Occasionally Wright

Nash-tastic

This might be the most impressive goal I've ever seen.

Sid the Kid

There's been some anti-Crosby backlash in some hockey markets and some people would like to think he's not a nice kid. Given the amount of pressure he's under and how much he time he spends dealing with the media and fans I think he's remarkably patient and extremely well grounded.

With the Penguins in town to play the Thrashers I had a chance to talk to him for a few seconds today and I told him a family friend from home wanted me to say hi to him on his behalf. As soon as I said the friend's name Sidney Crosby knew exactly who I was talking about. The kid meets thousands of people every year but without even mentioning the context of when he had met the friend of the family he knew who I meant.

"Sidney Smith wanted me to say hi to you for him."
"Yeah! Sid from PEI. Say hi to him back."

There was nothing fake about. He remembered golfing with Sid Smith at Brad Richards' charity tournament last summer.

I'd be fine with Crosby being held pointless tonight, but it's tough not to root for a kid like that. It's little wonder that he's leading the Eastern Conference in All-Star voting (Vote Hossa!).

Benny Goes Big Time

TSN carried a great human interest story on Monday related to the Thrashers. Give it a read if you have a few minutes. You might know the author.

You can also find the story here.

New Era for the Bruins

According to TSN, the Boston Globe and the Bruins official website the Bruins have extended contract offers to most of their key players from last year. Joe Thornton was offered a 5-year deal (rumoured to be in the $6 million range), Sergei Gonchar was offered 4 years and PJ Axelsson, Martin Lapointe and Sergei Samsonov were tendered 3-year contracts. Gonchar and Lapointe are both unrestricted free agents as of August 1 while the rest are restricted free agents.

My thoughts?

• In the past it has been extremely rare for the Bruins to comment on contract talks or terms publicly. I like the new openness and suspect it's a result of Charlie Jacobs playing a much larger role in the organization. Word is that they've also hired a PR firm to help them relauch the Bruins brand. I presume that where this came from.
• PJ Axelsson is one of the most underrated two-way players in the game. I'm ecstatic that they've offered him a longish term deal and I expect him to jump at it given that few other teams realize how good he is.
• If they want Thornton to stay they'll have to offer more than $6 million per year. He might not get the max over five years but he should get close.
• If Lapointe chooses to leave (and his agent says he'll test the waters next week before making any decisions) I won't be terribly disappointed. He didn't live up to expectations while he was in Boston but I can forgive that considering what a huge role he played as Patrice Bergeron's mentor last season (and by last season I mean the last season played- 2003-2004). Rumours have him  potentially receiving offers from Montreal and Detroit next week. If he leaves I wish him the best. If he stays I say management should have a quiet, discreet talk with Joe Thornton and ask him to focus on his game and pass the 'C' to Lapointe who is far more of a presence in the dressing room than he is on the ice.  you can't take the captaincy from a guy you plan to build your team around but I think Joe would be better without that extra burden for now. Give it to a natural leader.
• If Gonchar doesn't sign I expect the Bruins to be in the thick of things for Scott Niedermeyer and/or Chris Pronger if St Louis lets him go. The Bruins have defensive blueliners. They need a powerplay quarterback.
• I love Sergei Samsonov when he's healthy and playing with confidence. Unfortunately he's a china doll and is slump prone. He's on the bubble. He needs a huge year to prove himself but if the Bruins don't sign him for more than one year I have visions of him breaking out as a free agent signee somewhere else next year (with Datsyuk in Detroit?).
• I'd like to see an offer made to Glen Murray.  Once these higher profile contracts are taken care of I expect offers to be made to Jonathan Girard, Andrew Raycroft and Nick Boynton. Anyone else is replaceable.

It Was Just A Matter of Time...

We may not have had an NHL season but today all is right in the hockey world? Why, you ask? Because today, finally, on June 8, #8 Cam Neely is a Hall of Famer. the only drawback is that John Buccigross (who interviews Neely here) no longer has anything to write about and will probably be forced into columnist retirement.

What can be said about #8? Well as legend has it in his first game as a Bruin he fought in the first period, got busted open, got stitched up, came out, fought in the second and reopened the wound, got stitched up again, then came back and scored the game winner in the third. I have no evidence to back this up, but that's the legend. How tough was he? The only thing that could force him to retire was the fact that his quad muscle turned to bone. Beat that.

Congratulations Cam. It's about time.

Everything else you need to know about Cam Neely can be found here.

What's the Motivation?

Sometimes celebrities get off easy when they're charged because they're celebrities. Martha Stewart comes to mind. Other times celebrities get penalized for being celebrities because someone wants to make an example out of them. I'm no legal expert but to me it seems like overkill to go after Dany Heatley with charges of vehicular homicide in the first degree, vehicular homicide in the second degree, reckless driving, driving too fast for conditions, and failure to maintain his lane and speeding. If convicted on all counts Heatley could face up to 20 years in prison and $5,000 in fines. The average sentence in Georgia for those charges is 7.4 years according to sportsnet News.

Why does it seem like overkill? Because the victim's family bears no ill will against the defendant and has asked for leniency, therefore it was completely up to the Fulton County DA as to what charges would be pressed. So why is DA Paul Howard throwing the book at Heatley? Well, remeber when Atlanta Falcon Ray Lewis was charged with murder back in 2000? Remember when he pled out to a minor charge and then the DA dropped all other charges because their case was full of holes? That DA's name was Paul Howard, the same guy going after Heatley. You know he had egg on his face when he had to drop the charges in the case against Lewis and didn't come off looking good at all. Guess who's up for re-election on November 2? Nobody is running against him yet but I get the feeling he wants to redeem himself.

Simpson the Senator

People like to say that the Ottawa Senators aren't tough enough to beat the Leafs. I think it's a stupid debate because whether or not you can physically beat the dirtiest team in the NHL is hardly a measure of success, but apparently GM Muckler thought people have a point. As a result he traded spare part Petr Schastlivy for Anaheim defenseman Todd Simpson. Simpson's a bit of a scrapper and not a defensive liability, so the move will probably help the Senators out in the long run. They aren't exactly deep at the blueline after their top 3 or 4 guys so Simpson should see a bit of ice-time. Rumour has it that Muckler has been in contact with semi-retired scrapper Rob Ray as well. With the additoin of Simpson they might not need him. Ray would take up a roster spot, and there really doesn't seem like there's much point in bringing him back to sit in the press box. He can only be an effective deterrent if he plays, but who would you bump from the roster? I suppose you could give him Schatslivy's spot but I have a feeling it's being kept warm for another man named Peter.

Quinn and the Cup

It occured to me today that there's something weird about Quinn now being 4th on the all-time wins list for NHL coaches behind Scotty Bowman, Al Arbour and Dick Irvin Sr. what is it? Well, Bowman won 9 Stanley Cups as a coach, Arbour won 4 and so did Dick Irvin Sr. How many has Pat Quinn won? How about none. It must be tough to be that successful as a coach but always fall short when it counts.

Pat Quinn

I've never been a big fan of Pat Quinn. As a General Manager I don't really have a problem with him but as a coach he drives me nuts. Players seem to love him because he leads by example, and that's probably why I don't like him- his example is to whine, complain, and criticize everyone and everything except his own team. His players follow the model to a T. Black, Red & Gold has a couple of posts about why Quinn is disliked and why he's a bad choice to represent Canada as our coach at the 2004 World Cup. On top of the bits about lying and being a crook Quinn refuses to give credit to anyone for anything unless they wear a Leaf's jersey. For example, Toronto lost 4-1 to the 29th place Blackhawks tonight despite outshooting them 44-15. Chicago goalie Craig Anderson was outstanding in getting just his second career NHL win. When asked about him Quinn's response was typical- "Yeah, I guess he played good, but we did a lot to make him look good." Come on, give the kid some credit Quinn. Anderson kept the Hawks alive in a game that should have been a shootout.

The best part about the Leafs loss is that 3 of the 4 goals were scored by former Toronto players. Nicely done guys.

Who is that masked man?

Reggie Lemelin, Andy Moog, Matt Delguidice, Norm Foster, Daniel Berthiaume, Mike Bales, John Blue, John Casey, Vincent Riendeau, Blaine Lacher, Craig Billington, Bill Ranford, Rob Tallas, Scott Bailey, Tim Chelvaldae, Jim Carey, Paxton Schafer, John Grahame, Byron Dafoe, Andrew Raycroft, Peter Skudra, Kay Whitmore, Steve Shields, Tim Thomas, Jeff Hackett and Felix Potvin.

What do all of these people have in common? They've all been between the pipes for the Boston Bruins since I started following them during the 1989-1990 season. That’s 26 goalies over 14 seasons. They had 18 goalies in 8 seasons before they got Dafoe who is the only goalie since Andy Moog left at the end of the '93 season to start 40+ games in back to back seasons.