Adam Foote or Peter Forsberg?
How about “neither”?
How about Forsberg completing the 1-2 punch to the Avalanche’s credibility on Wednesday, agreeing to a two-year deal with the Philadelphia Flyers – the day after Foote signed with the lowly Columbus Blue Jackets?
This wasn’t supposed to happen, at least not in a fashion that made usually meticulous and crafty Avalanche general manager Pierre Lacroix appear ill-prepared for coping with the challenges posed by the NHL’s salary cap.
It didn’t take hiring a CPA to figure out that the Avalanche payroll was going to be a tough fit, and that at some point, hard decisions were going to have to be made and difficult goodbyes endured. In fact, it has been foreseeable for months, as far back as the September 2004 lockout and all through the NHL season that never was.
It is not a reasonable strategy to go to two players, Forsberg and Foote, and leave both with the impression Colorado doesn’t much care if they come back or not.
That’s what happened with both.
To its credit, the Avalanche went out of its way to get the numbers on the table in presenting its case for how it had done the best it could to re-sign two of the three players who had been with the franchise since its arrival from Quebec.
(And now there is one: Joe Sakic.)
But the Avalanche-supplied numbers only bolstered the suspicion that at best, Lacroix was arrogant in believing that either Forsberg or Foote would consider escalating deals that called for each to receive only $1.5 million in the upcoming season. At worst, he was inept.
That’s not a hometown discount.
Yes, even in the new NHL, even involving players with proven affections for Denver, that was an insult.
Lacroix either knew that, or he should have, before getting negative responses from both Foote and Forsberg, then signing veterans Patrice Brisebois and Pierre Turgeon to replace them.
At the Pepsi Center on Wednesday night, Lacroix said he didn’t seriously consider choosing between Forsberg and Foote, and offering one player the $3 million for 2005-06 and subsequent raises.
“If I give Peter $3 million for year one, I have to ask Peter to play one shift on defense and one at forward because it is a team sport,” Lacroix said. He added, “This is the structure of a roster. What you’re trying to tell me is that we should start a new hockey era by having short shifts.”
That was downright silly. Even without Foote or Brisebois, the Avalanche had a decent seven-man defensive corps in the fold. Concentrating on only Forsberg wouldn’t have been disastrous – and at least it would have had a better chance of working with more money on the table for the Swede. Or the same thing with deciding to concentrate on Foote. One or the other. Not the worst of both worlds in a strategy that was preordained to fail.
Lacroix also said he never talked about bringing both Forsberg and Vancouver’s Markus Naslund to the Avalanche as a package deal, as the Swedes had raised as a possibility recently in their homeland. “It never crossed our minds,” Lacroix said.
At the very least, it crossed Naslund’s and Forsberg’s minds, but it probably would have meant extreme financial sacrifice in the first year of a deal, and neither wanted to commit for more than one year under those circumstances. So once a package deal didn’t seem feasible and they began exploring separate options, the Canucks reached agreement with Naslund on Tuesday night and the Flyers jumped in and made the successful run at Forsberg.
Lacroix also blanched about doing what it took to re-sign Forsberg, then, if necessary, trading either Alex Tanguay or Milan Hejduk to get back under the cap.
“Not at their age and their potential,” Lacroix said.
Now the Avalanche appears to be caught in neutral as other Western Conference organizations accelerate through the open market.
Avalanche season ticket-holders have invoices on their kitchen counters now, and though they were granted price cuts of either 20 or 10 percent, many are suffering from sticker shock. Before Wednesday, they were saying that unless they’re watching both Forsberg and Sakic, they wouldn’t be getting their money’s worth and the cuts aren’t enough. (Sticker shock? A season-ticket invoice for the two “worst” seats in the lower bowl is about $7,500. Still.)
As disillusioned as Forsberg has been for the past few years, the new rules and alleged re-emphasis on discouraging obstruction should further unleash him.
The combination of the Flyers’ immediate energy in the free-agent period and the money involved was compelling.
So far, the New NHL isn’t playing well in Denver.
Staff writer Terry Frei is the author of “Horns, Hogs and Nixon Coming” (hardback 2002, trade paperback August 2004) and “Third Down and a War to Go” (hardback September 2004). He can be reached at 303-820-1895 or tfrei@denverpost.com.
