Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Prospal back where he started from


The transaction took place before the lights of the sports network cameras ever were turned on, more or less a preliminary bout for the main event of Tuesday’s marathon of speculation.

The Philalelphia Flyers who are looking for a bit of offence, picked up Vaclav Prospal from the Tampa Bay Lightning for a floating scale of a draft pick that will rise or fall depending on the Flyers eventual place in the standings.

If the Flyers should make it to the Eastern final, then the Lightning will receive a second round pick in the 2009 draft, if the Flyers should still come up short this year, the Bolts will be provided with Calgary’s pick in the third round of 2009. Also part of the deal and heading to the sunshine state is defensive prospect Alexandre Picard.

Prospal brings his pace of 29 goals and 28 assists in 62 games to a Flyers squad that is desperate to replace the missing offence that the season ending injury to Simon Gagne has presented.

His days in Tampa seemed to become numbered as he and coach John Tortorella seemed to bang heads more and more frequently over the last number of months, that and a need to clear some financial room in the Tampa vaults made moving Prospal a likely scenario.

The Flyers would seem to be the winner of the deal in the short term, providing Prospal can get his head back into a situation where the games actually count and the future includes a possible playoff run.

It marks a return to the team that drafted him back pm 1993 and where he played his first two years in the NHL before beginning his wandering ways which took him through Ottawa, Florida and Anaheim before he found himself in Tortorella’s doghouse.

The Flyers are hoping that there’s still a bit of the hunt left in the old dog getting his second chance in Flyer town.

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