Johnny Gaudreau Is Officially Heading To Free Agency After Turning Down A Massive Offer From Calgary
Len Redkoles. Getty Images.Jonathan Hockey is just a kid from South Jersey. He was drafted in the 4th round in 2011 with the 104th pick in the draft. Just behind NHL legends such as Dillon Simpson, Joachim Nermark, Josh Shalla, Joseph LaBate and Gregory Hoffman. All guys who you don't even know if I just made up their names or not.
Since getting picked up in the 4th round of the 2011 Draft, Gaudreau went on to win the Hobey Baker Award, put up 609 career NHL points in 602 career games including a career best 115 points last year. Not bad for an undersized fella. Not bad at all. So good, in fact, that the Calgary Flames were about to pay him $10+ million on an 8-year deal to likely play in Calgary for the entirety of his career. Ready to make him one of the highest paid players in the league. But guess what…
Ham & Cheese don't care about the money. Johnny Gaudreau knows that right now is the only time in his career he'll have the opportunity to go play for his hometown team. Johnny Gaudreau dreamt of suiting up for the Philadelphia Flyers since the day he put on his first pair of skates. The Flames could offer him ownership in the team and he still wouldn't be going back. Because Johnny Hockey was born to be a Flyer.
The only issue now, of course, is the goddamn fucking Flyers. I mean this team is so stupid it's unbelievable. You have a legitimate superstar basically throwing himself at you, and all you need to do is figure out a way to free up the cap space to make it happen. The easiest way to free up that space is to trade JVR and his $7M cap hit. It's a difficult trade to make since there aren't a ton of teams out there who would want to take on that contract. But the Flyers got a 1st round pick from Florida in 2024 in the Giroux trade they could attach to JVR to make him more enticing. I don't give a single flying fuck about that draft pick and neither should you. If it means it brings Gaudreau home to Philly, you trade the damn pick. Someone needs to pass that memo on to Chuck Fletcher.
Now there's a good chance that this is just some gamesmanship out of Chuck Fletcher. "Leak" to the media that he's not happy with the asking price. Buy some more time to make sure you can actually get a deal done with Gaudreau. Just see if someone falls for the bluff. But I swear to Christ if somehow Johnny Gaudreau doesn't end up being a Flyer for the rest of his career all because Chuck Fletcher didn't want to get rid of a draft pick he'd ultimately screw up anyway, I will put a curse on him for the rest of his life. So no pressure or anything, Chuck, but get the deal done. Preferably by 12:01pm tomorrow.
P.S. -- Just want it on the record now that we're calling the Gaudreau - Hayes - Atkinson line the "Philadelphia Golden Eagles" for all the BC boys.