Thank goodness I’m not a hockey player.  They can’t win.

If you take the big deal with a team that isn’t in the playoffs, you are selfish and greedy and only after money and tying their hands for the future.

If you take a shorter-term deal with a solid team in order to fit into their salary structure and win a Cup, you are selfish and a mercenary and only after a Cup so you can then cash in and float through the rest of your career.

So I guess the only option is to play for peanuts with a bad team and let them build themselves slowly up into a champion - at which point you will be too old to fit in and will be traded at the trade deadline because your contract is so easy to move, or something?  And for all this you are supposed to be grateful?

Somehow I never saw Yzerman or Lidstrom floating through the rest of their careers after they won a single Cup.  I can’t see Crosby choosing to rest on his laurels after winning one Cup, or Ovechkin, or any of a number of guys.

If you float, you float.  If you work hard, you work hard.  Motivations may change, but not disappear entirely for most people.

Sounds like sour grapes, a little bit.

Posted by Baroque from Michigan on 07/03/08 at 08:00 AM ET

Just a bit Baroque, but if you read the article, you’ll see this guy’s trying a bit too hard to be controversial. And who exactly are these “insiders” he’s referring to?

Plus, he actually uses the phrase “Gag me with a spoon.”

Were I Mr. Hossa, I wouldn’t be too concerned about the thoughts of a valley girl from 1984.  Forget the fact that many media insiders are suggesting this guy’s opinions are irrelevant.

Posted by Gabriel from San Diego, CA on 07/03/08 at 08:59 AM ET

Sounds like whining from a team that wrongly fell in love with a *possibility*. As you pointed out in another thread B, Hossa staying was a chance at best and one they gambled a slew of good players on.

Too bad.

I would argue that a bigger deal should be made of the fact that they lost Colby Armstrong in the whole deal.

Posted by Osrt on 07/03/08 at 09:05 AM ET

or if Marian Hossa shows up at all for Games 1 and 2, that the Stanley Cup might today be in the possession of his employer as of the day before yesterday, but no.

From Collier.

That statement alone proves the idiocy of the article. Hossa was the most productive Penguin in the finals and the entire team got shut out in the first and second games, not just Hossa.

Worse than bitterness is a set of bad arguments.

Posted by Osrt on 07/03/08 at 09:12 AM ET

Collier can’t seem to decide whether Hossa was the Penguin’s “fiercest playoff predator” or the guy who apparently single-handedly lost them 3 of 4 games in the finals. In the series I watched, him and Crosby were the only two Penguins I didn’t want to see on the ice.
Collier is in the class of our own Rob Parker and Drew Sharp as examples of what you get when fine writing and keen insight combine in the same journalist.

Posted by BobS. on 07/03/08 at 09:48 AM ET

Baroque you forgot the selfish players on non-playoff teams who refuse to waive their no trade contract, leave their families behind to move half way across the country, live out of a hotel for three months all for the benefit of the team that wants to pawn them off for picks.

Posted by Django on 07/03/08 at 09:52 AM ET

Thank you, Django.  I knew I forgot someone! 

Posted by Baroque from Michigan on 07/03/08 at 10:15 AM ET

Is Collier bitter?  You bet he is!  How can he not be when the team he covers loses one of the best two-way players in the game to the very team that dominated his team in the Stanley Cup Playoffs by imposing their ability to play all three zones?!
I know I’d be pretty bitter about it.  How can the Pens players think they can match-up with Detroit now that Detroit has essentially the same team PLUS one of the best players from the Pens last season?
It just wouldn’t make sense if Collier WASN’T bitter about this.  Sure he should be more unbiased but come on, that deal is a dagger to the heart of Pens fans!

With regards to the idea that a bigger deal should be made about losing Armstrong...are you kidding me?  The man is nothing more than a prototypical banger.  He can chip in a goal occassionally and has great enery & personality, but this guy has nothing 1st or 2nd line about him.  For a guy drafted in the 1st round he certainly hasn’t lived up to expectations.  He and Christensen are very replaceable parts.  No big loss there.  Now losing two first round picks who haven’t gotten a chance to prove themselves could be what comes back to haunt the Pens.

Posted by bigboi on 07/03/08 at 10:32 AM ET

“...of all the teams I could choose from, at the top there were two teams [Detroit and Pittsburgh], and at the end of the day I had to make a decision, and I felt best about Detroit.”

That’s the line that may be pissing off Collier, oh, excuse me, Mr. Collier. Marian had a chance to play with the Pens and against the Wings and, in the end, he felt the Wings were the better team...and, by inference, Hank and Pavel were better players than Cindy and Mindy.

It’ll be a storybook finish for the League if these two teams meet in the Fials again next spring. The sub-plots and the sub-sub-plots will be endless. The hype will be out of control. But, I’m guessing the end result will be exactly the same...in four games, though, not six.

Posted by OlderThanChelios from Grand Rapids on 07/03/08 at 11:04 AM ET

Sorry Pens fans and Pens writers, but Detroit gives him a better shot, on paper, than the Pens do. The Pens D doesn’t stack up with Detroit’s (as we saw), and certainly would’ve sucked hard if they’d signed Hossa and seen Orpik walk.

I think seeing Malkin cry about being tired while Zetterberg and Datsyuk forged ahead at all costs might have said something to him about which team is better to play for, as well. Granted, Malkin will eventually grow up.

Posted by Nathan on 07/03/08 at 12:04 PM ET