Welcome to the definitive guide to a very successful Trade Deadline Day. Over the next few paragraphs, I will describe to you my gameplan.
<div align=right>Brian Burke
</div>1) Always say you are happy with your team. Announce that you made your moves earlier in the season and do not plan on being active. Of course, you will be active, read on.
2) Never stop making phone calls. Always inquire about all the top names. Make some strong offers just to ramp up the asking prices for other teams. Call the other GMs multiple times a day.
3) Call Cliff Fletcher and ask if Mats Sundin is available, again, then hang up.
4) Leak rumors- crazy rumors to fringe news outlets. Message boards and comments sections are great places to start. The more controversial the better. Hell, throw in some rumors about you moving to another team. That will certainly get things stirred up.
5) Make sure you get on TV. TSN is always willing to put me on when I want. Look busy at your desk. Pick up the phone, even if there is no one you want to talk to, it just looks cool.
6) Call K-Lowe. Tell him you want Penner back, and you are willing to trade the Ducks 5th, 6th, and 7th in 2010. When he seems to be interested, say "Who's your daddy?" and hang up.
7) Make a minor trade that appears to not make any sense. When asked about it, talk about the player as if this is the perfect fit, and never admit the player is having a bad season. If trading away a bad player, say he worked hard, but just didn't fit.
8) When asked about trades made by other teams in Division, respond with a random story or analogy that doesn't make sense.
<div align=right>Brian Burke's wife
</div>9) Call up your cross-town rival. Find out if anybody's been asking about his players. You may have to listen to a long, sad story. At the end of the call, offer a late pick for
any player on his roster.... for pity's sake. Again, when asked, this player is of course a perfect fit. Say something about "depth" or "thinking of the future."
10) If asked about trading your top draft pick from another team ranked well below yours, respond with any combination of 4 letter words, interspersed with a few 5 and 3 letter words.
11) Call K-Lowe again and ask if he's still crying. When he denies ever crying, say "Well your mama's been crying since I left her, cuz I'm your Daddy!!" Then hang up.
If you follow these simple steps, you can have a very relaxed Deadline Day. It helps, of course, if you don't really need to make any changes to you team.
- Brian "Burlyman" Burke
P.S. Ok, so that's totally not my wife, but daaaaaaaaaammn the Burke family tree is HAWT!
Itlan @8-)
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:lol:You forgot one though12) stop at convience store for more dip