Yes, Eugene Melnyk pays the bills and he is entitled to his opinion, and whatever that opinion is carries more weight than yours or mine because it is his toy.

We have seen it in the past with owners like Jerry Jones, Al Davis, Mark Cuban and George Steinbrenner to name a few. Owners who like to stroke their egos in public much like Melnyk tends to do every so often just to make a show of things.

Not always the right decision and just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. I CAN drink that 40 of rye sitting in front of me, but that doesn't make it a good idea. The same thing holds true for the owner of a professional sports franchise.

I get that he is a big fan and wants to see his team succeed as much (and because it also affects his bottom line) or more than mos of the fan base, but sometimes a person in his situation needs to separate business from pleasure.

I get that he has a budget and he might not have the resources to spend to the cap, and while most fans don't like it, that is his prerogative.

But you can't have it both ways. Spending smart will only get you so far. I did a comparison of spending vs success three summers ago while writing for another site that showed pretty significantly that if you aren't among the top 10 payroll teams in the league, the chances of making it to the third or fourth round of the playoffs was pretty low. Spending at or near the cap doesn't guarantee winning, but not getting to that level pretty much guarantees that you won't. That doesn't mean you spend money foolishly, but you have to spend it at the right time. Maybe that time hasn't come yet, and you can spend it internally to keep key players happy, but at some point you have to spend it.

So not spending the extra $5, $6 or $10M (depending on what the actual dollar figure is), to ice the best possible team is well within Melnyk's rights, you also have to adjust your expectation as such. Is there anyone but Melnyk who thought the Senators were a top 5 or 6 NHL team, even when 100% healthy? I had them as a playoff team heading into the season, and even optimistically grabbing the third spot in the Atlantic division, but not many people who were any type of objective had them much higher than that.

Melnyk said it himself that he doesn't know much about the game of hockey itself, yet he sits there and says that practicing shootouts is something that the Senators need to do. The Sens are 6-6 in shootouts this season, and if they were perfect in the shootout (which no team is) they would still be 3 points out of a playoff spot. That is not the problem.

Having a 29th ranked penalty kill, regardless of how many shorthanded goals you score, is part of the problem. Having a low 20's ranked power play is part of the problem. Allowing 3+ goals per game, regardless of how many shots you allow, is part of the problem.

Coaching is part of it, players are part of it, icing a cheap roster is part of it. But expecting to get blood from a Stone (not a shot at Mark) and expecting to get cap results from a team far below the Cap isn't fair, and when you sit there and essentially brag that you "threw $68M at it" (not sure what that total includes exactly) and expect more when a majority of the other teams scoff at that value is counterproductive. Yes, that is a large amount of money for most people but if you run your NHL team that way then you have to realize that hopes and expectations are two different things.

The only team that I know of in the last 7 years that wasn't in the top 10 in payroll that made it to the Stanley Cup final was the 2011-12 New Jersey Devils. Spending doesn't guarantee ultimate success, because all but 1 team is going to finish their season with disappointment. At the same time, not spending pretty much guarantees that you won't get there, every year, unless there is an absolutely perfect storm.


According to generalfanager.com, there are 16 teams that will end the season with less than $1.6M in cap space left over. Of those 16, 13 of them appear playoff bound, or are at least sitting in a playoff spot right now. (As an aside, the 3 that aren't are Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver, all Canadian based teams).

So Melnyk has every right to be disappointed, as do the fans, that the Senators aren't playing meaningful games over the last month of the season and further into April. But for the owner to stand on his soapbox and to point the finger everywhere else while scoffing at the notion that maybe a few more dollars would have helped is rather short-sighted and more than a little hypocritical. He needs to realize at some point that there is more he could have done just by opening the pursestrings a little more and given Byran Murray more options. Sure, Murray has suggested that Melnyk has never said "no", but he also has been given an artificial budget that has given almost everyone else a head start in the race.

Some things are better left behind closed doors, and this time, like so many times in his tenure, just because he is entitled to have his opinion and has the forum to air it, doesn't mean Eugene Melnyk should always use it.

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