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by Tim Cowlishaw, The Dallas Morning News
Team defends its inaction in free-agent market as prudence
12:30 PM CDT on Wednesday, July 4, 2007

Two of the most talented free-agent wingers, two tried-and-true veteran goal scorers, are coming to Dallas. How about that?

You can see Paul Kariya when the St. Louis Blues open the exhibition season against the Stars on Sept. 18. Two days later, you get Ryan Smyth blowing into town with the Colorado Avalanche.

Almost makes you want to double up on your season tickets, doesn't it?

Free agents are cashing in all around the league, but the Stars' only news in the first three days is that the Darryl Sydor negotiations became so muddled and confused that he left for Pittsburgh.

I'm not going to sit here and tell you Sydor is a huge loss. More of a medium-sized loss from a defensive corps that has depth. But when a veteran nearing the end of his career would rather put on the Penguins sweater, something is wrong in Dallas.

The Stars apparently were getting more than a few calls from disgruntled fans, so they posted a story on their Web site titled "Stars Remain Prudent."

Not exactly sure that's the kind of headline that is going to have Web surfers plunging onto the next page to order tickets, which, for the most part, are not available to the more "prudent" spending sports fan.

"I know it's not the sexiest approach," general manager Doug Armstrong said Tuesday. "We feel like the smartest thing is to sign our players. When we re-signed Brenden Morrow and Jere Lehtinen last fall, that sort of made the bed that we are lying in."

The Stars also have to bank some money to pay four players eligible for arbitration. I can't tell you how seriously they are pursuing Atlanta winger Slava Kozlov, who was a really nice player when I was the Stars beat writer nine years ago.

OK, Kozlov can still score, although he is hardly going to add to the toughness of a team that doesn't have much. Kariya and Smyth both would have been better fits and, with the salary cap having grown to $50.3 million, a little creativity could have put one or the other in a Stars uniform.

It didn't happen.

How is it that the New York Rangers can add two top-tier free-agent centers, New Jersey's Scott Gomez and Buffalo's Chris Drury, and the Stars aren't able to land one player of note?

The good news, if they get Kozlov, is that he won't do much damage to the average age of the club, being that he is 35.

Dallas used to be a destination of choice among NHL players. Pat Verbeek, Ed Belfour, Brett Hull – veteran players from more traditional markets couldn't wait to get to Dallas and bring this city its only championship since the '95 Cowboys won a Super Bowl.

I wonder what it is now.

When owner Tom Hicks and Armstrong chose to retain Dave Tippett and his assistants after another one-and-done playoff experience, they didn't extend their contracts. So the players here and around the league know this is a lame duck staff.

That's not the most important consideration for free agents – uh, that would be money – but it does play a role in people's thinking.

Between now and October, we will hear a lot about how many "man-games" the Stars lost to injury last season and how without that bad injury luck, they can improve their rank as the No. 21 scoring team in the league.

Maybe so. A little.

FULL STORY