The 2009 NHL Entry Draft should just be officially renamed “The John Tavares Sweepstakes”. And to many Canadian eyes, its a little more than coincidental that BOTH the Ottawa Senators and Toronto Maple Leafs just happen to be “re-building” in the season leading up to this summer’s amateur draft. Toronto already staged a desperate attempt to create an eligibility loophole with the young junior star in 2007, offering Tavares an AHL contract.
And who can blame them, really? To land a scorer like the home province star would be a winning public relations strategy, while also making a ton of fiscal sense. As the league salary cap is due to scale back, which ever team ends up with Tavares will get a bargain on a 3-year entry level rookie contract totaling a mere $3 million. In this salary cap era/recession, young cheap production is crucial for every NHL club.
Since first challenging Wayne Gretzky’s junior scoring records in 2005-06 as a 15 year old, Tavares has been on the radar of both Ontario NHL clubs for over three years now. Far and away the best pure goal scoring talent in the draft since Alex Ovechkin, the talented Tavares has netted over 200 goals in less than 4 full seasons. And unfortunately for the Leafs and Sens, the New York Islanders appear to be sitting on the winning ticket!
