NHL Hockey Round-Up - B-Style
Let's start of close to home - Toronto Maple Leafs. The Leafs are laughable, but I guess I choose a bad game to watch - Ottawa Senators at the ScotiaBank Centre in Ottawa. Their defence is causing their downfall, I mean, I've watched bits and pieces of some of their other games, and highlights on TV, and they're always out of position, letting up easy goals. It's not Vesa Toskala's or Andrew Raycroft's fault that they let in so many goals, the defence has got to get better for this team to make it to the playoffs. The goalies aren't Gods!
The Philadelphia Flyers. I guess the team's tradition nickname really fits here - Broad Street Bullies. In the pre-season, rookie Steve Downie concusses Dean McAmmond of the the Sens with a vicious hit behind the net. This earns him a 30-game suspension. In the regular season, Jesse Boulerice viciously cross-checks Vancouver Canuck, Ryan Kesler across the face. Boulerice would get a 25-game suspension. And the most recent wasn't a goon move, but Randy Jones checks Patrice Bergeron from behind and sends him face first into the end boards. The hit wasn't malicious, and he only gets 2 games. This one, after watching it on TV, I'd agree with, the other two, those guys are crazy.
The thing with the goons in the NHL is, I don't understand why there are dirty players. The ones that look to hurt, even though, the cliche is that, "That's my style, that's how I play. I play hard and aggressive." I think there's a fine line to that. If you're playing hard and aggressive, it doesn't mean that you need to lay the body on someone and take him out of the game. You could play hard and aggressive without contact.
Goalie surprises so far this season:
Poor Performances: Martin Brodeur of the New Jersey Devils, Mikka Kiprusoff of the Calgary Flames, Roberto Luongo of the Canucks.
Kicking Butt!: Pascal Leclaire of the Columbus Blue Jackets, Dan Ellis of the Nashville Predators, Chris Osgood of the Detroit Red Wings, Martin Gerber of the Ottawa Senators, Dany Sabourin of the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Not much else to say! Go Habs! Go Avs!
The Philadelphia Flyers. I guess the team's tradition nickname really fits here - Broad Street Bullies. In the pre-season, rookie Steve Downie concusses Dean McAmmond of the the Sens with a vicious hit behind the net. This earns him a 30-game suspension. In the regular season, Jesse Boulerice viciously cross-checks Vancouver Canuck, Ryan Kesler across the face. Boulerice would get a 25-game suspension. And the most recent wasn't a goon move, but Randy Jones checks Patrice Bergeron from behind and sends him face first into the end boards. The hit wasn't malicious, and he only gets 2 games. This one, after watching it on TV, I'd agree with, the other two, those guys are crazy.
The thing with the goons in the NHL is, I don't understand why there are dirty players. The ones that look to hurt, even though, the cliche is that, "That's my style, that's how I play. I play hard and aggressive." I think there's a fine line to that. If you're playing hard and aggressive, it doesn't mean that you need to lay the body on someone and take him out of the game. You could play hard and aggressive without contact.
Goalie surprises so far this season:
Poor Performances: Martin Brodeur of the New Jersey Devils, Mikka Kiprusoff of the Calgary Flames, Roberto Luongo of the Canucks.
Kicking Butt!: Pascal Leclaire of the Columbus Blue Jackets, Dan Ellis of the Nashville Predators, Chris Osgood of the Detroit Red Wings, Martin Gerber of the Ottawa Senators, Dany Sabourin of the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Not much else to say! Go Habs! Go Avs!
spun by b at 10:23 p.m.
1 Web Spinners:
The leafs defence is laughable, to be sure, but part of the onus has to be on Toskala and Raycroft. Vesa gives up huge rebounds on every shot, and he's inconsistent. Some nights he'll show great athleticism and cross the crease quick as lightning, and other nights he looks like a flopper. Raycroft is at least consistently the suck, with a measure of reliability.
It should be noted that Maurice has made some interesting coaching choices in terms of defence pairings since the exit of McCabe (thank goodness!) - Kabs Kubs is the strongest pair there (and they've performed admirably). However, putting White with Woz is questionable. White plays a pinching game - he's the most offensive defence on the blue line and *tries* to play like kabs. Woz... Both are just too inexperienced to be put on a line together, especially on special teams.
Stralman on the other hand is surprisingly (and pleasantly) not sucky. He does give up a few mistakes, but the Veteran Gil has good enough hockey sense to keep the play together.
So where does the defensive breakdown occur? Mostly from massive amounts of giveaways by the forwards, along with poor decision making on the D. They also need to be more physical with getting guys off the puck...the only one doing any solid hitting so far is Antropov and more recently, Bell.
and yah, Go Avs!
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