Red Wings general manager Ken Holland appeared on 97.1 the Ticket’s Jamie and Stoney show on Tuesday morning. Holland addressed the team’s deadline move, the team’s inability to move Mike Green and Holland’s philosophy for the team going forward:
Update: CBS Detroit’s Will Burtchfield took note of Holland’s remarks:
Holland, who has spoken recently like a general manager who expects to retain his job, isn’t worried about his future with the Red Wings. His sense of security stems in large part from his close relationship with the Ilitches.
“I’m the general manager of the Detroit Red Wings. Very proud, very honored to have this job. Obviously there’s speculation because my contract expires at the end of the year, but I’m not concerned about it because of the relationship that I’ve got with ownership, and at the same time, where I am with my career and my life,” Holland told 97.1 The Ticket on Tuesday. “So, it’s of no concern to me. And the rumors with regard to Seattle can only be rumors. They don’t even have a team.”
Update: Here’s more from Burtchfield:
“To tell you the honest truth, I was prepared to take nothing in return, nothing in the sense that it would start out at nothing and (it would increase) based upon team performance, based upon his health, games played,” Holland told 97.1 The Ticket. “I was open to negotiating all that so that the compensation risk was on the Detroit Red Wings.
“Certainly we were prepared to retain 50 percent of the salary, but ultimately when you’re trying to compete for a Stanley Cup and there’s other players on the marketplace that are healthy, nobody really wanted to acquire a player that at this stage of the game was injured.”
The Red Wings wanted to structure a similar trade to the one they drew up in regard to Petr Mrazek, whereby Green’s performance would determine the extent of the return, but the handful of teams in on the All-Star defenseman got cold feet as he continued to miss games in advance of the deadline. Then Erik Karlsson and Ryan McDonagh landed on the market, and interest in Green waned further.
Green was reportedly willing to waive his no-trade clause for both the Lightning and the Capitals (and possibly others). Tampa wound up landing McDonagh in a last-minute blockbuster with Rangers, while Washington was engaged in discussions with the Senators about Karlsson right down to the wire. It’s unclear if any other teams had legitimate interest in Green.
“There were some teams that he would prefer to go to and some teams that he would prefer not to go to, but we never got to that point in time,” Holland said. “The teams that had the most interest, he gave me the green light that he was prepared to go there, so the no-trade had nothing to do with the ultimate outcome of the Mike Green situation.”
So in other words…the Illitch family isn’t paying any attention to my actual job performance. So if I want to come back and make some more millions I will. Awesome. So we’ll just keep spending to the max, patiently waiting for the albatross contracts to disappear, and hope that drafting 9th or 10th magically yields a superstar. And of course hope that these young players don’t become disgruntled with the clown I hired to coach them. Solid plan Kenny!