This week we discuss the latest ownership news in Phoenix and Montreal. We update the Dany Heatly situation as well as talk about two star players that may have issues with their contracts. Well let you know about the latest class to go into the US hockey Hall of Fame and read some listener e-mails. All that and a whole lot more in this special episode of the Puck Podcast.
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Regarding Doug’s view on why the Wings are at a disadvantage: Don’t forget, the Wings won the Cup in 2002 which was also an Olympic year. I also believe that in 2008 they had more sets of back to back games then any other team, not to mention they are a Western Conference team playing in the eastern time zone. So, as they say, this isn’t their first rodeo and I’m glad you touched on that too. Yeah a lot of guys remain on the team and thus are 8 years older, but they’ve proven they have extremely talented youth coming up. But we’ll see, it should be fun.
If I were to give an advantage to the Wings, it does seem they are able to plug in talent from their farm system as well if not better than any other team. So, though, overall, I’d put my $$ on the Penguins, I think that advantage should be pointed out…
I agree that the Pens will be the better choice for going back to the Finals, but I want to address Detroit a bit.
While I still think they will capture the Central Division, it will not be as easy as it has been in the past. The Blackhawks are stronger, Steve Mason and the Jackets youth can push them in the right direction, and the Blues are getting the injured players back. While the Wings have kept the core of a solid team (Franzen, Zetterberg and Datsyuk), they have also lost some role players (Hudler, Samuelsson, Kopecky). I have always felt the Wings’ depth has always been their key to winning, not their stars. But with Osgood as the projected starter and the depth disappearing, it makes a hockey fan wonder. I will agree with Kris though, they do plug in their farm players better than anyone in sports IMO, but can Abdelkader, Leno and Helm be guaranteed to be as strong as they were in the playoffs? Doug said it himself: players step it up in the playoffs. So who is to say that in game 45 of the regular season, Abdelkader can be that dominate of a checking forward. We seem to ask ourselves questions like this about the Red Wings about every 5 years or so and they usually shut those critics up very quickly. So we shall see how quickly they will make me stop asking questions.
Thoughts anyone? I will stop taking up space on this post.
In response to Jeff Ponder, the other thing to keep in mind with Abdelkader and trying to figure out if he’ll perform during the reg. season grind as he did in the playoffs is that his ’09 playoff performance was his first real stint in The Bigs. I don’t know if others have noticed it, but it seems like a lot of guys play way over their heads for their first 5 or 10 games in the NHL and then are rarely heard from again. It’s like an adrenaline thing or something. I imagine you can double that effect when most of those first NHL games are Stanley Cup playoff games.
Does anybody know what the reasoning is behind being able to average the salary cap hit out over the course of a contract? It seems kind of arbitrary to me.
Jeff,
I’ve always wondered the same thing about the cap hit being an average. To me, it’s always just made sense to make the cost of the contract in any given year the same amount as a cap hit. If that was the case, you wouldn’t have the issue that the NHL is trying to fight now. I think it would be too hard to implement now though, as so many contract have been signed/designed on the average, but I guess they could always grandfather it…
Jay Leno is on the Wings?!? Wow. That’s gonna be tough what with his new show and all…
On a serious note, does anyone know offhand when the current CBA expires? I have this sneaking suspicion we are headed for another work stoppage as the owners have screwed themselves over. Again. Any thoughts on the idea that maybe they would allow for some of these contracts to be restructured after a stoppage?
hey – i think i change my thought on a 2nd team in toronto – was at the rink waiting for my game and started a conv with a man who was from toronto – his daughter was on the ice. After about 1/2 hr conv just about hockey and how nuts they are up there about it – why can’t they have 2 teams , NY has 3 (well 2 and 1/2 maybe) –but maybe not hamilton – but brampton or other suburbs of Toronto – I mean they are crazy for hockey and why try to grow hockey where it obviously going to be costly –
I was the one who posted why doesn’t bill gates go buy a team and put them in Seattle, now maybe Seattle does want a team, and maybe the should get this one. But obviously if NY can support 3 teams, LA area 2 teams, Toronto should be able to.
BTW – this guys daughter was outstanding in net. Gave up 0 goals in the 2 games that i watched. Only thing that was annoying was that our game was to start at 9:30, and they ran about 1 hour late, so did not get on the ice till 10:30