The Two-Line Pass

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Saturday night Ryan Suter went back to Nashville for the first time since he signed that massive deal with Minnesota and broke up arguably the most dominant defensive pairing in hockey.

To the surprise of literally no one, the sellout crowd at Bridgestone Arena spent the entire game booing him whenever he touched the puck, all night long. Well, hold on. One person was surprised that no one deigned to thank Suter for the years of his life he dedicated to making that city a hockey market.

That person was Ryan Suter.

“I was just trying to get through it, trying to block it out,” he said, wiping away tears as fresh and deep blue as Minnesota’s 10,000 lakes with a fistful of $100 bills, which he promptly threw in the trash. “It’s not fun being booed. It went the whole game, too. That kind of surprised me. They’ll probably have some sore throats tomorrow.”

I don’t know what it’s like to be a super-rich, mega-talented professional athlete. That may come as a surprise to you, but I have very limited experience being either of those things. So maybe I don’t understand what, in Ryan Suter’s world, was meant to have happened when he came out for warmups, or when he touched the puck. Should old men have wiped away tears of joy that their homegrown talent had finally cashed in and been able to buy a nice, comfortable home in the country for pretty much every member of his extended family? Should children who spent a week after the signing crying into their No. 20 Preds jerseys have gone wild at the chance to see their favorite player return to his old rink? Should drunk guys in their 30s have clapped in stoic appreciation of all he’d done to make them give a rat’s ass about this sport?

Maybe he thought they’d throw roses on the ice when he picked up an assist on Zach Parise’s goal to open the scoring, like a matador who had successfully slain the savage beast of The Pressure that comes with heading back to his old stomping grounds. He had to answer a lot of questions about it this week, folks. Show a little class.

The bad news for Suter is that an entire city of people hate him enough to boo him for a little less than half an hour. The good news for Suter is that his Wild won in a shootout. And also that he’s super rich and wouldn’t care if anyone who booed him in particular lived or died. But when they all do it at once? That’s a little tough to take.

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

(Ed. note: I haven’t written a post like this in three years but now seems as good a time as any to do it again because of you-know-what.)

The entire purpose of my entire foray into the hockey blogging world was basically to highlight all the terrible and stupid things that happen in this great sport on a yearly basis. Much of that is driven by the sport’s greatest professional organization (for better or worse (worse)), the National Hockey League, so there was usually no shortage of fodder.

And for a little while (read: two years) after I started, I would compile a list of the dumbest things that happened in the previous calendar year and make fun of them all over again. Then I stopped for no good reason other than I got lazy. Frankly, I didn’t even remember I used to do it until like two days ago. So I decided to do it again. Here are Nos. 10-6 of the worst things to happen in hockey this year, as far as I’m concerned:

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Hi! I’m writing these posts as part of a Write-A-Thon 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!

It can be said, for sure, that many old-timey hockey guys don’t have a firm grasp on the ways in which statistical analysis of the sport is revolutionizing it, and our understanding thereof. It can also be said that they likely don’t want to have a firm grasp of that kind of thing. I saw the trailers for “Trouble with the Curve.” I know how the game be.

But that kind of lack of understanding was perhaps never more evident than a recent interview Preds coach Barry Trotz gave ESPN’s Craig Custance, in defense of the largely indefensible contract his team recently extended to Paul freakin’ Gaustad. You remember that one, right? It was for four years and $13 million. For a grind-line guy who, yes, is very good at faceoffs. Isn’t that right, Barry?

“Paul Gaustad fits perfectly to the needs of the Nashville Predators,” he told Custance.

That may very well be true. The Preds were tied for 21st in the league last season with a faceoff percentage of just 49, and Gaustad was seventh in the league at 57.3. That’s a huge jump and if you can use him situationally — then get him the hell off the ice — to win a draw on a crucial power play or late in the game. That’s totally fair. Trotz also notes that he’s a great leader and sets a sterling example for the Preds’ terribly young roster. Less important, but okay, whatever.

Then came the money quote:

“If the game is on the line, Paul Gaustad will be taking that draw. You’re up a goal with a minute left in the game, Paul Gaustad is out there. Is he worth 10 points a year? Probably.”

Well, uhh, how to put this nicely? Paul Gaustad’s ability to win close-and-late draws is worth 10 points a year in the way that Trotz’s neck is reminiscent of a giraffe’s. In that it is not in any way.

Let’s look at the basic facts. Paul Gaustad’s corsi relative last year was an astonishingly bad -11.5, though it must be said he didn’t exactly play slouches giving that he is a checking line center. That number means when he’s on the ice, his team gives up a lot more shots than it produces, regardless of how many draws he wins in vital situations (still less than three out of every five).

Let’s remember that this contract came after the Predators traded a first-round pick to acquire him, and a 14-game regular season in which Gaustad compiled a staggering 0-4-4, and 1-1-2 in 10 playoff games. So it’s not as though even basic counting stats are in any way helpful in vindicating this contract.

But okay, maybe all that isn’t fair. Let’s look at the point shares Gaustad earned last season for both Buffalo and Nashville, according to Hockey-Reference. If you guessed 1.2, you are correct. That’s KIND of close to 10, right? Hell, by this metric, Gaustad has only racked up 14.1 points for his teams in nine NHL seasons, so it’s not like last season was even an aberration.

For comparison, here is a list of skaters who WERE worth 10 or more points last season: Evgeni Malkin (15.7), Steven Stamkos (14.7), Erik Karlsson (13.1), Shea Weber (11.4), Marian Gaborik (11.2), Alex Pietrangelo (11.2), James Neal (11), Zdeno Chara (10.9), Claude Giroux (10.6), Ilya Kovalchuk (10.5), Jason Spezza (10.5), and Jordan Eberle (10.3). In short, the elitest of elite players. And only those players.

Granted, all those guys make a hell of a lot more than Gaustad’s $3.25 million, but 1.2 point shares is more in line with what Jim Slater and Nate Guenin provided to their teams last season. If you think you should be paying a player of Nate Guenin’s caliber that much more than league minimum, please get out of the NHL.

Although, now that I think about it, it occurs to me that Trotz might have meant “points” as in “goals and assists,” and Gaustad is certainly worth that.

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

The Lead

Somewhere in the immediate vicinity of New York City, Gary Bettman just woke up fully aroused.

For those that thought last night’s Columbus/Edmonton game was a delight to watch, kill a puppy if you have to in order to obtain a tape of tonight’s Calgary Flames/Nashville Predators game. In the New NHLiest game I maybe have ever seen in my life, Calgary won 7-6 in a game that featured a few breakaway goals, four power play goals, THREE shorties, a penalty shot, and nine goals in the last two periods alone.

At one point in the second period, Calgary led the game 5-0 and seemed to be ready to take this one in a laugher. The Flames had scored four goals on just 10 shots on Pekka Renne, well, Dan Ellis hasn’t really inspired much confidence of late either. But because the Flames got fat and happy on their five-goal lead, Nashville began to claw its way back in.

The Preds scored three times in the space of 5:25 to cut the Calgary lead to two, but a goal 60 seconds later from Daymond Langkow, who had another goal disallowed earlier in the period, put the Flames up three again. The teams went into the second intermission with Calgary up 6-3.

The third period was perhaps both teams’ worst 20 minutes of hockey all season. Jarome Iginla scored his second of the game on the power play just 38 seconds in to make it 7-3 and the game appeared to be out of reach, especially considering the Flames had allowed just seven third-period goals all year coming in (tied for second-best in the league). But the Flames tried to sit on it and fiddle around with the puck too much, and Nashville came roaring back. David Legwand scored at 5:26 but Calgary seemed to go into lockdown mode again until the final few minutes, when they got lazy, stupid and careless.

The Flames allowed a shorthanded breakaway to Vernon goddamn Fiddler of all people and Adrian Aucoin felt it necessary to hook him for a clear penalty shot opportunity despite the fact that Fiddler had two strides on him at least and any hook would have been superficially helpful in stopping him at best. Fiddler, of course, buried his penalty shot, because why wouldn’t he? Shea Weber’s second goal of the game, which was also shorthanded, came with just 20 seconds left, and even after Nashville called a timeout, the Flames gave up another decent scoring opportunity.

Mike Keenan left the bench shaking his head, and it’s not hard to tell why. His team, which had already lost two in a row prior to tonight, couldn’t even nurse on a FIVE-GOAL LEAD through the remaining 40-odd minutes of a game that should have ended 9-2. Calgary missed too many empty nets (Iginla put it into the end boards on a breakaway and the third and fourth lines missed tap-ins) and gave too many second and third opportunities and good chances.

Put it this way, you NEVER want to have the final minute of a game you led 5-0 in the second period be a nailbiter. It just shouldn’t happen on any level. Nashville did a great job coming back to make it interesting, but Calgary did a better job letting them do it and nearly erased strong contributions from Iginla (2-2-4), Craig Conroy (2-1-3) and Todd Bertuzzi (0-3-3).

Weber keyed the Nashville comeback with his two goals, but both Martin Erat and David Legwand chipped in with 1-2-3 lines and Jason Arnott and Vernon Fiddler each had a goal and an assist.

In the goaltending gong show, the three goalies combined to allow 13 goals on 58 shots, with Miikka Kiprusoff stopping 23 of 29, Rinne making six saves on 10 shots in his one period of work, and Dan Ellis having the best night of the bunch with 16 saves on 19 shots. Yes, the runaway best goalie in the game had a save percentage of .842.

This game was a total mess from start to finish but hey scoring in the league is up this year so hooray for goals at the expense of legitimate hockey!

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We’re now something like four days out from the start of the NHL season, which means I have to kick these season previews into overdrive because I’m a lazy idiot. This is mainly for two reasons: 1) I am lazy and there’s no way I’ll do one of these every day, and 2) These started early enough that if I just stop doing them entirely you’ll have forgotten by October anyway. Oh and I guess also to show off my near-infinite knowledge of the National Hockey League. I’ll be previewing the teams in reverse order of finish in the 2007-08 season. Please note, though, that this is the opinion of one man, however smart and handsome he may be.

Nashville Predators, you’re on the clock.

There’s been a lot of talk about the Predators this summer, and all of it has focused on bad things.

A member of the ownership group turned out to be a fraud (and really, with a name like “Boots,” who didn’t see that coming?) and one of their best players was all like, “Screw this, I’d rather play in Russia.”

More after the jump.

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It is shockingly easy to find unflattering pictures of Gary bettman

Over the last few days, it has become abundantly clear that Gary Bettman (get ready) screwed up royally in selling the Nashville Predators to a group of local investors that included William “Boots” Del Biaggio.

Now, Mr. Del Biaggio is under both bankruptcy protection and FBI investigation. And amid allegations that the NHL failed to perform due diligence on his background, it turns out that he had outlined to investors a scenario in which he would move the team to the noted hockey hotbed of Kansas City.

Great job, Gary.

While I agree with the larger sentiment of this article that the NHL shockingly screwed the pooch in its aggressive overexpansion into markets that were at best indifferent to the sport, I doubt that anti-Canadian bias is what has fueled Bettman’s almost psychotic desire to not move American teams to Hamilton or Winnipeg. It’s pride.

By allowing Jim Balsillie, who would have paid much more than the local investors, to move the Preds to his native Hamilton, Bettman would have been admitting in some way that he was wrong, that the American South could care less about hockey unless the team is winning, and typically only if it is. It might have proven that moving the Jets to Phoenix, the Whalers to Carolina, and the Stars to Dallas maybe wasn’t the brightest idea (which awarding the very successful Wild franchise to Minnesota had already partly done). It would have definitely proven that expanding to Nashville, Anaheim, Tampa, Atlanta, Miami and Columbus was a remarkably ill-conceived idea.

So Bettman blew up Balsillie’s plans to buy what could be turned into another successful Canadian franchise that sold out every night and never struggled to keep its stars in order to keep its head above the high-tide line of red ink. To call it anti-Canadian is to give the NHL too much credit for its foresight. Bettman and Co. have no plan except to not be made to look foolish by a near-success in Nashville hit the fan.

Canucks Corner has a great writeup of the financial particulars, and it shows with great clarity the many acrobatic ways in which the NHL bent over backwards to allow for the local group, who never had the kind of financial stability Balsillie did, to purchase the team. A discount of almost $20 million on the originally agreed-upon price seems a little odd, doesn’t it?

Well, the Tennessean has that covered: the league didn’t even investigate Del Biaggio properly.

Doug Bergeron, a California-based Canadian investor and entrepreneur and president of DGB Investments, was among those to whom Del Biaggio tried to market a share of the Predators.

Bergeron said Del Biaggio told him in December that National Hockey League Commissioner Gary Bettman’s office had given special permission for Del Biaggio to buy a share of the team without being subjected to all the scrutiny the league usually gives to prospective owners. Del Biaggio told him the commissioner’s office did not require him to show audited financial statements before it approved him.

The NHL’s deputy commissioner, Bill Daly, issued a kinda-sorta denial.

“With respect to Mr. Del Biaggio’s apparent claim that the League waived certain of our standard financial background checks, we do not believe that to be the case.”

Don’t believe? This is some real Watergate talk. Wouldn’t it be smart, and indeed incumbent upon the league to flatly deny this? It either did waive the background checks or it did not. Either way, the mounting evidence doesn’t look good for them.

Gary Bettman might, and probably should, lose his job over this, if any of it is true. Maybe he can ask David Stern for another job with the NBA. They can chit-chat with Bud Selig about which is the worst commissioner in professional sports today.

До тех пор, suckers!

Around mid-afternoon yesterday, it was announced that the NHL and the new Kontinental Hockey League (the expanded former Russian Super League) would both “respect” the other league’s contracts and agree not to poach players from one league or the other.

The NHL had grown increasingly concerned with several Russian clubs’ desire to lure the dynamic Evgeni Malkin back to his homeland with big, tax-free contracts. There hasn’t been a transfer agreement between the leagues in three years, but that’s all been sorted out now, and everyone’s just fine with the agreement.

“Everyone in the room agreed that for the foreseeable future everyone will respect everybody’s contracts,” NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly said.

Players’ union director Paul Kelly said all parties recognized the need for “clear respect between leagues.”

…

“There is no sense to make a war,” IIHF president Rene Fasel said. “Everyone agrees we could make a war very easily, but with no winner. The loser will be the game.

“Even if we don’t have a transfer agreement today we have a very good understanding of each other.”

But then later in the night, word got out that Predators forward Alexander Radulov had signed a deal with Russian team Ufa despite still being under contract in Nashville. Here are some highlights from an interview with the Russian paper Sport Express (click only if you can read Cyrillic moon writing).

“I have told them several times that I have an offer from Ufa and a great desire to play in Russia. I told them that what Ufa offered was much better than there in Nashville. They listened to me and said they would call back. Up until now I have received no call. Looks like they did not want to keep me that much, or maybe thought I would not dare take such a step.”

Or MAYBE it’s because you’re still currently under contract with them and they couldn’t just renegotiate a new contract in the middle of an existing one, and certainly not one that could come close to matching the $13 million over three years in tax-free cash the Russian team offered.

The IIHF has since demanded that the Ufa contract be voided, but KHL president Alexander Medvedev has since said that the transfer agreement doesn’t take effect until July 14, so no big deal (again, moon language).

Frankly this all seems a little fishy to me. If you take a look at his player history, Radulov has been committed to the North American development process since being drafted, playing full seasons for the QMJHL’s Quebec Ramparts and then even playing in the AHL for Milwaukee, the concept of which causes so many players to balk and head back to Mother Russia rather than face the indignity of playing hockey in Iowa.

If Radulov is forced to come back, that will be the most awkward moment in the NHL since Mark Messier met Gary Coleman.