The NHL offseason is always a firestorm of player movement. Free agency, the amateur draft and trades reshape franchises. Fan bases have their hopes raised and dashed. Pundits proclaim the rise and fall of teams based on the variety of new and old faces circulating throughout the league.
The biggest player movement story of this past offseason was actually a non-story. Mats Sundin not only didn't sign a deal with an NHL team, he has not yet stated whether or not he will play in 2008-2009.
I'm not talking about whether or not Mats Sundin should come back to the NHL. He's been a fine hockey player for almost two decades in the NHL, and he's the one who has to look into his heart and mind and make that decision.
What I am talking about is the perception being pushed in the media that Mats Sundin was clearly the most important player on the free agent market. He was touted as a veteran leader and legitimate #1 center, and beyond that a franchise player. He won something called the “Mark Messier Leader of the Year” Award for 2007-2008, a season in which the Maple Leafs won 36 games and finished 12th out of 15 Eastern Conference teams. Am I to take from this that he “led” the team to 12th place?
Sundin has certainly proven that he's a player that can be counted on to produce year in and year out. He works very hard. He wants desperately to win. He has been at times one of the best players in the NHL throughout his career. However, he's been miscast as a franchise player. He hasn't been a franchise player since well before the lockout.
You know what you'll get from Sundin. 30-35 goals, 70-80 points and defensively responsible play. You'll get everything he has to give on the ice. You'll get a guy who leads by example. However, you are not getting a guy who can simply pick up an average team and lift them into contention. In any sport these guys are rare, and the NHL is no different. There are perhaps three or four in the NHL who don't play the position of goaltender.
The Toronto Maple Leafs failed to realize this for most of the last decade, and failed spectacularly in their attempts to put the proper talent around Sundin to allow him to succeed. They also failed to build a system that made use of his outstanding offensive talent. It should be noted that such failure was widespread in the NHL for a number of seasons prior to the lockout.
And yet despite ample evidence that Mats Sundin is a very good (but not great) player at this point, for most of the offseason he was painted as a savior in Vancouver, or as a Stanley Cup lock-up piece in Montreal. If you're paying Mats Sundin 10 million dollars (as the Canucks attempted to) in the salary cap era, you're making a mistake plain and simple.
Now we've reached October and Sundin remains unsigned, just days from the start of the season. If he returns at all, he most likely will not play for at least a month or two while he gets into game shape. His return would probably look something like that of Teemu Selanne's a year ago, when Sundin returned after the mid-season point for the Anaheim Ducks. Should he return, he will do so as simply a complimentary player. If he joins a strong cup contending team, he could finally realize his dream of a Stanley Cup. But if he chooses to join a borderline playoff team, he will find himself the victim of unreasonable expectations much as he was in Toronto for many years.
