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To keep current on Hurricanes related news…..

Drayson Bowman and the Spokane Chiefs won the Memorial Cup on Sunday. They beat Kitchener 4-1 and Bowman scored the game-winner. The young Canes prospect led the tournament with 6 goals scored.

The MVP of the tournament though was goalie Dustin Tokarski, who had 53 saves in the championship game. I bet that his stock went up in the upcoming NHL draft.

Congratulations and hail to the Chiefs!

Luke DeCock recently reported in LSB that contract negotiations between the Hurricanes and Tim Gleason have “stalled”, although the update really isn’t too alarming at this early stage in the process.

While we have no idea what the numbers and terms are that are being discussed, let’s just throw out a couple of scenarios.

Perhaps Jim Rutherford is offering a four-year deal at an average of 2.5 million each year. That sounds pretty reasonable, doesn’t it? Not if you are Tim Gleason and his agent, it doesn’t.

A four-year deal would take Gleason two years past, when he would become an unrestricted free agent and when he could test the market for some really big money. In a best case scenario, Rutherford would love to get Gleason signed at a reasonable amount a couple of years after he is eligible for free agency.

But on the other side of the fence, not only is Gleason trying to get as much money as he can get for next year or two, he’s also trying to make sure that he’s not sacrificing a potential fortune in future years.

On top of those intricacies, they also have to take into consideration that if Gleason isn’t signed by July 1st, he could garner offer sheets from other clubs.

The Canes could either match any offer sheet, or receive compensation, (draft picks), if they decide not to match. In Gleason’s potential salary range, the compensation would probably be a first round pick and a third round pick.

Confused yet?

The whole process could turn into a combination of bluffing and calling bluffs. In other words, you end up playing a game of high-stakes poker against Jim Rutherford, and most don’t fare very well against him.

The worst case scenario for both Gleason and the Canes would be if he doesn’t sign by July 1st, and there are no offers from other teams. The negotiations would then head to an adversarial arbitration process in which both parties represent their cases to a neutral entity.

An unpredictable, mandatory decision is then handed out in which a binding salary amount is awarded for one year. Then both parties “look forward” to repeating the whole process again the following year.

Not only does Rutherford have Tim Gleason in this position, but he also has Tuomo Ruutu, Dennis Seidenberg, Chad LaRose, and Patrick Eaves in the exact same spots as well. Gleason’s contract will probably be the toughest to bargain though, because his value is more objective than the others.

Finally, I received an email last night informing me that Bret Hedican’s home has officially hit the market. I usually don’t post things of this nature, but this news isn’t surpising and really just confirms all of the other recent information about the Yamaguchi/Hedicans.

They really will be leaving town, sooner rather than later. It will be interesting to see if Bret gets offers from teams out West, and how much those offers will be for.

Best of luck to number 6, and thanks for the memories.

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