I have a much uglier word for it, Sir: Misappropriation

I was encouraged by dan-bob to take all of the anger that I have brewing behind Outpost.com (This happened to me) and focus it at internet journalism. So I went looking for love in all the right places, and found an old friend serving up a very old complaint.

ESPN.com and Scott Burnside have the honors.

Just wondering where all the howls of derision were when the Philadelphia Flyers announced last week that they had signed third-year center Mike Richards to a 12-year, $69 million contract extension.

That's pretty good job security for a player who just established a career-best 14 goals. When the New York Islanders became a league laughingstock when they signed netminder Rick DiPietro to a 15-year deal coming out of the lockout, at least he had won a playoff game and established himself as a capable goaltender, if not an elite one.

Those howls, if Scott listened enough, came from anybody who follows hockey carefully, and throughout Canada (with the possible exception of Toronto.) And why was nobody paying attention to hockey? Why, oh why, were the masses of sports fans who have nothing to follow during weekdays in the winter not see this terrible event?

Mike Richards signed this contract on December 13th. Other notable things happening on this date?

(1)A-Rod signs 10 year deal


Let's face it, Scott. Yankees baseball news, especially from the media's half-drunk prom date, usually trumps NHL news.

(2) Mitchell Report

The day that Adobe Acrobat was updated in more offices around the country than any other in the year. But let's bitch about hockey being ignored. Let's complain about this contract being ignored. Because Mike Richards' contract is long and pays over $5 million a year.

Not to mention the second part of his whining. Philadelphia wasn't made fun of as throughly as the Islanders were. Let's examine this a little more as well.

Rick DiPietro is a goalie. For good reason, the team is good, great, or awful depending on your goalie. Ricky D isn't a very good goalie. Career win-loss is right around .500 (104-93-8T-16OTL). 554 minutes played in playoff games. 2-7. And yet New York Islanders GM Garth Snow signed him to a 15 year contract worth $67.5 million. Garth Snow is an important name here because he was a goalie. And if the Mighty Ducks trilogy taught us anything, it's that goalies fly together.

Mike Richards is a forward. While they are touted as the superstars of the sport, it's because goals are more exciting when they are scored and not stopped. When your team sucks, you can rarely blame one guy playing bad hockey as the reason why the score is 9-1. The entire line must be looked at to see if there is a reason that goals have gone down. Adam Oates left St. Louis and Brett Hull wept. Teemu Selanne retires (or does he?) and Andy McDonald gets shipped away from Anaheim.

You cannot compare these players to each other. They are not interchangeable parts in the NHL.

Seems to me that I just read something about substitution and bad players.

In other sports terms:

MLB: Pitcher vs. Catcher
NFL: Quarterback vs. Cornerback
Rugby: Backs vs. Forwards

BUT IT'S EXTORTION!

Richards has one point in six playoff games for the Flyers.

Who was the goalie? His point was an assist. His +/- was -5. So what he should have done was score 10 unassisted even strength goals. Because he can do that without a team.

But less than half a season is a pretty short testing period on which to base a 12-year contract. Still, no one batted an eye when the deal was signed. Why? Because that's the new NHL. Identify the young core of your team, and then roll the dice and lock them up to as long a term as you can possibly manage.

Then hope you're not wrong.

I'm sure there is no scouting involved in signing him to a 12 year contract. If only there was a league that players could play in before they got to professional levels that would gauge them against other players.

OHL Stats for Mike Richards:

233 GP, 115 G, 177 A, +/- of +75, and 56 points in 41 playoff games.

But nobody is making the Flyers the butt of jokes.

Blame the WGA, Scott. That must be the reason why nobody cared about this hockey signing.