caucasianheat

Roseanne.

Couturier might fit in as a third Selke nominee, but it's a crowded house and he won't win it. Great player having a great breakout season though.

Hemsky's switch has been flipped to 'Giving a Shit' mode. Good lord.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J08tytwdhDs

A fine update to our title here.

George Stroumboulopoulos will be the new host of HNIC this coming fall

At the time, everybody said the Vanek deal would be good "... if they have some assurance they can re-sign him". Islanders didn't have any chance of pinning him down, he didn't really want to be there and so they ended up paying full price for half a turn on the ferris wheel. Buffalo ends up looking smartest in the whole thing because they walk off with a bunch of assets from Wang & Garth (party on!) and Minnesota, too.

I think Kovalchuk ultimately retiring from the contract probably had something to do with the lessened penalty for the Devils. Still a crooked move to change the punishment after the fact.

Callahan plus a 1st and a 2nd for Martin St. Louis is close to getting done, says TSN.

I feel like the value of any UFA rental player just gets lower every year. Even the truly elite guys have started to yield less and less because really the gamble is hard to justify when it almost never translates into winning the Cup.

Time will tell on the Luongo thing, but they definitely put themselves in a terrible predicament. I feel like Luongo and Schneider are having drinks in the corner of a bar somewhere right now, laughing.

(truthfully, I see a 6'6" 24 year old Swede goalie coming back and think there might be some silver lining in it. Matthias' stock could go up in Vancouver a little bit as a power forward in progress. We'll see.)

Anaheim was salary dumping to land Robidas. The pick they got from Washington went directly to Dallas. For the moves they made, I think they won out because it firms up their defense even more when Robidas comes back healthy.

Hearing Markstrom and Shawn Matthias plus presumably some picks. Vancouver will keep some of the salary as well.

Alberta is changing the liquor laws for one day so that bars can open and serve tomorrow morning at 5AM for hockey.

A jersey with a maple leaf being used to cheer on Team USA is a gross perversion, sir. Cease and desist.

russia has the talent, but the chemistry and effort was not there. they needed a shootout to beat the Slovaks, who against every other team, looked awful.

Agreed. When Kovalchuk and Radulov are your guys bringing the fire and emotion, you're maybe kind of fucked. Datsyuk was not nearly at his best and the goaltending was leaky as all hell, especially today.

Bye Russia. I guess Canada can't feel that bad about needing overtime against the Finns.

Hey, credit the helpers. He had great feeds from Van Riemsdyk and Gryba on two of those goals...

Most shots turned away in a shutout since 67-68! They should build apology statues for he and his wife outside Rexall.

I wouldn't give much more. He has always been a streaky player and he gives up the puck trying to make plays a lot more than he completes them. There's lots that someone with his speed can do for a team, though I don't think he necessarily gives Pittsburgh what they are missing minus Dupuis.

Does TBS have good originals now or is this sad?

Klein is a pretty good player to send out unless you have a lot of confidence in Del Zotto rebounding with a move. He's been pretty unimpressive in the bit I've seen this year but has undeniable skill. Hopefully he'll turn it around and get some confidence going because he's looked a bit lost. Nashville's blueline, at least on paper, is going to be a force in the years to come.

Leafs are getting the stellar bailout goaltending that gave them wins before. They've been better about giving up shots and some icetime/assignment adjustments haven't hurt either.

Martin St. Louis trolling his own GM this hard is amazing. Right now, he's locked in a 4-4 tie with SJ, by which I mean he's scored all four goals for Tampa.

Yeah, I'm actually really curious which teams people know. Mighty Ducks seems like the obvious answer everyone would submit, except they're not called that.

Pretty awesome to see what was basically a tooth-and-nail playoff game going on in January.

Also awesome? Team USA falling apart at the seams (probably!)

A coach turfing that was definitely more drawn out: Claude Noel has been fired by Winnipeg. Paul Maurice is the new head.

Leafs move to thirteenth in the East in points per game. Still think Carlyle's not the problem?

They haven't played to since I last posted. So yes

Speculative to say Kessel would have signed without his friend. There's no way of knowing and the order of events suggests getting Bozak was important if they wanted Kessel locked before the season. Remove the bromance entirely and it's still a logical move. If you're going to build your team around a streaky player longterm, re-up the center who he is most comfortable with.

We can take a larger sample size too (like all of Kessel's games in Toronto) and I feel it will still demonstrably point to Bozak as the best of all options to pair him with, admitting that it's not elite company or anything. Top line centers are scarcer to come by than maybe any other piece and, in lieu of superstars at that position, lots of teams are going with competent two-way setup guys instead.

Players who get more responsibilities on the ice (ie: carrying the puck out or playing heavy minutes & special teams) have to be more accountable, otherwise what is it that's keeping them in that position? It doesn't surprise me that a coach is harder on his difference makers than his support players. That's the way it should be. If Jake Gardiner is to be a star, he needs to handle some heat when he makes errors in judgment. He's missed *two games* all year and I heard a commentator literally use the word "insanity" and make reference to mistreatment. 20 minutes a night consistently for a guy with every-night defensive lapses is not mistreatment. Forgive me if I see a lot of this 'destroying confidence' stuff as hyperbolic.

That we're even beginning to crest on a sentiment of "Ron Wilson wasn't so bad" with that graph is just absurd. I'll call bluff and say that any coach you bring in today won't turn it around. Scotty Bowman couldn't get these guys to contend because it's a confused roster that's stuck between two identities. If you think the coaching is holding them back from overwhelming success, it's not the case.

But even if they passed on Clarkson, you'd still have five centers and four jobs. The only alternatives I see that allow Grabovski to stay would be trading Kadri's rights or not doing a Dave Bolland deal.

It doesn't surprise me that MacArthur and Grabovski leave and make Toronto look stupid in doing so, since that's what they both did to their old teams when they came to Toronto initially. I don't think Grabovski will ever make significantly more than he would have on the contract he was bought out of and that's not a criticism.

Perhaps in some way Carlyle is forcing these guys to play unnaturally so he can say "See!?" to management and get more of what he wants. It just strikes me that playing a speedy, offensive game as people have suggested was (with mostly the same players under Ron Wilson) an unmitigated disaster that they brought Carlyle in to fix with systems. So maybe he's not 100% wrong?

I should point out I think Reilly is developing great instincts and they've pretty much done it exactly right with him so far. I think he's got tons of versatile potential and will be successful for them longterm.

They play like a Tortorella team alright. It feels like Vancouver has been the same team for a really long time. I guess they could not change a thing (relatively) and still be competitive and in contention for at least a few more years with what they have now. Definitely seems like a team that's better than a wild card spot. They still need guys who aren't the Sedins to score consistently and none of their free agent gets in that vein seem to work out. Roy did nothing there, Booth is maybe approaching bust territory and Santorelli is touch and go.

Maybe it's because I don't have to hear people talking about his emotional state all the time, but Luongo does look much more composed this year. Having to hang around and wait for a spot polished Eddie Lack up pretty nicely as well.

Opine to me Sean: who is the best prospect in an organization that seems to prefer slower development? Has the Schroeder ship sailed? I thought Horvat looked alright at World Jrs, but he's not as quick as a lot of players at that tournament were.