Holy crap.

After a week of reading message board posts about various Islander rumors and hearsay, I think my head’s about to explode. Dissecting all of them now would be crazy, so for the time being, I’m just going to pick two of the more recent ones and give my take on them.

The first one I heard was that Ryan Smyth is headed to Calgary, but that’s only if the Flames don’t nab Devils center Scott Gomez first. I don’t know how you guys feel about this, but I think that stats aside, Gomez and Smyth are completely different types of players and there’s no way that Calgary is planning to pick up one in case they can’t get another. I’d like to believe it’s only one they have their eyes on.

Gomez is a pure offensive talent, while Smyth does a little bit of everything and is a great presence in the locker room; picking up either one of these guys would signal a huge change for that organization, so I think that the Flames are going to think this through heavily before they make a move.

The fact that this rumor [or at least Smyth being a part of it] was squashed the other day when Smyth’s agent told Newsday that he hadn’t received any offers from anyone else yet and that Smyth reportedly said was going to take his time before he made a commitment with anybody, makes me think that the Flames are after Gomez. At any rate, I’m hoping, like all of you guys that Smyth stays in Long Island. Unfortunately, the only thing that we can really do about it is wait and see what happens.

From what I’ve been told by a few of the writers I work with, Smyth isn’t really a big fan of Alexei “I don’t deserve the C” Yashin and that the general consensus is that if Yashin stays, Smyth is gone. With that being said, if this is true, the chances of the Isles keeping Smyth seem to range from slim to none. Hopefully, Snow can work some magic and get these guys on the same page. Otherwise, the trade that got Smyth here may come back and bite the Islanders in the arse.

The second rumor I heard was that Randy Robitaille has decided to play next season in Russia. This makes absolutely no sense to me.

Why would Robitaille go to Russia after stringing together three decent seasons in the NHL with three different teams? I might sound a bit crazy, but I think Robitaille would make a decent third line center on just about any team in the NHL. Add in the fact that he’s a left handed shot and I think he could be a valuable commodity for any team looking to improve their last two lines and powerplay as well. Sure, he is a bit inconsistent at times and I’ve seen Cloris Leachman take the body more than he does, he could still find a home on another team in the NHL.

Why he would decide to go to Russia now of all times [it would have made sense after his first stint with the Isles] is beyond me, but I guess where going to see what happens with that one as well.

What do you guys think of all of this?

Posted under Offseason 2006-07