I came to the Rangers in 2000. It took me 4 years to completely wipe out any reminder of my predecessor. In fact I don’t even remember his name, but I’m pretty sure he isn’t a Hall of Famer like The Generalissimo! Dumping Brian Leetch on the Maple Leafs in 2004 for a bunch of people no one has ever heard was obviously a big turning point.
But even The Generalissimo gets taken by surprise once in a while. Who knew that a 4th-line punk named Sean Avery would come in and actually have as big an impact as he did? So I started to push him out the door by calling him a “detriment” to the team in an arbitration hearing. The final step came this week, when I all but forced him out by offering him under market value terms, while adding insult to injury by happily throwing money around at Redden and Rosival. But I’ll let you in on a little secret – if Avery had been willing to accept less than market value – accept The Generalissimo’s terms – then I might have let him come back. But he didn’t, so he’s gone.
That brings us to Jagr. I’ll admit that I was taken by surprise with Jagr too. I never expected him to play as well as he did after the lockout – which is why I only agreed to pay half his salary when I traded for him. But I knew that if he exceeded the expecations, The Generalissimo would come off looking smart again, so there really was no downside. Except, unlike in Washington, the fans, and more importantly the local media, actually took to liking Jagr. Almost overnight, this became Jagr’s Team – he even broke the team’s single season scoring records!
The Generalissimo could not have that. Dumping Nylander, and signing Gomez was a brilliant move. Gomez looked like he would be a good match for Jagr to the uninformed, but The Generalissimo knew better! I knew that Jagr and Gomez would struggle to find enough puck to go around, and sure enough that’s what happened. So Jagr’s numbers dropped, he failed to trigger his automatic one-year extension, and voila, he’s gone.
That’s what makes The Generalissimo so great – even when I’m caught off guard by surprise, I react better than normal GMs.
So let’s all raise a glass in celebration. It took 8 years, but now this is finally The Generalissimo’s team.
[...] Generalissimo will do. Once again, The Generalissimo has outsmarted everyone. I told you people last July that The Generalissimo always comes out on top, and he wasn’t going to let some fancy boy in [...]