Category Archives: Sports – Hockey

On the Forecheck: Bouncing Balls – NHL Statistics, Analysis, and Opinion:

Thanks again to Richard Lawson at the Nashville Post, we have word that Jim Balsillie is still working hard to purchase the Nashville Predators, this time by sending a note to the Nashville Sports Authority that claims that if he owned the team, “the existing arena operating agreements will require no changes whatsoever unless they benefit the Authority and the residents of Nashville.”

Is this an effort to undermine the current Freeman/Nashville negotiations, or indeed a genuine change of heart on Balsillie’s part? His representative also wrote in that note,

Okay, anyone who thinks the Balsillie offer is on the up and up, please raise your hand. I have a bridge for sale. Cheap. One owner. Only drove it to church on sunday.

This offer is perfect for Balsillie’s long-term goal of getting this team to Hamilton. It’s designed to screw up the local ownership’s push for fixes to the deal by giving the local politicos an easy out for avoiding looking like they’re subsidizing the team to people who don’t want to invest in it. After all, Balsillie will take it without changes or subsidies.

Of course he will. it leaves him with a lease trivially easy to break in a year or so, after the “white knight” comes to the realization it’s not going to work. His protestations to try to make it work notwithstanding, he doesn’t have to screw this stuff up to make the lease breakable, he can do it merely by doing a good faith effort, suck up the losses for a couple of years, and then break the lease.

Given this second round in is something like $25m less in the price for the franchise? that’s a nice chunk of change he can invest in letting the team lose money, no? And in the end, the money he pputs in is about the same, but he has a free pass out of town.

His offer to bring in local owners? Sure — they’re just as easy to buy out again later. It’s nice eye candy, but it doesn’t mean anything.

And that assumes a few things.

First, it assumes that once he gets them to nuke the deal with the locals, he doesn’t come in and start negotiating. And what leverage do you have once the other owners get told to stuff it and leave?

Second, it presumes he’s actually going to follow through on his offers. What if he doesn’t? Or if he does them badly?

Third, it assumes the NHL will approve him as an owner. Given you can pretty much bet that Balsillie as an owner will someday lead to a lawsuit over moving the team to Hamilton, I think it’s far from given the NHL will let him join the club at this point.

We aren’t even talking about whether moving a team to Hamilton is good for the league. that’s an entirely different argument…

If Nashville falls for this gambit by Balsillie, they WILL lose the Predators. Maybe not for a couple of years, but they will. And they’ll deserve to. Now, with the other ownership group, will the Predators be saved? Maybe. Maybe not. But with Balsillie in the house, you KNOW you have no chance.

Nabokov SJ vs Bos 10/13/07
Originally uploaded by lsefton

Laurie’s starting to post her photos from games — she promises me that this year, she’ll acutally contribute to Two for Elbowing and that her goalie scouting will start appearing shortly.

For more photos from the home opener against boston, check out here photo stream:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lsefton/sets/72157602421717830/

San Jose Mercury News – Sharks take early lead, hold off Canucks:

“Last night was the best I felt yet,” Roenick said after Friday’s practice of his 9:47 on the ice against Edmonton. “My body’s actually really good. The hands are what have to come. It’s controlling the puck and making moves and holding onto it.”

Roenick took note of the fact he was on a line with two of the speedier Sharks.

“It’s kind of ironic how the oldest guy is on the fastest line. I don’t know where they get those jet-pack skates yet. I haven’t found them. I’ve just the old-time skates that weigh three pounds each.”

Roenick sure seems to have come into camp with the right work ethic and attitude. He’s definitely winning me over, not just because he’s played pretty well (unlike the game I saw in pre-season), but because he’s handling it with, well, the classic and good side of Roenick. After scoring his two goals, he was interviewed on TV by Drew, who more or less asked “two goals? What about that?”

To which Roenick replied “Blind squirrels and acorns”.

So far, the sharks actually look pretty good, and Roenick may make it tough to get Setoguchi back in the lineup when healthy. I didn’t expect that. I’m not going to complain.

One thing I’m enjoying — Thornton said he was going to shoot more this season, and he is. His goal last night is a classic of this; you could see the Canucks settle back and protect the pass a bit, leaving him a lane to shoot, assuming he was going to dish it off. He lasered it off the post an in; Luongo had no chance (he really had no chance on all three goals, IMHO). Teams are going to have to figure this one out and stop cheating on the pass — and when they do, expect Cheechoo’s goal numbers to take off, also.

I’m not exactly sure how you can defend someone who can shoot that accurately if you give him a little time, and pass as well as he does if you try to get in his face and pressure. I’m going to enjoy watching teams try.

OH, and sorry, Alanah. Really.

(heh)

Is the Roberto Luongo Trade the Worst in the History of Hockey? – FanHouse – AOL Sports Blog:

1. Peter Forsberg, Ron Hextall, Chris Simon, Mike Ricci, Kerry Huffman, Steve Duchesne, a 1st round selection (Jocelyn Thibault) in 1993, a 1st round selection (later traded to the Toronto Maple Leafs, later traded to the Washington Capitals – Nolan Baumgartner) in 1994, and $15,000,000 cash to the Nordiques. The Flyers received Eric Lindros.

The “Lindros-as-worst-trade” nonsense is about as played out as the “Alex-Daigle-as-worst-draft-pick” routine. Lindros averaged 82 points per season for the Flyers, won a Hart Trophy and led the team to a conference title. In hindsight, this was lopsided; at the time, it was actually less than what the Rangers were offering. Plus, there’s no accounting for future health or Scott Stevens’s open-ice checks when making this deal.

But the worst of all time? Worse than Markus Naslund for Alek Stojanov? Worse than Bernie Nichols, Steven Rice and Louie Debrusk for Jeff Beukeboom and Mark Messier? Worse than Adam Oates and Paul MacLean for Tony McKegney and Bernie Federko? Not a chance.

How about the Oilers trading WAYNE FREAKING GRETZKY (and Mike Krushelnyski and Marty McSorley) to the Kings for Jimmy Carson, Martin Gelinas, three first round draft picks (who were they? Can you name one? I can’t), and a boatload of cash?

Did any of those draft picks make an impact? ah, the wonders of google. Those draft picks turned into Jason Miller, Martin Rucinsky and Nick Stadjuhar.

Off Wing Opinion: The Extra Standings Point: A Win-Lose Proposition?:

What we have here is a case where late in the third period, teams now have an incentive to eschew attacking hockey in order to guarantee each team a standings point. With the “co-opetition” segment of the evening out of the way, then teams can get to business fighting over that extra standings point — one that is now always awarded thanks to the introduction of the shootout before the 2005-06 NHL season.

To rectify the situation, Guelph’s Prof. Alfons Weersink proposes adding a wrinkle from international Soccer: Instead of the current system, why not award three points for a win, and only one point for a tie?

On the face of things, that sounds like a reasonable solution, and one that I would favor.

Me, too. And so would anyone who intuitive understood that when some games are worth two points and some games are worth three points, that this was going to bias decision-making in how a game was coached and played.

Frankly, I”m not sure I care HOW they decide to divvy up the points based on any specific criteria. I think what matters is that each game counts for a certain number of points.

Update: I was sent email by someone who says that this was, in fact, discussed and agreed to by the board of governers and in her words, “passed almost unanimously”; which may, if true, imply something like “passed except for MSG”. Assuming this info is correct, and I believe it is, then MSG is in the wrong here by choosing to litigate to override the majority decision. It also implies:

1) Larry Brooks is wrong, which is, of course, unprecedented. Probably because he got his information from MSG sources and didn’t verify it. Probably because it fits his biases anyway…

2) I’m an idiot for using Larry Brooks as a source, especially without verifying the information with Al Strachan.

I”m going to let this simmer a bit and think through the implications, probably write a new piece later. But Im’ going to leave this one alone, with this update, rather than rewrite it, since I think it has a lot of interesting info in it as is.

HockeyNation:

n fact, Brunt may have published a primer on Tuesday for the Commissioner to study, featuring a couple of troubling developments for the league bureaucracy to examine and sort out. Some percolating issues, which try as he might, don’t appear to be on the verge of going away any time shortly.

In his Globe and Mail column on Tuesday, Brunt examined the state of the league as they prepare to drop the puck on another chase for Lord Stanley’s mug. His findings show that the league is doing quite well in Canada, where the suddenly skyrocketing loonie is making for a cash flow bonus that provides for more dollars in the Canadian franchise treasuries, while the southern teams begin to feel the pain.

Included in his column on Tuesday were a couple of interesting brush fires that have flared up this week for the league to address. The on again/off again saga of the Nashville Predators sale seems to have moved into the death throes again this week. As the new council in the Nashville area, has not smiled beneficially on some of the “changes” that the Preds would like to make to such things a lease arrangements and other financial subsidies that the city is underwriting to keep the Preds part of the Nashville scene.

Brunt also examined the washing of some dirty laundry heading into opening night, examining a Larry Brooks story for the New York Post, which reported that Madison Square Garden chief executive officer James Dolan has been busy blasting the league office for incompetent handling of the NHL brand. Dolan who seems to enjoy controversial roles these days, took time out from the legal woes that have befallen MSG to drop a little diversionary bomb at the doorstep of Gary Bettman.

Dolan believes the Rangers do a far better job selling their product in all of its permutations than the league ever could. Said Doolan, “we believe that the league continues to squander opportunities to improve our business and solidify and grow our fan base.” He pulled out some interesting numbers to back his case, recounting how some 93 per cent of the NHL overall revenue (up from 91 per cent before the lockout) is generated by the teams, with only 7 per cent generated by the league.

In effect, he’s probably wondering what the NHL office is doing to not only justify its existence to improve the game on a wider agenda.

(Continued from part 1….)

The MSG lawsuit is fascinating me. The one question I had I couldn’t find an answer to until Larry Brooks documented was this: did the Board of Governors approve this centralization of the web sites? Or did Bettman initiate this on his own? If it was the former, then the MSG lawsuit is groundless — but it turns out, from reading what Brooks said, that Bettman was given a charter by BoG to work on extending league revenues, this seems to be something added to the plan without formal approval (to quote brooks: ” Slap Shots also has been told that while Bettman had been granted previous authority by the Board to proceed with the league’s business plan, the commissioner has proceeded to implement and expand the plan without the necessary vote that would allow him to do so. “).

I think MSG has a point. A big one.

Excuse me while I set the wayback machine to, well, way back. About 1994. Laurie and I had a meeting with some people folks from the Sharks to show them a neat new technology — something called a browser and a web site. We felt that as the team “in silicon valley” one way to get involved with and connect with the region was to be an innovator in technology. They were very interested. And yes, we were hoping we could get involved and help them innovate. As it turned out, they did get going, but in a different part of the organization, and with a different group working for them. In retrospect, that was great for us (our year doing the web geeking for the IHL SF Spiders, and working with the folks who did the same for the Ice Dogs, cured me), but at the time, we weren’t quite so sanguine. And to be honest — I don’t think the Sharks have ever innovated here, or taken a leadership role in the league. Other teams, especially the Capitals, have done more, sooner. THAT bothers me, because I think it’s an opportunity lost for the Sharks, not just in growing into the regional community and business economy, but it was an opportunity for the Sharks to build influence and help set agendas inside the league and board of governors, and I think they missed it. They ended up being followers, not leaders here. (memo to San Jose Sharks web staff: that freaking LANDING PAGE is so 1999. Please, please, please, kill it. thank you)

Of course, we also have to remember that the Sharks MAIN purpose in life is to win hockey games, so keep that in perspective. I do — now.

When we were working for the Spiders, we spent most games with the staff; the management team came from the Warriors, so they had a lot of experience from the NBA. At the time, the NBA had been doing what the NHL is doing now: centralizing control in league offices, to the point where the league had final say on how a team could use its own logo. This follows the lead of the NFL, where frankly, you can’t sneeze without league office approval.

This works for the NFL, since the NFL is in reality a league driven by common revenues shared out to the teams — thank the glass teat for that. Every other league has wanted to tie into that glass teat, too, with better or worse success. Right now, bluntly, I wouldn’t be looking to the NBA as a model for how to run a sports league.

We tended to talk sports business a LOT during those games — it’s long been an interest of ours (Laurie’s MBA is in Sports Management involving financing stadium upgrades), and let’s face it, the hockey pretty much sucked…. And the league centralization was one of the topics, because of what the NBA was doing. you can imagine, by the way, how popular it was among the team organizations…

So now here we are a decade or so later, and the NHL’s following down that path, too. the web site is just one facet of this — you can also see the fingers of central control in the new jersey designs, and I don’t think it’s a good thing. But that, as Alton Brown would say, is another show.

Personally, I think it’s very important for the league to take ownership of league-wide issues, and that includes league marketing and promotion. you can’t depend on the teams to do what’s in the best interest of the league. I also think it’s useful for the league to have a central set of services — including web sites — that act as sort of a “minimum level of acceptability” for teams uninterested or unwilling to invest in their own systems. Give them a default setup they can plug and chug for the cheapskates and the incompetents, so the league doesn’t look stupid because of bad implementations by their franchises.

You know, the new web sites? the centralized stuff? It’s — OKAY, I guess — but man, it’s so damn generic.

But the MSG situation isn’t that. We’re now getting into the problem of whether the league can prevent from going beyond generic lowest-common-demominator web site, and whether teams can market their own way above and beyond what the league is doing.

The league is now saying “no, we’re in charge”, and MSG is saying “oh, f— you”. I’m with MSG here. If this issue had been hashed out by the Board of Governors and the plan voted forward, I’d be backing the NHL — they might be wrong, but they chose this path, and I’d say give it a shot and see what happens. But instead, if Brooks is correct, this is being implemented based on what can only be called feature creep of a more general mandate. And this kind of issue is too important NOT to have been talked through at the BoG level and there have been a formal buyoff.

Because we’re not talking about web sites here. We’re talking about who’s in charge. The league office — of which Bettman is the head — is now going to the teams and declaring they’re in charge, and that the teams have to do it the league way. I have no problem when this is involving league-wide intiatives and marketing, but to take the next step and start telling teams they can’t go beyond those league initiatives? I have a real problem there.

It’s one thing for the league to set minimum standards and policies, and work with the lesser teams to come up to those standards. It’s another when the league starts taking the progressive teams and pulling them back and preventing them from innovating or excelling. It’s almost like a classroom where the smart kids are told to quit reading extra, or ahead, or doing extra homework, so that everyone gets the same grades in the end. Phht.

So I’m with MSG here. Teams should be in control of the team marketing message and destiny — and the web site is a crucial aspect of that. To me, it looks like Bettman is exceeding his granted authority by attaching new initiatives to an old business plan, and frankly, I don’t see that this is something that is good for the NHL; it’s a power play to centralize power in the league, and the NHL has traditionally been a league powered by the teams, not by the league office. While I think having the teams run it creates its own set of problems (ask Hamilton fans about it!) Bettman seems to be willing to force the league into a generic mediocrity in the name of centralizing power in the league office (i.e., him).

What’s going to be REALLY fascinating is figuring out who’s going to fall on which side of this battle. At first approximation, this is going to be big team vs. small team; the high-revenue teams will support MSG for obvious reasons, and the less successful teams that depend on revenue sharing will likely back Bettman. But I doubt it’s that simple in the details, and this could well turn into a flash point that may determine Bettman’s future as commissioner. The issue of team control vs league control is a sensitive one, a true minefield, and only time will tell whether Bettman has the map to negotiate that minefield properly here, or whether he’s going to step in it.

That it’s actually gone public and turned into a lawsuit? that alone indicates to me this has gotten really serious; these are things handled privately in back rooms. that it hasn’t been indicates that MSG is ready for a fight, and thinks it has backing among other teams to win. And if Bettman KNEW he was going to lose, he’d have cut a deal. So my gut tells me right up front the Board of Governors is divided and it’s too close to call.

And I’m wondering what the worst case scenario here would be. Can you imagine, for instance, this getting to the point where MSG says the hell with it and sells the team?

I can. And so Bettman better tread warily here. The big-revenue teams have this tendency to trod on the league and dictate policy at the smaller revenue teams — but then, the top five teams or so are the ones making the finances of the league fly, and so they SHOULD be able to have more sway. but in this case, I think those teams are right.

We’ll see. but I’ll bet most fans are watching the Nashville situation and thinking that’s the big problem. And I’ll bet Bettman hopes they continue. Here is where the real fight is, kids. Adn the gloves are off.

HockeyNation:

n fact, Brunt may have published a primer on Tuesday for the Commissioner to study, featuring a couple of troubling developments for the league bureaucracy to examine and sort out. Some percolating issues, which try as he might, don’t appear to be on the verge of going away any time shortly.

In his Globe and Mail column on Tuesday, Brunt examined the state of the league as they prepare to drop the puck on another chase for Lord Stanley’s mug. His findings show that the league is doing quite well in Canada, where the suddenly skyrocketing loonie is making for a cash flow bonus that provides for more dollars in the Canadian franchise treasuries, while the southern teams begin to feel the pain.

Included in his column on Tuesday were a couple of interesting brush fires that have flared up this week for the league to address. The on again/off again saga of the Nashville Predators sale seems to have moved into the death throes again this week. As the new council in the Nashville area, has not smiled beneficially on some of the “changes” that the Preds would like to make to such things a lease arrangements and other financial subsidies that the city is underwriting to keep the Preds part of the Nashville scene.

Brunt also examined the washing of some dirty laundry heading into opening night, examining a Larry Brooks story for the New York Post, which reported that Madison Square Garden chief executive officer James Dolan has been busy blasting the league office for incompetent handling of the NHL brand. Dolan who seems to enjoy controversial roles these days, took time out from the legal woes that have befallen MSG to drop a little diversionary bomb at the doorstep of Gary Bettman.

Dolan believes the Rangers do a far better job selling their product in all of its permutations than the league ever could. Said Doolan, “we believe that the league continues to squander opportunities to improve our business and solidify and grow our fan base.” He pulled out some interesting numbers to back his case, recounting how some 93 per cent of the NHL overall revenue (up from 91 per cent before the lockout) is generated by the teams, with only 7 per cent generated by the league.

In effect, he’s probably wondering what the NHL office is doing to not only justify its existence to improve the game on a wider agenda.

(part one of a long piece on these two issues facing Bettman — Nashville and the MSG lawsuit…. Stay tuned for part 2)

Over in baseball-land, there have been fans calling for Selig’s head since he was named commissioner; baseball has, much to their dismay, simply ignored them and continued to follow Selig, and has shown really nice financial numbers and seems to be doing well. Challenges? Yes, such as the steroid issue — but all in all, baseball’s doing pretty well (and I say that as a “not a Selig fan” person).

Which is a good reminder who the Commissioner works for. Fay Vincent’s failing was that he actually thought he represented the fans, and his real bosses wouldn’t put up with it forever.

Ditto Bettman. But in this case, it’s not so clear how his support with the bosses is going. but I felt I had to point out right up front that the commissioner isn’t working for the fans, unless doing things for the fans fits the larger agenda. They never have, never will.

Now, having said that… To me, the Nashville “problem” isn’t. Bettman has made his position clear on this up front, and it’s the same position he’s had with other teams (Pittsburgh, and for those with shorter memories, Edmonton during the worst of the exchange rate crisis) that were at risk of moving. The league position is simple: you do whatever you can to keep a team from moving, until it’s clear it’s not going to work. At that point, you figure out where to move the team.

the “new ownership problem” is really not Bettman’s problem. It’s Leopold, the owner of Nashville. Let’s not forget that Leopold negotiated with Balsillie in secret, hiding it from the league until there was an agreement in place. Why? Because both sides knew the league wouldn’t support what they intended to do, which was move it to Hamilton, and Balsillie wanted to get the PR machine going to try to force Bettman’s hand. Didn’t work.

Now, Leopold’s trying to work out a deal with a local “white knight” group (which actually includes a major backer of the Kansas City group — that should have told you up-front how strong the Nashville group’s finances were, folks). For those with short memory, we’ve done this before, in a town called Winnipeg. We went through the love/hate live/die cycle with the Jets, with a local group coming in to buy and “save” the team, going to government for help in making it financially viable, and finding out, ultimately, that it wasn’t going to happen.

Now, the same is happening in Nashville. And we’re now seeing the government say “well, maybe not”. That particular game of chicken isn’t over, but it looks really unlikely that the prospective owners will get what they want. I expect the deal to fall apart.

None of this is really Bettman’s fault, much as the Canadian press loves to pillory him (THAT is an essay for another time; I’m getting pretty damn tired of the Canadian press whining about hockey in America and ripping on Bettman for his sin of — gasp — not being Canadian. Pretty much everything else about why they hate him falls from that fact, folks).

This is business. It’s how these things work. Bettman is letting the people of Nashville decide if they (a) want the Predators, and (b) are willing to pay full price to keep them. Don’t forget: Leopold’s been subsidizing that team heavily since inception; the region’s gotten the team at a discount (not unprecedented, the Sharks have lost some money every season also — it comes down to how much and whether the ownership is willing and able to do it). Now, we’re trying to find out if the Predators are viable in the town, and whether fans will support them at a ticket price that’s going to support the team. Neither, frankly, seems to be true.

What you end up with once this process is done (painful for fans, but typical for business situations, actually. and let’s not forget, this is a business based on the game of hockey), you’ll have a lame duck team in Nashville, and no fight by the region to keep them. They were given their best shot, fair and square, and it didn’t work. To a good degree, all of this is a vaccination against lawsuits and all of the legal pain a team move might cause — because Leopold and the league can point and say “we tried!” — and they did. Balsillie would have had a much harder time of it, by the way, but was willing to simply throw money, guns and lawyers at it to make it work, and be damned with the PR. the NHL isn’t quite so — straightforward.

Now, officially, Bettman has no “plan B”, he’s working on saving the team for Nashville, as he did in Edmonton, as they tried (and failed) in Winnipeg and Quebec, due mostly to currency exchange problems. Unofficially, I’ll bet the Kansas City move is already being talked about — informally.

The rest is just letting the process finish out, which, since lawyers and contracts and PR and governments are all involved, has to happen. Fan response in Nashville seems to be hovering around “well, it was fun while it lasted”, so I expect this is the last year for Nashville in Nashville.

I’m not surprised. If you look at how Winnipeg went down, it was a very similar way. White knights riding in on armored horses, only to, well, have to think about it once they see the size of the dragon. Public displays of loyalty by fans, drives to buy tickets. Lots of theater — but theater doesn’t change the financial reality, and eventually the real part happens when the people who write the checks (the current owner, new prospective owners, arena and local governmetns) sit down to talk money. And frankly, you probably could have guessed this — if Leopold could have found a way to make this work, he would have. And didn’t. He’s not a bad owner. In fact, he’s one hell of an owner and the NHL really is going to lose a good one when he moves on.

So nobody should be surprised that since he didn’t get it done, nobody else is going to, either. And Bettman has very little role in all of this, except to take the criticism of Canadian journalists and of bloggers looking for someone to blame. But then, that’s his job, to take the bullet for the board of governors while they pull the primary strings.

continued in part 2…..

Time for me to make a fool of myself, although we won’t have firm evidence for at least a few weeks…. Time for me to predict the season.

First, the western conference:

None of last year’s playoff teams really got worse, and this is going to make the west a tough conference again. I’m predicting 95 points to make the playoffs at all.

Division winners:

Central: Detroit (and most points in the west, and president’s trophy)
Pacific: San Jose (2nd seed)
Northwest: Vancouver (third seed)

is it possible for only one team in the central to make the playoffs? Probably not. St. Louis is better, but not a playoff team. Chicago is better, too, but not this year. Nashville, I worry that the ownership issues will get in the way. And I’m not convinced Columbus is good. But changes are, one other team will put it together and make a late spot. Since I’m rooting ofr them, I’ll choose the Blues in 8th.

4th seed: Anaheim
5th: Dallas
6th: Colorado
7th: Los Angeles
8th: St. Louis

Right now, who comes out of the west is a pick’em among Detroit, San Jose, and Anaheim. It depends entirely on who gets lucky and who stays healthy and who avoids the traps each team has:

Detroit: will hasek stay healthy? If not….

San jose: will they work out the consistency problems? Will Navokov perform to expectations? Will Cheechoo bounce back?

Anaheim: Guigiere? and when will Niedermeyer come back? Selanne too, probably.

I have an issue about players who sit out until mid-season or later and then roll in for the playoffs; Forsberg made it work, and I expect Niedermeyer will do something similar. If Selanne doesn’t retire, he’ll come back later, too; I’m guessing both will rejoin Anaheim at some point, or they’d have formally hung it up. And they’ll be fresh for the playoffs, and taht’s scary.

Now, I don’t think this is fair for the fans or the game, but it’s legal, and if you’re good enough, you obviously can get away with it. I hope the practice doesn’t expand, but you can see advantages for teams, too — salary cap savings and better play in the playoffs when others are tired. Now, should this be changed? Can it? I think it’s something the league needs to think about and monitor. I’m torn, personally. maybe there’s some date beyond which if you aren’t on the roster, you have to clear waivers to join in? Or maybe if a team and player can actually pull this off, we should congratulate them.

but I don’t think the fans are getting a fair shake. And I worry we’ll start seeing older, key players turn this into the hockey equivalent of the designated hitter. And how do you explain it to that player who spent four months busting his butt for the team, to be dropped from the lineup when the stud decides he’s ready to play?

urgh. It’s always something…

Anyway, eastern conference:

Atlantic: Pittsburgh
Northeast: Ottawa (2nd)
Southeast: Washington (3rd)

again, it turns into a crapshoot quickly. I like what the capitals have done — and they play in a pretty weak conference. It’ll help, but they’ll be a lot better, too. No gimmee.

I’m guessing 90 points to make the playoffs.

4th seed: Buffalo — they won’t suck as much as some buffalo fans worry.
5th seed: NY Rangers
6th seed: New Jersey
7th seed: Boston
8th seed: Carolina

I like the Senators to come out of the east this year, personally. But Ottawa or the Rangers might make it intersting. I keep waiting for Martin Brodeur to get hurt or get human, but it may not matter, the rest of the team isn’t as impressive as it has been.

And right now, if I had to bet, I’d bet the Sharks to take the cup. It’s what I do. But there are easily six teams that can take it depending on luck and happenstance, and I wouldn’t be disappointed. Much.

San Jose Mercury News – Team looking forward to full-strength Rivet:

His illness was mentioned in passing after he was traded to the Sharks in February because the illness had forced him to miss his last nine games with the Montreal Canadiens.

But once he got to San Jose? Rivet played and the assumption was he had recovered.

Not so.

“I was never healthy, not in the slightest,” Rivet said. “As time went on, it just got a little worse and worse. The energy level and strength wasn’t there. It took a lot out of me.”

Rivet, a steadying influence on a young defense, still showed the Sharks enough to be rewarded with a four-year, $14 million contract. Now that he has finally gotten past the sickness, Rivet is eager to demonstrate his full capabilities.

“When I first got here, I jumped right into the fire and tried to do the best I could to help the team compete,” Rivet said. “But now I feel great and I’m looking forward to starting the season healthy.”

Rivet is a vocal, assertive presence on the ice – a good thing for the Sharks, who are still youthful on defense with
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regulars such as Marc-Edouard Vlasic, Christian Ehrhoff and Matt Carle.

I seem to be the only person not worried about the Sharks blueline this year. Not taking anything away from Scott Hannan, but in the context of the Sharks, replacing him with Rivet is an upgrade.

No, Rivet is not as strong defensively but the Sharks weakness on the defense last season, and in past seasons, was the lack of offense from the blueline, to the point that Patrick Marleau spent power play time there last year.

I will happily give up some “stay at home” minutes for an upgraded power play, and that’s what we’ve done. Hannan and McLaren play very similar styles, solid shut-down guys. Given the rest of our talent on the blueline, we really didn’t need both; McLaren brings more size and physical play, but I won’t call him the “better” guy — very closely matched, actually.

Rivet should also be a useful advisor to the kids on how to grow their offensive potential — no offense to Robb Zettler or anyone else on the Sharks, but until you get to Doug Wilson himself, it’s hard to find someone in the organization who knows how to score from the blueline to coach the kids — and I think that’s shown in past season. Rivet is going to be a help for guys like Carle and Vlasic.

With Davison as the 6th defenseman, I think we’ll be fine. I can think of a lot of teams wishing they were worried about someone like Davison being their 6th Dman; as long as Vlasic and Carle play decently, we’ll be fine. If they don’t, Hannan wouldn’t be the solution anyway.

throw in Doug Murray as a 7th guy, and wild card Sandis “Sandis! No!” Ozolinsh — who knows what’s going to happen there, but make him your 8th guy and go for a ride.. That’s not a bad group to open the season with, and if Davison and Murray don’t prove up to the task the Sharks have cap space to go get someone to fill in the gap.

The big knock on both: foot speed, but Davison makes up for it with some ability to predict the play, and Murray makes up for it with an immense physical presence — don’t ever get near him with your head down, not even in a restaurant). Either one could be a 12 minute a night guy, and I noticed the Sharks working with Davison on penalty kill in pre-season. If the Sharks helped him gain half a step, he’ll be fine.

I know some fans argued the sharks needed to get someone in the off-season (I was a bit surprised they didn’t go for Souray, but then, lots of teams didn’t, and he signed later than expected, for less than expected, with an unexpected team, so something seems to have scared teams off that the press didn’t know about (wow. unprecedented). Maybe his agent had bad breath or something…). That goes against the general philosophy of the Sharks, though, which is to grow from within. Your prospects need to know they have a legitimate chance to make the team, and you don’t do that if you’re constantly going over them by bringing in outsiders to fill the roster.

So instead, if you have someone you think can do it — let them play, but maintain the ability to be flexible based on how things work out. Davison and Murray both have done the black aces thing, without complaint, without whining. Reward them and see what happens. If it works, great. If not, the Sharks have options — AND it means everyone down in Worchester hoping to make the team will feel they have a real chance to do so, and that makes them better, more motivated players. Compare that to a team like the Leafs, where prospects pretty much can guess their best shot at an NHL job is as part of a trade to another team…

So for me, I’m headed into the season very happy. Now, all the Sharks need to do is execute to potential and stay healthy…

update: I realize I wrote the above while completely forgetting about Alexei Semenov. He’s starting the season on the IR with a funky back, but that’s another piece to the depth puzzle that gives the Sharks more options.. (hat tip: Sharkspage)

and nobody really cares. which is great.

First chance to see the team in person — once again, I miss most of training camp (only about 2 hours on the first day, before we headed out of town to Oregon) and most of the pre-season games. One thing I always tried to do at Apple was schedule some flex time so I could visit training camp, and one thing that always happened was something that came up and kept me from going. It became sort of a running joke after a while — so what do I do? Two years in a row, I schedule my own conflicts instead. go figure…

Doesn’t really matter.

The Sharks looked pretty good. They more or less manhandled the Flames, until they decided to ramp it down and coast. the game wasn’t nearly as close as the stats might indicate, the Sharks got bored as much as anything.

They did look pretty good to me overall, though. Setoguchi saw limited time, but impressed. Roenick didn’t see limited time, and looks, well, old and slow, and took a number of “old and slow” penalties. But then, Mark Smith, who signed in Calgary just before the game and is basically the roster spot that went to Roenick, didn’t impress, either.

I would not want to have been wearing a flames jersey within sight of Keenan after that performance.

Davison looks to be the 6th defenseman for now, with Murray 7th. I expect once Sandis is released from substance abuse, he’ll be signed to some minimal contract as an 8th Dman and we’ll see what happens. It may be a pity signing, or simply the Sharks giving an old friend a chance — but what’s wrong with that? Don’t forget that Sandis was Doug wilson’s partner in the first season before Sandis hurt his knee, and so there’s a lot of “more than pure hockey” going on here. And the Sharks have a soft spot for Sandis, and have a history of reclamation projects, both well-known and not so. Some worked out okay, some (Link Gaetz) didn’t, and some (Brant Mhyres, anyone?) were, well, reclamation projects.

Sandis’s problems started with the Sharks, a kid a bit too young, with too many responsibilities, acclimation problems, a bit shy and nerdy, frankly. He also was sort of a real-life lab experiement that helped the Sharks understand what it took to bring in european talent successfully for both the player and the team, and the team has strongly benefitted from that; perhaps just for that reason, the Sharks will give Sandis a shot, giving both sides some closure. And Sandis is still well-loved in San Jose.

(Sandis, by the way, has a really funky record on his resume: he scored the first goal in San Francisco Spiders history, as he was holding out at the time and signed a deal with the IHL team; then he went off and rejoined the Sharks, and if I remember properly, THEN went and scored the first goal of the season for San Jose, too…)

I’m probably the only person in the universe NOT particularly worried about San Jose’s defense. Yes, we lost Hannan, but to me, Hannan and McLaren were very similar players, and the entire defensive corps was way too “stay at home”; swapping out Hannan for Rivet, which is effectively what we did, improves the power play a LOT and increases the blueline offensive capability. Yes, we lose some defensive-defense, but we have plenty to spare, I think.

And Rivet can teach Carle and Plasic how to play as an offensive defenseman, a benefit we need. Honestly, Robb Zettler teaching offensive defense? Not gonna happen…

I think Davison and Murray as a time-sharing combo is a perfectly acceptable 6th dman. As long as Vlasic doesn’t have a bad year, we’ll be fine. And if Sandis brings something to the table, that’s a benefit. But I’m not sure I want Sandis to teach the kids how to play…

I will admit — I really like the new home jersey, and I wasn’t sure I would. I still am not sure about the logo redo (wasn’t broken, why fix it?) but it’s no worse than the old one, merely different. It’ll probably grow on me. But the epaulets instead of those black underarms? That looks pretty nice, actually, and I thought the orange highlights addded to the look, didn’t clutter it. So it gets a thumbs up for me.

Other changes in the arena — the new video board absolutely rocks. Absolutely. well done. As someone sitting near me said last night, “I found myself watching the board, even when the Sharks were in our end of the ice!” True enough, and we’re three rows off the glass. THAT good. A nice thing is that it’s a purely software/video scoreboard now, so it’s got a lot more flexibility for different events.

And they finally redid the sound system, which has sucked since the building opened. We can actually — god help us — hear what is being said over the PA in section 127 now, unmuffled and without legibility problems. Well done. So THAT is what Joe Eich sounds like…

They also replaced the boards a wrap-around system similar to those seen in newer building (gah, that building’s over a decade old; I remmber it as a hole in the ground); The effect is pretty nice.

And a minor thing I noticed — they’ve retuned the lights. In previous years, some of the lights were turned off for hockey games because they caused bad shadows or glare; everything got re-aimed and now all of them are used in games; it makes it brighter in there (about an F/stop, I’m guessing); add in the light from the boards (it’s no longer dark, even with the lights off) and it’s a much brighter building.

One thing the sharks didn’t do (oh well) was theatrical lighting like GM place does. If you want to know why that’s a nice thing to have? just think about the 20 minute delay before the first game in London…. Shuttered lights avoid that but allow you to dim them for effect, something vancouver uses to good impact.

And now it’s time to drop the puck!

Is The NHL Ignoring a Concussion Problem? – FanHouse – AOL Sports Blog:

That data point, and a whole lot more, comes from a story in yesterday’s Orange County Register written by Scott M. Reid. The piece is the first part of a two-part series on the subject of concussions in the NHL, and unearthed a number of other interesting facts and quotes from players and front office types from around the NHL. The study, sponsored by the Register, looked at concussions over a ten year period

This should be a must-read piece for all hockey fans…..

I talked to doctors involved with studying concussions in the league years ago, and I’ve been arguing for protecting the head for a while (see this piece from 2003, for instance) — and yes, the league needs to do more, but part of this is, frankly, a growing recognition of the problem and how to diagnose it. “Getting your bell rung” has been going on in hockey since forever, but there’s a lot of peer pressure and motivation to “shake it off”, and in the “good old days”, guys who couldn’t tended to get swept under the rug or left behind to cope as they could.

At least now, the doctors have diagnostic data and training and the authority to do something without easily being overridden by a player or cooach — assuming the player actually says something. Which they still don’t, far too often…

There are, unfortunately, conflicts between protecting the player and the hockey mentality — there are good people in the medical staff trying, but the “shake it off” world still holds a lot of sway here. it’s changing, but slowly, and we keep losing good players because of it — and a lot of the players are the primary problem that needs to be solved…

Tom Benjamin’s NHL Weblog: Good Night and Good Luck:

The whopping ticket price increase is, to me, another indicator that a deal to relocate the team to the Anschutz Empire in Kansas City is signed, sealed and delivered. If team had to increase attendance to an average of about 14,200 customers a game to ensure revenue sharing payments and an ongoing lease, is it smart to increase ticket prices by 25%? I don’t think so either.

The season must be approaching, because the Tom Benjamin “life is a conspiracy just waiting for some tin foil” train is leaving the station… (but we love you, tom. honest…)

Here in the real world, of course, we’ll spin this a bit differently. The reality is that the folks in nashville don’t just need to draw 14,000 (per the lease), but at an average ticket price that’ll support the finances of the team. Leopold as owner tried to build an audience and then hope he could move the average ticket price to something close to league average. That didn’t work.

so now? it’s time to find out whether nashville can support a team, and at a price that’s actually financially rational. It makes no sense to build attendance at a price guaranteed to lose money. They’ve already tried that.

My take? I don’t think it’ll happen. Maybe for a year, maybe two, but I doubt it. and then they’ll move, which tom will use to justify his conspiracies as being correct, of course.

but the reality is, we don’t need conspiracies here. it’s simple: you price it at the price you need to get, and either the region gets on board, or it doesn’t. if it doesn’t, you move. But you don’t need a conspiracy for this — because if you price it and they do come, you still win.

But heck, standard, simple business isn’t nearly as much fun; no need for tinfoil, and where’s the joy in that?

The Battle of California: Sharks training camp Videopalooza:

There are a lot of questions as the Sharks start training camp about who will be the backup goaltender behind Nabokov, which defenseman will play his way into the lineup after the loss of Hannan, and what the forward lines will shake out with Jeremy Roenick and several prospects vying for spots on all 4 lines (if you listen to head coach Ron Wilson’s interview above).

Playing a GM on the internet, at this early date I like Dimitri Patzold as the backup goaltender. Good size (6-0, 195), solid positionally, more experience as a starter at the AHL level. I think he is more NHL ready. Although German goalie Thomas Greiss may be more athletic and have a higher upside, he only has 1 season of hockey in North America under his belt. He will grow into his talent quicker with another season as the go-to guy in Worcester of the AHL. But this goaltending competition will probably boil down to who has a better training camp.

PJ Swenson does a bang up job covering the opening of camp for the Sharks. Given the continuing cutbacks in coverage in the traditional media” (Vic Chi is gone, and the Merc is now covering the sharks with Dave Pollack, who’s got a strong hockey background, with backup from Mark Emmons, but as I understand it, it’s home coverage only), I think PJ is the best “beat” guy in San Jose at this point. Between him and Dave we’re in good shape… You’ll find PJ here on Sharkspage as well as on the Battle of California blog.

Who will pick up Hannan’s minutes against opponent’s top lines is a question, who will fill out the 6/7/8 slots is another, but how will the Sharks address a lack of scoring or a lack of initiating offense from the blueline is a question that sticks out for me.

I think letting Hannan go was a fairly easy decision — he was very much the same style player as Kyle McLaren. By picking up Rivet late in the season and then re-signing him, you can argue (well, I am arguing) that what the Sharks did was upgrade from Hannan to Rivet — and go from a team that was overloaded with stay at home “shut down” type defensemen to one with a more balanced talent set; Rivet being with the team for an entire season will improve the blueline offense and hopefully the power play, but I also hope that given a year under his belt and tutelage from Rivet, we’ll see Vlasic also pick up offensively.

Davison and Murray are solid stay at home guys with an edge — the negative on both of them is they’re relatively slow skaters; Davison is better at compensating for that positionally right now, Murray is more of a physical presence and just scary strong on his skates. Laurie’s nickname for him is “you fall down now, okay?”

today was the first day of camp for the Sharks today, and I wandered down for a bit to take a look at what was going on.

you forget just how bloody big these guys are until you get close to them.

The practice seemed high tempo and spirited. I won’t pretend to have any deep insights for having watched cycling drills by half the team for about an hour. I’ll leave that to others… (grin)

I will say that the energy level seemed high, spirits were good but the players seemed very focussed and down to business. Very little horseplay and nobody seemed to be dogging it.

the “this seems, well, weird” moment: realizing that one of the coaches on the ice was Bryan marchment (along with Wayne thomas and Rob Zettler); it made me flash back to the old IHL and the Las Vegas Thunder, when we were down there for a couple of games, and ex-Shark Lyndon Byers was playing for them.

Byers was named assistant captain, and was asked to take a leadership role with the younger players. And he humorously mused about that in the newspaper with a “me? a role model?” quote.

I actually have a fondness for Marchment, as former readers of our Dallas Stars mailing list (now retired) might remember. For all his reputation and repeated suspensions (mostly earned, but towards the end, his reputation preceeded him at times), he actually could play some pretty good hockey.

The day San Jose traded for him, I stood up like many and had a big, noisy fit about on the list; I also have to admit that it took about two games watching him and isolating his game on the ice to realize what he brought to the sharks — above and beyond physical play and intimidation.

He was a good hockey player; and I admitted it. Dirty player? sometimes; so are lots of guys. Who’s a dirtier player, Marchment or Chelios? tough call. But mostly, I think Marchment’s game was not that he was trying to hurt guys, it was that he was playing the game his way, and simply didn’t worry about whether someone got hurt. That wasn’t his problem, his problem was getting the job done without getting himself hurt.

Of course, he did — I was watching the night he got concussed and went into convulsions on the ice. I don’t think I reacted as strongly to any on ice injury, other than perhaps Malarchuk (who was goalie for the Las Vegas Thunder when Lyndon Byers was the captain. small world — and the team had this young phenom named Bonk, who went on to become a first pick and a good, solid, third line center. For the record, at the time, I said he was a good mid-first round draft, not a top draft or top three. I guess for once I was right — and if he’d been drafted 12th or 15th, people would think Radek Bonk has had a good career; as a top draft, he’s been a big disappointment. be wary of getting what you ask for, and having to live up to it)

But I digress. Given camps are opening, I can. It means hockey isn’t far away, and the season tickets will be arriving any minute now… (seriously).

time to drop the puck!

Ian left a comment about Mark Bell I wanted to pull out into its own posting:

Two for Elbowing: More on Mark Bell:

Something really smells about the NHL suspending Bell out of the blue, after he played in the league for a year, and after the terms of his plea bargain were set (i.e. agreeing to start his prison stay after the NHL season).

It’s clearly intended as some sort of statement to other players, but I don’t know what that statement is, exactly. It smacks of grandstanding,

I had the same reaction: I couldn’t believe that the punishment by the NHL wasn’t agreed upon as everything else was being worked out, because it makes no sense for Bell to set up his prison so he can play the season — only to have the NHL suspend him. Either the NHL is being a twit here, or Bell’s agent blew it big time in coordinating the details.

Now, if Bell only misses a few games, it’s a symbolic slap on the wrist, and that’s not so bad, but right now, this isn’t making the NHL look good — letting him play an entire season before suspending him is stupid; either he has a problem and they should have gotten him into the program a year ago, or he doesn’t, and this makes no sense other than some kind of grandstanding stunt.

Now, having said that, I can understand the league waiting until the court action is done to punish Bell — that’s due process — but this wasn’t presented as a punishment, this was presented as being put into a substance abuse program. Suspending him a few games for a braincramp that makes the league look bad? fine. Putting him into an abuse program when it’s not warranted? Makes the league look bad.

And there’s no indication there is an abuse problem here, just the results of a mistake and a long court case.

I’m not exactly Mark Bell’s biggest fan here — but what the league is doing is at best badly communicated to the real world, and that’s making the league look punitive and arbitrary.

Here’s hoping this — at the least — gets clearly explained and put behind everyone….