Teemu Selanne Pulled the Plug on a Blockbuster
Lou Lamoriello’s instincts were spot-on at the 2003 trade deadline, when he apparently worked the phones to try and land his team an established scoring threat. Right wing Teemu Selanne was coveted by Lamoriello for years. He supposedly tried previously acquiring Selanne before the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim traded him to the San Jose Sharks in 2001.
According to the New York Post’s Mark Everson, Lamoriello tried acquiring several players at the 2003 trade deadline, from Teemu Selanne to Jarome Iginla and Miroslav Satan. Lamoriello’s talks with then-Sharks General Manager Dean Lombardi apparently went beyond Selanne. Lamoriello also inquired about veteran forward Vincent Damphousse, along with names like Marco Sturm and Mike Ricci. Both teams appeared to have agreed on a multi-player deal that was sending Scott Gomez and defenseman Oleg Tverdovsky to San Jose for Selanne, Sturm, and Ricci.
The trade couldn’t be completed however, because Selanne refused to waive his no-trade clause.
Although Lamoriello failed to make a big splash at the 2003 trade deadline, his biggest trade wound up being for Grant Marshall, who would score that pivotal triple overtime goal in the Eastern Conference Semi-Finals against the Tampa Bay Lightning. Again, New Jersey Devils fans would have been ecstatic if this trade actually happened at the time, but how would that deal have changed history?