get in someday. Maybe next year is the year.

Dave Andreychuk

Eligible since: 2009

The numbers: 640 goals, 1,338 points, two All-Star Games.

The case for: He scored the 14th-most goals in NHL history, and every eligible player ahead of him was a slam dunk. In fact, other than Recchi, Andreychuk has over 100 more goals than any other eligible player. That’s stunning, and feels like it should be enough to get him in on its own. He’s also one of the few players to have lifted the Stanley Cup as a captain, having done so in 2004 as the veteran leader on an otherwise young Lightning team.

The case against: Along with Recchi, Andreychuk is the poster child for the “long career, big totals, good but never great” class of player. He played in an All-Star Game only twice and never got significant votes for any major award, and it’s fair to say that nobody ever dragged their kids to the rink to see Andreychuk play. He also racked up most of those goals playing in the high-flying ’80s and early ’90s (although that’s not as big a factor as you might think; on an era-adjusted basis he still ranks 18th all time).

If I had a vote: I’ve lobbied for Andreychuk’s name to be featured more prominently in the HOF discussion; that he rarely generates any sort of buzz is baffling to me. That said, I’m not sure I’d vote for him, for the same reason I wouldn’t have voted for Dino Ciccarelli and would at least hesitate on Recchi.

Bottom line: It doesn’t seem like Andreychuk will ever get in, and if that’s the case, that record of 640 goals for a non-Hall-of-Famer will probably stand forever.

>> Read the full post on Grantland

Is Marian Hossa a future Hall of Famer?

There’s a conversation about the Chicago Blackhawks that seems to repeat itself as their playoff run rolls on. It goes something like this: Somebody wonders out loud how many future Hall of Famers are on the roster. Someone else immediately rattles off the names of the team’s big three — Jonathan Toews, Patrick Kane, and Duncan Keith. And someone else points out that head coach Joel Quenneville will be an obvious choice.

Then there’s a pause, the question hangs in the air for a bit, and finally someone hesitantly adds “ … and maybe Marian Hossa?”

At 36, Hossa has spent this latest playoff run doing what Hossa does: a little bit of everything, often quietly, and usually from just outside the spotlight. Last night he had an assist on Toews’s opening goal, giving him four points in the series. With the Hawks now deploying him on a line with Toews and Patrick Sharp, he figures to be a key figure over the second half of the series.

He also makes for the subject of an interesting HOF debate. My experience has been that people say it’s a relatively easy call — they just can’t agree on the call. To some, he’s a slam dunk. To others, he’s a respected player who falls solidly into the “Hall of Very Good” but just doesn’t have the résumé to deserve more than that.

So as Hossa makes what by now has become his near-annual appearance in the Stanley Cup final, it’s fair to ask: Are we watching a future Hall of Famer? Let’s walk through the pros and cons.

The Numbers

Hossa crossed the 1,000-point mark early in the season, and with 486 goals he should get to 500 next year. Those tend to be the big milestones for HOF candidates, at least among forwards, so by crossing them Hossa guarantees himself a spot in the discussion.

But that’s about all it guarantees, because those milestones don’t carry the same weight that they once did. There are plenty of guys in the 500/1,000 club whose HOF candidacy never gained serious traction. That includes players like Pierre Turgeon (515/1,327), Pat Verbeek (522/1,063), Keith Tkachuk (538/1,065), and, for reasons that nobody has ever fully explained, Dave Andreychuk (640/1,338). Jeremy Roenick (513/1,216) hasn’t been inducted and looks like he may never be, and even Mark Recchi (577/1,533) didn’t get in on the first try, although virtually everyone agrees he will eventually. So Hossa’s number are good, but they’re well short of making him any kind of a sure thing.

Of course, unlike all those guys mentioned above, Hossa played his entire career in the dead puck era. But even on an era-adjusted basis, he’s still trailing Roenick and Turgeon, and he’s miles behind Andreychuk and Recchi.

On the other hand, all those numbers are for the regular season only — mix in his 143 career playoff points, second only to Jaromir Jagr among active players, and Hossa gets a boost.

The Honors

This may be the strongest argument for the “good but not great” side of the debate. Hossa has never won a major award and was a finalist only once (for the Calder as Rookie of the Year in 1999; he came in second to Chris Drury). He has one postseason All-Star selection, making the second team in 2009. And that’s pretty much it. His best finish in Hart Trophy voting for MVP was 10th; his only other top-five finishes for any award came for the Lady Byng in 2003 and the Selke last year.

He did appear in five All-Star Games, which isn’t bad in a league where that game is often wiped out by lockouts and Olympics. But the lack of any significant hardware, or even all that many near misses, paints a picture of a very good player who was never in the conversation as being among the league’s best.

>> Read the full post on Grantland

In memory of the holdout

NHL training camps opened last week, and all players have now reported, completed their fitness testing, and started playing preseason games.

Well, almost all players. A few aren’t there yet, because they’re sitting at home waiting for a new contract. The most notable name in that group is Blue Jackets star Ryan Johansen, whose increasingly ugly contract dispute has left him millions of dollars away from the team’s best offer.

Except that Johansen isn’t holding out. Neither are Torey Krug and Jaden Schwartz, and neither was P.K. Subban two years ago nor Drew Doughty the year before that. A restricted free agent without a deal isn’t holding out — he just doesn’t have a contract, and he’s not allowed to play without one. Stop calling RFAs holdouts. I feel very strongly about this.

No, a real holdout comes when a player has a valid deal and refuses to honor it, usually because he wants to renegotiate for more money. And those holdouts are essentially nonexistent in today’s NHL, thanks to the 2005 CBA, which made it impossible to tear up an existing contract. That change eliminated the incentive to stay home, and basically made long holdouts obsolete.

That’s a good thing, because it wasn’t always that way. Years ago, true holdouts happened all the time in the NHL, often involving superstar players who’d sit out for months or even a full year in an attempt to get their way. Somehow, this didn’t seem like all that big of a deal at the time — everyone just kind of accepted it.

Usually, those old-school holdouts eventually ended with a new contract and some hurt feelings. But sometimes, the impact was far greater. Here are five players who decided they didn’t like their contracts and held out, and who helped change NHL history along the way.

Ken Dryden lawyers up

For a team that spends so much time celebrating its many legendary stars, the Montreal Canadiens have dealt with a surprisingly long list of holdouts over the years. Guy Lafleur once threatened to walk out and take Larry Robinson with him. Patrick Roy’s infamous tantrum behind the bench was essentially a midseason holdout, although it didn’t last long. And in maybe my favorite contract dispute story of all time, the Canadiens once forced a reluctant Jean Beliveau to finally sign with them by buying his entire league.

Dryden’s case wasn’t quite as dramatic, but it came close. In 1973, the towering goaltender had played two full seasons as the Canadiens’ starter, and had already amassed two Cups, a Conn Smythe, a Calder, and a Vezina. He was the best goalie in the league at the age of 25. And he figured he deserved a raise.

That was a bit of a problem, because the Canadiens weren’t interested in reworking his deal, which reportedly paid him $80,000. That wasn’t bad money back then, but in an era where superstars were starting to get six-figure deals, Dryden knew he was worth more. He didn’t have any leverage, though. After all, what was he going to do — go out and find another job?

Yes, as it turns out. Unable to come to an agreement with the team, Dryden took the entire 1973-74 season off. He used the time to finish his law degree and got some experience working at a Toronto firm. When time permitted, he suited up for Vulcan Industrial Packaging of the Toronto Lakeshore League. He played defense.

Dryden’s holdout lasted until he re-signed with the Canadiens in time for the 1974-75 season, getting the sort of big-money deal he’d wanted all along. He went on to win four more Vezinas and four more Stanley Cups in Montreal before retiring for good in 1979, at the relatively young age of 32.

Then he enjoyed a successful post-playing career as a best-selling author, general manager, politician, Grantland contributor, and yes, it goes without saying, a lawyer.

>> Read the full post on Grantland