Jim Kelley

Jim Kelley writes regularly on the NHL for Sportsnet.ca and can be heard on Primetime Sports on the FAN590.

The Butch Goring trade set the standard for trade deadline hopes.

Nearly 60 players were traded Wednesday, but hardly anything of Cup-winning consequence.

Let me make this perfectly clear and say it right at the onset: Butch Goring is not dead.

He is in fact living the reasonably comfortable life of a hockey player who missed the big money days. He makes up for some of that lack of life-changing cash (and does a darn fine job) providing insight as to what's happening with the three New York-area NHL teams as a commentator on the Madison Square Garden network.

What apparently has been laid to rest - and we say thankfully - is that NHL trade deadline day is when a good team becomes a great team, plugs all its holes and solves all its woes with a Goring-like acquisition at the deadline.

We've heard this story ever since the early 1980s when New York Islanders general manager Bill Torre cemented a very good team with the acquisition of the versatile Goring, a forward who would play hard, win faceoffs, pot timely goals, be responsible in his own zone and produce good energy in a drive that culminated in a championship.

We've heard it now for three decades and seemingly 30 times in Wednesday's marathon trade deadline day coverage when news was scarce and "fill" was the order of the day. We keep hearing it pretty much because no one has ever trumped it in 30 years of trying.

But if Goring were to at least raise an eyebrow regarding - cue big voice announcer here for - "Trade Deadline Day" - it would be to note that there were once again no "Goring-like moments" Wednesday, not even close.

In truth it was again the quantity of deals, not the quality that grabbed the headlines on (cue) "Trade Deadline Day".

There were some 31, (perhaps 32 depending on when you log in the deal in which Calgary acquired Andy Delmore and Detroit acquired Riley Armstrong,) deals involving either 55 or 57 players; a record any way you add up either column, but it's hard to say there was anything of Cup-winning consequence.

The reasons are not complex.

First off, several general managers have wised up to the fact that last-minute trading can be costly especially if one of the brethren manages to construct a bidding war for an in-demand player or a reasonably competent player who happens to play an in-demand position. New Jersey GM Lou Lamoriello got around that with an early move that scooped up Ilya Kovalchuk seemingly just minutes after Atlanta's Don Waddell said the door was open and Kovalchuk, a genuine goalscorer, was going to be walking through it.

Toronto GM Brian Burke made a similar, though less dramatic move given that his team is destined to be a playoff also ran once again, when he shipped a quarter of a lineup he hated to Calgary in return for Dion Phaneuf and then executed a near perfect salary dump - Jason Blake and Vesa Toskala - to pick up a quality goaltender in Jean-Sebastien Giguere. All this before the league shut down for the Olympics.

Secondly, there were numerous teams with salary-cap issues - either legitimate or self-imposed - who simply couldn't do all that much. A good example in this case was Buffalo GM Darcy Regier. He has a decent team and a very good goaltender coming off an inspirational Olympic moment, but Ryan Miller can't do it all by himself. Regier knows he needs a true No. 1 center, a puck-controlling defenceman and a winger with size and muscle who can drive to the net and score the ugly goals that his top six forwards tend to avoid, but he also had issues.

A:) How often are those players available? Almost never and especially on (cue) "Trade Deadline Day". B:) The Sabres have a self-imposed cap and rarely give up prospects or even picks so Regier moved a second-round draft pick he had from Vancouver and non-playing forward/defenceman Nathan Paetsch to Columbus for well-traveled veteran Raffi Torres. "We get a little bigger on the wall," Regier said regarding his interest in Torres. "He's got good playoff experience. He's been to the finals. He's something that we think fits into this group of forwards."

He's also an unrestricted free agent at the end of the season so cap money isn't a huge issue. Even for the rest of this season, with Regier also moving Clarke MacArthur to Atlanta for draft picks, the cap hit evens out.

There were a slew of deals like that Wednesday as teams didn't so much trade for a shot at the Stanley Cup as they traded to either dump salary or fine tune their lineups. Sometimes it was for something as limited as trading a left-handed shot from the point for a right-handed one. Sometimes it was to counter a single individual a team might have to face somewhere along the run deep into the playoffs or to even get into the playoffs. Sometimes it was simply an opportunity for a GM to at least look like he was trying.

But in the big picture, there was no Butch Goring going somewhere to cement a championship. There wasn't even a big time goalie move even though Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington (among others) could have used one and speculation had it that several teams including the Florida Panthers and the New York Islanders and maybe even the Boston Bruins had one available.

There wasn't even a major move on a puck-controlling defenceman despite the fact that the Maple Leafs - at least in limited fashion - found they might have been able to move Tomas Kaberle and that Dan Hamhuis (Nashville), Ray Whitney (Carolina) and Sheldon Souray (Edmonton) were available (Souray, with a hand injury, more so for next season than this one).

If there was a good player to be had, in most cases, the price was too high to get him.

That's the way of the world in the NHL 2010. If you want to improve a broadcast, you can still reach out for Butch Goring.

If you want to truly improve your hockey team, well, (cue )"Trade Deadline Day" 2010 was pretty much a non-starter.