Money Money Money Money (Money)

Now that the season is almost over, I decided to revisit the whole team salary cap vs. success on the ice thing that I did at the beginning of the season. (Here's the original post.) In the first few weeks of the season, here's how things were shaping out (data from Oct. 2006):

The top five teams (in terms of salary spent) rank as follows in their respective divisions:
Devils- first (8 pts)
Bruins- fifth (3 pts)
Flyers- fifth (3 pts)
Avalanche- fourth (6 pts)
Leafs- second (8 pts)

Now, the bottom five:
Thrashers- first (9 pts)
Blues- fourth (5 pts)
Predators- third (6 pts)
Penguins- fourth (4 pts)
Capitals- fourth (6 pts)

That was a couple of weeks into the season. How about now? (Thank you, NHL Salary Cap Info.)

Top five, ranked by salary spent, followed by the rank in their respective divisions:
New Jersey- first (102 pts)
Dallas- third (102 pts)
Toronto- fourth (87 pts)
Calgary- third (96 pts)
Atlanta- first (93 pts)

Bottom five:
Philadelphia- fifth (53 pts)
Los Angeles- fourth (66 pts)
Pittsburgh- second (101 pts)
Florida- fourth (83 pts)
Washington- fifth (66 pts)

All of the sudden, spending more in salary doesn't look so bad, does it? (Pittsburgh, as usual, is the anomaly.)

Of course, spending more for good players is never a guarantee. Just look at the Islanders; they rank 10th in salary and they're likely going to be shut out of the playoffs. Toronto's another one: they're right on the bubble for the playoffs, but they're third in salary at $45 million. It's interesting to see the difference in spending between the beginning of the season and now.

I'd like to pontificate more, but I'm being heckled by the OFB guys for blogging during the game. "Blog geek!" they call me. Well, duh- never said I wasn't!