We're not even one month into the NHL season and already there are several notable players popping up in the rumor mill.

Marian Gaborik's stalled contract talks with the Minnesota Wild had him tied to the Montreal Canadiens and Los Angeles Kings.

The Chicago Blackhawks signing Cristobal Huet this summer has had Nikolai Khabibulin on the trade block for months, linked to Kings, Ottawa Senators and Colorado Avalanche.

Mats Sundin's uncertain status has resulted in rumors of the Canadiens, Senators, Avalanche, Philadelphia Flyers, New York Rangers and Tampa Bay Lightning interested in him.

A recent wacky one had the Blackhawks as a potential destination for Senators forward Jason Spezza.

While there are several reasons to shoot down these rumors, the main one remains the salary cap.

In the good old days of the old collective bargaining agreement there was no cap on salaries and thus trade rumors tying players with expensive contracts to rival clubs could be argued as having some smidgen of truth to them.

In today's salary cap world, however, none of the aforementioned deals make sense.

Gaborik and Khabibulin carry salaries that are a cap hit of over $6 million each, Sundin will likely seek over $7 million for this season (pro-rated at this point but still an expensive bite for any club that signs him), and Spezza (whom I doubt very much is available, given how it was current GM Bryan Murray who re-signed him last year to a lucrative, long-term contract) hauls in $7 million per season against the cap from now until 2015.

None of the teams they are linked to in trade rumors can afford to absorb their contracts at this time. To do it would mean clearing considerable cap space, something none of these teams can afford to do without hurting their roster depth.

At this point in the season deals almost always have to be dollar for dollar and player for player, and so far there's no team willing to move that kind of money this early in the season.

Check out this link to NHLnumbers.com where you'll find a listing of where the teams place in payroll this season, and you'll see what I mean about the foolishness of many of these rumors.

If the dollars don't fit under the cap, the deal doesn't get done. Simple as that.

In the first three months of this season the Ottawa Senators were the powerhouse of the Eastern Conference.

Unlike the Anaheim Ducks, who defeated them in the 2007 Stanley Cup finals, the Senators bolted from the gate this season playing like a team on a mission to avenge their woeful performance last spring and earn another shot at the Cup.

While the Ducks struggled through the usual “Stanley Cup hangover” that plagues finalists in recent years, the Senators were one of the best teams in the league, dominating the Eastern Conference and challenging the Detroit Red Wings for best team overall.

Goaltender Ray Emery was slow to recover from off-season wrist surgery but Martin Gerber stepped up and played well, at one point leading all Eastern Conference goalies in wins.

The Senators vaunted defense corps exhibited its usual skill, while the offense was again powered by Ottawa’s “big three” of Dany Heatley, Jason Spezza and team captain Daniel Alfredsson.

Throughout the fall new Senators GM Bryan Murray sought to bring in another scoring forward, and it seemed likely the Sens might deal from their blueline depth by the trade deadline to do so.

Otherwise, life was peachy in Canada’s capital city. The Senators were dominant, no one was even close to them in the Conference standings and they appeared destined to be this season’s “Beasts of the East”.

But since beating the Red Wings 3-2 in a nationally televised match-up on Hockey Night in Canada on January 12th, things have gone horribly wrong for the Senators, losing seven of their last ten games heading into the first full week of February, most of those losses to lesser teams.

It’s more than just a slump or a “Stanley Cup finals hangover” as some has suggested.

Gerber, who had played so well earlier in the season, has struggled between the pipes, as has Emery, whose clashes with teammates, coaches and management overshadow his poor play.

The defense, once the Senators strength, has been anything but over the past month, with uncharacteristic breakdowns and careless turnovers in their own zone.

In the aforementioned seven losses in their last ten games the Senators offense managed to score only 10 goals, a shocking decline in offensive production.

Much of that is attributable to injuries to Heatley and Alfredsson, but it's also demonstrated the Senators lack scoring depth beyond their first line.

It was a weakness exploited by the Ducks in last year’s finals, one that the injuries to Heatley and Alfredsson clearly show remains a significant problem.

Because of these problems, the seemingly insurmountable lead the Senators had over the rest of the Conference a month ago has been whittled away.

The Montreal Canadiens, Philadelphia Flyers, Pittsburgh Penguins, New Jersey Devils and NY Rangers are all now within striking distance of the Senators, with only 8 points separating first overall from seventh in the Conference as of this writing.

Sub-par goaltending, shoddy defensive play and the injuries to Heatley and Alfredsson are wearing down the Senators.

Heatley and Alfredsson should eventually return soon and there’s more than enough defensive talent on the Senators to overcome their uncharacteristically poor play. Still, rivals have taken note that shutting down the Sens first line and pressuring their defense with a swift offensive attack can be keys to success.

But it's the goaltending that's the most difficult problem to address. For all the talk of Gerber and Emery having to step up their respective performances, thus far they’ve failed to rise to the challenge, and in the case of Emery, he’s seemingly becoming more of a distraction with each passing week.

Disgruntled Senators fans can call for Emery's trade or demotion but the reality is neither is really an option. As more than one pundit has observed, there's really no suitable replacement for Emery either on the farm or via trade.

If Gerber and Emery fail to measure up, it really won't matter if the offense and defense improves, because the Achilles heel in goal will not only prevent the Senators from returning to the Cup finals but could put their dominance of the Conference at risk.

For the first time in a long time, the Senators are facing a potentially serious mid-season crisis, which if not soon addressed has the potential to put their season in jeopardy.

The list of potential targets for offer sheets next summer grew smaller on Friday when the Ottawa Senators announced the signing of center Jason Spezza to a contract extension.

Spezza, who was eligible for restricted free agent status in July, received a seven-year contract worth $49 million, or $7 million per season against the Senators salary cap.

TSN.ca breaks down the deal as follows:

For the first three seasons (2008-09 to 2010-11) Spezza receives $4 million in base salary with a $4 million signing bonus.

For the next two seasons (2011-12 to 2012-13) he’ll receive $6 million in base salary with a $2 million signing bonus.

He’ll receive $5 million in 2013-14 and $4 million in 2014-15.

The site also reports that, like linemate Dany Heatley, Spezza’s new contract also comes with provisions for a no-trade clause.

Some might question if Spezza is worthy of this contract, as the deal is close in dollars per season to Heatley’s new $7.5 million per season contract, but Spezza’s numbers over the past two seasons are comparable to Heatley’s. Indeed, they might’ve been similar had Spezza not missed an average of 15 games per season in that period to injury.

The bottom line is the Senators weren’t going to break up one of the best offensive “one-two punches” in the NHL. Spezza and Heatley power the Sens offensive attack and with both now in their prime should continue to do so over the next five or six years.

With this signing the Senators have now committed over $41 million in salaries for next season for 12 players. Assuming the salary cap increases to $52 million for 2008-09 that’ll leave just over $10 million to fill out the rest of their roster.

Three key players to re-sign will be defenseman Wade Redden and checking forward Chris Kelly, both eligible for unrestricted free agency in 2008, and defenseman Andrej Meszaros, like Spezza eligible for RFA status.

Kelly might accept a raise from his current $1.262 million to between $2-$2.5 million per, while Meszaros could be in line for around $3 million per, a figure a rival team might be willing to pay via offer sheet should the Senators balk.

The big question is Redden, who’s earning $6.5 million this season. Senators GM Bryan Murray claims he wants to retain Redden but unless he’s willing to accept a pay cut that doesn’t seem possible. Even if Murray were to trade Martin Gerber and his $3.7 million per season salary between now and next July that still might not free up enough to retain Redden, re-sign Kelly and Meszaros and still flesh out the roster for 2009-10. 

The Ottawa Senators took it to the wire but ultimately emerged with a long-term contract extension for Dany Heatley.

Various sources reported Wednesday the Senators had re-signed Heatley to a six-year contract believed worth between $7.5-$8 million per season, and the deal is apparently heavily front-loaded much like the one Daniel Briere signed this summer with the Philadelphia Flyers.

Heatley was the only player to have two consecutive 50+ goal, 100+ point seasons, and with linemate Jason Spezza form one of the NHL’s most lethal offensive one-two punches. The pair along with Daniel Alfredsson powered the Senators drive to last year’s Stanley Cup finals.

While Senators owner Eugene Melnyk last week expressed salary cap concerns regarding an extension for Heatley, in the end the club had little choice but to reach a deal with him if they hope to remain a legitimate Stanley Cup contender in the coming years.

Heatley had set a deadline of the puck drop of the Senators opening game of the season (October 3rd) for the Senators to reach a deal, otherwise he refused to negotiate during the season. That would’ve forced the Sens to negotiate with him at season’s end, and if the club should make a return to the Cup finals would leave them little time to hammer out a deal before July 1st, when he would’ve become eligible for UFA status.

Another fifty-goal, 100-point season might’ve also pushed Heatley’s asking price even higher, as it’s safe to assume he would’ve receive offers worth between $9-$10 million per season if he opted to test the UFA market.

With Heatley now signed the Senators will turn their attention toward re-signing Spezza, who’s a restricted free agent next summer, to prevent him from getting an offer sheet from a rival club. They also have to consider signing Wade Redden and Chris Kelly (both UFAs in July) and RFAs Antoine Vermette, Patrick Eaves, Andrej Meszaros and Brian McGratton.