Fisher Signs 5-year Extension with Sens

With a full dozen players finishing their contracts this season, Brian Murray is wasting no time in taking care of business. The Ottawa Senators announced today that they have signed peerless two-way forward Mike Fisher to a whopping five year extension, worth 21 million dollars, or 4.2 million a year against the cap. This extension makes Fisher the Senator under contract furthest into the future, one year longer than the end of the last year of Alfie's option years, to the end of the 2012-13 season. Fisher and Murray are both happy to see him stay in the capital, not to mention legions of Senators fans.

While not possessing the scoring touch of Dany Heatley, Mike's got as much heart and grit as anyone else in our Nation's capital. Depending on Redden's future with the team at the end of the season, it's very likely that Fisher could take on the "A" full time alongside Phillips, although it's likely that Murray wants Redden to stick around, albeit for a much reduced price. Saving the Selke Trophy nominee from hitting the market next year undoubtedly saves the Sens some bankroll, despite how lofty 4.2 million a season seems. Comparable players this season went for similar amounts, ones without the complete grit, leadership, and two-way package Fisher offers.

Signing Fisher also sends some interesting messages. The first and most important message is this: in choosing to sign Fisher first, ahead of scoreboard babies Heatley and Spezza and the rest of the squad, Murray is showing that players who give their heart and soul to the team every night will always reap the rewards, without having to try to extort or bargain their way there. Now look at the flip side, back to the part where we want to have a 23 man roster next season. Including Fisher, the Sens have now locked up 10 players for 27 million dollars, averaging 2.7 million dollars each. To lock up the remaining 13 we'd like to have, we have less than 2 million to spend on each of them. If we sign Heatley to an extension, worst case cost of 8.5 million, that would give us just over 1.2 million to offer the other dozen. If we were to sign Spezza on top of that, we'd be the Tampa Bay lightning, filling out the rest of our roster with league-minimum players.

So what's going to happen? My guess is that Heatley will get the nod over Spezza. While Spezza's no slouch, comparing their numbers prior to pairing up, it's Heatley who's proven his mettle on his own. Heatley also differs from Spezza in that he can play a full season, can take and can dish out a hit, can kill penalties, and can deal with the hardest of demons. My guess is that this will be Spezza's last season with the Sens, barring some kind of gift discount to the Sens offered by the dynamic duo in order to stay together. Most likely, we will see ourselves the proud new owners of four first-round draft picks. If we're lucky, maybe one of those might just be able to nab us John Tavares.