Bob Clarke Quotes (32 Quotes)

It's no different than having an injury. He's strong enough to ask the Players' Association and the league for assistance. So let's get him the help he needs and get on with his life.

Once we signed Forsberg, we knew we had to make a trade.

He'll move up in the middle (of the ice) and hit people. Like Kasparaitis, he'll go after the better players on other teams. I think that was one area where we felt we had to get better, especially with the injuries we have on defense.

You're not going to get a top four defenseman. And we never even thought about trading a goalie.

If everything goes well with Forsberg the way the doctors have told us, he will get back in before training is over and be ready by the start of the season. Even though it is a little bit disappointing, it is something we can live with.

We think that this is the best player that we've had in years and years in this organization. At this time in August, we're a great team. We'll see where we are in November, but we're really, really excited to have Peter here with us, and we hope he puts the finishing touches on our team.

The doctors have talked to Keith about it and he's got all the information. It's horrible, but there's really nothing he or we can do about it.

Usually we would bring up a couple Phantoms for five or six days, but you can't because it costs money against the cap to practice these guys.

It was just re-grouping. We were an undisciplined team (Monday). When things got bad, we got worse. We can't play dumb like that.

We felt Gauthier is a really good fit. He's a physical player. He'll move up the middle and he'll hit people. That was an area we felt we had to get better, especially with the injuries on defense.

No, never. Hitch, he's a pain in the butt on injuries. A guy gets a shoulder injury that's going to take about eight to 10 weeks, when it gets to be about seven weeks, he goes, 'Is he going to be ready tomorrow' He lives on hope that the players are going to get back quicker. But we never allow that, neither do the doctors.

Some questions are of a personal nature, which I don't think should be documented.

I don't have a problem with it at all. There was no criticism of the coaches, no criticism of the team. It's his assessment, and we don't even know if he's right.

Peter Forsberg is one of the best players in the game. We signed him knowing that he puts us over the (39 million) cap, and we will have to trade some guys.

We've got to add it all up. Until he tells me he and the doctors have agreed he can play I'm not even going to worry about it. Whether we can spring enough money to get him into any games or not I don't know. I haven't even thought about it because we've been under the assumption he's not going to play.

I think where we get hurt is when the little forwards can buzz around the front of the net without being touched, If you knock them down, you get a penalty.

We felt that Savage has been a really good scorer in the National Hockey League, has good speed and is a skilled hockey player,

He went with the better deal. They had a better offer to make than we could have.

Jon was one of 14 forwards that we have now, and was the guy who probably was not going to play very much. It did not make any sense for us to carry his contract on our payroll.

Until the doctors tell us he can play, I'm not even going to worry about it.

We felt that he has been a really good goal scorer in the National Hockey League, has good speed and is a skilled hockey player, ... Losing Kapanen for at least two months leaves us shallow at forward, so we thought that getting a player like Savage would really help our team.

If hes going to play its going to be his decision based on his relationship with the doctors. If they clear him and he thinks its the right thing to do, then hes welcome to play.

He's been training and skating for 45 minutes. He's been lifting weights and everything. He's had some spinning after that, but even though it's happening, he said they're getting shorter all the time. So he feels like he's getting better.

The contract becomes available if we're able to and want to find another player.

If the fans don't come out to see a kid like this play, who will they come to see There are a number of young, good players in the league this year, but it doesn't get any better than this.

We tried. We made our best shot. Carolina had more than what we wanted to give up.

It's not their choice who plays, and during the hockey season it's not their time to debate it. If one guy wins, the whole team wins. If one guy loses, the whole team loses. Their job is to support one another and support the team.

Sami last week had a collision with one of our players when they were fooling around. He hurt his shoulder and had an MRI performed on him yesterday. The results were that he's got a slap tear, they call that, and a partial thickness tear of his rotator cuff. He'll have surgery early next week, and will miss approximately 10 weeks from the date of surgery.

I think Peter knows what the results of the MRI were and he knows the risks involved. Going over there is his choice and he made the decision to go, so we wish him good luck except against the Canadians.

If the decision is made that he can't play for the rest of the season, he probably wouldn't play in the playoffs because it would be pretty tough to play after missing almost two years.

When we traded for Denis, we obviously liked him and wanted him on our club. We knew his contract was up at the end of this year and he was going to be unrestricted so we pursued him and we were able to come to a deal.

He has size, strength, vision and speed--and he shoots the puck dead-on. He's only 20 years old and he's a major force. When he matures, he'll be dominating.