Looking at the most recent long term deal, Ilya Kovalchuk is currently at 12 goals, 13 assists for a total of 25 points on the season, not to mention a league worst plus minus of -27. He is on pace for a career worst season in every single category possible. He was awarded with a 17 year, $102 million dollar deal just last summer, and has done nothing to live up to it. With the way this is going, not only is New Jersey dead last in the NHL(yes, even the Oilers have more points), but they also seem to have a not so bright future ahead of them.
It's only normal for the Jersey fans to ask themselves: "Where do we go from here?" If Kovalchuk continues to perform this way, the only sensible move is to get him out of there. But with a deal like that attached to a player, Lou Lamoriello has better got some good strings to pull. At the end of the day, it's more than likely that Lamoriello's only option is to do something along the lines of what Washington did with Jaromir Jagr years back.
After acquiring Kovalchuk, the Devils went to drop out in the first round of the playoffs against the Flyers in 5 games. Losing in itself wasn't all that bad, the Flyers had a great line up and momentum coming into the playoffs. Instead, what stood out for me was that Kovalchuk was a one man army on the ice, fighting a lost cause. Kovalchuk has been doing that his entire career with Atlanta, it's no wonder that the Thrashers has only made the playoffs once during his stay there.
As demonstrated, Kovalchuk was not the missing piece that they were looking for. Why would you bother resigning a player that had limited success in your lineup? This is no where as strange as the Olli Jokinen signing done by Calgary. Still, it is strange reasoning nonetheless.
This just goes to show, contrary to popular belief; GMs do not place the team before themselves. Before anything else, the top priority for any staff is to keep their job. Sometimes it has a mutualistic relationship with the success of the team, but other times it may not. In my mind, a vital factor that played a role in the signing of Kovalchuk was that the Devils did not want to make their trade with Atlanta go down the drain. Like any good poker player, they should have known when to stand up and walk away. But they chose not to: they gambled and lost.
Just like how respect must be earned, so do contracts. Signing players to huge multi year deals just because they've been putting up star player numbers is one of the biggest mistakes a GM can possibly make. There are certainly some players that deserve life time contracts, but sadly Kovalchuk is not one of them.
Agree or disagree? Let me know what you think.
