The 6th Sens on Diminished Returns:The fact that no one in the League is willing to pony up for the third most productive player in the last three years isn't a reflection that he's the shittiest 50 goal scorer out there, it's a reflection of how highly the Sens organization thinks of him.Nice.
Thing is, that $4M payout on July 1st is a sticking point; teams don't want to deal and then pay, especially if they can get someone else to pay for them. Problem is, Heatley's value goes up after that payout -- while anyone retaining his services from September would still feel the cap hit, that's $4M in real money that they don't have to pay. So Heatley's asking price is only going to go up after July 1st.
My feeling is that we're going to be stuck with Heatley for the first two or three months of the season. THere will then be a deal to see him gone by Christmas. Unfortunately he'll be with the team long enough to be blamed for the inevitable low level of performance this year.
...or maybe that's a good thing. If we can scapegoat him, maybe the boo-birds will lay off of the rest of the team.
All things being equal, I'd like to see him gone so we can start building for the future, rather than continuing to drag along in the awful present.
