The Two-Line Pass

(Ed. note: This is a sponsored post for George Clam. If you want me to write about any old thing in hockey, all you have to do is donate $50 below. It’s easy and fun. Bye.)

Hi! I’m writing these posts to benefit 826 Boston, a nonprofit writing and tutoring center for area kids at which I volunteer. If you want to make a donation, you can click right here. Thanks!

The NHL trade deadline came and went yesterday with lots more action than anyone probably expected — save for maybe Roberto Luongo — but one team that didn’t exactly cover itself in glory was, not surprisingly, the Colorado Avalanche.

Puck Daddy gave the Avs, and GM Greg Sherman, a D+ for their lack of doing anything noteworthy at the deadline despite the fact that they’re dead last in the West (which, by the way, is quite a feat, because they’re in the same division as Calgary). That sounds about right. Ryan O’Byrne to Toronto for a pick, and decent defensive prospect Cameron Gaunce to Dallas for slightly younger, similarly-decent left wing prospect Tomas Vincour. That was it. Sherman didn’t try to unload any of those other contracts he’s been rumored to be trying to offload for some time now.

This is an appallingly bad team with numerous not-great contracts on it. Not that teams are lining up to acquire David Jones and his laughable $4 million a year through 2015-16 cap hit, but making any attempt to shed some of the worse deals weighing down the roster at the deadline — when it’s a seller’s market — seemed more advisable than waiting until the summer. By the way, as if to really show just how off-his-rocker Sherman is in thinking this team is good, he saw the calls he received from other GMs/vultures interested in some of his players as further evidence that he has a solid core in place and should not pursue the wiser course of action of selling anyone off. Even Jay Feaster isn’t that dumb, but one supposes it goes back to “intellectual honesty,” and Sherman is as bereft of that as his team is of playoff hopes.

Fortunately for Avs fans, he doesn’t seem long to hold his seat of power atop the Avs organization, and rightly so, but to say he’s bad at his job is one thing. To say he decided to stand pat is entirely because he thinks this is a team that can succeed at some point in the near future shows he they need to take him out of that office posthaste, preferably Hannibal Lechter-style so he can’t pick up the phone and extend Milan Hejduk for another year.

If he thinks there’s a solid core there, he’s probably not totally wrong, but at the same time, a great way to build around that is to make player transactions and offload some dead weight. That he didn’t do that, well, it underscores why he’s gonna get the axe this summer.

Don’t forget to donate to 826 Boston. Thanks again.

Hi! I’m writing these posts to benefit 826 Boston, a nonprofit writing and tutoring center for area kids at which I volunteer. If you want to make a donation, you can click right here. Thanks!

You’ll recall that the Detroit Red Wings used to be considered the gold standard among NHL teams in terms of being well-run and also being exceptionally good at the sport of hockey. These days, uhh, not so much.

The first and most obvious fact here is that the Red Wings sit just sixth in the Western Conference as of this writing, just a point up on disappointing San Jose, three up on St. Louis, and four ahead of Dallas, all of which have a game in hand on the team that seems to have been completely thrown off by the loss of Nicklas Lidstrom. I guess it’s understandable that you’d not be quite so good when you lose the second-best defenseman of all time, no matter how old he is, and also Brad Stuart and probably a few other guys too, and replace them with Carlo Colaiacovo and a rookie.

On the other hand, with Lidstrom’s retirement seems also to have come this very bizarre and almost inexplicable loss of whatever mojo the Wings once had as well. Just yesterday, Ken Holland — long one of the most beloved and seen-as-brilliant GMs in the league for reasons that border on the inexplicable — was saying how he doesn’t know what’s going to happen with Pavel Datsyuk come the summer, alluding to the potential of his bolting for the KHL after his deal expires in 2014 because at 34 he’s older than almost all of us probably think of him as being. The Ken Holland of, say, three years ago would have had that extension agreed-to in principle three years before that, and everyone would be laughing and happy about it the whole time.

Then there’s the fact that he’s considering trading Valtteri Filppula, who, like Datsyuk, is older than anyone probably considers him to be. He just turned 29 despite everyone in the league checking their watches and wondering if this season, this one right here, is the one in which he finally at long last breaks out and becomes a Datsyukian or Zetterbergian talent, which he never will. Will the Red Wings trade him at the deadline? Tough to say, but the fact that it’s even up for discussion is, again, indicative of some rather deep problems inherent in the way the team is run.

However, Holland did make one move yesterday that could reinforce his singular genius among those who don’t need to be sold on his singular genius. He signed NHL-ready NCAA free agent Danny DeKeyser to an NHL deal, beating back a pack of ravening GMs for the honor. People want to play for Detroit. People want to play for a winner. People want to play for Mike Babcock. Well, yes and no. The Red Wings also told DeKeyser he could start playing for their NHL club straightaway, which is a position in which most pundits would probably figure they’d see, say, Edmonton or Columbus, and not the mighty Winged Wheels for whom everyone has only the most endless of praise.

What ever happened to that Red Wing mystique? Being a mediocre team this late in the season is something you might be able to write off as being a result of the shortened schedule and some weird luck. Not knowing what’s going on with Pavel Datsyuk’s chances of leaving the continent is something you might be able to write off as being just one of those things with guys wanting to go home and make a crazy amount of money tax-free. Considering trading Valtteri Filppula before the deadline is something you might be able to write off as shrewd GMing if Holland doesn’t think he can re-sign the winger, but might also be a sign that they just don’t think they’ll be competitive. Roping in a sought-after college free agent is something you might be able to say is the result of Detroit being one of the most desirable destinations in hockey, but could just be because they don’t have any better options on the blue line.

It’s all very confusing and weird.

Don’t forget to donate to 826 Boston. Thanks again.

(Ed. note: This is a sponsored post for @thebuck9. If you want me to write about any old thing in hockey, all you have to do is donate $50 below. It’s easy and fun. Bye.)

Hi! I’m writing these posts to benefit 826 Boston, a nonprofit writing and tutoring center for area kids at which I volunteer. If you want to make a donation, you can click right here. Thanks!

As you all likely well know about me, I am very open to the opinions of others, even if they challenge my own, and so when the guy whose Twitter name is listed above said I should write this sponsored post about how the Leafs wouldn’t be in a playoff hunt if not for the work of Colton Orr, that gave me a lot of pause.

After all, if Randy Carlyle is playing the guy as many minutes as he has been in recent weeks, and the Leafs keep winning (if you ignore last night, which was clearly an outlier in expected results) doesn’t that tell you everything you need to know about the value guys like Orr provide? Carlyle, and every other NHL coach who routinely puts fighters in the lineup, have been around the game a lot longer than me and likely know a thing or three about what motivates professional hockey players, and makes teams win. Randy Carlyle has 555 NHL wins and one Stanley Cup more than I do, so it’s tough for me to sit in judgment.

Let’s think about it another way, on a more macro level: Remember that game a few Saturdays back when Toronto went into the Bell Centre and stomped Montreal’s guts and teeth into a fine, unrecognizable paste? Sure you do. Do you also remember how did they do it? With tough guys in the lineup, that’s how.

Here’s the box score. What do you see? Three fighting majors handed out, all of which the Leafs decidedly won thanks to the top-quality pugilistic efforts of Mark Fraser, Mike Kostka and Frasier McLaren. Colton Orr also played nearly five minutes that night, likely because the Habs were already so intimidated (as evidenced by Brendan Gallagher’s diving penalty early in the second period) that they didn’t need to put the big guns out there. Someone would have gotten killed.

Or how about the example of a young man on the Phoenix Coyotes run by the name of Paul Bissonnette, otherwise known as BizNasty? His team is technically ninth in the Western Conference, but tied with eighth-place San Jose at 21 points. But they just beat the Vancouver Canucks, and Bissonnette is a big reason why. He has three points in his last three games, tripling his total in 31 last season and 48 the year before.

In furtherance of this theory, I also took a look at HockeyFights.com to see the team leader board. The Leafs, a playoff team, have more fights than anyone else in the NHL. The Philadelphia Flyers, also a playoff team, are tied for second with 18. The Vancouver Canucks, also a playoff team, are fourth with 16. The Dallas Stars and Montreal Canadiens, playoff teams both, are tied for fifth with 12. The Los Angeles Kings, also a playoff team, are tied for eighth with 11.

So that’s six of the league’s top 10 fighting teams in the playoffs. And here’s another fun fact for all you punk pacifists out there: When the Bruins won the Stanley Cup two seasons ago, they were also second in the league in fights. That tells you everything you need to know, and stands as evidence enough that there’s a strong correlation between playing so-called “thugs” and winning hockey games with regularity.

Figure it out, and give Colton Orr 20 minutes a night.

(*This post tagged under “Arguments an idiot would make.”)

Don’t forget to donate to 826 Boston. Thanks again.

There is a lot of great hockey writing out there, probably. I mean, you hear about transcendent books like Ken Dryden’s “The Game,” or about Red Fisher’s legendary gamers for the Montreal Gazette, but I’ve never read them because I’m not 100 years old. This is the digital age, my dawgs and dawgettes, and as a result we need cutting-edge hot sports takes and we need ‘em 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365.25 days a year. That’s just how the game be.

Which is why we need writers like Craig Remsburg. “Who is Craig Remsburg?” you ask. How dare you. Remsburg is among the one or two greatest hockey writers and thinkers of our day (present company INcluded), and if you need evidence, I would direct you to the magnum opus penned for the Marquette, Michigan Mining Journal on Feb. 3, in the year of our Lord 2013.

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The Lead

On Feb. 20, Dallas had a 77.52 percent chance of making the playoffs.

It is now 12:53 a.m. on March 31, just 38 days later, and the Stars have about a .37 or so percent chance of making it thanks to tonight’s 6-5 overtime loss to Phoenix, which might be the worst team in the league right now.

There are a lot of reasons why Dallas tanked it so god damn hard. The first, and most understandable, are the injuries to several important players, like Brad Richards and a couple others. The second is that a couple of teams, most notably those in the Central Division, have really turned it on of late.

But the most obvious (and least surprising, really) is the fact that goaltending is a killing them. Marty Turco’s a bum. A total bum who has cost his team almost literally any hope of a playoff berth. To wit, he has played in 17 of Dallas’ 19 games since the 4-2 win over Edmonton on Feb. 19. His GAA is 3.05 (obviously terrible), and his save percentage is .893 (somehow below his already-low season total of .897). As a basis for comparison, those are almost exactly Peter Budaj’s numbers for this year.

This is going to shock you, but because of that (and backup Tobias Stephan, who gave up six on 33 shots tonight and also blew it on March 1 when he gave up four goals on 23 shots to Pittsburgh), the Stars are 4-12-3 in the past 38 days. Which is hilarious and sad.

Now that the Rangers are playing vaguely well, can we just admit that Sean Avery was never a problem for the Stars and it was, in fact, all Marty Turco’s fault all along?

Because it was. Because he suuuuuuuuuuuucks.

(By the way, it is very rare that I get to use the “LOL Marty Turco” tag in reference to nights where he didn’t play. I am very glad for this opportunity.)

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The Lead

It must be confusing as hell to cover the Sedins. The Stars had a bit of trouble with it tonight. It’s like the opening of the Patty Duke Show, only with Swedish guys. And goatees. And less choreography.

Those rascally boys combined for three goals and two assists as the Canucks pounded Dallas tonight 5-2.

The best part was when Mark Fistric high-sticked Daniel right in the kisser, knocking out a tooth or two and bloodying him up. Daniel then scored on a very nice redirect on that same power play before heading to the dressing room to get stitched up. That’s badass. Earlier in the game, Henrik caught a stick in the noodle as well. I’d like to see Patty Duke pull that off.

Another rad part of the game was when Steve Ott stepped out of the penalty box and low-bridged the absolute piss out of Taylor Pyatt (as he is wont to do), and Kevin Bieksa basically threatened to murder him in the resulting scrum. I wish more people would deal with Ott this way.

But then Ott did not get much in the way of retaliation, unfortunately. Marty Turco did instead, mainly because he came out to play the puck along the sideboards, turned his body to protect it from a coming forechecker (I believe it was Darcy Hordichuk), and promptly got cleaned out from behind. It was hilarious.

Then the Canucks broke it open in the third period and Ryan Kesler scored a gorgeous goal, his second of the night after getting his head stepped on, and Dallas completely imploded. Turco ended up giving up four goals on 21 shots.

I know that, as a Flames fan, I shouldn’t be rooting for the Canucks to win, but this game was so awesome I don’t care.

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The Lead

Whatever the opposite of a goaltending battle is, Versus viewers were subjected to one tonight.

Sure, you can argue that there were a few highlight reel saves and that as a result it’s reasonable to surmise that despite allowing nine goals on 79 shots, both Chris Osgood and Marty Turco weren’t quite so bad as perhaps the statistics would lead one to believe.

You, of course, would be horribly wrong, because both the goals AND the ridiculous stops were the result of neither goalie participating in anything resembling sound positional goaltending. Go look at the highlights. What’s Turco thinking on that first goal? The announcer says it was a deflection, but it wasn’t. On the second goal, Turco overcommits to the puck carrier, Pavel Datsyuk, who once again owned him in a consistent and thorough manner all night. As for the Red Wings’ goaltending, the first two Stars goals were through screens, so no fault of Osgood’s there, but the rest of them.. yeesh.

I have never been a goalie at any level of competitive hockey, but I have to assume that, if I were, it would be a bad thing for me to be lying four feet outside of my crease when the opponent scores an overtime game-winner against me. Right? Maybe any readers out there who are goalies can fill me in.

This game would make a perfect instructional video for every goalie under the age of 10 to learn what not to do. “See, Billy, unlike Marty Turco, you DON’T want try to glove a weak wrist shot and have it hit you in the mask twice in one period.”

Man, I’d make such a good peewee coach.

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The Lead

If Sean Avery really wants to help his team, he could get suspended before every game.

Despite Calgary having a large advantage in time of possession, shots and bulletin board material, the Stars improbably cobbled together their second consecutive win for the first time all year and handed Calgary just its fourth loss at home, 3-1.

In the first period especially, Calgary controlled much of the game’s tempo and flow, and Mike Cammalleri was making phenomenal passes every shift. But Flames forwards seemingly had no interest in putting their stick on the ice while in the slot and all the heroics went for nought. Shots after one period read 9-5 for Calgary, but it could’ve easily been 15 had the Flames not been so careless. Consequently, the 1-0 scoreline for Dallas, courtesy of a goal from Toby Petersen of all people, was more than a little frustrating.

The Flames did, however, capitalize on the only power play Dallas gave them all night, with David Moss scoring one second after Stephane Robidas finished serving a penalty (he hadn’t even gotten both feet out of the box yet) to level the game at 1:44 of the second period.

Marty Turco eventually turned aside 27 more shots over the final two periods, many from in close but none particularly threatening, and finished the night stopping 36 of 37. Fabian Brunnstrom’s goal at 7:53 of the second proved the eventual game-winner. Loui Eriksson added an empty netter.

Here’s why this was SUCH an impressive performance from the Stars: with the Sean Avery suspension, Dallas had just enough bodies to dress 18 skaters, 11 forwards and seven defensemen. That the Stars outworked the Flames in such a situation was a small miracle, that they won was a big one. They took one penalty all game, and while it cost them, it’s pretty impressive considering they came in averaging 17.6 penalty minutes per game, sixth most in the league.

The goals came from Petersen, who had just one coming into the game, and Brunnstrom, who had played just 1:16 in the Stars’ previous game. Dave Tippet has to be happy with the way the team responded to such adversity. The Suspension, injuries, a season of poor play and worse special teams numbers could have had the Stars hanging their heads and ready to get steamrolled. But they ground out an unlikely win at Calgary, and that has to feel great.

Now then, a word on the real headline from the Calgary/Dallas game: Sean Avery and the “sloppy seconds” comment.

Who cares?

Okay that was two words, but it’s pretty hard to condense it from there. Perhaps “So?” would have worked. Here’s why it’s ludicrous. Avery is suspended INDEFINITELY for a comment to the press, while Chris Pronger is free to elbow and stomp on whomever he likes with, y’know, general impunity. Sometimes he doesn’t even get suspended for it.

It reminds me of an old Avery interview I read from Player Magazine, wherein Avery is asked what is off limits in his voluminous trashtalking.

PLAYER: A lot of that is trash talking?

SA: Yeah. I guess I know how to hit certain guys’ sore spots.

PLAYER: Are there any rules to that?

SA: Kids are pretty much the only thing that’s off limits for me. Everything else is fair game. Especially wives and girlfriends.

So do you think this is something Avery hasn’t brought up to Dion Phaneuf before, or Mike Komisarek, or Jarret Stoll? You don’t think Avery hasn’t mentioned to each of them, in passing, that he has, in fact, slept with their puckbunny girlfriends? It’s never come up? Please. And I bet they can take it. EVERYONE takes EVERYTHING Avery says with a grain of salt. It’s been that way forever. Why care now?

This is such a ridiculous reputation call that has been snowballing for months, between criticizing individual members of the media, basically calling Bettman an idiot (rightly so, in some cases), flipping off cameras and generally being kind of a dick — all as per his job title, by the way — has finally caught up to him in the league’s eyes. Plus, there’s no precedent for this, so the “throw the book at him!” attitude seems a bit of an overreaction.

Avery’s suspended indefinitely. Meanwhile, Ryan Hollweg played for the Leafs tonight. Who’s worse for the league?

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You’re darn right the Dallas Stars are down with the “hahckey mahm.” You betcha!

(The number on her jersey, by the way, denotes the place her ticket will come in on Nov. 4)

Interesting article in the Dallas Morning News yesterday about what makes the Stars’ organization so player-friendly and successful. Making the playoffs 12 times, winning the division seven times, making the conference finals four times, and winning the Stanley Cup once in 14 years since the move from Minnesota can, in one player’s view, be boiled down to one thing: no mean things are being said.

Turns out the reason Mike Ribeiro hated Montreal so much wasn’t because the media, fans, coaching staff and organization was putting undue pressure on him to perform at a high level on the ice. It was the fact that they made fun of the way he dressed.

He would be insulted and told that’s not how things work in the organization. And he always wondered, what’s the big deal?

When he was traded to the Stars, Ribeiro said he was delighted to find that while there are heavy performance demands, there also is the leeway to tread a path less traveled.

“I just really appreciate the fact that they let me be me,” Ribeiro said. “That makes you more comfortable. That makes you feel a part of the team more.”

That last part sounds an awful lot like something Clay Aiken said a little while ago, no?

Come on Mikey, you’re a hockey player. I’ve been to some games where fans say pretty nasty things about players, and somehow I didn’t picture them running home with tears in their eyes, sobbing into their pillows while their wives rubbed their backs and said, “Don’t you listen to what those mean fans say, honey.”

I mean, who gives a crap that anyone makes fun of the way you dress? When Ribeiro got traded out of Montreal, he was 25 years old. That’s how old I am now. I can honestly say that I haven’t pouted because someone made fun of my hat in quite some time. Other people’s comments shouldn’t make you play with less of an edge.

It also makes you want to do more for the team, he said. So when the coaches ask Ribeiro to grind in the corners, to play more defense, to work on his face-offs, he does just that.

I find it laughable that any player would not want to make himself better simply because someone said his pink shirt looked gay.

The relationship between a player and his organization shouldn’t be this feelings-driven. They’re not buying a puppy (in Ribeiro’s case, probably a bichon frise) together, the latter is paying the former millions of dollars to play a game.

Suck it up, Ribeiro.

P.S. Nice pants, loser.