Big deals of the year so far:
Luongo to Vancouver for Bertuzzi.
Raycroft to Toronto for some goalie I don't know
Tanguay to Calgary for Leopold

Free agent period also started today, signings so far include:
Chara to the Bruins for 7.5 mil a year, Savard to them for 5.
Jovanoski to the Phoenix Coyotes
Roloson re-signed by the Oilers, 3 year deal.
Hurricanes resign Stall for 4 mil this season, 5 next.
Lagenbrunner signs with the Devils.

Also Pronger has asked to leave Edmonton, for personal reasons.

...

So far so good for a lot of teams, I think. Luongo for Bertuzzi is obviously the biggest deal so far, and I think it'll work great for both teams. Bertuzzi will get his fresh start, and Vancouver will finally get a good goalie.

Tanguay to Calgary is also something I'm impressed with. I think Calgary will stick around in the West for a while, as consistently high ranked. I could easily see them as #2 next year, as Dallas is getting too old to occupy that position, maybe even #1 if Detroit follows suit. They've got the best goalie, solid players everywhere, and now a huge 1-2 punch with Iginla and Tanguay up front. I think one of the problems lately with Canadian teams and their playoff runs, is that they're always cinderella stories, and in the end the favorite and better team just holds them off. If Calgary can reach the finals as legitimately ranked high, as a favoured team, and they play against the cinderella, of course they can win likely much easier than what they would have to work with before. I can see Calgary taking the cup in the next 5 years.

As for Pronger, meh. Sounds like his wife doesn't like Edmonton or something. I hope we get somebody strong for him, but I doubt it, it'll probably be like 3-4 passable ones. Hopefully with the cap space though, we can sign another star. He was obviously built out to be a cornerstone, and I'm disappointed, but I think the Oilers can get through it.

I'll make up standings predictions for next year later, by the way.

Rob Blake back to the Kings! Surprisingly high 6 mil a year deal too.

Man, the Avalanche are getting decimated. Something tells me this might be good for them though, maybe they can sign some young speedy stars with all their cap space, that they desperately need..

Glad to see Roloson got re-signed. We've also resigned Pisani, so we're keeping our core group of players.

And I heard that the reason Pronger wants to leave is because he was cheating on his wife while he was here. Believe it or not. His wife still lives in St. Louis, and he was having an affair here. What a guy!

At least we'll get some decent players in return for him...

And Ottawa picked up Gerber.

Lots of stuff going on.

PEACE, Mike.

There was a helluva lot of signings today. I was working all day, so I missed it all, but it was nuts.

I'll make up predictions for next season once it quiets down a bit.

Canadiens resigned Bouillon for a 3-year deal. Excellent.

Oh, and I personally love how the Canadiens' club policy is to not disclose financial terms of a deal.

PEACE, Mike.

Arnott signed on with Nashville, which was the biggest deal on Saturday.

Elias also got a monster contract from the Devils, which was a great move in my opinion because he was pretty much the MVP of last season by far, the only problem was that he only got to play 38 games thanks to coming in half way through due to injury. In those 38, he got 45 points, if you adjust that ratio to the full 82 schedule, that would equal out to 162 points(!). When he came back was also when the Devils suddenly went from crap to the hottest team in the league, stealing 3rd place in the East as we all know.

Also Sillinger went to the Islanders, the Oilers' former goalie Morrison to Phoenix, Sydor to Dallas, and MacCauley to the Kings.

Bruins today signed Shean Donovan, or as he'll affectionately be called here..........

Who?

Pronger's been traded to Anaheim for Lupul, a prospect, and three draft picks.

This sucks. Why? A number of reasons. Firstly, Anaheim has one of the best defencemen in the league in Scott Niedermayer, and now they have Pronger as well. Also, Anaheim nearly made it to the Finals without Pronger, so they will only be better with him. And finally, I can't help but think the Oilers could have gotten more for Pronger. Lupul's a good player, but will he develop into a great one? And the prospect and three draft picks are nothing now.

I just hope that this deal clears up enough salary for the Oilers to make a big signing.

It's official:

The Anaheim Ducks have traded Joffrey Lupul, top prospect Ladislav Smid, Anaheim's first-round choice in 2007, a conditional first-round pick and Anaheim's second-round pick in 2008 to the Edmonton Oilers in exchange for Chris Pronger.

I kind of expected something like this to happen, superstar for superstar trades are pretty rare.

Pronger and Neidermayer on the same team though... .

Oh I couldn't believe it when I read the news! It's going to come back and bite the Oilers in the butt next season! Anaheim is going to walk all over them now. Stupid trade! It's funny just the other day the Edmonton Sun ran an article about how the Oilers screwed up the Messier trade years ago and how it lead to years in the dump for the team, which was right after they had won the Cup.I'm thinking same thing here. I mean they trade for a guy whose father is one of the owners of the Oilers! Give me a break!

This isn't quite to that level, as the Oilers have a ton of depth right now. Lupul's not a bad player, but it does look a bit suspicious that his dad is one of the owners. I would have liked another players in return rather than a prospect and draft picks, though.

All we've gotta do now is re-sign Spacek so our defense corps isn't totally ruined.

I wish we had managed to sign Chara on July 1st, we would've been the perfect replacement for Pronger and we'd have ample cap room because it was obvious Chris was going. Obviously tons of teams wanted him though including Boston, unfortunately.

Nobody is even talking about the BIGGEST news in the NHL in the past 22 years...

Steve Yzerman, one of the greatest players to ever play hockey, has retired.

It's a sad day in Hockeytown.

Not quite the BIGGEST news, but it is quite memorable. Not exactly shocking, though.

The reason why it isn't the biggest news in the NHL is because we all saw this coming SO long ago. Seriously, the whole hush-hush build up to the press conference was kinda silly. We all knew what Stevie was going to say.

PEACE, Mike.

The Oilers grabbed Marty Reasoner back, who I like.

Roenick is going to Phoenix. He's getting pretty old, so it's not that great of a move, though not bad.

Well, sad news, it is ruined: Buffalo has just signed Spacek.

PEACE, Mike.

I know...

We signed Daniel Tjarnqvist to replace the holes left by Pronger and Spacek. Yeah, right.

Well Edmonton officially sucks again.

Part of me wishes they offered Elias or someone else big like a 10-12 million a year deal or however high they want to go, heh, just so we get something out of this offseason. We're basically all loss right now, with Pronger gone, Peca likely, Roloson probably a one year wonder, Spacek signed off, arghhhh. Best we can hope for right now is a trade I think, a bunch of small players and draft picks for someone big, dreamingly. If we go into next season like this, the Oilers are dead ducks.

I'm not too worried yet. The biggest priority for them was re-signing Roloson, and they did that. I had faith that he's going to be every bit as good as he was in the playoffs. And, at worst, at least he'll be better than the goalies they had last season. The loss of Pronger and Spacek will hurt, but they still have Smith, Staois, and Bergeron. And their payroll is only sitting at $22 million right now, half of the cap. They've still gotta sign Hemsky, Horcoff, Stoll, and Lupul, which will add about another $10-12 million or so. That still leaves at least $10 million. They should be able to get some decent players with that.

I wouldn't have liked for them to offer Elias $10-12 million - that would have flown in the face of everything the lockout was for. And they don't really need help offensively - they're quite deep. Smyth, Hemsky, Horcoff, Lupul, Stoll, Torres, Pisani, Moreau, etc. And they've still got Schremp down in the minors, who should be able to make the jump to the starting line-up and who's a big offensive threat. So they don't need a player like Elias. They do need some more solid defensemen to replace Pronger and Spacek. But that'll come. I have faith in Kevin Lowe.

And they need to re-sign MacTavish as well. Not sure what they're doing with that.

Eeeek for Edmonton.

But the losses still sting. Superstar defenceman Chris Pronger forced his way to Anaheim with a trade request. Top-four defenceman Jaroslav Spacek signed with Buffalo even though he could have got the same $10-million, three-year deal with the Oilers. Free-agent centre Michael Peca won't return. Even tough guy Georges Laraque bolted to Phoenix.

Pronger, a loss, yes, but I figured that would be it.

I didn't realize that Spacek got offered the same amount of money from Edmonton as from Buffalo. So, basically, he chose to leave Edmonton and be with Buffalo, since money was the same either way. Ouch.

And I had no clue they had lost Peca too. Man, oh man.

PEACE, Mike.

In other news, Shanahan is now with the NY Rangers!

PEACE, Mike.