The Dallas Stars are delaying the inevitable trying to contend
By Jim Lynch
The Dallas Stars are delaying the inevitable.
Rather than turn their attention to the future and rebuild starting this season, the Dallas Stars are doing their best to compete and sneak into the postseason, even if their back is already against the wall going into things.
The Stars re-signed Joe Pavelski just a few days ago, they have their stars like Tyler Seguin and Jamie Benn under contract for a handful of seasons, and they have a handful of players on expiring contracts looking for extensions with limited amounts of money to hand out to everyone.
The Stars should be focusing on their future, not re-signing guys like Pavelski to one-year deals in early March. This Stars team has way too much competition ahead of them, and making the playoffs is not going to be a given.
The Stars are behind four teams in the Central Division, the Colorado Avalanche, St. Louis Blues, Minnesota Wild and Nashville Predators. Getting back into the mix is not going to be an easy task and considering how much more competitive the Pacific Division has been is going to make things that much more difficult for the Stars.
Let’s assume they were going to try and sneak in with a final wild card spot, now they are competing with teams like Nashville, Vegas and Edmonton. There is going to be one team sitting on the outside looking in on the postseason, and in my mind, Dallas is that team.
Not selling with guys like John Klingberg and even Joe Pavelski was a big mistake for the Stars. Even if they do make it into the postseason they are going to continue to be one of the mediocre teams that just make it and can’t seem to get anything done past that point – kind of like what the Minnesota Wild have done up to this point the past few seasons.
Dallas is delaying the inevitable, their top Stars are all over 30 and are getting paid a lot of money to be on this team. It is only a matter of time before this team ends up selling their players and rebuilding for the future, the issue is that won’t probably come until a few more seasons is through.