| Subject: Et tu Sergei? Est que tu parles francais? |
Author:
Sal Trachan
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Date Posted: 17:30:51 12/05/02 Thu
Whitehorse made another in a line of surprising moves today... it started when the press conference scheduled for Friday was held on short notice today.
First, the speculation ended as the Warriors GM Steve Gandour re-introduced their number one goalie, Martin Brodeur.
"We were so happy to get him back and locked up long term." began Steve at the conference. "Martin is our pilar and franchise. We need him to compete. And to be honest we were pleasently surprised not to have to pay more to keep him."
"I am glad to be back," Martin said at the conference, "Whitehorse was where I wanted to play... it was my first choice. The fans have been great to me and to my family... and I look forward to four years of great hockey in this city. I would not have signed here if I did not feel we had a strong chance this year to win it all. Management has shown their commitment to win, and I responded by showing my commitment to them."
Then the news conference took an interesting turn. Whitehorse broke a deal which had been completed in silence and secrecy two nights before. It was stunning in that no word had leaked out to the media.
They introduced the newest Warriors, Ruslan Fedotenko, Justin Williams and Simon Gagne to a stunned media gathering. Gone are Sergei Samsonov, the most recently acquired Jeff Friesen and Dan Boyle.
In Gagne the Warriors get basically what they lost in Samsonov. The salaries of the two players differ only by $100,000. Their overall skills are almost identical. Defensively their is only a minute edge to Gagne. Scoring again sees a minute edge to Gagne... stickhandling and passing see a minute edge to Samsonov, and back and fourth across the board. Williams and Fedotenko represent help for the future, while Friesen and Boyle were expendable with Whitehorse's depth. So why this lateral move? We put this question to GM Steve Gandour at the press conference.
"We don't see this as a lateral move," Steve begin. "Gagne is someone we cherish greatly, maybe more then most teams. Williams was huge in this deal, we wanted his youth and skill to help keep this team competitive now and in the future. We felt Friesen was expendable because we had our eye on another LW. Fedotenko is another star in the maknig in our minds... Boyle was hard to part with but our hearts and our heads and our scouts agreed this deal was too intriguing to pass on."
The move does leave WHI with an interesting scenario on LW. Brindamour and Gagne are the one two LWers, but who is number three. We posed this question to Steve, as well as who he had his eye on for this other LW.
"I am not at liberty to say on the potential addition of a LW, that is not totally my right to divulge. However, we have always felt we had options on that wing. Gratton has proven his worth on LW in the minors... and though a third line spot may be too much too soon, a fourth line spot is our current projection for him. Fedotenko has interesting possibilities for the future on LW as well. For now we are working on a few options but if all fails, we feel confident Handzus could make the switch to LW and fit in quite nicely on third line LW."
Finally, no mention was made at the press conference of Petr Nedved until the question period where he was asked point blank by Bowie Herger if they did indeed offer Nedved a contract and what the status was on that.
Steve had a quick reply... "Yes we did, and it seems like London will match the offer and keep Nedved."
Reporting for your Warriors,
Sal Trachan
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