Eugene Melnyk is back in the news again. After bringing a lawsuit against a yacht company in the Caribbean came to light this past week, the Senators owner made a public appearance on the Bob McCown Podcast yesterday.
For an individual who seemed to enjoy basking in the limelight as an NHL franchise owner, the last few years have been relatively subdued when it comes to media appearances. I believe this was Melnyk’s first appearance on the radio since the fall. Melnyk’s step back is a noticeable one that coincides with his approval rating and his team’s plunge in the standings.
With the Senators playing better hockey down the stretch however, it feels like Melnyk may figure more prominently in the news cycle. Yesterday’s interview was important because it hit on a number of interesting topics ranging from Brady Tkachuk’s contract negotiations, the captaincy, LeBreton Flats, future arena locations and reflections on the Senators’ previous management.
For those who are not familiar with format for the ‘Thoughts in Bold’ articles, I have transcribed Melnyk’s interview below. I have cut some of the uninteresting responses, but there was a lot to dissect here. After each of Melnyk’s responses, I’ve included my own which are highlighted in bold.
Without further ado…
On his team playing very well down the stretch and whether he’s encouraged his team can take the next step necessary…
“You know, I had a long conversation with the coach… with D.J. (Smith) just a couple of days ago and reflected on, ‘Okay, so what does this all mean?’ He gave me one of the best assessments I’ve ever heard from any coach at any time since I’ve owned a hockey team and that includes junior. So, I’ve been at this almost 24 or 23 years. We went through player by player and what do we need to get there? He basically said, ‘Look, we are set for the next 10 years with the team that we have.’ Except, there’s a couple of young ones that need to grow up fairly quickly. We’ve got some gaps. For example, we need a very good defensive defenceman as a starter. There are two things we need. We need a good defensive defenceman and we need an almost veteran-type centre… first line centre. Those are obviously not easy to come by.”
I am going to jump in here. After Pierre Dorion played coy in his media appearances about tipping hands and revealing too much about his offseason plans, Melnyk responded to the first interview question by revealing that the Senators believe they need a defensive defenceman and a first-line centre.
The Senators absolutely value Nikita Zaitsev’s defensive contributions and Artyom Zub established himself as a reliable defensive option that feels undervalued by the organization. Jacob Bernard-Docker got into some games down the stretch, but he may be a year away from being an impactful young player. At the very least though, projecting forward over the next two or three years, the entire right side of the defence carries the ‘defensive defenceman’ label.
Improving the right side in the short-term makes sense if the team wants to relegate Nikita Zaitsev to a lesser role. For as good as his defensive contributions are believed to be, a lot of his defensive value is mitigated because of his inability to retrieve pucks and transition the puck up the ice effectively. His poor puck-moving abilities help create disjointed breakouts which lead to the Senators spending more time defending in the neutral and defensive zones. Adding another right-shot defenceman would be tricky however because Zub, Zaitsev and JBD are under team control for at least the next two seasons. Even if it is desirable to afford JBD some development time in Belleville, the Senators certainly don’t want to box him out of a job if he excels down there and proves he’s ready to contribute at the parent level.
What may make more sense is for the Senators to add a defensive defenceman on the left side. Throughout the 2020-21 season, D.J. Smith exhibited a tendency to relegate one of his undersized puck-moving defencemen – Erik Brannstrom or Christian Wolanin – to the bench. The games in which both players dressed were few and far between, but once the Senators dealt Braydon Coburn, it forced Smith to dress Brannstrom and Victor Mete regularly. Although the team results and the individual performance of these two players were good, Smith’s preference for size may motivate Dorion to look for a left-shot defensive defenceman. Similar to the issue with targeting a defenceman on the right side, the Senators certainly do not want to run the risk of boxing Jake Sanderson out of a job as early as next season. Back to Melnyk…
“The defenceman, we have one coming called (Jake) Sanderson and he’s going to be an absolute rock star that guy. But, I think he’s 18 or something. He’s too young. He should play some games next year with us in the big league. We’re hoping… he’s still staying in college, but then he’ll get into Belleville very quickly. As soon as we can just to give him a taste and that’s it.”
Jumping back in here. The Senators may insulate the depth on the left side, but at least it sounds like they’re cautious of blocking Sanderson’s development. It may take some time for him to adjust and mature physically, but the desire to add a defensive defenceman could mean that one of Victor Mete or Erik Brannstrom could be used as a trade asset this summer.
“I think next year, we should get better. This is a great, great collection of players. I’ve seen bad dressing rooms. Everyone has. This is a group that does exactly what the… it’s a coach’s dream. They push each other. They’re young and they all have the same dream. They’re all pulling and they control each other. They can get nasty with each other if they have to, but they don’t. They’re friends and they’re all after the same thing. There’s none of this prima donna stuff. D.J. will get rid of these guys so fast it’ll make your head spin. If he sees one guy showing up in a fedora or some kind of hat coming into the dressing room. I mean, he is curtains. He won’t even get to the dressing room and we don’t put up with that crap anymore. We just laid down the law. It’s not like say Lou Lamoriello… I mean, he to me, is a piece of work that… it actually entertains me. He’s got rules in that dressing room. You know it better than I do. I just heard about this stuff. You’ve got to have your hair a certain way. You’ve got to dress a certain way. None of this baloney walking around with hats and some kind of green shiny suits. Forget about it. So, I think the discipline is there. I think the talent and skills are there. The motivation is certainly there. And I think you can’t BS these players. They know what they’ve got around them and I think we’ve got a good shot of making the playoffs next year and it only gets better from there.”
Great. You’ve got a collection of young and talented pieces that the fans are excited about and want to get invested in and the owner is talking about implemented (or implementing) archaic policies that have the potential to rob the players of showing some personality and expressing themselves. In a league that desperately needs to do a better job of marketing its young talent, pushing for these policies sounds out of touch. Melnyk used to be big in the horse racing scene however, he should know something about people wearing different outfits and stupid hats.
On how satisfying it is to see a market that was recently very dissatisfied with the state of things…
“Well, how would you feel at the end of the day, you put up with all this knowing full-well that this was the best thing for the team to do. It was not easy. When you drive into town and there’s a billboard telling you to get lost, I mean, it’s tough. #MelnykOut. There’s no other way to say it, ‘Melnyk Out. Get out.’ The press wasn’t happy. They had a free for all on slamming me and I couldn’t even imagine doing this in Toronto with the press there. Things got a little out of hand at one point, but it’s nice to see… I’m not an ‘I told you so’ kind of person, but I told you so. Just give it time. We’ve just got to do this and over time, we’ll rebuild.”
Melnyk believes that the fan and media dissatisfaction with him stems from the organization’s decision to rebuild. It’s an interesting but unsurprising distortion of the facts. Fans here have endured rebuilds before and are smart enough to understand the benefits they can offer. The decision to rebuild was not the reason why fans got tired of the owner’s act. The #MelnykOut movement was born out frustration for an owner who went on one of the league’s biggest platforms in the Heritage Classic and insulted this fan base while threatening to relocate. Fans were embarrassed. They were embarrassed by his comments then, they groan with every subsequent Melnyk interview and there is a genuine distrust and lack of faith in the owner’s ability to help this franchise progress in its development.
The doublespeak, mixed messages and a complete unwillingness to accept any responsibility for events have undermined a lot of the good that the organization does in the community and on the ice. That’s the reality of the Senators’ current relationship with the fans. Winning can help be a cure-all, but for as good as the kids have been, there are still a lot of people in Ottawa who want to love this team unconditionally, but have become disenfranchised simply because of the words and actions of the owner.
On having a corporate event in Toronto and telling people that after a few lean years, this was going to happen…
“When you do a rebuild, it was not just a whimsical thing. We actually sat down and went position by position by position. I spent two days with Pierre Dorion and it was brutal because I wouldn’t let it go. I’d say, ‘Well, explain it to me.’
‘Well, it’s hockey stuff.’
‘Explain it to me, I’m not stupid. If I can figure out a molecule, I can figure out a certain type of play. What do you mean? Where are the strengths? Where are the weaknesses? What do you want to do to the other team? How do you want to play? Do you want to play the trap from 20 years ago and never have a person buy a ticket ever again like New Jersey? I remember a player, who used to be our captain from way back, and his philosophy and he’s no longer anywhere near the organization… his philosophy was everything should be offence. Everything. Just score five, six or seven goals and if you have four scored against you, you still win the game. That’s another philosophy. Pierre’s philosophy was more, you have to balance it. Go the traditionalist route – which was fine with me because that’s the one I group up with and I understood.”
Randy Cunneyworth was a head coach at one point, but I’m not sure he’s the former captain Melnyk is referencing. If I had to guess, my money would be on it being Jason Spezza.
“And then you go position by position and I think the only place where we failed this year and we could have gotten better… and we made changes to adjust… and that was in goal. We got killed in goal. You bring in a top, top guy. He’s now improved himself a lot and we’re hoping that Murray guy steps up next year. We need him to, but then we’ve got five little guys, like young kids… and young in goalie is anything under 25 (years of age) is very young. That’s the other thing that I’ve kind of learned over the years is until they’re 25 or 26, they really don’t even start getting into their prime. But, if Murray can step up and one of the young ones steps up as a good number two, then we have the makings of a true contender. I really believe that. And after that, I’ve got a bunch of 22 year olds that aren’t even close to their prime.
Matt Murray has not been a top goaltender for quite some time. Statistically, he’s been one of the worst goaltenders in the entire league over the past two seasons. That Murray got torched arriving while playing behind one of the league’s worst blue lines to start the season was hardly a surprise. In what should have been a show-me year, nobody needed revisionist history to recognize the significant risks associated with the term and dollar that the Senators awarded Murray on his contract extension. But, Melnyk was right, the team made changes to adjust by reassigning their goaltending coach Pierre Groulx and hiring Zac Bierk. Whether that ultimately works out remains to be seen, but the goaltending coaching reshuffling feels like a move that was made to placate the owner. If Melnyk’s as involved as we are led to believe, I wonder what the next steps will be if Murray cannot rediscover the success of his first few years in the league.
“This is where every franchise wants to be and we took the hard way up. I was reading a little bit about climbing Mt. Everest, not that I’m doing it but, there’s different ways of going up Mt. Everest. There’s the real, real tough way where everybody dies and then there’s the easier way which is almost impossible to do anyways. We went kind of halfway between the two. We didn’t take the toughest route, but god damn it, we got rid of every fan favourite. Like every one of them. There’s nobody left. They’re all playing for the teams I’m watching. I’m watching three guys on the Islanders who are connected to me. It’s just amazing. Then you see the Vegas team and there’s (Mark) Stone, he’s their captain. You go over to the Islanders, there’s three guys there. Pageau…
All these guys… They say, ‘Oh, you traded all these guys away.’ Yeah, but I got (Tim) Stützle for that and he’s going to be an All-Star within three or four years. It’s easy to look in hindsight at some trades that were done that were good and bad. I’ve got to say, I think we’re on the plus-side of that column. I believe we are.”
Bragging about winning trades by auctioning off your best players isn’t a great look. The easiest thing an organization can do is strip a team down to the bone, lower all expectations and then turn around when the team finally makes inevitable gains and talk about how smart you are.
Evaluating trades should be more than just an analysis of the wins and losses. Irrespective of due diligence, scouting, analytics and etc., mistakes happen. Deals that look bad today could look bad years from now and conversely, deals that look good now may not later on as the deal ages. What is important is how the organization learned from its mistakes and successes. What worked well? Why didn’t the trade work out? Is there anything in the process that can be changed to help mitigate mistakes in the future? Answering these questions and acting on the results will help push this franchise forward.
On having to sign all these kids eventually like Brady Tkachuk…
“Well, it’s not hard if you’re both agreeing. Look, I think we’re on the same planet with Brady’s agents and him. We really believe that he’s a leader of the team and is a pivotal part for us. But, these things sometimes come down to things that even we can’t even understand. And it’s not money, it’s something in their heads that somehow, they want to do something else… But, it’s not the case with Brady. I think all it is with us, is the season is now over. Everybody is going away, think about it and we’ll come back. I don’t foresee a problem with signing Brady. I don’t. But, you know, five years from now, we’re going to be running into some serious… they’re not going to be cap issues… we’re going to try to avoid cap issues and financial issues won’t be a problem either… but, you know, you could have five guys like Brady that you have got to sign. It’s no different in Leaf land right now. You’ve got some real big money in the top four or five guys and when you’ve got four or five superstars, that’s what you run into.”
Maybe I’m reading too much into Melnyk’s comments here, but it sounded like (and Pierre Dorion channeled a bit of this through his media availabilities last week) that the organization recognizes that some players just do not want to sign long-term deals right now. The flat cap can have a significant impact on contract negotiations, but for a player like Tkachuk, it makes sense for him to bank on his own abilities and bet on himself. If he signs a bridge deal, he’ll have a better opportunity to cash in on a much larger contract value when his second contract ends than if he took a long-term deal now.
No one should be concerned about the team’s ability to sign Tkachuk now, the only concerns should arise if the winger signs a contract that takes him to unrestricted free agency (UFA) and doesn’t buy up the first few
On making Brady Tkachuk the captain…
“Oh, I didn’t say that. Not at all. That’s going to be what we’re all thinking about over the summer and whether he’s the person for that. It would have to be some… whomever it is, they have got to be around long-term. That’s the key for us. You can’t have a captain there on a bridge contract. It’s just not going to happen. He, and along with Thomas Chabot, they’re both leaders. They’re both leaders in the dressing room which is what you’re looking for. I’ve been there deep in the Stanley Cup Playoffs and that’s when these guys really shine. It’s not the game in January that matters. It’s when you get into these playoffs is when the leadership shows up. If they’re not there, you’re done. You’re going to wipe out (so fast) it’ll make your head spin.”
Would the Senators owner dangle the captaincy as a leverage tool Tkachuk to sign a long-term deal? What if Brady doesn’t? Does the team then give it to Thomas Chabot because he has signed a long-term deal? If the answer to the last question is yes, how does this sequence of events play over within the dressing room?
On whether the need for a captain is overrated in professional sports these days…
“I think the reverse is more true. If you name the wrong one, you’re screwed. You’re absolutely screwed because then you’ve got a guy… a flimsy… you know everybody kind of looks… When it’s a tight, tight game – three minutes to go in game and let’s say you’re in the playoffs and it’s a critical game – and there’s a bad call, you need a guy out there that goes crazy. Goes crazy! If he gets fined, he gets fined. But, you need somebody that stands up and everybody understands that this guy is about to unleash. And, you should be worried about that guy. I just think that you need that leadership in the room. You need a person that when everything is falling apart, (stands up and says), ‘This is what we’re going to do. This is how we get there.’ And everyone believes him. It’s changed. A lot of teams name the highest-price guy or the best player, but not the best leader.”
The worst captains are the “smelly and cranky” ones who take you out on the Atlantic Ocean against your will.
It’s kind of hilarious that Melnyk looks at a guy going crazy on the bench and believes that to be leadership, but if a player wears a hat he doesn’t like, that’s a prima donna.
“We’ll see. I think that we’re going to make the right decision. I think that we are going to sign Brady to a fair contract. And, I think that at the end of the day, we are going to search and destroy trying to find two key pieces to our team that we need to fill. You know, we’ve got two great, young centres that are stepping up big-time in (Josh) Norris and (Shane) Pinto. This Pinto kid, he came out of the blue. You know he didn’t start being a good player until he was 15 years old. And then he comes to North Dakota and all of a sudden, there must be something about the North Dakota water. I don’t know. It’s either that or there’s truly not a lot to do out there, but they have the best hockey program, I think, in the world. But, the guy comes out of there and all of a sudden he’s playing second-line centre. But, he’s 19 and I remember my juniors at St. Mike’s were older. In any event, I think we’ll find that missing piece and the defensive defenceman.”
If the Senators are going to try and address these two roles, hopefully, the organization uses the free agent route since it will only cost them money. Pierre Dorion’s track record of acquiring talent to make the team more competitive isn’t particularly good. He has a tendency to overpay for past production or familiar names. The best course of action for the organization may be to use another year to evaluate some of the young assets that the team has before making a splash – especially since the 2022 and 2023 draft classes are expected to be strong. Using sizable opportunity costs while targeting the wrong players has worked against the organization before and it’s a genuine concern now.
On LeBreton Flats and where that process is at…
“As far as LeBreton Flats is concerned, we’re nowhere. We’re not involved anymore. It was a bad dream that has ended up in court. We had a horrible partner. Unbeknownst to me, I didn’t even know this person and out of the blue, previous management signed him up. Interesting today, by the way, today is the sixth anniversary of my liver transplant. But, the reason I bring it up or it came to mind, is that it was during my liver transplant, when I was in the hospital, that the previous management signed a deal with this guy under my nose. I was literally under the knife and now it’s ended up in a $700 million lawsuit. As far as what we’re doing in Ottawa though is a better question and that is, I have about 70 acres of land around our arena in Kanata. In the 16 years that I’ve owned the team, Ottawa has grown westward which is towards Kanata and it’s now… that 26-minute drive that felt like forever, is no longer a big deal. And, I’ve spent enough time in Toronto to know what traffic is or any other city. I think that I like it out in Kanata, but if I can’t get anything done there, I have also had proposals to still stay in the Ottawa area but going across the river into Gatineau. There’s some beautiful land and beautiful backdrops of Parliament Hill from there. It is closer to downtown. I’m still committed to Kanata and I’m looking at some time in the next three to five years committing to one or the other. And I’m going to have to build a new arena. I need a new arena in about seven years from now… five to 10 (years from now). Our arena is already 26 years old. It was well-built, but, it has a lifespan. These things usually have a lifespan of 25 or 30 years, but this thing probably has a lifespan of 40. And what I mean by that, you start spending a lot of money on maintenance. I mean, if a piece of roof falls, you’re in big trouble. So, you’ve got to spend the money to keep it up and I’ve just spent $11 million on a new HVAC system because of Covid to clean the air quicker. Go figure that. I think that that is more of a reality than LeBreton ever was. Either we build another stadium out in Kanata on our own property that we own or there’s a great deal that comes from the other side of the river.”
I have never heard Melnyk speak ill of his former business partner John Ruddy or Cyril Leeder publicly like this before. It is a marked change in behavior for the owner. Regardless of how Melnyk feels about the LeBreton deal falling apart, he’s running his mouth criticizing a pretty well-respected member of the Ottawa community in Leeder. Not only was he one of the franchise’s founding fathers, but he also led the drive to help find Melnyk a liver donor.
Melnyk speaks about the need for a new arena in five to 10 years, but never explains the urgency to get one built so quickly. If the lifespan of the rink is an estimated 40 years, by his own admission, the CTC should have 14 to 15 years of life left in it. This may lead some to presume that Melnyk wants to move this process along quickly because he’s looking to boost the team’s franchise value and pivot to sell. Rumours of Melnyk’s liquidity and financial wherewithal have dogged this franchise for years. So much so that it’s like the ‘Boy Who Cried Wolf’. When it comes to Eugene Melnyk being ready to sell, I’ll believe it when I see it.
On the likelihood of relocating across the river to Quebec and whether that’s palatable for fans…
“I know. It’s all a question of though… and I get that part. But, I’ve not had the easiest time in the city of Ottawa. Not with the people. Not with the fans, believe it or not. There’s a hierarchy in that city, political yes. I just read this literally an hour ago. Here I am paying through the nose in taxes out there and they just gave the Porsche dealer a $2.6 million tax break. And I’m going… it’s because of all the economic benefits. What economic benefit? He’s selling god damn Porsches! Give me a break. Give me a tax break. I’m dying out here. I’ve got no fans and I’m still trying to put out a show for everybody. In any event, it’s about fairness. It’s not even the money. It’s the fairness. And if I feel that I’m being unfairly treated, I don’t want to come to this party. I’m going to do everything I possibly can. I don’t see that border (being an issue). Ottawa’s become very, very multilingual. I mean, 90-percent. Maybe 90, but I don’t know what the official number is but everybody speaks French. Many, many people live in Gatineau and commute into Ottawa to work. But again, my number one preference is Kanata by far my number one preference. But, you read stuff like I did an hour ago. A Porsche dealer? Really? Honestly? You just gave a Porsche dealer his new dealership? He’s got two. I don’t even know these people. He’s not going to sponsor me anymore, but I just don’t think I’m treated fairly and we’re going to have to talk about it.”
In bringing up Gatineau and Kanata as prospective sites for a new arena, is Melnyk trying to leverage the city or NCC to work with him on a more favorable deal at LeBreton? It is a theory that has surfaced on social media, but if developers are trying to work with Melnyk on these two sites, my assumption is that those negotiations are centred around these developers building the rink for him.
The complexities and complications of building a rink in Gatineau and relocating the franchise to a new province are so wildly unrealistic it is laughable. Building a new rink on the property he already owns certainly makes the most sense, but it creates challenges of its own. After spending years waxing poetic about the financial benefits of building a rink downtown and being the catalyst property on LeBreton Flats land, the prospect of the Senators spending another 25 to 50 years in Kanata feels completely underwhelming (and I say this as a fan who grew up in the west end).
The rink needs to be downtown and it’s in the city’s best interests to have it there. But, how do you navigate securing that dream while negotiating with a person who has seemingly napalmed every relationship he has had with politicians in various levels of the government, employees, business partners and the local business community?
On ruling out putting an arena downtown on the Ottawa side…
“I’ve ruled out going to LeBreton…. Yes, there is a federal site, which is attractive as well. But, Ottawa’s a funny city geographically. It’s such a sprawl. It’s unusual, but Ottawa, as a city, doesn’t have a commercial downtown per se. Not like traditional cities. Everyone of them, you go through Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary, all of them have a downtown like Montreal or even Halifax. Ottawa’s a sprawl. You’ve got the Parliament buildings right there in the centre, but that’s not really… there’s activity, but it’s not like Toronto at all, or Montreal. It’s not even close. So, where is downtown? Is it right next to the Chateau Laurier? I think what people are talking about, as long as you’re on the LRT, there is word -- they haven’t gotten approval yet and that’s why I’m kind of waiting – that they’re going after to have the LRT go all the way out to Kanata and we would be a stop. If that happens, that’s a big plus because then you would take away the drive and then we can use some of the parking and that sort of thing. There’s a lot of moving parts right now mostly for your listeners. Just give us some time. We’ve got our rebuild almost complete and now we can start focusing on our arena and everything that can go around the arena.”
A CBC article from 2018 indicated that an 11-kilometre western leg of the LRT line would run along the Queensway from Moodie Drive to Terry Fox while running through the residential neighborhoods lining Campeau Drive. From Terry Fox, the proposed line would become elevated and run past the Canadian Tire Centre towards Hazeldean Road. At the time of that article, the estimated timeline for that project beginning was after 2031. That timeline feels like a best-case scenario and would bring Melnyk to the end of the five to 10-year window that he referred to earlier. Perhaps the promise of an eventual line and hub would renew his commitment to keeping the team on his property in Kanata. As disappointing as it would be to continue to host the team there, if the property around the rink could be used to create a rink district filled with bars and attractions to enhance the gameday experience, it would be a welcome step forward. Would it be perfect? No, but if Melnyk refuses to sell and holds onto the team for the next 10 to 20 years, this may be the best alternative to a downtown location.
On if he’d reassess staying in Kanata if the LRT goes out there…
“Absolutely. Like I said, I’m 75 to 85-percent (sure) I’m staying in Kanata. I’m just saying there’s an option to not stay there and move to another part of Ottawa or even across the river. These are just options and I’m giving it all out. I just met with a developer over the weekend and they presented a huge program and plan around Kanata. I’m talking about hotels and condos and this and that on my land. I don’t know how baked that plan is, but there are people that are recognizing that the land out in… people are starting to cluster out in Kanata believe it or not. There’s massive, massive development going on out there like hundreds of thousands of new homes.”
Nothing creates excitement like a rink surrounded by suburbia…
“By the way, I really believe that the next arenas that are going to be built may be the same size as the current arenas, but will only hold 12,000 seats. That’s it. I think the days of cramming 19,000 people into a building, I don’t know if that is going to stick around. I just don’t know. I’m a believer of more of a Winnipeg model or less where you have sellouts, slightly higher pricing, slightly, but you’re jammed.”
Melnyk may be onto something with the idea of creating rinks with smaller seating spaces. They may allow more people into the rink than there are seats through the use of social lounging and standing areas that provide great views of the ice, but when it comes to the next evolution of rinks, I think he’s right to think about the effects that television and the comfort of watching from home have had on attracting fans to an expensive live experience.
12,000 fans does seem awfully low, however. Much is made about Ottawa’s attendance when the times were good, but even in those days, I believe the organization was still papering the building. An arena that’s 15,500 to 16,500 makes sense for the area, but with a growing community, I believe the Senators could still fill an 18,000 seat arena. They just have to find a way to reconnect and engage with fans that they have lost in recent years.
On the Canadian Tire Centre always being too big and there once were plans to make it even bigger…
“Same guys that did the (LeBreton) deal. Same management team that bankrupted by the way. Bankrupted the company. Like an idiot, I made the biggest mistake in business I ever did. Like, what moron – and I’m pointing at myself – buys a bankrupt company and then leaves the same management (in place) that bankrupted it? Exactly. You don’t need anything to figure out… a grade school kid will tell you that’s a stupid idea. Look, it happened and we’re doing the best we can out of it. I think we’re going to have great crowds. Are we going to have 19,000 people? You never know, but all I can do is give them the best product and the best team to cheer for. And there’s nothing better than to cheer for a young team that you know is going to be around. Those young guys are going to attract all sorts of young fans individually and I just think it’s a recipe for success.”
There’s nothing better than to love a team without having to worry about whether the guys pulling the strings are capable of building something that every fan can be proud of. Based on Eugene’s comments yesterday, there is no humility. He still carries himself with bravado and brashness that existed before the team’s record went into the gutter. A good farm system and some established young players will carry this team, but eventually, they will need new contracts and the pressure will be on management and ownership to step up and not only reward them but insulate them with the right blend of players. In listening to Melnyk, I just don’t get the sense that he’s learned anything from this experience. The blame lies on the coaches, prima donna players, previous management, and anyone not named Eugene Melnyk.
There’s no ownership of anything. In a city that desperately wants to love this team unconditionally, I understand why the fatigue factor is real. Everyone understands what the problem in Ottawa is, but it’s tiring talking about the owner. The dynamic of being excited about this young generation of players while trying to reconcile the fact that this owner is still presiding over everything just pulls you in different directions.
It’s exhausting.
So...the guy who Bryan Murray had to block from running into the room during intermission of a playoff game had subordinates sign off on a $700m deal meant to alter the entire future of the franchise without him being involved?