Who has been the Most Supportive Team in Regards to NHL Player Salaries?

In every league there is that one team that pisses you off because they keep poaching the top talent which in theory is supposed to make them winners; the New York Yankees were the poster child for this theory of Talent+Money=Winning. Of course, there are a lot of other teams that have failed in this model, mainly because they tend to stick with the 'franchise player' idea, in which you pay 1 player an insane amount of money to produce wins and while it has proven to perhaps increase your winning percentage a little, it doesn't necessarily equate to championships.

The idea of the salary cap is to make a competitive team on the ice and in the owner's bank account. And while there have been some instances where a GM appears to have been sniffing glue at that one particular moment in time when they fill in the 'yearly salary' blank on a player's contract, most teams are learning that they can't just ride the back of one player to the Stanley Cup. Well, except for Philadelphia who has had a decades long history of raising the bar in terms of player salaries.

Did you know Chris Gratton once made $10 million a year? (1996-97) Which was $4 million a year more than Wayne Gretzky was making at the time?

Of course, it helps that he signed in Philadelphia, who has continually shown over the years that their ownership has no concept of money, says Chris Pronger, Ilya Bryzgalov, Danny Briere, Mike Richards, Eric Lindros, Shea Weber - all people who have profited immensely by being on Philadelphia's 'no price is too much' bargaining strategy. By trying to buy talent not only do the Flyers put a 'price' on a player, the rest of the players use that as a comparison to what they should get paid. When Gretzky saw what he was being compared to, he retired rather than be the guy that was being paid less than Keith Tkachuk, who is a great player, loved the guy but he's not all-time scoring leader.


Basically, the Philadelphia Offer Sheet is every Restricted Free Agents Holy Grail as proven time and time again when it comes to the off season.

Seriously, who the fuck was Chris Gratton?

Other notable observations taken from Wikipedia's top 5 NHL salaries by year...

Then there's this book....

Not much to say about this book. OTHER THAN I WROTE IT (Future Jay looking back at this post)

Other than perhaps if you went into a local library, said 'hey i want to read something that is deep but not too deep, light but not too light, strange but not too strange and oh yeah, maybe something about drugs, that would be cool' then this would be it.

I'll review it another time but figure WTF may as well mention it now before I forget.
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It probably shouldn't have a white cover from the looks of it..

Russell Brand. Who'd uh thunk?

This will be a blog about how much I respect Russell Brand. If you are someone who will never change their opinion about someone or respects Fox News mouthpieces like Sean Hannity (the reason why I'm writing this) or that the Canucks will win the Stanley Cup next year then you probably should stop reading this as of now. There will be nothing here that you agree with.

If you are someone who is interested slightly in why i think Russell Brand is one of the most important celebrities out there today then please feel free to read on and agree with me. Fair warning, this blog will have a fair number of clips of Brand in action so give yourself 30 minutes or so to really have your mind blown by this former heroin-junkie, Katy Perry marrying, C-List Hollywood actor who has evolved into one of the most important advocates in pointing out Media Manipulation and the Willful Following of the Masses through public forums, stand-up routines, media discussion panels and most importantly his youtube channel; The Trews. 

Brand came to attention in Britain on television, hosting a few shows and even having his own talk show for a brief time. He was charismatic and engaging, enduring trademarks that haven't been washed away by Hollywood, Katey Perry or heroin. Here in North America Brand first made an impression Aldous Snow, the greasy rock star husband of Sarah Marshall in the entertaining yet also forgettable date movie which also starred Jason Siegal's penis "Forgetting Sarah Marshall". 

Canucks Jersey Mash-up

13 Different jerseys in their 40 year history.  Someone took the time to put them all together = awesome.
yet i'm not seeing the 'salmon' rainbow 3rd jersey influence in here.

From the Nostalgic Files - And then there were 2... The 2013 Stanley Cup

Once, a long, long time ago, I wrote a thing or two about hockey. Now there is no hockey. I need my hockey fix. It's the dead time when nothing of importance is going on - but i do think i saw a vaguely familiar NHL player walking downtown yesterday. Why do I think that? He was young, well-built, facial hair (stating 'hey, i've been on vacation for awhile) and had poor fashion sense (so probably rich). I try to keep interested in NHL news but I can't get excited about who won what in arbitration or which player recently signed a minor league contract for X team. 

So, I'm going to post this - an retro article back in the day when life was good and the Hawks had yet to win their second Cup in three years. 

We all know how this ended. The biggest winner by far was 3rd string lunch bucket man Dave Bolland managing to take advantage of scoring the Cup-winning goal into a 5 yr/$27.5 million contract with Florida despite only playing in 58 games the last two years. 

If he continues to take his 2 year yearly average of 29 games played per year to the Panthers, that guy is ringing in approximately $190,000 per game. 

And all because of an incredible let down by the Bruins in Game Six. On behalf of the Chicago fan base and especially Dave Bolland - thank you.

a rare picture of Bolland actually on the ice in Toronto.