Shane Doan's Decision Will Come Soon

Other than the currently stalled CBA talks and potential season lockout that could come along with it, fans of the New York Rangers have had one other concern on their minds since the acquisition of Rick Nash last month. That concern revolves around free agent winger Shane Doan, who has now been on the market for nearly two months without making a decision on where he will play out the remainder of his career. That decision, however, will be coming sooner rather than later. 

Doan has held up on signing a new contract because of his obligatory feelings toward remaining a part of the Phoenix Coyotes organization; the organization he's spent his entire career playing for. But his camp has maintained strict guidelines in which they will not ink a new deal with the Yotes unless the team's ownership situation is solidified, and right now it is not. While it's been confirmed that potential buyer Greg Jamison is doing his best to close out a deal to buy over the club, that's yet to happen and time is ticking. 

There's no doubt that Shane Doan is the biggest name available this late in the offseason, and much interest has been shown from around the League. Among the reported sixteen teams that have contacted Doan, a four-year, $30 million deal has been placed on the table by the Buffalo Sabres. So Doan certainly has his options if the plan to stick with Phoenix falls through as many general managers hope it will. 

But when will Doan be making his decision by? September 15 - the deadline for the NHL and NHLPA to come to terms on a new CBA before the 2012-13 season is temporarily and possibly permanently locked out. 

"Shane is going to sign a contract before the CBA expires on the 15th," said Doan's agent, Terry Bross, to Arizona Central. "(Ownership has to) be done before the 15th, otherwise we're signing somewhere because we don't know what the new CBA is going to look like, and I don't know if it's going to limit any scope of a contract, so we want to make sure we sign before then."

Taking that into consideration, Doan and his agent must have a date in mind in which they will give Jamison until to buy over the team, because they obviously will also need time to sign elsewhere before the mid-September CBA deadline.

Just this past week we saw Scott Hartnell signed to a six-year deal with the Philadelphia Flyers and young phenom Taylor Hall a seven-year deal with the Edmonton Oilers. Although it is the League owners and general managers looking to apply all sorts of limitations to player contracts in the new CBA, they've been awfully quick to go against their word and sign players to extreme deals before they no longer will have that luxury.

The Doan camp has that in mind as the time ticks to sign a new deal, and we can only hope at this point that the final deal made is with Glen Sather and the New York Rangers.