For the last time...Sakes was not overpaid! He is paid market value. It may be a high price tag but Gainey did not OVER PAY. Cripes, I know 30 teams in the NHL who would have paid him either 4.5 mil or even 5mil.

So I cannot agree with the subliminal messages I hear on this board that Gainey Over paid. He just paid what the market going rate was.

No way the habs are going to pry a superstar like Ovechkin, etc away, and even if they did you are looking at 7 -8 mil for a guy like that( but no team will let a rare commodity like that go anyhow).

So then you start looking at guys whom you might be able to get REALISTICALLY to replace Koivu's shoes: Let's see....ummmm:

1 Savard--no thanks, he is also small and plays that way. Plus look at his career...that's right...Savard who?

2 Jokinen--I like this guy, but again, he is 27 years old and his highest point production in his career was 65 points. AND worse still, he plays weak in his own end---he is no Koivu. But I would grab him as a second line center though.

Who else REALISTICALLY would the habs have been able to replace Koivu with huh? Trust me Gainey paid fair market value. If he had let him go( and trust me, 30 teams would have grabbed him), we would have replaced him with a weaker player or went with Ribs as our first line guy. God help us with that option

I am actually asking a serious Question here. All you guys that post here seem knowledgable. Is there any player that we could actually have gotten that would have been better?