THOMAS VANEK: "[The contract] doesn't come up much now because I'm doing well."
Sabres' Vanek is worth his weight in goals
Winger makes '07 deal look like a bargain
Show of hands, please: Any Sabres fans still want those four draft picks from Edmonton? Anyone?
Didn't think so.
Think back to that tumultuous summer of 2007, when Oilers General Manager Kevin Lowe signed Buffalo winger Thomas Vanek to a much-ridiculed $50 million offer sheet even though Vanek, then 23, was coming off a 43-goal season.
From a public relations standpoint, the Sabres had to match the deal rather than take draft compensation. Almost predictably, Vanek struggled early last season before rebounding with a better second half to finish with 36 goals.
This year, however, you see what all the fuss was about: Vanek has exploded into the NHL's leading goal scorer and a surprisingly strong two-way player.
Vanek has also quickly made the case that he's become Buffalo's premier big-money athlete. He's the one guy in town playing like he's worth every penny of the $8 million he's making.
Vanek has 24 goals through the Sabres' first 30 games. He's on pace for 65 goals, which would make him just the second 60 man in franchise history behind the 76 Alexander Mogilny rang up 16 years ago. Vanek has 49 goals since the calendar hit 2008 and the only player with more is Washington superstar Alexander Ovechkin.
"You're around 30 games, and that doesn't make a season," Vanek said after a recent practice. "I know where I'm at but I try not to think about it too much. ... Leading the league is not a goal. The goal is to keep playing well, score goals to help this team win and get back in the playoffs. At the end of the year, if it means I'm in the top five, that's great. Right now, it's not really one of my concerns."
Vanek is one of those athletes far more comfortable talking about his teammates than himself. He isn't prone to wild goal celebrations and you won't see him do too many Ovechkin-style face plants into the glass. You're far more likely to see him quickly wheel and point at the teammate who made the pass that allowed him to beat another frazzled goalie.
"Whether it's his stickwork in front of the net, getting tips or on straight-up shots, when he's got the puck in scoring position there's a pretty good chance he's scoring," said Drew Stafford. "He's so talented at finding ways to get open."
"In the last part of last season, he just lit up and was scoring from everywhere," added Jason Pominville. "It's gone that way this year and who knows how many he can score if it keeps up this way."
Having a 60-goal scorer naturally bodes well for the team's hopes as well. Only three times in NHL history has a team had a player get to 60 goals and not make the playoffs, and the last time it happened was when Steve Yzerman had 62 for the 1989-90 Detroit Red Wings.
Whether Vanek can challenge Mogilny is certainly a question. The league is much tighter now than the days Pat LaFontaine was feeding Buffalo's enigmatic Russian. Mogilny had 22 goals through 30 games that season but really blew up in games 31-40 by scoring 16 goals in his most productive 10-game stretch.
Vanek will be hard-pressed to keep that kind of pace but 60 seems like a realistic goal.
"It seems like he can get a hundred the way he's going," joked Derek Roy, Vanek's longtime center before line shuffles the last couple weeks put Vanek with Jochen Hecht. "He just finds that hole. He's great in front of the net tipping pucks and he's always in the right place."
"He's been pretty much unstoppable," Toronto Maple Leafs coach Ron Wilson said prior to his team's trip to town last week. "You just try to minimize the damage and keep the puck out of his hands as much as possible."
Practice makes perfect
Vanek has spent lots of practice time on his hands and stickwork and he has been scoring virtually all of his goals from in close. The edge of the crease has been his home and so has the slot, where he's used some deadly stickwork to create tip-ins on the power play (he's second in the league with nine power-play goals).
Vanek burned Montreal with a highlight-reel goal a couple weeks ago, putting his stick between his legs to flip the puck past startled Canadiens goaltender Carey Price. Last week against Tampa Bay, he scored the clincher on a nifty backhand to the top corner.
"I'm not much of a long shooter anyways," he said. "When I work on something, it's mainly being in front of the net, rebounds, tips. My backhand [has] never been a strong suit so I've worked on that but it's tough to get the puck up. So I'm working on it.
"I'm never trying to show off. I'm trying to freeze a goalie and those are ways you can do it. It's satisfying when you work on something in practice that works in a game."
Where Vanek's practice has really paid off, however, is in his own end. He's become a much better two-way player, often backchecking deep into his zone to break up opposing rushes. Coach Lindy Ruff has harped for the last two years on the need for Vanek's defensive play to improve as a way to create offense. Lo and behold, Vanek's improved work in his own end coincides with his big year in the other team's zone.
"I don't think there's any coincidence," said Ruff. "The more responsible you are, the more ice time you get, the less you get scored against. It's really a two-way street."
Vanek has earned some penalty-killing duty this year and is averaging a career-high 18 minutes, 49 seconds per game, still well below the 20-22 minutes elite scorers often get. But in the last three games, his average is 21:03 and you have to believe that's going to be the norm as long as he keeps putting the puck in the net.
"I've seen him score goals in so many different ways but to me the most impressive thing about Thomas' game compared to last year is the way he's committed to playing well defensively," Pominville said. "He's backchecking, getting takeaways. He's a different player. He's become an elite player.
"For him to be committed defensively that way is huge to our team. You see him do it, why wouldn't the other guys, too?"
Austria is proud
Vanek's fast start is big news in his native Austria. A magazine writer from his homeland was in town to follow him last week and he said he's had several calls from other journalists back home this season.
"It's awesome to hear from people back home," he said. "I do a lot of interviews. It's good to Austrian hockey to see more and more young kids come over here. It's part of my job to answer those phone calls and make sure hockey gets that publicity over there so kids have their dream to follow it."
And the buildup is certainly going to continue on this side of the Atlantic as the goals keep going in. As long as Vanek keeps scoring, those crazy days of '07 and all that contract talk gets very quiet.
"I knew this would come with a lot of media attention," he said. "If I wasn't aware of that, I wouldn't have signed the contract. It doesn't come up much now because I'm doing well. Maybe if I'm struggling a year from now, it will come up again. We'll see.
"I know I was very happy the day they matched it that I got to stay in Buffalo. I still respect Edmonton for the trust they had in me but at the same time I was very happy that [Buffalo GM] Darcy Regier, the ownership and management here wanted to keep me with all the guys I grew up with."
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