Page 33 - Sports Energy News, Cornwall, Issue No 77

www.sportsenergynews.com Issue #77 April 2019 33

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Sports Energy presents Sports Panel

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Sorry panel, but we have to ask – what do you think about those Ottawa Senators?
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Gilles Gaudet - Sports Enthusiast - What you think about the Ottawa Senators is coloured by whether you are fan of the team or
not. If you are a fan it’s been a long and dreary year; what with the Uber incident, the trading of most of their star players, and their cellar
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dwelling status in the NHL. For the non-fans, the Sens have become water cooler fodder as the worst team in Canada, taking over a role that
the Leafs held for years.
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Not to worry the dynamic duo of Melnyk and Dorion have a plan, and if a plan from this pair of bunglers piques your interest, there’s some
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land for sale in Ottawa’s LeBreton Flats. Yes it was announced recently that the Senators would spend close to the cap from 2021 to 2025.
So that means that when the Sens players start to reach their prime in a few years they will invest dollars in the team to make them Cup
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competitive in the upcoming years. So when players like Chabot, Tkachuk, Brown and Batherson reach the point where they are ready to
sign big dollar contracts, the Sens will sign them. Why didn’t that fuzzy logic apply to Karlsson, Stone, Duchene and Dzingel? Why not
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sign these players, who are in their prime right now? Karlsson and Stone are cornerstone players, so who’s to say that any future Sens will
achieve their all-star status. The Senators cap hit for this year is now at $44 million, that’s about $35 million under the cap, and those are
numbers that Melnyk loves.
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In the environmental world the term cap and trade means “a policy in which the government sets a “cap” on carbon dioxide emissions and
then creates a financial market in which companies can trade permits to emit those gases”. In Melnyk/Dorion speak cap and trade means
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whenever players salaries get close to the NHL salary cap, we trade them. That’s a smelly emission of a different sort!
Jake Lapierre - Conditioning Coach - Watching the Ottawa Senators for the past two years has been painful. The team has been
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the worst performing team in hockey. Fans have endured what seems to have been one bad front office decision after another and fans are
rightfully frustrated.
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But there’s something happening with Ottawa lately. It’s become apparent to me this month watching the team’s attitude on the ice. It looks
like there’s a change happening with the team. These young players are playing with heart, having fun again, and it’s infectious. This pool
of young fast talent is poised to bust the team out of that bubble of despair it’s been playing in for many years.
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Ottawa’s front office has to harness that energy and build on it. All it would take is one key trade to bring in a player to compliment this fast
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energetic group to fuel an exciting turnaround. Mr Melnyk! Talk to Mitch Marner, convince him to step out of Auston Mathews shadow and
into a stellar career in Ottawa.
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Jim Riddell - Seaway Karate Club- The Ottawa Senators are not a very good hockey team, haven’t been for several years and they
face major challenges on many different levels.
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Starting at the top, the team owner doesn’t seem to mind controversy and in the past year alone, he has been at odds with the team’s fan base,
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a business partner, the mayor of Ottawa, the NCC and certain members of the media. There have been rumours that the team is for sale, and
there is no certainty that the present ownership is committed to the long term future of the organization.
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The Sens are a small market team that carry an excessive amount of debt. Last June, the team refinanced borrowing $135 million from a
syndicate of lenders, then borrowed another $30 million from the Bank of Montreal in October. Ontario has the highest tax rate for high
income earners of any state or province that has an NHL team. This means overpaying star players to retain them and/or offering front end
loaded contracts with bonuses.
According to Ottawa media, Eric Karlsson, Mark Stone, and Matt Duchene were offered eight year comparable dollar contracts but they all
opted not to re-sign leaving the team no choice but to trade them. Traded to the Las Vegas Golden Knights, Mark Stone quickly signed an
eight year deal at $9.5 million a year. With tax rates at 53% in Ontario compared to 36.5% in Nevada, this means that Ottawa would have
had to offer Stone a contract of almost $12 million per year to give him the equivalent net pay.
The Sens arena, the Canadian Tire Center is an ageing, poorly located venue that sits vacant many nights. The Sens are only one of four
NHL teams that are not playing out of a downtown arena and to be financially successful, that is where they need to be. Downtown arenas/
event centres go far beyond hockey and are booked out most nights for events such as concerts, conferences, and trade shows. Cities with
downtown arenas are bringing between 1.5 and 1.8 million people through their doors annually, generating a considerable amount of non-
hockey related revenue for the teams. There is still optimism that a downtown arena can be built with the LRT system providing quick and
easy access from anywhere in the city.
As for the on-ice product, the sample size is very small so far, and no decision has be made yet on a contract extension for their interim coach
Marc Crawford. He has been distributing ice time to deserving players and has been getting more out of his team than his predecessor. GM
Pierre Dorion has done an excellent job in a very difficult situation by trading the UFA’s for good young talent and picks. Although the Sens
do not own their 1st round draft pick in 2019, they have four picks in the first three rounds, and in 2020 have a total of twelve picks, with
seven in the first three rounds. With the Sens, every day seems to be an adventure and only time will tell how this will all play out.