I'm going to be on The Lounge 94.1FM at about 8:05AM MT on Tuesday morning, talking to local media dean Mark Campbell about our upcoming appearance on Test The Nation. Notes to self include not being boring and not violating the release I signed.

[Also, a bit of a bleg: I haven't been able to figure out how to record streaming audio, and Mrs. Matt will be unavailable to hear it live, so if someone out there is willing and able to capture it and send me the file, or a link (even better, then I can post it here), I'd be extremely grateful.]

Flames GM Darryl Sutter had a one hour sit-in with Rob Kerr & Co. this afternoon on The FAN 960. They're replaying it right now, so here are a few notes and impressions:

- His first comment in response to, "What are you going to be discussing at the GM meetings?" [between Games 1 & 2 of the Finals] was, "the IIHF thing", i.e. the player transfer agreement. Other guys have been on this much better than me, but no doubt that's a serious issue going forward.

- About 10 minutes in, I'm very glad I haven't been counting the times Sutter says "to be quite honest". It's bordering on a speech impediment.

- "Improvements are needed from within." True dat, due to lack of alternatives among other things.

- Yes they were after Brunnstrom. Sounds like he really was looking for a Top 2 Lines assurance; Dallas either gave it to him, or he thought it was more realistic there. Sutter evaluation: "He's a very talented player."

- Kerr asked about unsigned/undrafted players at the Worlds, and brought up a couple of goalies. Sutter: "You know what? I'm kinda not looking at goalies."

- Doesn't care if Backlund comes to play junior. Says most Scandinavian players who come to junior don't end up in the NHL, ~the best of them play in the elite leagues there until they're ready to play in the NHL. Anyone know if he's right? I can only think of Tollefsen and Sjostrom off the top of my head.

- Really likes Backlund (duh). Per the above, Puustinen "is a 19-year-old who we're not going to sign."

- Dan Ryder: "Still don't know if he wants to be a player.... it's something we've left open for him." Sounds like he's a bit of a messed up kid, Sutter made reference to his Mom & Dad "wanting the same thing as I do", or thereabouts.

- They want McElhinney back. CuJo won't be, nor will any other veteran ("it'll [the backup] be an organization guy"). No mention of Krahn, so he's gone. He wants Irving playing in QC, probably with Keetley.

- He'd like to have Grant Stevenson back. Won't be re-signing Kolanos.

- Interested in signing Vandermeer, but didn't sound super-hot. Sounds like it would depend a lot on his price. On Hale, he was more explicit about "see what he wants ($)". To me, that sounds like bye-bye: if you like him, it shouldn't be hard to afford a guy with 0 career goals.

- "Contracts don't mean those players are on your team." There's the QOTD. Translation: they are willing, if not planning, to send players to the minors to lose their cap hit.

- Probably going to draft a forward. No goalie. Only really interested in D-men who have an offensive upside, feels like they're good at "tough" (young) defensemen.

- Phone call, and I missed the rest, which I think was more about the draft.

To be quite honest, I generally liked his tone, heard some things that I wanted to hear, and didn't have to suffer through too much snarkiness. Onward.

Is there anything like playoff overtime to reinforce the fact that hockey is much better described as a puck position game than a puck possession game? Watching parts of the Sharks/Stars 4OT with no stake at all in the outcome, this just seemed crystal clear: the drama arises almost entirely from where the puck is, and hardly at all from who has it.

When the other guy's D is collecting the puck in his own zone all by himself, there's no tension at all. When your D has the puck in your end, but hasn't gotten rid of it yet and is under pressure, you hold your breath. Yes?

For those who may be interested, it looks like the Test the Nation: Sports episode that Matt refrerred to in an earlier post has been moved up and will now air on Sunday, May 25th, at 8 p.m. (EST). Interestingly, despite our trip to Toronto, a prominent place in our team's section, and having cameras in our face for two hours straight, it appears that Matt and I will no longer be guests on the show. At least that is how it appears if one looks at the list of "Armchair Athlete" members on the Test the Nation page. Not to worry, though, folks. Paul Coffey will appear on the show as a celebrity captain, along with BoA favorites Mark Lee and...wait for it...wait...patience...here it is...The Team 1260's Bob Stauffer. Bob and I actually got into a gas-fight over a signed 10 x 8 headshot of Joffrey Zoolander during the shoot, but I guess that's also been dropped. Too bad, as I screamed out "moisture is the essence of wetness, and wetness is the essence of beauty!" right before the show cut to commercial. Embarrassing for me, sure, but great television for the rest of you. It would have beat out the episode on Degrassi High where Dwayne and Joey fight in the bathroom and then Dwayne reveals that he is HIV positive as the greatest moment in Canadian television history. Sadly, it's not to be.

Edit: it looks like we are back on the show. As for the gas-fight, I've been told it will be an Easter Egg on a future DVD release of either "Little Mosque on the Prairie" or "Danger Bay." Look for it in a store near you.

"I went from lifting a lot of weights – bench-pressing 230 pounds – to just using the bar (45 pounds)."

I doubt this is a permanent gig (if so, call us, we have space!), but Pisani has an interesting post up on The Hockey News concerning his battle with ulcerative colitis. It's a bit odd to say Pisani deserves to win the Masterton Trophy this season--I'm sure he and many others nominees, like Jason Blake, would have preferred not going through the illness and/or adversity--but it really should go to him. To come back and score 13 goals four months after losing 40 pounds and being unable to walk up a flight a stairs is...well, it's damn impressive. And inspirational. In 2008, Fernando Pisani "best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship, and dedication to hockey." And for that he deserves to be recognized.

It's on, Lebron.

Like most bloggers, I like to cherry-pick facts and situations that provide evidence that I know what I'm talking about and am really, really smart. In that spirit, I think it's rather fascinating to look at the NHL's final four and realize what distinctly different paths they took to get here.

Right now, it is as clear as it has ever been that there is no magic formula for How to Construct a Successful Hockey Team. Yes, there are absolutely things in common between these teams, but there is not a similar Step One-Two-Three-etc. plan that they have followed.

Pittsburgh: built what you might call the "old school" way, i.e. the patient rebuild. Be lousy for a few years, get some very high draft picks, and when they start to dominate, surround them with some decent role players. (Also: convert some depth into a high-impact rental once the vine is ripe.)

Philadelphia: the on-the-fly (RFN) rebuild. Last summer, Tyler had what I thought was a great line:

...building an elite club requires a long series of making smart bets and having some of them hit bigger than you’ve got any right to expect them too.

With the possible exception of the word long (I say "possible" because although the calendar says it hasn't been long, they have made a ton of roster decisions in the past 15 months), this describes the Holmgren Era to a tee, doesn't it? At least right now, Briere, Timonen, Hartnell, Lupul, Smith, Upshall, and more, are providing what the GM was hoping they would provide, and rather precisely. Umberger and Coburn (and Biron, last series at least) are providing much more. And when all these acquisitions were made, they were smart bets. (No hindsight is needed, they were lauded quite roundly when they happened.)

Detroit: geez, maybe you can stay at the top forever. Obviously, these guys are the epitome of "a long series of smart bets". Terrific scouting, especially in Europe, and good decisions at the draft table. Good free agent signings to address need. It goes on.

And to top it off, they obviously run a terrific organization where players like to be. This pays off most evidently in their ability to re-sign their own free agents to good-value contracts. The Cleary extension ($2.8M x 5 years) is an absolute coup, IMO. Getting a 20+ goal scorer who is less than 30 years old signed up for 5 years at <$3M/yr is a steal (just watch what Ryan Malone gets this summer).

Dallas: Flames fans probably ought to find these guys the most intriguing of all. What do you do with a team that seems to have a pretty good core of varying ages, and is able to qualify for the playoffs year after year, but doesn't look like they have much chance to take the next step? The answer, according to the Stars of the past several seasons: "Eh, not much."

The 2006/07 season, the Stars were T-21st in Goals For and T-26th in 5v5 Goals For. This past season, they were 9th and 10th in those categories. Because -- because why? A healthier Morrow hardly begins to explain that boost. The addition of Brad Winchester and Toby Petersen? Not so much. They're just... better. A lot better offensively, and not too much worse defensively. For whatever reason.

The Stars' philosophy would seem to be (a) having a good core and a coherent philosophy is a good place to start, (b) try to make smart bets, (c) don't react harshly to disappointing results, (d) hope that luck and opportunity coincide for a run at the big prize. [Important caveat: all this may be changing with the Jackson/Hull regime; the Richards trade, and perhaps the Ribeiro extension, say that it's quite possible.]

Can this work? Maybe! Pat had a nice post on the weekend reminding us that the Wings had 5 straight seasons of "yeah they're good, but they don't quite have what it takes" before winning 3 Cups in the next 6 seasons, and being excellent ever since.

I don't know if there is an underlying truth here, but at worst, it's some evidence that when you're good-but-not-good-enough, changing philosophies (or blowing it all up) is not necessarily the way to go.

Leafs fan and Leafs' Media-hater [redundant? -ed.] Chris Selley bangs out a rather spot-on post on, "Things the hockey commentariat would be saying right now about the Montreal Canadiens if they weren't the Montreal Canadiens, and especially if they were the Toronto Maple Leafs". I liked the conclusion especially:

...I hasten to add that I prefer the media's deference to the Habs as an abiding national treasure to their treatment of the Leafs as an abiding national cold sore, since the former at least recognizes that NHL hockey, for all the passion it quite rightly arouses, is a game.

Hear hear. Even if the NHL GMs were the 30 smartest, best-informed, most sober-minded hockey people in creation, the seasons of 29 teams would end in disappointment. Way too much hockey commentary pretends otherwise.

Here's the Flames' cap situation for next season as it sits right now. Typical reports on this are not very illustrative, as they tend to mainly talk about (a) number of players under contract and (b) dollars committed. What that misses is the fact that empty roster spots have to be filled, and you have to spend real money to do so (league min. salary will be about $500k next season, IIRC).

At any rate, that bottom line number is likely either at or above the 08/09 NHL salary cap (I'm sure the new Reebok jerseys goosed revenues a bit, but not to the tune of 250 million dollars). Two things seem clear.

One: Sutter is going to have to shed some salary, one way or another. Trading Tanguay (along with another salary, touch wood), sending Eriksson to the minors and hoping he retires back to Sweden, buying out Warrener; these are some of many options and permutations.

Two: Sutter is going to have to be a good bargain shopper to improve the roster via free agency.

Important note, though: success at the first takes pressure off the second. Other important note: it's almost impossible for next year's 4th line to be worse -- less effective -- than this year's, no matter who's on it (touch wood again).

Having thought hard about it for a good 15 minutes, here is one concept for next season's roster. I'm not quite saying this is my ideal scenario (see: 15 minutes), but it's one that involves only a moderate, rather than extreme, amount of salary dumping.

Here, Warrener and Nilson are still around. In the past 24 hours or so, I've talked myself into believing that Aucoin is tradeable, so he's been traded. Eriksson has been waived, and Primeau has been bought out. (I repeat: this is not a guess as to what will happen; more like an illustration as to what the possibilities are if some but not all of the bad contracts are disposed of.)

As far as I can tell, WJC performance aside, Backlund isn't ready for the NHL quite yet, but that's too bad 'cause here he is. I didn't want to trade Tanguay for Michael Ryder, but I'm happy to spend money on a 27-year-old with some nice scoring numbers in his past whose value should be depressed for all sorts of reasons.

Conroy is back because he really wants to be, he'll take less money to be here (said so quite explicitly), and I think he still has a couple of useful years left as a 3rd-liner who can keep his head above water. Todd Fedoruk needs to be signed because, as we saw this year, Keenan simply will not fill out the lineup card without a heavyweight. So, let's make it a priority to find one who can play a bit. And no offense to CuJo, but I hate the idea of bringing him back. The good value bet here is to pay someone who has been successful stopping pucks at a good rate in the AHL; whether that's McElhinney, Michael Leighton, or someone else, I really don't care.

All for $1M less than the current scenario. This isn't how things will go, but I can at least look at this roster and think, "Hey, the Flames might be a decent team next year." YMMV.

I read a nice couple of season review/looking forward pieces on the Flames Monday afternoon. Metrognome has a terrific piece (Part 1) with a whole whack of enjoyable and incisive lines:

...When I first heard the Sutter interview in March, his claim [~"it's parity, what do you expect?" -ed.] struck me as a bit of ass-covering sophistry. "Okay is not okay" was one of his famous lines from the previous off-season. "Okay is simply inevitable" seemed to be the new Franchise motto come the end the regular season, however.

And though I agree with it quite a bit less than MG's, Eric Francis did a pretty good job of laying out the basics of a plan:

[Tanguay is] the first to admit he struggled, which is why he spoke cryptically about his future here Friday -- a future few believe will (or should) last past the NHL draft.

While Sutter is too smart to simply give a man of Tanguay's talents away, as soon as he finds a reasonable offer, he has to free up that precious cap room and inject some much-needed youth into the club. In that vein, he might just be the Flames' most-valuable player this summer.

EF's other bullets are: gut the scouting staff; re-sign Langkow and Giordano; buy out (at least?) two of Eriksson, Nilson, & Warrener; and "decide on a backup goalie" ...which is a topic for another day.

What's the actual GM thinking, as opposed to we wannabes? I thought this, from Saturday's Herald, was interesting:

The GM says the toughest calls he'll have to make this summer aren't necessarily tied to a list of unrestricted free agents that includes Kristian Huselius, Owen Nolan, Stephane Yelle, Jim Vandermeer, David Hale and Curtis Joseph.

"Those aren't the tough decisions," said Sutter. "It's the guys already under contract who aren't earning what they're making. There's a number of those guys that, based on their careers, they're third- and fourth-line guys. Well, every one of our forwards in Quad Cities (the Flames' top farm club) can play on our third and fourth lines."

At first it looks like Sutter is going down the same road as Francis, but then he takes specific aim at the depth players... wait a sec... this can't be right. Who are the guys who are (A) already under contract, and (B) based on their careers, third- and fourth-line guys? Not Iginla or Tanguay. Moss doesn't have enough GP under his belt to be one of the guys singled out here (nor does Boyd). Lombardi? Maybe, but in the same Herald piece, Sutter is quoted as saying, "...when you look at his minutes played and the way he played down the stretch... I think he can clearly be a No. 2 guy based on minutes played and performance. We're fine with that."

That leaves Wayne Primeau and Marcus Nilson. Let's insert their actual names into that quote, and tell me if you're as jarred as I am:

"Primeau and Nilson, based on their careers, they're third- and fourth-line guys. Well, every one of our forwards in Quad Cities (the Flames' top farm club) can play on our third and fourth lines."

I guess if you're a mere fan who, like me, was confused as to why these two got signed to multi-year contracts last summer, you've got company -- because Sutter is too. Which segues to my next thought, which is: if you're looking at buying anyone out, the first guy getting the money to just go away ought to be Wayne Primeau. I'm really not sure why everyone one else seems to like him more than I do, but I maintain that he doesn't bring anything to the table. He doesn't score (career high = 11 goals). He doesn't kill penalties. He doesn't shut down the other team's good players. He doesn't fight, at least not much. He doesn't stay out of the penalty box.

He may be big, and he may not be a hide-your-eyes liability in any one area, but he doesn't help you win. Here's a little table that you may wish to laugh, or cry, at. Numbers are from Vic/Time-on-Ice, and are for when that Flames forward is on the ice in even-strength situations (excluding when either goalie is pulled, i.e. 6-on-5 & EN situations).


Columns from left to right: jersey #, games played, goals for & against, saved shots for & against, missed shots for & against, Fenwick# (Vic's gloss for the total of those 3 things, for minus against), and finally Fenwick# per GP. Not to re-explain all this from scratch (that's another summer project), but if you're looking to find out who is helping the team win the even strength battle, you could do a lot worse than this table.

The biggest thing not captured by these numbers is quality of competition and quality of linemates. In Primeau's case, I'm reminded of the joke from Rounders (older than that no doubt): if you can't spot the sucker in the first half-hour at the poker table, then you ARE the sucker. Accordingly, if a guy is dead last on the team in shots for minus shots against (by a huge margin), it's a bit of a waste of time to worry about whether he had crappy linemates, because he is the crappy linemate.

A few footnotes for you to ponder as you review that table:
- Desjardins has Tanguay and Conroy as playing the toughest opposition (which matches my eye)
- Moss is a player. Nystrom probably isn't. Godard definitely isn't.

Let's wrap this up by getting back to Tanguay. There are a whole bunch of reasons why trading him right now (or in June) is a less-than-ideal plan.

1. His counting numbers (G-A-Pts) sucked this year. He will certainly have some value based on his career numbers and age (potential), and some of the teams that look closer at EV play (and correct for the fact that he "performed" on the #2 PP unit) will be interested. But trading a guy coming off his worst season in years doesn't exactly maximize return (see post header).
2. They're limited in what they can seek in return: they almost have to get a quality LW in return. Not sure if you noticed, but the Flames' depth chart at LW sans Tanguay and Huselius is virtually non-existent. Who would the #1 LW be? The right-shooting Moss, I suppose? He, or some centreman playing out of position.
3. Per 1 and 2, he's almost a mortal lock to be better next season. Huselius is gone, so he'll almost certainly be the LW on the #1 PP unit, and his numbers will go up. He just scored essentially 20 points less than his career average, and his shooting % was 5% lower than his career average. These are things that are extremely likely to bounce back.
4. If he is reunited with Iginla on the #1 line -- i.e. if the Flames can cobble together a #2 line that doesn't get torched without Tanguay on it -- their performance ceiling is unbelievably high. In 2006/07 (a mere one season ago), those two were the most productive EV players in the entire conference. They really were! Forsaking the possibility of that repeating in order to fish for "depth and energy" (esp. given Sutter's non-success at doing so to date) seems like a bad bet to me.

Your mileage may vary, as we say, but I think there are other ways to find money and try to improve that have a better chance of working. I think Aucoin showed this past season that he still has value: he stayed healthy, did a competent job on the PP, put up some attractive-ish counting numbers (10-25-35, +13), and was generally solid. The Flames can use him next season, but I'm a lot more confident that they can replace his contribution to the cause for $4M than they can replace Tanguay's for $5.25M. He has a no-trade clause (so does Tanguay), but maybe they can work with him to find a situation where he'd be happy. Primeau's contributions, as noted above, are that of a minimum salary player, but he's earning making $1M/yr more than that. Same goes for Eriksson. Etcetera.

I'd love to finish with a stirring conclusion of some kind here, but I think I'm stuck with, It should be an interesting summer.

Jean Lefebvre covers it all -- including the unanswered (and unanswerable) questions.

There's amazingly little grey area in this discussion, with one side vilifying Keenan and the other accusing the media of being sensationalistic making a mountain of snow out of a mole hill.

While the media (a very broad classification that unfortunately makes no distinction between those who operate on opposite ends of the professionalism and reasonability scales) in the past has indeed been guilty of blowing things out of proportion, it's very surprising to see so many fans so quickly ready to sweep the entire matter under the rug and shrug it off. Really, it shouldn't be easy to take at face value either hypothesis, that it's either a irreparable crisis that will necessitate either the coach or goalie leaving the organization, or that this is all entirely a media fabrication and that there's no problem at all.

Read the whole thing.

There's a temptation, when deconstructing the performance of your local hockey team after it fell short of your hopes, that ought to be resisted. It's the temptation to generalize; to attribute things to philosophy, rather than performance.

Some will say the Flames were too old, but they're not really talking about everyone, just the guys who failed to perform up to their paycheques. "We're too old... we should let Yelle go, get rid of Eriksson and Warrener, see if Aucoin can be moved so we can use his $4M for a more pressing need, give Nolan another 1-year deal, and bring back Conroy at a reduced salary, ..." -- this is not actually a beef about old guys, this is a beef about specific old guys who didn't do enough to help the team win. Or, if you prefer, who suck.

Some will say the Flames need more energy, but they're not really talking about, I dunno, finding the five guys who fly around with the most reckless abandon, adding them to the lineup, and calling it a day. They're talking about guys who are actually effective on the forecheck, not just effective-looking. If Eric Nystrom returns as the guy from March/April (post-face injury), then he'll help the team. If he returns as the guy from November and December, he won't. If Brandon Prust is nothing more than a Wayne Primeau clone, adding him to the lineup won't help. They don't need "energy guys"; they need energy guys who don't suck. And who doesn't.

Some say the Flames are too slow, but they're not referring to Robyn Regehr, who, despite having below-average speed, does an important job and does it well. They're referring to the slow guys who also suck.

As the great Brad Goodman said, there's no trick to it: it's just a simple trick. You need good hockey players -- regardless of age, speed, style, whatever -- and to be really good, you need guys who will outplay their contracts. If there was a simple formula to achieve that, 26 or 28 teams would win the Stanley Cup every year. Actually, you're right, still only one would.

First, my own take: I didn't agree with the decision to pull Kipper in favour of CuJo in the 2nd period of G7 (and then leave him in for the 3rd), but it was defensible. Pace Darryl Sutter and many others, that 2nd goal was horrible: Kipper clearly did see the puck, which is why he moved his stick in anticipation of the deflection that didn't happen and left his 5-hole open. And the fact that the Flames players were "furious" with the move is a point in Keenan's favour, not against him. (When you're down 4-2, furious isn't a bad way to be IMO.)

Anyway, this whole brouhaha is mostly (A) misplaced fan frustration, and (B) relieved told-you-so's re: "Iron Mike" from the media corps, but it is obscuring the broader, more serious issue -- if you want to be stressed about something, this is it, and just because Cosh brought it up simply to be a dick doesn't change the reality of it. These are Kipper's career numbers with the Flames:


I guesss you could look at this and shrug, and say he'll be fine, he's an elite goalie. I'd prefer some sort of explanation, though. Possibilities:

1. He had a couple of hot years, and he's settling down to be a quality, if average-ish, NHL goalie
2. He is progressively deteriorating, due to age, wear-and-tear, a specific health issue, poor fitness, an unhealthy lifestyle, dwindling desire (pick any or all, and PS, no libel in the comments please)
3. He was very comfortable and confident with Sutter as the coach, less so with Playfair, and even less so with Keenan
4. The team in front of him is, progressively, allowing better quality scoring chances
5. Other

I'm open to suggestion on #5. I'm almost certain that #4 is not true, but give me a couple days and I might track down someone who can tell me more empirically (JavaGeek, for one, tracks Expected SV% and GAA based on the location & type of Shots Against).

#3 is the hot button topic right now... I'm sure I won't change anyone's mind here, but I have a hell of a time attributing the difference between today's Kipper and the one of 2-3 seasons ago to Head Coaching. If Kipper had had the same EV SV% this season as he did last season (the Playfair season, where, again, I'm pretty certain the D wasn't "tighter" re: quality of shots), he would have allowed 20 fewer goals. Twenty. To me, that's an awful lot of missed saves to put onto Mike Keenan.

Believe me when I say, I hate to sound gloomy about this, but I'm hoping that the answer is #1; I think #1 and #2 are the only explanations that hold up, and #2 is far too horrible to contemplate. (Kipper's contract extension might prove more regrettable than Kevin Lowe's? Say it ain't so!!!)

Okay, the hated rival is out, the arrogant p**ck who skipped town is shopping on Rodeo Drive, and most of the Canadian teams are gone. So who's left to cheer against?

Calgary Flames
Burke Prongers
Ottawa Senators
Vancouver Canucks
Carolina Hurricanes
Toronto Maple Leafs
Minnesota Wild

I think it's pretty easy. Here's my list of who I want gone.

Dallas Stars
San Jose Sharks
Montreal Canadiens
Detroit Red Wings
Philadelphia Zoolanders

I'd be fine with a Ryan Smyth vs. Georges Laraque final. Anyone else? Crosby? Here's the schedule for the conference semi-finals.

“We haven't done many deals with Vancouver, although Dave Nonis and I had many conversations,” Lowe noted. “I suspect we won't be doing any in the future."

So what is that, four teams the Oilers can't deal with now? Anaheim, Buffalo, Calgary, and now Vancouver?

While I understand Kevin Lowe's frustration, and the fact that the Oilers and Canucks don't often trade with each other, I also don't think it's wise to bump the number of teams in the league that you can't trade with up to 14%. Call me crazy, but that just doesn't make a ton of business sense. Which brings to mind the words Lowe had for Brian Burke earlier this season: it's a business. Let's hope Lowe keeps those words in mind, along with the fact that the Oilers narrowly escaped being stuck with Michael Nylander for four years, before he makes any more rash statements about the hiring of Mike Gillis.

(Flashback) The Flames were a five-handicap in a tournament where they needed to beat a bunch of threes, twos, and scratches. They didn't need miracles, but they needed a lot of things to go right. And it sucks to say (it sucks even more that it's true), but their putting let them down a bit. Sorry Kipper.

Also, looks like this 'Lupul' is a real playoff performer. KLowe will probably want to look into him, he's a G-A-B who even has a family connection to the Oil's outgoing ownership.

More Flames season debriefing later, when Private Time is over.

This is Ray Whitney. He has, quite quietly, put together a heck of an NHL career. He has two more years on a well-earned contract with the Carolina Hurricanes; during that time, he's likely to pass some significant milestones: 1000GP, 300 goals, 800 points.

In 1995, he was a San Jose Shark. At that time, he had established himself as a major-leaguer, but was still mainly known as that other Spokane Chief, having been drafted by the Sharks in the '91 2nd round after his junior teammate Pat Falloon was drafted in the 1st (#2 overall, right behind Lindros). I'll get back to him later.


I guess, whatever happens tonight, I can at least say that my optimism was justified. The Sharks aren't the '77 Habs; Brian Campbell isn't an "every shift" type of difference maker; the Flames have been the Sharks' equals (at least) 5v5; and Calgary's depth forwards haven't been run over by San Jose's 4 Lines. (Thru 6 games, the Sharks are +4/-4 5v5 with Thornton on the bench; with Iginla watching from the bench, the Flames are... +4/-4.)

These are all things that, contrary to the "playoffs are a different game" chanters on the tee-vee, follow closely from what we saw in the regular season (with a dose of common sense thrown in). Iginla and Thornton are great players who will create scoring chances every game; sometimes more, sometimes fewer, sometimes they go in and sometimes they don't; that's what they are. Nabokov and Kipper are excellent goalies who occasionally let in an iffy one; that's what they are.

The only thing that hasn't quite followed to form is the special teams, where CGY is 5/20 on the PP and SJ is 4/27. If they played another 6 games, I'd expect those numbers to reverse (or worse). But, they aren't... :)

So are there any wild cards for tonight? Things we might expect to see that are, uh, unexpected? Maybe a couple:

*Huselius. I'm really not a big believer in 'confidence' as a driver of results -- my default assumption is that pro hockey players are more confident in their abilities on their worst day than you are confident in their abilities on their best day -- but maybe this guy is the exception.

He had a terrific game on Sunday, got into it physically, and looked strong on the puck. Maybe this will translate into a PP goal.

*Godard. I wrote a big thing last month about consistency, using golf as an analogy. If the Flames were a competitive golfer, scratching Godard would be the equivalent of taking the 3-iron, which they always hit like crap, out of the bag and leaving it in the trunk. It's a move that can have immediate postive consequences on the score even though it doesn't magically make them a better golfer.

*The Tank...


I was in the Saddledome for Game 7, Sharks v. Flames, in 1995. The home crowd was weary from several seasons worth of disappointing playoff exits, and while they were plenty loud and ready to explode when things went right, they were tense. When things went wrong, there was an unmistakeable, "Oh, no, here we go again" vibe.

So based on some agonizing personal experience, I'm going to guess that the longer tonight's game goes with the result still in question, the more it will turn into a Guillotine Game for the home fans. They'll be raucous and emotional, but not necessarily in a manner that helps the Sharks. They'll just be waiting, assuming, knowing that Calgary's Ray Whitney, whoever that is, will eventually stick the knife in and twist. Go Flames.

Hell yeah. Go Flames!

Robert Cleave, last night's game thread:

I likely saw the Flames 25 or so times this year, and I don't remember them having so little to do in a third period to hold a lead against an allegedly competent team. Maybe one of the woohooing types can amplify, but my sense is they normally exhibit the late game defensive zone composure of Kevin Bacon at the end of Animal House.

Stars Guy james t o'brien, basking in the post-victory glow:

I think I've stumbled on a solid nickname for Brad Richards: the $5 shake. As you may remember from "Pulp Fiction," Mia Wallace (Uma Thurman) orders the questionably priced shake and John Travolta is understandably skeptical. Although no shake could be worth $5, Travolta ultimately admitted that it was a "damn good shake." But not worth $5.

I love the hockeysphere.

This is Alex Tanguay. I spent much of the middle part of this season banging the drum for him, whether it was regarding trade rumours, or what to do to retain Huselius (there's a topic not broached much lately), or just the state of the club in general. Naturally, he ended up posting very indistinguished G-A-Pt numbers, and really, just didn't have a great season.

Game 6 vs. San Jose goes tonight (6PM MT, CBC) at the 'Dome, and my victory scenarios (and 2-game winning streak scenarios) all involve some bounces going his way.

Signs from the last couple of games, in this regard, are promising. The puck has been following him around. My personal bellwether for whether Tanguay is being effective is if a lot of fans are annoyed by his refusal to shoot more. If they are, that's good! -- it means he has the puck a lot in and around the scoring areas, and a career's worth of precedent tells us that it will regularly end up in the other guy's net when that happens.

I don't have a prediction for tonight. I really hope the Flames play as well as they can. Next year, the team will look different; their biggest hole is forward depth, and they're going to be going backwards before they can go forwards. Right now -- even down 3-2, to a very good team, in only the first round -- their odds of winning the WC and the Stanley are probably better than they are for next season.

Go Flames!