Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Peter Chiarelli Needs a Nap

Poor poor Peter Chiarelli had a bad day. I think he probably needs to go to his bed, pull down the shades, turn off the lights, pull the blankets up over his head, and nap for 48-72 hours. Maybe when he wakes up fans of the Boston Bruins will have calmed down and stop threatening his health.

I have a feeling I know what Peter Chiarelli was feeling like throughout today's NHL trade deadline excitement. Imagine a Viagra commercial. Got that image? Now imagine the man in that commercial about 3 minutes after realizing that he needs to place a call to his doctor so that he can ask about Viagra. That is probably a very accurate depiction of Peter Chiarelli's state of mind today.

From the NHL roster's point of view the Bruins moved Byron Bitz, who has been a healthy scratch and is still probably existing in the weird skill level purgatory between the NHL and the AHL. I call this space the Cameron Mann Zone. It could be a loss down the road, but right now it's just a loss of a popular guy who's name is kinda fun to say. The real departure is Derek Morris. This off season's big free agent pick up who is the 2nd highest scoring defenceman (behind Zdeno Chara) on the Bruins. He was cast off to Phoenix (where he played for many years) for a 4th round draft pick.

That's what I said, you didn't read that wrong. A 3+ million dollar defenseman dumped to the desert for a 4th round pick. The pick may turn into a 3rd rounder if Morris signs a contract with Phoenix. Personally, if I were Mr Morris I would never sign with Phoenix simply to spite the Bruins for dumping me so cheaply.

Coming back to the Bruins NHL roster is Dennis Seidenberg from Florida. Seidenberg's numbers are pretty comparable to Morris' but he makes about a million dollars less per year.

Effectively, the Bruins swapped a good defenseman for a cheaper good defenseman.

That's it.

Think back to the days leading up to the Olympic break. The Bruins won the four games immediately prior to the break, but lost the TEN games prior to that. During that TEN game losing streak Peter Chiarelli kept telling us how he was working the phones trying to pull off a deal to get some scoring help. In other words, he was trying to fill the gaping void in the current roster's make up by acquiring a forward who can actually score goals. He failed to achieve this goal during the losing streak and he continued to fail today.

So one of the worst offenses in the NHL failed to do anything that might improve things at the trade deadline. Bruins fans are feeling devastated over the lack of movement and are jumping off the bandwagon in droves. The coaching staff are forced to continue to try and squeeze goals out of a line up that is almost completely unable to score goals. We have two forwards who are capable of producing consistent offense (Savard and Sturm), one forward who is as good an offense/defense combination as any in the league (gold medal winner Patrice Bergeron), and a whole cast of players who are either under producing or drastically over produced last year thus skewing all of our expectations this year.

The absolute pinnacle of this team's achievements this year will be a first round exit from the playoffs. That's as good as it can possibly get. Frankly, I doubt we will even go that far. I foresee a lottery pick in our future, and I ain't referring to the first round pick we got from Toronto for Kessel. (although we will be getting a lottery pick out of that too)

It's going to continue to be painful to watch the Bruins for the rest of the year. We've already had 60 some odd painful games so what's another 20 or so.

Two further trade deadline Bruins related notes. Scott Walker was traded from Carolina to... Washington, I think. The cost to get him was, if I am not mistaken... and I could be... I don't think I'm making this crap up as I go but I suppose it's possible I'm doing it subconsciously... a seventh round pick. Late in this afternoon's festivities the Bruins announced that Dennis Wideman was not on the trading block. I give that statement the gold medal for bullshit statements. Wideman was not available because no other team in the NHL (or the AHL for that matter) was willing to take him. Walker went for a seventh round pick, and even that was too much to pay for Dennis Wideman.

I am still very much on the Bruins bandwagon, but if one of the rumors I heard today had come to fruition I would have been off faster than you can say, "convicted felon." The Bruins were rumored to be in the running to acquire Joe Corvo. Uh uh, no way. Corvo comes to Boston and you suddenly start seeing lots of posts about how big a San Jose Sharks or Chicago Blackhawks or Los Angeles Kings fan I am. I will not root for some one who is slime enough to beat up a woman, never mind a man who is scum enough to beat up a woman in a restaurant. Joe Corvo shouldn't be playing for Washington (after getting dealt there today from Carolina) he should be playing for the Bridgewater Penitentiary team.

And that, ladies and gents, is my NHL trade deadline wrap up post. Maybe by next year's trade deadline Peter Chiarelli will have some Viagra to help him out.

Go Bruins!

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