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Ed Willes' Tweets on Gillis/Weber


King of the ES

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Look, we don't have the luxury of "being patient". Too old.

If Holmgren doesn't throw out the offer sheet, Weber either signs an extension in NAS, or indicates that he wants to be traded at some point during the season so that he can sign elsewhere. He probably wouldn't be traded here, because we really don't have much that would likely interest the Preds. Meaning that Vancouver's best chance to land Weber probably would've been signing him to an offer sheet a la Paul Holmgren. Don't think that this decision was automatic, either. If the Preds were THAT confident in this decision, they would've announced it being matched an hour after it happened, not 6 days.

Holmgren tried, Nashville matched. Applause to both. No different than when Gillis tried with Backes. That was a good attempt.

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After years of Taylor Pyatts and Brad Isbisters, Gillis has upped the ante by bringing in some QUALITY free agents and trade returns in his offseasons.

2008 - Needed top-6 forwards badly. Landed the most sought after forward (Sundin), and another top-10 free agent forward (Demitra). Signed a top RFA to an offersheet (Backes), but was matched, so traded for another highly-regarded young powerforward (Bernier).

2009 - Sundin retired, and Bernier didn't work out...but Kesler and Burrows took huge steps. Still could use another top-6 forward with size, and an offensive D-man to replace Ohlund. Signed Samuelsson to a reasonable amount, and pretty much stole Erhoff from the Sharks. Eye for talent proven, as both went on to have their 2 career years with the Nucks.

2010 - Top-6 forwards working well, but needed a better bottom-6. Also, D-corps continues to be ravaged by injuries and exposed. Signed the top free-agent D-man available (Hamhuis), and traded for another highly regarded D (Ballard) - both with histories of avoiding injury (Ballard hadn't missed a game due to injury in nearly 4 years, Hamhuis had only missed 9 in 6 seasons). Signed Malhotra and Torres, giving us arguably the best 3rd line in the league (until Manny's freak injury). Best season in team history, and really could have been far better if not for all of the injury troubles (still think we beat Boston if Hamhuis wasn't hurt).

2011 - Two of the best free agents available for the team's needs were the ones they picked up at the deadline - Lapierre and Higgins. So Gillis got them re-signed to very reasonable deals. There were some questions about Samuelsson's health, so MG got a similar player in similar questionable health in Sturm. By the time the year started, neither were ready to contribute. So before the season was even a few weeks old, he flipped both the question marks for Booth.

2012 - Biggest team weakness seems to be D, particularly defensively. Also, powerplay fizzled in 2nd half of the year. So MG signs last year's 2nd leading PP goalscoring defenseman, who is also known for his shutdown abilities. Offseason not over, Luongo trade expected at some point.

Pretty dam good, IMO. Despite limited quality players to go around all 30 teams, Gillis has managed to reel in quite a few of the big fish in his limited tenure.

His reward? Whiny fans with now sky-high expectations?

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:picard:

This does not make him "right". Poile probably told all GMs that he'd match any offer. Holmgren made him put his money where his mouth is, at a cost of NOTHING and with the potential upside of landing Weber for draft picks.

By no means can you call Gillis "right" for not signing Weber to an offer sheet. Paul Holmgren and the Philadelphia Flyers now proceed to MOVE ON as if nothing happened.

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Oh wow, Gillis is such a sage, isn't he?

You're all missing the point, really except for PMB. I'm a trader, so I often think in terms of upside/downside. Here's the analysis from Philadelphia's perspective:

UPSIDE:

-NAS decides that they either can't afford or don't want to bring back a possibly disgruntled Weber, and choose instead to let it go.

DOWNSIDE:

-....

Mike Gillis would've lost nothing by trying. Without trying, he could've hoped and prayed that Weber made it to free agency in 2013 without either being extended or traded somewhere else and signed, but there are pretty clearly HUGE RISKS associated with that, as well.

All I can say is that him and Gilman are L-U-C-K-Y that Nashville matched, because the "Well, we just assumed that they'd match!" phrase would go down forever in Canuck history with the likes of "it is what it is", "we choked", "I'll drive him to the airport myself", etc.

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:picard:

This does not make him "right". Poile probably told all GMs that he'd match any offer. Holmgren made him put his money where his mouth is, at a cost of NOTHING and with the potential upside of landing Weber for draft picks.

By no means can you call Gillis "right" for not signing Weber to an offer sheet. Paul Holmgren and the Philadelphia Flyers now proceed to MOVE ON as if nothing happened.

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Well, that or the option that was mentioned directly by Gillis and the Canucks to get him to sign a one year offer sheet and go after him without losing any picks in free agency next year. Weber wasn't convinced though, and regardless of the Philly option that didn't work or the Vancouver option he didn't like, Weber is stuck in Nashville for at least one more year.

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Why would Weber do that? Seriously, think about it for a minute. The CBA could be adjusted next year to ban the "lifetime"-type contracts. And then, he's screwed. There's too much money at stake here to do a foolish move like that, which could kill your career. Just ask Matt Leinart.

And then there are other risks. What if the Canucks just bomb this year, and don't make the playoffs? What if the Sedin's suffer a steep decline? What if Gillis makes a few other boneheaded trades, mid-season? There are a lot of negatives around this organization that seem to be converging at the same (like, now). If there's a pullback this season (likely, IMO), and if Vancouver's future isn't looking too bright in the summer of 2013, and If Weber becomes a UFA, and if his interest is a Stanley Cup, why would he rather come to Vancouver than, say, Pittsburgh, or Philadelphia?

And besides, do you think Nashville would be more likely to match a 1-year, $14M offer, or a 14-year, $110M offer? They would've matched Gillis' offer 10 minutes after it was received.

I would think that he'd probably PREFER to play in a place like Philadelphia, or Vancouver, but he is also CLEARLY happy to stay in Nashville, or else he simply would not have exposed himself to the possibility of doing so.

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What if, what if, what if? You clearly didn't like the what if game when talking about how Salo seemed to be on a decline while Garrison is more likely to be better going forward. The what if game was around earlier in the thread too, and you shot it down like you were playing Duck Hunt in your parent's basement.

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A little premature with your tweets eh Ed?

Everyone calls gillis an idiot for calling exactly what was going to happen.

King of ES, we know weber is not an idiot and almost anyone would take the money. But you and others have repeatedly called gillis out for not trying to get weber. In fact gillis went and sat down with him as soon as he could and laid out the only plan that could get him out of Nashville(if that was his top priority). It was apparently not his top priority and the money was(can't blame him).

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:picard:

This does not make him "right". Poile probably told all GMs that he'd match any offer. Holmgren made him put his money where his mouth is, at a cost of NOTHING and with the potential upside of landing Weber for draft picks.

By no means can you call Gillis "right" for not signing Weber to an offer sheet. Paul Holmgren and the Philadelphia Flyers now proceed to MOVE ON as if nothing happened.

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Now when you look at it, if Weber really wanted out of NSH signing the offer sheet was a big mistake. Instead of playing out his last year and becoming a UFA he's now basically in a lifetime contract with the Preds. Sure he could be traded but I see that as a lot less likely with that contract and probably not for a few years if at all.

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Now when you look at it, if Weber really wanted out of NSH signing the offer sheet was a big mistake. Instead of playing out his last year and becoming a UFA he's now basically in a lifetime contract with the Preds. Sure he could be traded but I see that as a lot less likely with that contract and probably not for a few years if at all.

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So basically you're mad at Gillis for not pursuing an exercise in futility purely to grant you the brief illusion that Weber would be a Canuck simply to make you feel better. A futile exercise that eliminates any chance of Weber ever becoming a UFA during his career and having the freedom to sign here if he ever actually wanted to be a Canuck in the first place.

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