Brian Burke admits he threatened the Bruins with offer sheet to Phil Kessel

When you thought the former Leafs GM didn’t like offer sheets…

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Published 2 years ago
Brian Burke admits he threatened the Bruins with offer sheet to Phil Kessel
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Well all know how Brian Burke can be and most fans assumed that the former Toronto Maple Leafs general manager and now president of hockey operations for the Pittsburgh Penguins was not a fan of offer sheets. 

It seems like it isn’t the case, especially after Burke himself revealed that he almost tended an offer sheet to then-Boson Bruins Phil Kessel when he was GM in Toronto. 

“I was prepared to offer sheet Phil Kessel when I (traded for) him in Toronto, and I told the Boston Bruins that,” Burke told Sportsnet’s Eric Francis. “They were trying to make a deal with the (Los Angeles) Kings and trying to talk to (the) Nashville (Predators), and I said, ‘Either you guys make a deal with me or I’m going to offer sheet him.’ So they made a deal with me.”

You know what happened. Burke pulled the trigger on a Kessel deal on September 2nd 2009, for which he sent back to Boston  a 2010 first-round pick (which Boston used to select Tyler Seguin), a 2011 first-rounder (with which they took Dougie Hamilton), and a 2010 second-round selection.

We might have gotten it wrong when it comes the Burke’s feeling towards offer sheets seeing that, when he was GM of the Anaheim Ducks in 2007, he challenged Oilers counterpart Kevin Lowe to a barn fight after Edmonton signed forward Dustin Penner to a five-year, $21.25-million offer sheet, which Burke ultimately declined to match. Anaheim got three picks from Edmonton as compensation, but Burke clearly wasn’t happy about it.

“My anger about it, going back, was I didn’t like the player they signed and I didn’t like the way they did it,” Burke explained. 

The conversation prompted Burke to state that he understands why the recent Jesperi Kotkaniemi situation played out as it did. On Saturday, the Montreal Canadiens announced that they have elected not to match the Carolina Hurricanes’ offer sheet to Jesperi Kotkaniemi. The young centre will now join the Hurricanes on a one-year, $6.1 million contract, while the Canadiens received the Hurricanes first- and third-round picks in 2022 in compensation. 

“I thought it was a smart move by Carolina to handcuff Montreal, and I think it was a smart move to take the picks, which they managed to flip for a player I think will be useful,” Burke said.

You never know what to expect with Burke! 

Source: Sportsnet