Skip to main content

Double-Edged Sabres

The price of success is rarely cheap, and the Buffalo Sabres are learning that lesson the hard way. While yesterday they announced the re-signing of defenseman Dmitri Kalinin to a two-year deal, leaving only goaltender Ryan Miller left to consider, the Sabres are going to pay roughly 50 percent more in player salaries this upcoming season, despite not landing any significant acquisitions, and letting J.P. Dumont and Jay McKee leave via free agency.

From the article at TSN:
Buffalo had a payroll of approximately $29 million last season but still advanced to the Eastern Conference finals, where they lost to the Carolina Hurricanes in seven games.

But the cost of re-signing restricted free agents moved the payroll closer to the $44 million salary cap for 2006-07.


Making it to the Eastern Conference finals is a fine achievement, but a 50% increase in pay? It looks like this is a classic case of the Boiling Frog. Each individual signing may have seemed like the right thing to do at the time, but looking at this team, with this salary, the label "overachieving" can be changed to "underachieving" awfully quickly. Anything less than a trip to the Stanley Cup finals will be looked at as a disappointment, which is unfair given the youth on this roster, but that's what happens when Early Success meets up with Fat Contracts.

 

Popular posts from this blog

My goals for 2011: Make sports blogging pay off

In my never-ending quest to figure out a model for making what is currently my hobby & passion into something bringing in at least a side income, I've decided to set a couple goals for myself to complete during the rest of 2011. Simply put, I plan to publish two products over the next few months, which I hope will provide real value to hockey fans, and that they'll be willing to pay for. Will it succeed? Will it fail? The only way to know is to put my nose to the grindstone and get these two things done (I'll keep the details under my hat for now). The important thing to note is that these efforts are in addition to anything I'm doing over at OTF . Taking away what we're doing over there and asking people to pay for it is a surefire lose-lose all the way around, because if there's anything we've learned over the last few years, it's that people love to read about sports, but only for free. I'm also optimistic about Hockey Gea...

Social Media, Internet Marketing, and Real, Paying Customers - it really works!

Applying the basic tenets of internet marketing (SEO best practices and social media network building) have helped me grow the readership and engagement over at On The Forecheck tremendously in recent years, but lately I've been wondering if those same techniques could be applied to small- or medium-sized local businesses, to help them drive real, tangible business results. I'm talking about not just drawing idle hockey fans looking to a blog so they can muse over line combinations, but helping businesses connect with potential customers in ways that otherwise wouldn't occur. Recently, I was able to help make just such a thing happen, and it shows just how great the opportunities are for small, local businesses which may not have the resources or skills available to extend their brand effectively on the internet.

Celebrating a milestone month

I've been remiss in providing regular updates on my quest to turn this whole sports-blogging hobby into at least something of a significant side income, if not a career, but good news has a way of prompting action. That, and I've been heads-down busy working on a few different fronts to push things forward...