Marian Hossa Leaves Hockeytown

Today, NHL star Marian Hossa decided not to resign with the 2009 Stanley Cup runner-ups, the Detroit Red Wings. Instead, he will play for the Chicago Blackhawks, who better prepare themselves to be Stanley Cup runer-ups--the past two seasons, Hossa has led his team to the Stanley Cup finals, but both times, he has lost. Since 2004, Hossa has been a journeyman, playing on four teams: during the 2004-2005 NHL lockout, he played in Europe for Slovakia; from 2005-2007, he played for the Atlanta Thrashers; at the trade deadline of 2008, he was traded to the Stanley Cup-ready Pittsburgh Penguins, with whom he finsihed the season by losing in the Stanley Cup finals to the Red Wings; then, a free agent at the end of the 2008 season, he signed a one-year deal with Detroit, only to be defeated once again in the Stanley Cup finals, this time by his former team, ending consecutive seasons as the 2nd place team. Now, he hopes that his new team, the Chicago Blackhawks will be the team that gets him his first Stanley Cup victory. And if Chicago doesn't perform, he can just about forget about ever hoisting that silver trophy over his head. He signed a 12-year deal worth $62.8 million with the Blackhawks today. It will be weird seeing Hossa with one team for such a long time! (A twelve year contract may seem ridiculously long: if he gets hurt, then what? Well, like the NFL, if a player is unable to play, the franchise does not have to pay his salary. This is different from professional baseball, where 100% of a player's contract is guarenteed.) Nevertheless,the Blackhawks better hope Hossa keeps scoring goals and stays healthy, or else this could go down as one of the biggest flops in the history of hockey. Keep in mind, he did go down after suffering a neck injury this March (motionless for several minutes), and who knows whether anything is still lingering.

At the same time, Hossa better hope that the Blackhawks continue to progress as a team: Chicago has improved its 2005-2006 record from 26-43 to 2008-2009's 46-24, which culminated in a Western Conference finals appearance. Although the Blackhawks have the longest active Stanley Cup draught in all of hockey (48 years), its next several years seem awfully promising, and Hossa seems to be in a good situation. Chicago's 2006 and 2007 first round draft picks, Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews were each finalists for the 2007 rookie of the year award, and are sure to improve over the next few years. Toews is 21 and Kane is only 20. In all likelihood, Detroit probably probably made the decision for him, lacking salary cap space after giving Henrik Zetterburg a 12 year contract extension this offseason, however, I think Hossa will find that Chicago will actually be the better team in years to come, and will once and for all get that Stanley Cup that has eluded him since his debut with the Ottawa Senators eleven years ago. He will be 42 years old when his contract expires, and probably won't land another deal at that age, so this is it for Hossa. He's really putting all his eggs into one basket, a basket that might someday become a heavy silver one with his name engraved on the side.