I still Hate New Jersey

You know what I think is a sign that society is doomed? All these shows about the plankton who come from New Jersey to turn whatever place they're haunting into the back room at The Go Go Rama. New Jersey is responsible for this, and I demand that they set up an escrow fund for $USD20,000,000.00 for damages resulting from its citizens. Also, the notion that Newark is in some kind of Newark renaissance.

I used to think the new haircut guy was funny, but he's acting. It spawned a bunch of knock-off new haircut guys (My favorite is the Irish guy), but now its all been reciprocal-lampooned by the escape from Jersey reality rash. New Jersey instituted the dead-puck era in the NHL, and aside from the business model of the Rangers is the biggest threat to hockey. The more I think about it, the more they are ruining everything present-day. I hate New Jersey.

Just when I thought...

That Ottawa was exemplifying maximum silliness, they signed Brad Isbister, further signifying, on all fronts, that its all over as true contenders for the foreseeable future. 

Other teams have problems such as "Can Lombardi hang onto the #2 C position?", but not Ottawa. Sometimes, the sense that the clock is ticking on your "window" comes from fans or the local media, but at some point it comes from your teammates and management. I wouldn't call what Bryan Murray does "management", but, as in earlier posts, I wonder if the players themselves are under the impression that commitment to winning (with the best of intentions) are sinking to the bottom of the East wearing Murray's cement shoes. Also, their playoff production involving a lardy pseudo-Roman soldier. 

My Penguins are preparing to once again give every team they face this season a lot of trouble. I want to look at, in this installment, something which I feel will be a strength unusually attributed to Pittsburgh: Penalty killing. 

Fleury obviously is going to be as solid as any starter not playing for NJ this year. I don't care if Canadians will always remember MAF for his shortcomings in the WJC back in the day, the fact of the matter is Pittsburgh has a top-five netminder for the first time since the early 1990s (Before Barrasso could be counted on to pimp his .759 save %). Pierre McGuire can tell you, your best PK has to be in net. 

What is different is that the PK units were extremely effective last season, and with the omissions of Malone and Hossa, look to be improved going forward. I'm not worried about Hossa, basically, because I think the ice time he ate will be taken by one Evgeni Malkin, who's shown himself to be a force shorthanded. Sure, that was international competition, but when are the stakes higher or the teams you face more complete? 

Ryan Malone, on the other hand, as a winger, can be compensated for by a new Penguin, Matt Cooke. Matt Cooke is an outstanding PK forward, both in terms of positioning and tenacity. 

Speaking of tenacity, we have the pair I'm most confident of, Pascal Dupuis and Max Talbot. Dupuis has been a 30-goal man in the past, and while he possesses lips like a lemur, also is extremely fast... and he knows how to use it. Max is Max, a man who should be wearing an A, a man who should be used to check primary or secondary scoring threats. Max is hungry, watching video of top face off men, plenty in the bank to pay the price near the net, and a fan favorite. 

That leaves Jordan Staal, who will probably be playing wing on the #2 line, a somewhat enigmatic figure given his ridiculous performances shorthanded as a rookie. The overall theme with Pittsburgh's PK forwards is the constant presence of shorthanded danger. J Staal plays blueline-to-blueline hockey, and while somewhat mercurial, doesn't have any problem crashing the net. 

I don't expect to see too much Sid on the PK. He'll see plenty of minutes, but I don't think Therrien wants Sid blocking shots and wearing himself down. Sid isn't terribly good at face offs (No Penguin is), so there won't be any draw-dump-changing going on either. That leaves secondary wings to fill that 3rd unit role, the Kennedys and the possibly Stone/Taffe types. 

I'm not aware of any special abilities any of our recent signings' PK abilities aside from Cooke. Pesonen... nobody knows nothin. I think Satan would love him some shorthanded breakaways, but I think he'd be more of a liability. Fedotenko should stick to jumping over the boards and only worrying about 2 things: staying onsides, and staying in the goalie's sightline. That is really all I want from him. He's got a pretty good shot, but I want to see him shelfing rebounds. 

Face offs remain the glaring inconsistency. This is what happens when your centres are 20, 21, 22, and 25. While I wish we would have signed Yannick Perreault to win draws when it matters, especially since PKs start in your zone 100% of the time this season, I'm comfortable with our guys learning themselves. 

The D? The D is the same line up that annihilated the Eastern conference, plus a healthy Mark Eaton. Whitney is out until roughly some team signs Sundin. That's OK. Assuming Andre Savard actually has responsibilities, this gives him a nice NHL look at Goligoski and Kris Letang on the PP. I feel that one of the two is going to be traded, by the way, and it may be Letang since he's a much more sought-after righty... it depends on the plans of one Carl Sneep, the 6-4 200 R prospect from 06, playing at BC this season. 

Darryl Sydor continues to be dangled in trademonger circles, although I'm sure he'll only be deasirable as a means to reach the cap floor. Return? Minimal. 

There is a bit of everything on this seasons' defensive menu. Hal Gill continues to be a light-armor cruiser. Gonch is the same steady scoring threat he's always been, and is coming off a season where denying him Norris candidacy was shocking. Brooks Orpik, on the other hand, is a blunt instrument who seemed really determined to smash forwards into the dasher. 

Eaton and Scuderi, they are the kind of defenders who don't make the spectacular happen, and I don't think you'll see anyone wearing their jersey at the Igloo. The things they do, however, effect the outcome of a hockey game in a big way. Shot-blocking is paramount to PKing, and these guys are outstanding. Scuderi is a typical, hard-working positional stay at home, while Eaton has a bit more intelligence is his arsenal in terms of getting the puck up-ice. Even with Whitney out, we have the capabilities of matching Gill, Scuds, and Orps with complimentary partners in Letang, Sydor, and Gonchar. 

Goligoski? I think many tmes this season we'll be going the 7 D-man route, because having an additional offensive threat from the blueline is preferrable to yet another Chris Minard-Connor James type. At least I hope so, because to ice a line featuring Eric Godard for anything other than attempting to break someone's orbital bone isn't going to get us closer to 2 points. I want to see Goligoski when we're leading a game and on the PP. How he does will determine how long we have 9 NHL-calibur defenders. 

August and Everything After

That's right, it seems like there hasn't been Hockey since that album was released. I know, we were in the SCF and then the NHL Awards... the closing of the 08 Season, and my feverishly erasing my primary NHL 08 file (which had my Create-a-93-goal-scoring-power LW) to send Hossa packing. No more riding Sid's digital coat tails on his way to 149 digital points.

So now, the only things in the Hockey world appear to be Toronto creating McCabe trades to see if they'll gain any traction, and Scandinavian all-star forwards who won't sign contracts, and the discussion of the proposed "Nordic League", which will have top Scandinavian club teams against each other. The early problem apparently is that this league would be made almost entirely of Swedish teams, with only 2-3 from Norway, Finland, and Denmark.

It is true that the Fins don't like to be called Scandinavian, but they won't actually confirm who they're tolerant of so as to link them to a major land mass. They're taking the aggressive "we hate everyone" stance. They share a border with Norway, Sweden, and of course, Russia... I'm really not sure where they feel they can leverage an argument that they aren't "part of Scandinavia" without being lumped into the Soviet sphere. You see, if you try to just say "We're independent of the larger countries", you end up being Estonia, the Haiti of Europe.

I also need to see more serious discussion about floundering NHL franchises being moved to Canada. I think this is the make-or-break season, hopefully, for such discussions. Atlanta doesn't have a shot in hell at signing Kovalchuk to an extension, and when he leaves via UF Agency, there will not be anything resembling an NHL franchise. This would be OK if the fans loved the team and could survive an honest rebuild, but I think there is already a lot of trepidation regarding the team's future. Sure, they drafted Bogosian, but who's their second most promising defensive prospect? Boris Valabik?

Florida, similarly, put half the rumor monger core out of business as they finally traded Olli Jokinen. They now cannot seem to gauge the interest long-term of awesome talent Jay Bouwmeester, who seems intent on playing for a legitimate team. That is the trend, players not wanting to end up like Kovalchuk or Hossa before him; making the dollars, but being out of the playoff hunt (in a terrible division) by February. Who can blame them? Who wants to only start making the playoffs by the time they've played 7 or 8 years in the league?

Carolina and Washington, on the other hand, have a future. Carolina has won a championship and remain competitive every season. There are quite a lot of transplants from the Northeast that keep their building rockin, and although there aren't any mega-stars in the lineup, they win games by committee.

Washington had better start selling their building out. Ovechkin is the most marketable commodity in the league (yes even more than Sid) because it is very easy for the casual U.S. fan to quantify his worth. Last time I looked, D.C. has a good economy in place and plenty of diversity in terms of who attends their games. Honestly, if they don't sell that building out every game after OV signed that ridiculous contract, I would rip that team away from them.

NHL Hockey exists for the most part on ticket revenue, so for the league to not squeeze every nickel out of their greatest asset is a horrific possibility. Washington can have a team back in 5 seasons or something, but a team worthy of playing in front of 80% capacity crowds. D.C. had better attendance figures on the road, which should be as embarrassing as shitting your pants in public, but the much-heralded love affair between the Southeast and Gary Bettman remains as incredulous as ever. Their ranking is #24 both at home and overall, meaning they're behind New Jersey in attendance.

Just for some perspective, Pittsburgh is #16, but not for lack of persons shelling it out to see the team. We average over 100% attendance at home (100.7) a n d on the road (105.5). Once we get the New Igloo with its' capacity of more than our average 17,076 fans, that will all change. We lead the NHL in average overall attendance with 103.2% of seats sold, with the only other teams breaking the 100% margin being Buffalo (101.8) and Calgary (101.7).

Washington? 88.2, good for 26th.

Look at the home % for Toronto, Buffalo, Ottawa, and Montreal. All above 100% home attendance, even as two of those teams miss the playoffs. Quebec and especially Ontario can facilitate these teams.

Before I forget, Tampa has a very respectable home attendance record. Also, it is a circus down there at the moment, too much fun to relocate... although you could argue the feasibility of creating 2 run-and-gun teams given the number of forwards under contract. Their strategy: Roll all six lines, like the trap-era teams of the mid-90's. Horrible.

Carolina, as it turns out, is putting up an 88.8% home figure. That isn't terrible, and their overall is padded by a 91.2% on the road. They remain competitive, have won a championship, and have a few legit NHL stars despite winning games by committee. There are tons of Northeast transplants in the Carolinas, and I could actually see each Carolina with an NHL team. That would be an instant rivalry... plus, the team concept is good. Yes, I just said South Carolina could have its very own NHL team, and still have one in North Carolina. What you do is take the team you erroneously placed in Columbus, change the logo's colors to reflect the Confederacy, move it to Charleston (Where Fort Sumter is), call the team "Rebels", and market the idea that "The Charleston Rebels; beating the North at their own game". Believe me, they'll support that.

Regarding Bettman

I give GB a wide margin of error basically for checking into the Westin for 2 weeks and leveraging a deal between the City/State and Lemieux LLP. We're not going to have to watch what Quebec did (Team moves and immediately wins a Cup) because he mediated that deal on behalf of the NHL.

On the other hand, he refuses to stand up for the marginalization of our game by re-upping with Versus and letting the rules committee diminish aggression. People in taverns in non-hockey markets are either watching ESPN, which has roughly 2 minutes of NHL coverage an hour, or ESPN2, the network of billiards, darts, and poker tourneys.

I wish the short bastard would promote Hockey as Hockey. Yes, people may indeed fight one another. No, there aren't mixed messages. They are there so that nobody is boarded at 25MPH or elbowed in their orbital bone, hence, enforcers.

The guys who know those oft-mentioned unwritten rules, ones which I hope Gary Bettman isn't planning on someday jotting down for the purposes of printing them on a tee-shirt for $29.99.

Promote them. Those types of men are the ones at every Hospital visit, in the communities, and generally giving of themselves on behalf of the team and their sport.
The Parroses and the Laraques are the guys taking little kids' slappers off the junk at the Boys and Girls clubs whilst retaining a smile, after all.

I don't wanna see Marty Turco hit in the face with a pie. I want to see the average NHLer's athleticism and toughness put on equal terms with any other sport. At least equal terms.

I'm talking to you, Shaq, and your injured toe. You big bitch. You know what? Dmitry Yuskevich played in a Quarterfinal series with 9 broken toes for the Leafs, and the mainstream would maintain that he's a Soft Euro, nowhere near as tough as, say, Kyle Farnsworth.

It would be nice to see NHL Hockey in certain Canadian cities again, but Bettman can't expect investors to start popping up to build arenas and take a multi-million dollar risk. Save for Hamilton, ON, that's exactly what it would be.

Until then, get back on mainstream TV, and stop marginalizing junkie fans like me, Gary. I hate Joe Bennenatti. Hit him in the face with a pie. Do it, Gary! Stay out of your own way.

Footnote: I can't wait to smoke Toronto 5-1 on "Dougie Night". He was a punk in Toronto, and especially in Buffalo. I'd fight him right now, left handed, but his punk buddies like Vaclav Varada would charge me when I was trying to pick up my morning paper next week.