The Hockey News: Ryan Kennedy's blog: THN.com Blog: Champion free agents should stick with winning formula

THN.com Blog: Champion free agents should stick with winning formula

Rob Scuderi was a plus-5 for the Pens in the post-season and chipped in five points as well. (Photo by Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)

Ryan Kennedy
2009-06-17 11:08:00

Based on his Yeoman-like work in the Stanley Cup final – particularly a goal-denying leg save at the end of Game 6 – a lot of teams are going to want to get into the Rob Scuderi business this summer.

The Pittsburgh Penguins defenseman is eligible for unrestricted free agency come July 1 and will definitely get a big raise from the $712,500 salary he brought in this season. His play in the post-season has earned him mentions for the 2010 U.S. Olympic team and though he is a priority for re-signing in Pittsburgh, the Pens don’t have a lot of room left under the cap for next season and sacrifices will have to be made.

So what’s the best move to make if you’re Scuderi? Stay put, sir. You’re literally playing for the best team in the league and with Pittsburgh’s core, that ranking won’t waver too much in the next few years.

Bolting a Stanley Cup champ for greener (as in the color of money) pastures is certainly a nice reward for a job well done, but it certainly hasn’t helped the on-ice careers of those who have made the leap in the past.

Patient Zero in this scenario is Carolina’s Matt Cullen. After the slick center helped the Canes to their one and only Cup, he departed the Triangle for the bright lights of Broadway, where he instantly didn’t fit in with the Rangers, despite a four-year, $11.2 million contract. Cullen’s production dropped in the regular season, then took a nose-dive in the playoffs, where he managed just four points in 10 games after netting 18 in 25 during Carolina’s run.

The experiment was such a failure that the Rangers dealt Cullen back to Carolina last season, where his numbers have been better, despite injury woes limiting his games played. As Paul Maurice and Erik Cole found out this year, sometimes there’s no place like home, assuming that home is in Raleigh.

Maybe it’s expectation that dooms free agents. Two members of the 2004 champion Tampa Bay Lightning found that out once the lockout was solved. Defenseman Jassen Cullimore and goaltender Nikolai Khabibulin both signed nice deals with the Chicago Blackhawks only to flounder in Chi-town: The Bulin Wall’s goals-against average went up a full goal, while Cullimore’s plus-minus dropped to a career-worst minus-24 from plus-8 in Tampa.

Ironically, Khabibulin rebounded this year with the Hawks, helping them to their best season in more than a decade. Cullimore, now in Florida, was sturdy for the Panthers last season, though his numbers this year suggest the 36-year-old’s career is winding down.

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It took a couple years for the ex-Bolts to get back on track, so maybe that’s a little comfort for Ryan Malone, who didn’t win a Cup in Pittsburgh, but certainly got championship money from Tampa this season (he even got his dad a job with the team).

Playing on a bad Bolts squad, Malone’s numbers and play dropped, even though his previous playoff run in Pitt was such a success. There’s no point dumping on Tampa’s new braintrust again about its “all offense, no defense” team-building strategy, but Malone was certainly the centerpiece of that spate of signings.

But back to Mr. Scuderi.

Yes, you will probably be able to find a team out there willing to give you in excess of $3 million per season over several years, but that team may be dreadful. Take $2.5 million a year in Pittsburgh and you’re going deep in the playoffs again next year.

For further proof of why this is the best course of action, look no further than your recently vanquished foes, the Detroit Red Wings: The only attrition after Motown’s Cup win in 2008 came from retirements (Dallas Drake, Dominik Hasek) and the merciful waiving of Kyle Quincey, whose game took off in L.A., thanks to a weaker defensive depth chart.

Money or Cups? You rarely get both.

Think you know your prospects? Enter THN.com's Free NHL Draft Predictor contest for your chance to win an RBK Edge jersey.

Ryan Kennedy is a writer and copy editor for The Hockey News magazine, the co-author of the book Hockey's Young Guns and a regular contributor to THN.com. His blog appears Mondays and Wednesdays, his column - The Straight Edge - every Friday, and his prospect feature, The Hot List appears Tuesdays.

For more great profiles, news and views from the world of hockey, Subscribe to The Hockey News magazine.

COMMENTS (9)

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mrkrinkle Posted
(2009-06-17 21:56:20)

Scuderi is a prime example of how the player salaries steadily rise. Enter Joe blow who puts it together finally and after one good season after a long road of average ( if less than ) play is going to cash in. $3 mil from just under 800 000 !!!! Please....to much to quick. Players use to have to prove the value they bring on a REGULAR basis. As in consistant play over a few years before big dollar contracts. So here we are. Scuderi ( whom I like actaully, but don't over rate ) will be given I predict $3 mill per year on a 4 year deal. But lets be generous and say $2.5 mill. The next average overachiever who has arbotration rights will compare himself to Scuderi for a contract. Then ya have oh lets Kurtis Foster in Min who is a far better part player that has upside getting $3.5 to 4 mill........and the stupid GM's will pay it

dave1927p Posted
(2009-06-17 16:23:15)

smw2340, i agree with you. Something i never understood as a child but these guys careers can end so suddenly with an injury or now being replaced with a younger cheaper player he's best to take the most money he can get in UFA. Unless PIT matches it are in a semi-close it would probably best to take the money. I still gain alot of respect for a player who takes a hometown discount, but they don't lose any if they chase the money...well, maybe just alittle bit.

smw2340 Posted
(2009-06-17 15:25:43)

I think now is the perfect time for Scuderi to cash in. He has a ring now, so if another team is offering a substantial amount more than Pittsburgh, he'd be a fool not to take it. These guys have very few opportunities to strike it big as a UFA, so I think he should take as much $$ as possible. Scuderi is 30 years old, so he doesn't have much time left in the NHL. He needs to cash in while he can. An extra $500k/year over 4 years would put another $1 mil in his pocket after taxes. I'd take that!

singollo Posted
(2009-06-17 14:41:41)

I'm on the fence here: it's the amount of money that's the crux of these discussions, especially for a player like Scuderi. It's easy to say a superstar should take the hometown discount to stay with a champion- when you get to silly money levels, who cares? If you take $6MM a year instead of $7MM for 5 years, what's the difference? Thirty or thirty-five million still has you set for life either way. Scuderi though, regardless of how valuable he was to the Pens, is a different story. With the blue-collar style of his game, he may never again be a hot commodity. Ray Shero has shown a reluctance to offer anything more than two-year deals to players outside of his "core" stars. Suppose Shero offers just the $2.5MM for two years, while someone else offers a Finger-style deal at $4MM over four. Scudueri is supposed to just take $5MM instead of $16MM because we think he should stick with a champion? That's a lot of money to pass up. And in general, why are sports expected to be so different than other walks of life? ESPN's Sports Guy phrased it perfectly in his book. Say your buddy has a great job at his firm: decent salary, happy life. Another firm comes calling with a partnership and a 3-5X raise. In eight of ten cases, if your buddy asks your advice, you probably don't hesitate: you tell him to take the money, that you don't get many shots like that in life. Why do sports players get a different standard?

ktownboy Posted
(2009-06-17 13:26:17)

I can understand why players go to another team for more money. They have short careers and have to make it while they can. They are playing for the future of their families. It is a business folks and like in the regular business world some companies have a reputation for being good employers and can get away with paying a little less, the same applies to the NHL. It is not all about money but money is always the number one issue.

chris_k Posted
(2009-06-17 13:20:07)

In all fairness to Malone, the Penguins were not offering him anything near a fair value for his services. Malone made the right choice. Sadly he is no longer with the Penguins, but he is still respected here.

daniel Posted
(2009-06-17 13:09:14)

The old addage of goalies taking forever to ease into the NHL (at least relatively) probably occurs because they have the opposing teams' finest players bombarding them with shots, and unless they know how to read the shooter, and not overplay a puck, they're going to let in a stoppable goal here or there. The same can probably be said of defensive defensemen; Rob Scuderi will never be confused with Sergei Gonchar, or even Brooks Orpik for that matter. I've been watching Pittsburgh constantly for years, and Scuderi has been every bit as important to Pittsburgh's success over the past two seasons as anyone else. Every time one of the young guns up front made a mistake, Scuderi was back ready to bail the team out. As evidenced by the end of game 6 in the finals, 'Scudsi' is always around the net, ready to knock a loose rebound to the corner, or block a few shots with Fleury floundering out of position. As the Maple Leafs did with Jeff Finger, some crazy GM could offer him a $4+ million contract (and it might not necessarily be a horrid team) that Pittsburgh would never be able to match. The Penguins already have 4 defensemen signed for next season (Gonchar, Orpik, Eaton, Letang) and with Alex Goligoski poised to make the team next year, they only have room for one more blueliner. Ideally that would be Scuderi, but unless he's willing to pull an Orpik insead of a Malone, he'll have played his last game as a Penguin. But at least it was a good run.

janb55 Posted
(2009-06-17 12:57:19)

It all depends on what's more important-- the chance to win another Cup or get a big raise playing for someone else.

psu7bmr Posted
(2009-06-17 12:43:27)

The funny thing is that when Scuderi came into the NHL he was little more than a pylon on defense. He has improved steadily, but even last year he was only an adequate 5th or 6th defenseman. This year his value was still not as noticed until the Washington series. He did a great job against Ovechkin when out there against him and then just continued to improve from there. He is still not a guy that is going to fill the opposing team's net from the blue line, but I for one hope he follows the advice of this article and stays in Pittsburgh. He is becoming a very solid shut-down blueliner.