OT-Paul Kariya

[MrBug708]

Thinking of the Ducks run this year, it makes me think of how happy I am for Paul Kariya. He is considered one of the NHL's best, but he has played for a team that has a history of underacheving and has small market appeal. Yet, he never complains, he doesnt ask to be traded to another team, when his best friend Selanne is traded as well. He does his job and isn't afraid to give the limelight to anyone. He is active in the community and loves the Ducks organization. He stays out of trouble and is a greta leader for the team. He plays hard every night and does his job even when the Ducks are down by however many goals.

I'm sure Chief will echo these thoughts, I just wanted to thank him for sticking with the Ducks

[Chief Rum]

Yes, Karya is just a great player and a great person. Even acknowledged as one of the game's best, I don't think he gets nearly the credit he deserves as both a playmaker and as a person. Of course, part of that goes directly to Paul--he is a very quitely intense person. One of the reasons Selanna and Kariya worked so well together is because they offset each other's personalities. When Kariya got too quiet or too frustrated or too down, Selanne would cheer him up with his seeming endless amount of cheer, humor and good-naturedness. When Selanne was lacking focus or goofing off too much, Kariya was always around to hold him down and keep him disciplined and in the game.

It's one of many reasons that I want to see Selanne, a personal favorite of mine, back in a Ducks uniform this year. He still keeps his family down here in Orange County for most of the regular season (otherwise they live in Finland, of course). He is beloved down here, and as great an acquisition as Sykora has been as a goal scorer, we could still use another sharpshooter like him.

Back to Paul. Actually, Kariya has been off for most of the playoffs, which makes the Ducks' run even more incredible. I was very much cheered by his two goals in Game 3 against the Wild--he needed a breakout game in a big way.

The Ducks' organization modeled itself after the Red WIngs of the late 80s-early 90s, trying to find that one star and build around him. For the Wings, that star was (and is) Steve Yzerman. For the Ducks, it is Kariya. They haven't built it up quite as well or fast as the Wings did, but there is still plenty of hope, as Kariya is still pretty young (just 30). And even if we don't become a regular season star team like the WIngs did, well, at least we have this year. :)

Thinking about Kariya reminds me of one of my favorite old ESPN commercials, starring his new teammate Adam Oates. One year, Oates (while with the Bruins) finished second for the Lady Byng behind Kariya. The Lady Byng (for non-hockeyites) goes to the player who exhibits the best sportsmanlike conduct while on the ice (and usually goes to high-scoring forwards with low penalty minutes who don't fight, all of which suited Kariya and Oates to a tee).

Anyway, in a commercial the following season pushing hockey on ESPN, they show Adam Oates (wearing his Bruins jersey) walking through a park. They introduce him by saying, "This is Boston's Adam Oates, who finished second behind Anaheim's Paul Kariya for the Lady Byng trophy for sportsmanlike conduct." Meanwhile, Oates is smiling and saying hello to everyone, good-natured guy and all. Then he finds a wallet on the ground. He picks it up and looks through it. It's Paul Kariya's (I think they even had a card in there that said "Lady Byng winner" and the year :) ). Oates paused for a second, then he took the money out of the wallet and threw the wallet in the trash. :D lol...great stuff.

Chief Rum

[bbor]

Chief..do you get paid by the word? :D

[Karim]

Kariya is a RFA come June and needs to be qualified at $10 million. I don't know if the Ducks want to do that and there is some speculation Kariya may be willing to renegotiate if it involves bringing back Selanne.

[klayman]

Didn't Kariya hold out his rookie year?

[Chief Rum]

Don't get your hopes up of Kariya leaving the Ducks, Karim. :)

It ain't gonna happen. They have always said they would match anything he got. He has reached RFA status 4-5 times now in his career, so we have been through this one before.

They won't need Selanne to resign him, although I'm sure it would help negotiations if they promised they would look into it (and I'm pretty sure they already are doing exactly that).

There is some reasonong that Selanne himself cut ties with the Sharks to go back to Southern California which, if true, would put his services in a lone duel between the Ducks and Kings, and the Kings have been very reticent to give out big contracts of late (witness the loss of Lucky Luc two years ago--that guy was about as King as anyone in the league).

Chief Rum

[Chief Rum]

dola,

klayman, it depends on what you call holding out.

Kariya was drafted in 1992 after his freshman season with the University of Maine, in which he won the Hobey Baker award.

Negotiations with the Ducks didn't start off too solid on a new contract, so Kariya decided to sit out 1993 (from hockey period) to play for the more sparsely-scheduled Canadian Junior National Team.

In the interim, Kariya signed a contract with the Ducks sometime in 1993, and first joined the team in its second year, in September, 1993--only to be a part of the NHL lockout that year. He finally skated in a Ducks uniform for the first time in January, 1994.

So you might call 1993 a holdout, but there was no real animosity on either side in the move. I believe Kariya even said from the get go that he wanted to do that, and that he wanted to join the team after that.

The only bad holdout between Kariya and the Ducks happened in 1997, the year after Ron Wilson, our popular coach who resigned/got fired at the end of 1996-97 season (the Ducks' first playoff run, BTW, ending in the second run against eventual Cup winner Detroit). In the folloiwing year, Kariya felt he was worth more than the team was offering (he was), having led the team to the playoffs with Selanne, for the most part. He missed the first two-and-a-half months in a holdout. Finally, they compromised, and Kariya got a solid contract, and he came back on December 14, 1997--to play for an awful Ducks team against the very good Washington Caps under control of, guess who, Wilson. I was at that game; it was great. The Ducks came back from a two goals down in a wild back-and-forth game, and Kariya, of all people, won it with the go-ahead goal late in the third, to end it 5-4. Wilson got mostly cheers, because he got run out by Disney's crappy management.

Anyway, about a month-and-a-half later, that bastard Gary Suter crosschecked Kariya on the bridge of his nose and gave him a concussion and post-concussion syndrome, which put him otu for the rest of the year. Obviously with only a month and change of playing, Kariya had his worst year ever. And the Ducks had one of their worst years ever, too (which is saying something).

Fortunately, we bounced back and made the playoffs in 1998-99.

bbor, I will be expecting the check in the mail. Thanks.

Chief Rum

[illinifan999]

Originally posted by Chief Rum
dola,
He finally skated in a Ducks uniform for the first time in January, 2004.
Chief Rum

Dang, so that guy in the Karyia jersey must be an imposter!!! I can't wait to see Paul debut in a Ducks uniform next year! ;)

[Chief Rum]

Originally posted by illinifan999
Dang, so that guy in the Karyia jersey must be an imposter!!! I can't wait to see Paul debut in a Ducks uniform next year! ;)

lol...oops...:)

Going back to edit now.

Chief Rum

[tucker342]

Karyia is awesome. I hope he stays with the Ducks.

Wow this is a good sports year for Anahiem, Baseball winning the world series and now, the Ducks are in the Stanley Cup finals, impressive.

[Cards4ever]

Originally posted by Chief Rum

Anyway, about a month-and-a-half later, that bastard Gary Suter crosschecked Kariya on the bridge of his nose and gave him a concussion and post-concussion syndrome, which put him otu for the rest of the year.


Suter's kid is playing hockey for Wisconsin this fall.

[bbor]

I STILL think Paul Kariya's brother is a better player:D

[Cards4ever]

Originally posted by bbor
I STILL think Paul Kariya's brother is a better player:D

Which one? :D

[Karim]

Two questions regarding PK:

1) Will Anaheim be willing to give him term at such a high salary in light of 2004 or is a 1-yr. deal more likely?

2) Does anyone think he's the same player after Suter crosschecked him following the goal? (Did Suter even get suspended? That was one dirty hit...)