Just Like He Drew It Up

So just as expected...T.O took two days after his being cut by the Cowboys to mull things over and then signed a one-year deal with the Buffalo Bills....wait.....what!?!

Celebrate Good Times, Come On!

It's over....
Its finally over.

The Beckham saga has come to an end.

From TSN.ca:
David Beckham will remain with AC Milan until the end of the Italian season after striking a deal to delay his return to Major League Soccer's Los Angeles Galaxy.
Beckham, 33, will now stay in Serie A before returning to America in July for the second half of the MLS season.
He will then return to Milan in November at the end of the American season in order to play a second year in Italy.

Word is also that he has agreed to cut his salary and pay for some, if not all, of the move himself.

Finally we can put this storyline firmly in the back of our brains and move on with our lives.

Terrell Owens Back Doing Sit Ups On His Driveway

Late word out of Valley Ranch, Texas last night was that all-pro wide receiver Terrell Owens had been cut from the Dallas Cowboys.

This now ends the third tumultuous reign T.O has had with the NFL, checking off San Francisco, Philadelphia and Dallas as "cities not to return to."

The impetus for this move had as much to do with Owens' performance on the field as it does his antics off of it and probably even more.

Though he did average 12 touchdowns and almost 13,00 yards in his three seasons in Dallas, last season was not a great one for the controversial player.

He finished the year with 1,000 yards and 10 touchdowns, but only had two 100-yard games and only three games with over five passes caught. He also finishes in the top-5 (bottom-5?) in dropped passes a season after leading the league in that category.
Owens has always been known for having a penchant to make a lot of dumb plays, but if you can get past those, he'll win a few games for you single-handedly.

The problem with Owens is his other favourite pastime: Ruining relationships with players and coaches.
In San Fransisco he called out his QB, Jeff Garcia, as being gay.
In Philadelphia, he called out his QB, Donovan McNabb, for not having enough heart and giving up on the team in the Super Bowl, saying they would have won if Brett Favre was his QB.
In Dallas, he openly questioned the motives of the coaching staff for not giving him enough plays and got in several arguments with QBs Drew Bledsoe and Tony Romo, as well as tight end Jason Witten.

To read ESPN's explanation of where Owens might end up next is like listing all the cities a fugitive has hit and can't return to for fear of getting caught.

He's not likely to return to San Francisco or Philadelphia, the other places he wore out his welcome. Then again, it seemed unlikely he would come to Dallas after having offended Cowboys fans by celebrating on the team's star logo while playing for the 49ers.

Don't expect him in Miami, not as long as Parcells is in charge. And perhaps also count out Kansas City because new coach Todd Haley and Owens hardly got along when Haley was Dallas' offensive coordinator.

Anywhere else T.O won't be welcome now that he's a free agent again? Probably.
The amount of bridges this guy has burned throughout the league would make any engineer cringe.
It seems as though his act has tired considerably, especially since his production has taken a bit of a dip and not very many teams are willing to give him a chance....save for Oakland, mostly because Al Davis is crazy.

But we can thank Owens for a number of highly entertaining moments from the last three seasons alone. There was the infamous "not really suicide" suicide attempt, followed by the even more infamous "Terrel has 25 million reasons to be alive" speech by his publicist. Then the post-playoff loss press conference cry session; "That's my teammate...that's my quarterback", spurned by the mini-vacation QB Tony Romo took with Jessica Simpson and Jason Witten during the team's bye-week in the playoffs.
Heck we haven't even mentioned his driveway, topless, sit-up press conference after being told to stay home by the Eagles.

On his wikipedia page, there is an entire section of "controversy" that reads pretty much doubly as long as the rest of his page combined.

So what now?

Likely there will be some team out there willing to give a shot to a troubled and talented player who still has a few good productive years ahead of him (again...likely Oakland, because they're crazy).

The T.O saga is over....or has it just begun again?

Redemption

Gotta hand it to him...Scotty the Body has a sense of humour...

Here's a reminder of the initial gut-splitting incident...




...and here's what happened last night

Quick Reactions; Early Winners and Losers

Haven't had a ton of time to digest what went on, but here's what I think about it at this early point.

In total, 22 trades were made, including 45 players and 21 picks.

While this is only down three trades from the past three years where 25 deals were made, the nature of these trades were unbelievably irrelevant for the most part. Maybe half a dozen deals will have an impact on the teams who made them and there were no real surprises or suspense to speak of.

Of the picks exchanged, only one was a 1st rounder, that being the one Calgary sent to Phoenix as a part of the Olli Jokinen trade.

The first trade of the day officially was made at 9:56am and by 3:00pm only 11 trades were reported. Then suddenly from 3pm until 4:18, another 11 were made...talk about last minute shopping.

If nothing else, this gives credence to all those college students out there who claim they do their best studying the night before a big exam, or who put off writing a paper until the day it's due.

Big Winners:

I'm gonna put these into two tiers and ironically, both teams traded with each other.

In the "Made themselves an instant contender this year" category, the clear winner is Calgary.

Picking up Olli Jokinen and Jordan Leopold filled both the teams needs of a big, strong first-line center and offensively capable defenseman who can man your powerplay. They gave up a lot to get them both, but they should now be considered a strong contender to come out of the Western Conference.
Watching Iginla play with Olli Jokinen on an already division leading team is gonna be fun.


In the "Put themselves in a great position for the future" category, the clear victor is Phoenix.

The Coyotes did themselves a great service by setting themselves up for future success. Partly this may have been warranted because of the financial crisis this team is in, but that being said, the pieces they acquired will help greatly.

Out of Phoenix goes: Derek Morris (disgruntled pending UFA), Daniel Carcillo (1-year remaining at $893,000), Olli Jokinen (1-year remaining at $5.25 million), Mikael Tellqvist (backup goalie, pending UFA) and a 3rd round pick.

Into Phoenix comes: Dmitiri Kalinin (young, pending UFA), Nigel Dawes (young, pending RFA), Petr Prucha (young, pending RFA), Scottie Upshall (young, pending RFA), Matthew Lombardi (speed demon, 1-year remaining at $1.8 million), Brandon Prust (decent rookie, 1-year remaining at $500,000), plus a 1st, 2nd and 4th round pick.

That's a lot of picks and young assets who don't cost you much and can give you a few months of a tryout before having to decide if you want to try and resign them or kick them onto the curb and dump their salary.

Big losers:

Montreal: Needed a center after the injury a while back to Robert Lang...did absolutely nothing to help their team. For the 100th anniversary of this franchise, the organization should have gone out on more of a limb to make sure this year is THE year.

New York Rangers: Got Nik Antropov (pending UFA) and Derek Morris (pending UFA) but had to give up a 2nd round pick and a conditional pick and a few good young players to Phoenix...They still have very little shot at making the playoffs and virtually no shot at doing any damage if they make it in. This smells of what Atlanta went through a few years ago when they sold the farm to make the playoffs, then got booted in 4-straight games and lost the players they acquired to free agency anyway in the summer.
The Rangers were desperate, but made all the wrong moves.
How long can Glenn Sather continue being a GM in the NHL riding the coat-tails of his 1980's Edmonton Oilers legacy?


The hometown Leafs did a pretty good job of making smart moves to improve the club in the long run. They gave up Nik Antropov and Dominic Moore for two 2nd rounders and a conditional pick and essentially traded cap space to the Lightning for a 4th rounder in the last announced deal of the day involving a few players who are either too old or injured to play and some little known prospects.
Martin Gerber, picked up off waivers from Ottawa, will presumably be the starting goalie from here on out as Vesa Toskala is out for the year after saying he will have hip and groin surgery.

Brian Burke could probably have made a few more deals (we know there were offers made for Ian White, Matt Stajan, Alexei Ponikarovsky and a few others) but decided to hold on to his assets and see what trades he can make in the summer in combination with draft day.

I'll have more thoughts tomorrow, but that's it for now.
Thanks for reading and keeping up with the craziness (or lack of craziness) of the day.

Almost nine hours later....I'm turning my TV off (until Lost comes on at least).