There goes Nils Ekman, joining a growing list of NHL free agents who are following their noses to Russia this season.
At least reportedly. The blogosphere was aflutter on Monday with posts titled things like
'Nils Ekman nu klar för ryska Khimik', the universal hockey language for 'He don't play here no more.'
We've seen what I'm sure is a record number of decent NHLers take that route so far this summer, something that comes as a result of the penny-pinching under the league's new collective bargaining agreement. Even with the salary cap rising to just more than $50-million, there are an awful lot of teams that don't have more than the minimum to allot to their checking-line forwards and defenders, which, after an injury-plagued season in Pittsburgh, is where Ekman was likely going to play this season.
The money in Russia isn't necessarily 'big money', but it does dwarf an NHL minimum contract, and especially so when tax considerations come into play (as in, in Russia, there aren't many).
Ekman is perhaps the most significant player to flee so far (aside from Alex Yashin, although that depends on your definition of significant), given he's one season removed from back-to-back 20-plus-goal, 55-plus-point campaigns in San Jose – but he's far from alone. Familiar faces to make the jump this summer include Jamie Heward, Alex Perezhogin, Jamie Lundmark, Oleg Tverdovsky, Stanislav Chistov, Oleg Saprykin, Jamie McLennan, Anton Babchuk, Alex Suglobov and Randy Robitaille.
And we're also getting word Jan Bulis and Josef Vasicek could soon join them.
On Saturday night, TSN hockey analyst Gord Miller became the latest person to jump on the Pittsburgh is doomed because it has too much cap money tied up in too few players(!) bandwagon.
