from Gary Lawless of TSN,

Despite NHL luminaries quoting Brian Burke over and over — “Our group makes more mistakes on July 1 than we do the rest of the year altogether” — there they were, throwing down money on one bet after another.

“A lot of teams gambled with term,” said Montreal Canadiens GM Marc Bergevin, in one of the few understated acts on the day.

Kyle Okposo, Milan Lucic and Andrew Ladd all signed seven-year deals. Frans Nielsen and Loui Eriksson grabbed six-year contracts. David Backes and James Reimer are locked in for the five seasons.

How many collective lost seasons are there among those packages? How many buyouts?

Sure, the Chicago Blackhawks are in salary-cap hell but they got there as a result of being victims of their own success. Building toward a Stanley Cup by tying a team’s finances in knots is counterintuitive.

Solving a problem today by creating one for tomorrow is acceptable if it puts a team in position to win a championship. That’s Stan Bowman’s saving grace in Chicago and Dean Lombardi’s in Los Angeles. They’re paying for their sins, but they’ve already been to heaven. So what’s a season or two in hell?

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