Low Ryder

From a 50,000 foot level, it looks like Daniel Ryder's time as a Flame has ended before it even begun. No less than a year ago, Ryder was one of the brightest young prospects in the Flames system. Now, for reasons as yet unknown, Ryder has been suspended by the Baby Flames and removed from the team's roster. This all comes on the heels of Ryder mysteriously refusing to attend the Flames training camp earlier this year for "personal reasons".

Nothing substantive has come to light regarding the nature of the personal issues Daniel is battling and why they are placing his promising hockey career in jeopardy. What we do know is that a rising star has seemingly been snuffed out - quite a blow to an organization that is suddenly hemorrhaging quality kids for one reason or another. In a matter of weeks, the Flames have lost Giordano and Taratukhin to the Russian league and now Ryder to...whatever it is that's ailing him.

As a Junior, Daniel was a bit of a sensation. Some scouts placed him above his older brother, Michael, in terms of overall skill and hockey sense. He scored 307 points in 253 regular season games with the Peterborough Petes and Plymouth Whalers in the OHL, and added another 60 points in 53 play-off games. During the Petes run to the Memorial cup in 05/06, Ryder scored 31 points in 19 games and won the Wayne Gretzky 99 Award as the play-offs most valuable player. I considered him one of the Flames top 3 prospects with Irving and Boyd until recently.

His pro career had a decent beginning to it as well, if you ignore the training camp thing. He scored 1 goal and 5 points in this first (and, probably only) 6 AHL games, despite the fact the QC Flames have struggled in the early going. I was actually feeling fairly secure that Ryder was back on track until the recent announcement of his suspension.

It's pointless to speculate about what Demons Ryder may or may not be facing right now. It could something as simple and benign as burn-out or lack of interest and it could be something deeper, more complex and more pathological. Im disappointed that he won't be able to fulfill the promise he showed as a Junior, but wish him the best as he moves forward in his life - even if it's one away from the rink.

Get 'Em While They Last!

Nashville @ Calgary Pregame

There's only a few things you need to know about the Preds/Flames game tonight:

- Dan Ellis will probably be in net for Nashville. He's won his last few starts, one being a shut-out, and has a 1.88 GAA and a .929 SV% so far. He's played all of 6 games total in the NHL over the course of his career. He was primarily an ECHL and AHL goaltender prior to this season, and never managed anything above mediocre numbers in those leagues. In short, the party has to end sometime. Perhaps it'll be tonight.

- Marcus Nilson is injured again. Apparently Eric Nystrom will be filling in beside Lombardi and Moss. Shudder.

- The Preds are lacking Shea Weber and Steve Sullivan.

- Nashville's PP (11.9%, 26th) is almost as bad as the Flames PK (75%, 27th). Good news, in a way.

- Barry Trotz reminds me of a Troll. I think it's the pumpkin head, permanent grimace and complete lack of a neck. Im not saying he's a bad coach. Im just saying he resembles a devious, billy-goat eating, sub-human creature. Not that this has any bearing on the match, I just wanted to get it out there.

- Finally, Madmac and I will be in attendance tonight. I'll just go ahead and apologize right now.

EDIT - Apparently Eriksson is drawing for David Hale. I haven't the first clue why.

PS - For a view from the other side, check the Forechecker.

Kipper Re-signed

- Locked up. I heard it was the possibility of being courted by Edmonton that scared him away from free agency.

I was going to post a rumor from a Finnish newspaper saying that the Flames were likely to announce a longterm re-sign of Kipper this week.

Luckily, I procrastinated a few hours and am now able to post something closer to the real thing:

Sources add that the deal is worth approximately $35 million for six years - or an average annual cap hit for the Flames of about $5.8 million per year beyond this season - and that it's heavily weighted in the early years of the contract and that Kiprusoff could retire after the fifth year and it wouldn't cost him significant dollars.

Initial reaction: Yay! Franchise type goalie and all that. The cap hit is comparable to Kipper's peers and therefore not unreasonable. In fact, it looks like a bit of an Iggy/Regehr discount considering what he might have commanded on the open market this coming off-season.

Other reactions: Uhhh...how are the Flames going to afford a team next year? If the purported cap hit for the Kiprusoff deal is accurate, that means Calgary has 25.65M tied up in Iginla (7), Regehr (4), Sarich (3.6), Tanguay (5.25) and Kipper (5.8) alone. Add in Warrener (2.35), Aucoin (4), Eriksson (1.5), Primeau (1.4), Yelle (1.4), Nilson (1) and Lombardi (1.817) and you have a 39.117M payroll without the likes of Phaneuf, Huselius, Langkow, Nolan, Conroy, Hale, Godard and Smith. That's anywhere from 12 - 15M, depending on the wherever the cap lands, to fill 8 roster spots. And I'm willing to bet Phaneuf will come in around 4.5M (minimum) when (if?) he gets re-signed. Meaning about 8 - 10M to fill 7 spaces, 3 or 4 in the top 6 forward area.

EDIT - scratch Yelle. This is the last year of his contract as well.

This could get concerning.

Update - Sutter confirmed the numbers during the presser.

Insults and Ramblings

- Mr. Mcgeough. Giant head still planted firmly up his own ass.

Stuart Mackenzie: Look at the size of that boy's heed.
Tony Giardino: Shhh!
Stuart Mackenzie: I'm not kidding, it's like an orange on a toothpick.
Tony Giardino: Shhh, you're going to give the boy a complex.
Stuart Mackenzie: Well, that's a huge noggin. That's a virtual planetoid.
Tony Giardino: Shh!
Stuart Mackenzie: Has it's own weather system.
Tony Giardino: Sh, sh, shh.
Stuart Mackenzie: HEAD! MOVE!
Stuart Mackenzie: I'm not kidding, that boy's head is like Sputnik; spherical but quite pointy at parts! Now that was offsides, wasn't it? He'll be crying himself to sleep tonight on his huuuuge pillow.

About the Friday game against the Avs: Im only going to say that I thought it was, in many ways, the best performance of the year by the Flames and the outcome was by no means indicative of the play. An unlikely combination of horseshoes, referee incompetence, a relatively flaccid Flames PP and Joe Sakic conspired to hand the victory to the Avs. I take consolation in the fact that Colorado has probably used up a years worth of breaks in 2 games against Calgary already, with the assumption that the pendulum has to swing back in our favor sooner rather than later.

Anyways, speaking of giant heads, Im starting to get the impression that the Flames are grossly top heavy again this year. The money players are scoring a lot - again - which is great. Unfortunately, after them, the roster is rife with barely adequate (or worse) fillers and plugs. Godard and Smith are 5 minute/night guys - detriments at ES that have to be coddled and sheltered with great care. I get butterflies in my stomach whenever a Godard trio ices the puck; knowing full well the opposition coach is chuckling as he sends his big guns out to run roughshod over the goon and his plugger linemates.

Not that the damage is limited to the 4th line. The Owen Nolan experiment, which got off to a decent start, has really started to take on shades of Tony Amonte over the last few nights. In 11 games (playing primarily with the likes of Langkow, Huselius, Conroy and Tanguay) Nolan has managed just 2 assists. His ES production rate is a miniscule 0.86 ESP/60 and he has yet to record a single PP point. While he's been coasting around the perimeter and beating up marginal enforcers, Nolan's typical linemates (Juice, Langkow) have racked up 25 points, including 16 at ES. Which means he's either really unlucky and his contributions aren't showing up on the scoresheet, or he's another aging anchor being dragged along for the ride. To my eyes, it's been the latter, particularly in the last 5 games or so. I've started to only notice Nolan when he's doing something that annoys me, ie something detrimental. He's become a rather reserved, perimeter type player as a Flame - one that seems to give the puck away in the offensive zone at inopportune times. It's early, this is a new team and he could be going through a rough patch (etc etc), but if he can't put up points amongst the Flames top 6 (especially when they're rolling along so nicely) I question whether he'll be able to do so at all.

Speaking of which, Craig Conroy is still starting games between Tanguay and Iginla for some reason. He has one more point than Nolan thus far, despite playing with arguably superior players more often. In Conroy's defense, he hasn't had much PP time (for good reason), but let's face it, he's only managed to be in on 3 of his linemates 20 ES points so far. I submit that ANYONE not putting up points with Iginla at ES right now is probably a leaden weight.

Naturally, the question becomes: what does Keenan do with all of these guys? Smith, Godard, Yelle (and Primeau, when he returns) aren't ever going to outscore the opposition and it's a prayer for them to hold the bad guys to even. Nolan and Conroy can't get results with the big guns and dropping them into the bottom 6 will likely only further limit their already anemic production. Add in the snakebitten David Moss (who has to battle for every single goal he gets anyways), and Keenan has two solid lines of single digit scorers to worry about. That's a challenging row to hoe, even with a potent top 6 attack. I suppose it could be argued that Nolan/Conroy don't seem to be hurting the production of Iginla et al., so there's no real impetus to kick them down the depth chart. Yet. But really...is that the measuring stick we should be applying to $4.546M worth of capspace? "At least they're not hurting us!" is the relieved sigh typically reserved for bubble guys and kids. As far as Im concerned, anyways.

On a happier note, I'd like to say that I've been thrilled with the play of Matthew Lombardi so far. Not only has he been doing it on his own, offensively speaking, between Moss and Nilson (1 goal, 4 points between them), but he seems to be playing a more complete, two-way game under Keenan. On Friday, Lombardi broke up several quality Colorado scoring chances through intelligent back-checking. He was a probably the Flames best penalty killer that night as well, not only deterring scoring chances against, but creating a few by forcing neutral zone turn-overs. His goal was a something out of nothing play, singlehandedly conjured through speed and perseverance. Overall, it was the type of performance you see out of Selke-caliber centers, and it was one that no doubt endeared him to the coaching staff. Very encouraging stuff from him in the early part of the season. Here's hoping it continues.

NHLnumbers Update

Soundwave has finished converting his salary site nhlnumbers from html to php/MySQL. Meaning he's substantially expanded the site's functionality: now one can find salaries per team, as well a number of other useful curios:

- Player comparison - want to know who the 25th highest paid player in the league is? how about 400th?
- Team Comparison - allows you to rank teams by caphit, average age, as well as percenatge of cap dollars spent by position.
- Free Agents - List of pending RFA/UFA's, sortable by team, FA status and position.
- Nationalities - The number of players/native country as well as each nations average age and salary in the league.

Great stuff. Check it out.

COL @ CGY Pregame

Not a lot to separate these two from each other. The Avs are a couple of points back of the Flames with a game in hand. Both have 5 wins on the season and a GD of two. Neither has been able to attain a consistent level of excellence through the first couple weeks of the season.

For their part, Colorado has been suffering from a strong bout of Flames-itis thus far: sadists at home, masochists on the road. Wield the whip in Denver and wear the ball-gag on the...well you get the idea. I believe their lone "away" victory came at the expense of the Oilers - whom we all know will be grabbing their ankles a lot this year, where ever they are.

Besides their opponent's road woes, the Flames will have a couple other advantages this evening - both Hejduk and Leopold are out with injury, dealing a couple of significant blows to the Avs depth-chart. Wayne Primeau is the Flames only casualty and let's just say "he won't be missed".

Also, word is Jose "it was only Propecia" Theodore is getting the start tonight, seeing as Budaj has been Calgary's bitch on more than one occasion in the past. The former hart winner has been terrible since 05/06, but doesn't have quite the same relationship with Flames as the other guy, so it's hard to say whether his starting is a good thing from a Calgary perspective...

Prediction - Tanguay continues to roll and a couple other guys finally get on the scoresheet as Theodore continues his long tumble into the vortex of suck. Flames 3, Avs 1. Tanguay, Moss and Nolan for Calgary. Sakic for Colorado.

Right and Wrong

Trap and revelatory Swedes aside, there would have to be a goodly amount of breaks for and almost none against to allow only 10 goals in 8 games in the NHL...at some point pucks are bound to start finding the back of the Minnesota net with a little more regularity.

Check.

Iginla and crew were pretty bad against San Jose, but have been excellent overall, so I expect a return to form tonight. The Captain seems to play well against Minnesota for some reason, so those with him in your pools should be excited.

Check.

Tanguay, on the other hand, has been a little off to start the season (Im not sure the point on the PP is the best place for him), but he's an elite player, so Im confident he'll turn it around.

Check.

Anyways, expect a typical neutral-zone clogged snore-fest tonight. Let's go with a Flames 3-2 OT victory. Nolan and Iginla (2) for the Flames, Burns and Gaborik for the Wild (on the PP of course).

WRONG!

Improbably and against all odds, Calgary scored 5 unanswered goals (after going down by 3) to beat the Wild 5-3 last night and produced one of the most exciting games in recent memory. I was a good book away from turning the game off after the craptacular first period. I mean, who ever comes back from a 3-0 deficit against the Wild?

Nobody, apparently. Until now. Not only did Calgary hand Minnesota their first regulation loss of the season, they handed them the first loss in Franchise history when leading by 3 goals. Huzzah!

Some questions about this squad remain (GA, PK, Kipper). But, for now, I think I'll bask in the warm glow of this victory.

The Man Versus The Fan

Interesting back-and-forth going on between Battle of Alberta's Andy Grabia and Edmonton Journal writer John Mackinnon. Check out Andy's original post on the subject and then Mackinnon's response.

Highly recommended.

Minnesota Game Preview

I'm sick as hell today, so this'll be a shorty.

The Minnesota Wild have been good so far. Really good. Inexplicably good, in fact. They've allowed just 10 goals against in 8 games. Only 4 of them have been at ES. the Toronto Maple Leafs seem to allow more than that each and every game they play.

Not to take anything away from Lemaire, the players or the goaltenders, but that pace is pretty much unsustainable. Trap and revelatory Swedes aside, there would have to be a goodly amount of breaks for and almost none against to allow only 10 goals in 8 games in the NHL.

When I saw that ridiculous GA number, I figured the Wild would be tops in most, if not all, defensive measures thus far. Not so. They're only mediocre at preventing shots against (although this says nothing about shot quality), suggesting at some point pucks are bound to start finding the back of the Minnesota net with a little more regularity. Whether that new trend begins tonight or not remains to be seen.

It may not matter if the Flames aren't significantly better than their last outing. Nothing about the defeat to the Sharks was notable beyond the fact that the team stunk at just about everything. Globally, Kipper is still pretty ordinary and the PK - like all of last year - is still struggling to reach even middling levels of efficacy. Iginla and crew were pretty bad against San Jose, but have been excellent overall, so I expect a return to form tonight. The Captain seems to play well against Minnesota for some reason, so those with him in your pools should be excited. Tanguay, on the other hand, has been a little off to start the season (Im not sure the point on the PP is the best place for him), but he's an elite player, so Im confident he'll turn it around (hopefully, because he's the guy I have in MY pools).

Anyways, expect a typical neutral-zone clogged snore-fest tonight. Let's go with a Flames 3-2 OT victory. Nolan and Iginla (2) for the Flames, Burns and Gaborik for the Wild (on the PP of course).

Rules and Symmetry

Sometimes contributor Madmac and I attended a Flames game together last season. It was an early season home game against the San Jose Sharks, their first visit to the Dome that year.

The Flames ended up playing horribly, looking equal parts disinterested and confused. The Sharks easily built up a 4-0 lead on the strength of two PP goals and coasted to a 4-1 victory. Calgary managed to salvage an iota of pride by spoiling Nabokov's shut-out in the last few minutes of the 3rd.

Last night, sometimes contributor Madmac and I attended a Flames game together. It was an early season game, the Shark's first visit to the Dome. As for the rest - see above.

You'd think we would have learned our lesson from last year. Sigh.

(Calgary is now oh-fer five with me in the building this season. Soon, the mere mention of Flames tickets is going to evoke in me a feeling of disgust and nausea in true Pavlovian fashion.)

I'll leave aside any sort of analysis with the assumption that last night's game was no in way indicative of future performances from this club. Just one of those evenings where no one wearing red really had his head in the game.

Not that there weren't other forces working against the team. With the score 0-0 in the middle of the first, a linesman made the mystifying decision to blow the play dead in the middle of a Jarome Iginla break-away. Why you ask? Poor JR wasn't feeling too hot after a Robyn Regehr hit. And Im not just employing rhetoric to downplay the level of Roenick's injury when I say "not too hot" - he wasn't down on the ice and he wasn't rolling around in agony. He was leaned up against the boards. He skated to the bench under his own power and he played the very next shift.

It wasn't only stupid to stop play for a temporarily dazed player, it was AGAINST THE RULES. From the NHL rulebook:

When a player is injured so that he cannot continue play or go to his bench, the play shall not be stopped until the injured player's Team has secured possession of the puck; if the player's Team is in possession of the puck at the time of injury, play shall be stopped immediately unless his Team is in a scoring position.

(NOTE) In the case where it is obvious that a player has sustained a serious injury, the Referee and/or Linesman may stop the play immediately.

In this case, the "injured" player's Team most certainly did not have possession of the puck. Of course, the decision to stop play would have been defensible if Roenick had clearly been greviously injured (as per the note), but, as I mention above, there was no reason to come to that conclusion. Absolutely bush league officiating.

Can't say whether the lost break-away had any kind of significant effect on the game or not. It came on the heels of a disallowed Godard goal and seemed to completely take the wind out of the Flames sails. They were penalized shortly thereafter and the Sharks scored the first of their 4 unanswered markers (assisted by Roenick, of course). The let-down was apparent and the club lost their legs for the rest of the night. Naturally, there's a chance that Iginla wouldn't have scored and the Flames would have staggered to the 4-1 loss anyways, so one can't complain too loudly.

Oh well. Onwards and Upwards.

Victory is Ours!

Always nice to beat the Oilers, especially by 3 or more goals. It's a bit of a downer that the "two-goal scorer per game" thing came to an end, not that it was in any way important (who keeps track of these ultra-obscure records anyways?). The best part, aside from the victory, may have been Dion Phaneuf's 3 point outing, which no doubt induced some loud expletives and excessive rending of garments in Edmonton on Saturday night.

Despite a few miscues that led to a couple Oiler opportunities (2 break-aways to be exact), the defense looked fairly tight. Unfortunately, it's hard to know if that's due to improved play from the Flames or an artifact of playing a toothless opponent. For example, did Calgary kill off all 6 PP against because the PK was decent? Or because the Oilers are the worst team in the league on the PP? Probbaly a helping of both, though until I see otherwise Im going to assume the latter factor was the more influential.

Iginla has certainly turned things around since his awful night in Detroit. He's scored 12 points in his last 5 games and is amongst the league leaders in total points (13) and points per game (1.62). He burned the Oil for 3 on Saturday and probably could have had a few more if Roloson hadn't been so solid. It's definitely nice to Jarome setting the pace and dragging some of his teammates (Langkow, Huselius, Tanguay, Conroy) with him.

We're only 8 games in, but Dion Phaneuf continues to look like a different player thus far. "Different" meaning, "significantly improved". His offensive prowess was never in doubt, but this season Phaneuf has begun to control play at both ends of the ice. There's less of an emphasis on "big hits" and "big shots" in his game this year. Both of his goals have come from intelligent roaming in the offensive zone, rather than simply blasting away from the point. His speed and strength on the puck are unmatched by anyone else on the back-end. He seems to be consistently making better decisions, particularly in his own zone.

I think these are the first real glimmers that validate the "future Norris trophy candidate" hype that's surrounded Dion since he entered the league. I've always been impressed with Phaneuf's play, relative to his age and experience, but this is the first time I can honestly say hes looked like a bona fide elite defenseman for more than a game or two. Here's hoping he keeps it up.

Speaking of the back-end, Rhett Warrener has looked better ever since David Hale was inserted in the line-up. Hmmm...I wonder who the weak link is here? At this juncture, I'm willing to give good odds that Eriksson ends the year with the exact same stat line that saw Andrea Susan dumped in the off-season...

On the Oilers side of the ledger, I can't say I noticed many of their guys last game. Penner was invisible when he wasn't taking penalties. I expected to see more out of Pitkanen, but he was ordinary at best (he was the one who left Iginla alone in the slot for the Flames 2nd - and game winning - goal).

No question, the Oil certainly have some nice players in Cogliano and Gagner, but they're not going to be able to carry this group for very long (certainly not yet, anyways). It's going to be a tough slog for the Oiler faithful this year and I almost feel sorry for them (not really).

**As an aside, I think the Torres blindside on Moss is suspension worthy. It wasn't overly vicious or delivered with ill-intent, but it was a cheap-shot on a player who wasn't aware and didn't have the puck. With the recent spate of egregious misconducts and long suspensions, I don't know if Torres will a.) benefit from a contrast effect, where his hit on Moss pales in comparison to the Boulerice and Downey actions, thereby looking less "suspension worthy" or b.) be a victim of the resultant rush to condemn head-shots. I guess we'll know soon enough.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

The Sharks will no doubt prove to be a stiffer test this evening. It'll be interesting to see if the Flame's apparent defensive improvement from last game was an actual step forward or merely an illusion conjured from Edmonton's impotence. While San Jose has been fairly mediocre to start the year, they historically play well against the Flames and are ALWAYS a threat to break-out thanks to their offensive depth led by Marleau and Thornton.

Prediction -
Flames 3, Sharks 2. Nolan, Langkow and Iginla for the Flames. Michalek and the irrepressible Mike Grier for the Sharks.

Battle v1.0

The Stinktown Greasers roll into the Dome for the first time tonight. Against all odds, they've somehow managed 3 wins so far this season, although one of them was against the Phoenix Coyotes (a game in which they were grossly outshot by the woeful Desert Dogs).

Souray was recently felled by the indomitible Byron Ritchie, meaning the Oilers blueline will be populated by Staios, Pitkanen and a bunch of guys most hockey fans have never heard of. The likely result will be a lot of Iginla, Tanguay, Conroy/Langkow skating against the likes of Grebeshkov and ? (Gilbert maybe) tonight. Also, note that 8 of Iginla's 10 points have come at ES this year. This is a GOOD thing.

The Oil do have assets in the form of a couple of kids playing above their heads. Andrew Cogliano leads the club in points (2 goals, 6 points) with Kyle Brodziak hot on his heels (2 goals, 5 points). It'll probably be 4 or 5 weeks before these guys hit a wall, so the Flames will have to be aware of them this evening.

Beyond that, nothing much to worry about tonight from a Flames perspective - aside from their own defensive deficiencies (horrid PK, penchant for kicking pucks into their own net), of course. Kiprusoff hasn't yet regained his typical Vezina form, so tonight would be a GREAT night for a big step in that direction.

Prediction -

Flames 4, Oilers 1. Phaneuf, Tanguay (he has to score eventually), Lombardi (2) for Calgary while some unknown scrub gets lucky for Edmonton.

Let Them Score Goals

The Kings of allowing goals against roll into town tonight. Which is good, cuz the Flames aren't exactly stingy themselves these days. To be fair, Calgary's offense has been so potent lately that they've been scoring indiscriminately at both ends of the ice. If the boys are able to cut down on the own goals going forward, it might spare Kipper some angst and a few notches on his admittedly swollen GAA.

I never got around to assessing the Avalanche implosion. Short version:

The Flames deserved a better fate, Phaneuf and Iginla are playing great, the Flames defensive zone is a maelstrom of cancer and madness and the Eriksson/Warrener duo scare me to death.

Can't complain about 5 of 8 on that road trip though. Despite continuing defensive and goaltending issues, the Flames managed to slay some major demons in Dallas and Nashville. That's good. A goal differential of 0 and the worst PK in the league? That's bad. But at least Iggy and co. are scoring again. Now if only we had a 4th line that wasn't a 7 minute/night liability.

Oh well.

I believe JS Aubin will be in net for LA this evening. On most nights, I'd be willing to bet my gonads on Kipper out-dueling the ex-Leaf back-up turned Kings-last-option, but in light of Kiprusoff's struggles and the fact Aubin recently defeated the best-in-the-West Minnesota Backstroms, I'll probably forgoe any such wager.

For those of you that aren't so risk averse, note that it's unlikely that I'll be watching the game tonight, given that this is the 3rd PPV broadcast of the month. For anyone unaware, the Flames are currently winless with me watching, recording or in attendance this season. Place your wagers accordingly.

Prediction time - Let's go with a 5-3 Flames victory. Tanguay (2), Iginla, Moss and Phaneuf for Calgary. Mike-Cam, Kopitarded and Lubo-Viso for the Monarchs.

Check out RudyKelly's preview at BoC.

Arghh! This Gun is Filled With Blanks!

I'll post some thoughts of my own regarding the Avs/Flames tilt later on. For now, I'd like to concentrate on the Bob Hartley firing in Atlanta.

In my opinion, the wrong guy got his walking papers today. I'm pretty ignorant when it comes to Hartley's strengths and weaknesses as a bench boss, but it's clear as the nose on Tim Hunter's face that he wasn't given the horses to succeed. It was my contention last season around the trade deadline that Don Waddell was one of the worst GM's in the league, and his performance during the off-season only served to further reinforce that option.

Waddell has made a lot of missteps along the way. Aside from the Heately/Hossa swap, his trades have been average or worse (overpayment for Tkachuk, Coburn for Zhitnik, Bourret for Dupuis, etc.).

Just take a look at the assembled roster for this season:

Kovaluchuk, Hossa, Kozlov, Todd White...and a bunch of scrubs. The defense corps. is terrible, featuring Alexei Zhitnik as the de facto #1 guy. Bobby Holik is a washed up, $4M anchor.

I don't think any coach this side of Scotty Bowman could mold that motley collection into a winning squad. Three quarters of the roster is filler. The superstars skate with 4th liners at ES. Outside the SE division, the Thrashers are cannon fodder.

This isn't to say that Hartley was getting the job done or the players hadn't tuned him out. That's all very possible. But it's tough to truly evaluate a coach's effectiveness when he's given two queens and a board full of pawns to play with.

Update - AJC columnist Jeff Shultz makes the same point, but more effectively here:

Don Waddell, the general manager who has drafted 28 defensemen but has only two to show for it on the Thrashers’ roster, stays.

Bob Hartley, who has been trying to shuffle semi-comatose bodies in hopes that defective ingredients can somehow be made into a better soup, goes.

Hartley will get another job. But how does Waddell get another chance?

The Thrashers fired the wrong guy.

Welcome Back Me! (Sort of...)

- By ChunkyMoose

Well, it’s been a long off-season since my humble hockey-related prose has graced the virtual paper of this site... and let me tell you, it’s desperately needed. SOMEONE needs to stem the flow of Metrognome’s postings that display at least half of the key elements from the ‘disease’ medical model, and almost all of the ones from the ‘addiction’ model.

I must admit, I have been tentatively stapling my heart to the sleeve of my UnderArmor golf shirt this season when it comes to the Flames... there’s a lot of question marks. Although, I had a surge of hope after watching the boys take on the Avalanche last night.

Now when you blow a 4-0 lead, especially in the manner in which the Flames did, I don’t think that a simple ‘minus’ is sufficient to describe some of the defensive gaffes. Instead, I vote for the inclusion of a new statistical category – “DT” or “Defensive Treachery”. Numbers should also not apply to this category; they should have little daggers beside their names, or even blood droplets. Perhaps there is a symbol that identifies the onset of an aneurysm.

3 goals off the skates of our defensemen? Are you kidding me? I’m convinced Anders Eriksson is a mole sent in by the Blue Jackets and their ex-Oilers-brass GM to sabotage close games. Think of him as a Mole Assassin, “MoleAssas” for short.

There were some bright sides. Some REALLY bright sides to the game. As was typical of the Avalanche before the end of the year, we chased off Budaj AGAIN. Unfortunately, we failed to capitalize on how bad Theodore can be.

Iginla made Avalanche defensemen look silly. Even their new shut-down expert, Hannan, could barely handle him all night. He had jump, determination, and I think he would indulged his pugilistic talents given the chance. Instead he peppered the score sheet AND scored a crucial shootout goal. Welcome back.

Phaneuf is turning into one of the leagues best workhorses. He’s not logging minutes by playing an active stick game (i.e. anyone with a “sson” or a “strom” in their name) and conserving precious energy. Instead he’s crushing guys, playing head games by jawing the competition, and trying end to end rushes. He’s not comparable to any other defensemen in the league. He’s special. The good special.

I don’t know what the public consensus is yet on Nolan, but I think he’s a great addition. He’s still using old school moves and plays, and demonstrating why they were so successful in his heyday. He uses veteran brains and consistently fools younger players. He reminds me of the grizzled vet on my beer league team that doesn’t look like he’s got one good knee... heck he doesn’t look like he’s playing the same game, but still manages to make everyone look stupid. I think he’s going to do what we hoped Amonte would do for the last two seasons.

Unfortunately, we split periods with the type of play we needed to destroy the Avs. The way we played in the first period (strong forechecking, physical attacks) sets them on their heels, and is ultimately what got us up 3-0. The way we played in the second period (scrambling, kicking the puck in our own net, letting the MoleAssas log some icetime) is what got us back to square 1.

All-in-all 5 points out of 8 on a roadie is a huge improvement on last season.

Awards for the game:

Iginla – 5 stars
Kipper – 4 stars (not mentioned above, but I think Roger Millions and John Garret did a good job of massaging his berries)
Phaneuf – 4 stars
Nolan, Lombardi, Nilson – 3 stars

Eriksson – 2 turkeys, a blood droplet and 3 daggers
Sarich – 1 turkey
Regehr – 1 turkey

My Bad

Karma Police...arrest this man
he talks in math
he buzzes like a fridge

[...]

This is what you get...
This is what you get...
This is what you get,
when you mess with us.

Sooooo...yesterday I went about pointing and laughing at McCabe and the Leafs for blowing multiple third period leads and scoring an own goal. Then, the Flames go about blowing a 4 goal lead in the 2nd while scoring an unprecedented 3 own goals. Hmmm...

Flames fans, consider this my apology. Both for the post below AND for selfishly watching the game.

Sincerely,

MG

GOOOooooAAAAaaaLLLL!!!

Better View of the goal


Fantastically entertaining game between the Sabres and Leafs last night that saw the Sabres come from behind 3 separate times. All in the 3rd period, no less. The capper was Toronto's 6M defenseman sweeping the puck into his own net with 4 second left in overtime (see above**).

And the Toronto mediocrity parade continues unabated...

**Clip found at http://mccabesucks.com

The Observer Effect

In the absence of any direct observation by me, the Flames seemed to have turned things around a bit. They're still giving up too many goals and the PK is currently the worst in the league, but at least the sticks have come alive. Speaking of which, Calgary has had a two-goal scorer in each of their games so far (Langkow, Langkow, Huselius, Lombardi, Huselius) and will set a new league record if someone manages to equal that feat tomorrow night (I'm looking at you, Tanguay).

2-2-1 is looking like a nice little record considering we were staring down the barrel of a 0-5-1 opening series just a week ago. Given that I expected the worst from this road trip, the 4 points already accrued is an acceptable .500 kind of mark and I therefore consider anything garnered against the Avs on Tuesday to be a bonus.

**Bonus Stats supplement**

Defencemen icetime:

Phaneuf - 139 TOI, 27:48/game
Sarich - 110 TOI, 22:00/game
Aucoin - 102 TOI, 20:28/game
Regehr - 98 TOI, 19:45/game
Eriksson - 79 TOI, 15:52/game
Warrener - 71 TOI, 14:16/game

Some interesting trends here. Robyn Regehr behind the likes of Aucoin and Sarich in ice-time is a tad surprising, although he gets next to no PP time and still leads the club in terms of SH ice. Sarich doesn't play on the PP either, but tends to skate with Phaneuf, and Dion gets a lot of time at ES.

Warrener's right where he should be in my humble opinion. He plays the least amount of any defender at ES and only about 1:40 per game on the PK. He's still an Aucoin injury away from getting bumped into the top 4, which makes me nervous, but so far so good.

Eriksson is getting the Giordano/Zyuzin minutes and has managed to be "not detrimental" with them so far - 2 assists, +2. Am I happy with those numbers? Relatively, considering his role. Are those contributions worth $1.5M? Not a chance. If Eriksson continues in this vein, he'll prove to be at least better than Andrea, but a still less than optimal replacement for Giordano. If he falls off, well...

In addition to the above, here's each blueliners "events" thus far:

Phaneuf - 9 GF, 4 GA, +5
Sarich - 4 GF, 8 GA, -4
Aucoin - 6 GF, 6 GA, 0
Regehr - 4 GF, 10 GA, -6
Eriksson - 6 GF, 4 GA, +2
Warrener - 4 GF, 2 GA, +2

I've added up goals for and against across all situations: ES, PK and PP. Like last year, it's plain as day that Regehr is struggling to effectively kill penalties (although Kipper's mediocre SV% sure isn't helping things). I thought a reduction in Warrener's SH icetime and the addition of Sarich would help out Regehr and the ailing penalty kill, but that hasn't happened in the first five games. He and Kipper will need to improve in that area if the Flames are to be any better than average.

At least Phanuef's stats are encouraging. He gets a ton of PP time of course, thus the high GF mark, but he also gets a lot of time at ES and the 3rd most SH time behind Sarich and Regehr. Phaneuf had the highest GA/60 rate on the blueline last year, so it's nice to see him excelling at both ends of the ice early in the season.

Aucoin has come out at evens, with the benefit of middling competition, some PP time and apparently some improvement in play over his first couple gawd awful performances. At $4M per, the Flames will need him to be better than that, but at least there's been some improvement there. Here's hoping it continues and he remains healthy (knock on wood).

The Jinx

Well, I've missed watching precisely two Flames games of the 12 they've played since the season started. And those are the two they've won, including last nights OT victory over Dallas.

Which bodes well for tonight, since the game isn't being televised by anyone.

Aside from the win, a couple of other things from last night make me happy:

- Lombardi stepping up, despite some rumors his wrist injury was still bothering him. Lombardi finished the night with over 18 minutes of ice, which is also a good sign.

- Rhett Warrener played all of 11 minutes, which is also good. In addition, he only had about a minute on the PK which is double plus good. That's the kind of ice I think Warrener can be effective with (or, at least, less detrimental).

- First win in the Big D since 2001. Yay!

- Looks like Jarome and Tanguay were a little more effective last night. Managed to score and generate some chances on the PP (according to the hilights I've seen).

Im actually glad the Flames are right back on the ice tonight. With the feeling of their first victory still fresh in their blood perhaps some of the momentum will transfer to this evening's match. Nashville almost always beats up on the Flames, but if there ever was a time to arrest that trend, it's tonight. The Preds have struggled a bunch lately (most recently getting beat up by the woeful Coyotes to the tune of 6-3) and Chris Mason is in the middle of rough patch (one that is harming me in a number of pools may I add). If the big guys and Kipper continue to improve, the Flames could conceivably win their 2nd in a row...

Quotable Keenan

"I think there's a lot more in that dressing room than we're seeing," Keenan said. "I hope so anyway."

Me too, Mike. Me too.

Beetlejuice and The Pensive Pedestrians

The Flames continued their October rope-a-dope routine last night, falling to the Red Wings 4-2. I use the term assuming the club will at some point snap out of their stupor and start counter-punching, but, watching them right now, it's hard to fathom when - or how - that'll actually happen.

I was worried about the bottom half of the roster going into the Joe last night, but it seems my anxieties were misplaced: it was the Flames heavy hitters that were the weak links on this particular evening. Keenan went power on power last night, deploying Iginla, Langkow and Tanguay against Zetterberg et al. and Babcock was more than willing to oblige him. For good reason. Zetterberg, Datsyuk and Holmstrom dominated the match-up. The Detroit trio ended the night with 2 goals, 4 points and a +4 rating, while Iginla and co. were all pointless, minus players (pun intended). Beyond the stats, the Flames difference makers seemed out-classed pretty much every time they were on the ice. They rarely managed to maintain any offensive pressure and were often hemmed in their own zone. Iginla was thrust aside like a wet piece of paper in a hurricane. The puck may as well have been a tennis ball on his stick. Not that Tanguay or even team leading goal getter Langkow were much better.

Of course, there's plenty of blame to go around. "October Kipper" was also in attendance, allowing a softy through the pads and manufacturing the first goal against by delivering a perfect pass to Datsyuk during a PK (Creating a 2on0 rush). Im sure Kipper will turn it around at some point. It would just be nice if that happened sooner rather than later.

Another game, another batch of PP goals against.

Kristian Huselius was the lone bright spot last night. The game would have been out of reach by the third except for his creativity and finish. Pass some of whatever you've got Jarome's way, will you Juice?

Let's face it kids...this road trip is going to be torturous. It includes all the Flames nemeses at a time when the club can't execute basic plays even though they appear to be stuck in 2nd gear. It'll take some grand bounces, some favorable officiating and probably a return to form by at least one of the Big Guns to eke out a victory. 0-5-1 is looming large on the horizon. The question will be whether the Flames can pull out another miracle November to right the ship.

Media Round-up

I haven't any inspirational phrases or positive predictions for the game tonight. Might as well fill the ol' blog with some mainstream clippings.

Damond Langkow earns some praise for his quick start from Scott Cruickshank:

After scoring twice in Thursday's 3-2 stumble to the Philadelphia Flyers, Langkow swatted home another two in Saturday's 4-3 overtime groaner against Vancouver.

"He's had a good start," said coach Mike Keenan. "He was hurt during the pre-season -- I don't think we ever told anybody that -- and he's rebounded pretty well. He's not a big man, but he's got a big heart. He's made an impression, certainly, coming out of the gate."

Now we just need thew rest of the team to follow suit. Or at least the $35M man playing on Langkow's right side.

George Johnson revisits the Ghosts of play-offs past:

To The Joe.

What awaited them there six months ago was the stark reality of their limitations, the utter folly of their aspirations. The Wings averaged 45 shots in the three playoff games versus the Flames at Joe Louis Arena, winning 'em all en route to a six-game series victory [...]

The unfortunate Miikka Kiprusoff was the only thing standing between Calgary and being swept away by the tide. Go back to The Joe? Passing a kidney stone the size of a billiard ball might be more laughs.

Expect the Red Wings to shove the billiard ball, dry and unyielding, up a neighboring orifice tonight if the Flames don't play significantly better than their first two games.

Eric Francis goes down a similar road in his piece:

Marcus Nilson summed up his club's first-round playoff effort with two words: "Horse (bleep)," while Alex Tanguay encapsulated the spring shellacking by using three: "Men against boys." [...}

However, with a summer of reflection behind them, the Flames took time before returning to the scene of the crime yesterday to come clean on just how outclassed they were by a Red Wings squad that outshot them 135-59 and outscored them 12-3 at Joe Louis Arena.

(says Tanguay) "We're proud individuals, and obviously we feel extremely bad and embarrassed about what happened last year. And while it will take all year, we can start redeeming ourselves (tonight)."

The Flames talked a good game last year too. There was a virtual tidal wave of quotes from everyone between Iginla and Warrener stating they "knew" they were playing poorly and just "had to get better". It never happened, at least not when it came to the road and not when it came to the post-season. We'll see what their words are worth this season.

To and Fro

Two games in and the Flames still look like the loser team that ended the season last year. They find ways to end each game on a low note. They snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

Anyone unfortunate enough to watch them in the pre-season saw this coming. The boys just aren't on the same page and the difference makers look a step behind and out of sync with each other. I estimate it'll take a few weeks at least for the Flames to hit their stride (for the third season in a row).

To counter my strident melancholy, I've decided to balance the good with the bad. While there are ample and apparent reasons for fear and trembling in Flames town (3 wins in the last 21 games, 3 or less GF in all of them), not all is doom and gloom...

Notes of Optimism:

The bounces have been decidedly one-sided thus far this season. While the Flames hit posts and miss nets by mere inches, the opposition is getting dying-second, double-deflection overtime winners. Eventually, stuff like that tends to balance out.

Miikka Kiprusoff won't play this badly for much longer.

Dion Phaneuf and Cory Sarich have been terrific thus far. In fact, Phaneuf hasn't been on the ice for a GA yet, something he struggled with last year. In contrast, Adrian Aucoin has played 19 less minutes than Dion and been on for 4 GA.

Matthew Lombardi has played decently thus far and is getting rewarded with ice-time amongst the top 6, which is a good sign. Craig Conroy is back to 3rd line type duty, an even better sign.

Damond Langkow is doing his damndest to prove his career season last year was not a fluke.

David Moss is back in the line-up, meaning we'll see less of Eric "The Glacier" Godard.

Notes of Pessimism:

That pungent stench on the wind is the Flames Penalty Killing. It was appalling last year and, thus far, it's appalling this year (5 PP goals against in 2 games). It's overly passive and way too willing to collapse towards the net. The odd thing is, the Flames rarely seem able to win those goal-mouth scrambles (which are inevitable because the Flames defenders deter point-shots about as effectively as anti-doping ads deter marijuana consumption).

The bottom half of the Flames roster still looks highly exploitable to me. Eriksson, Aucoin and Warrener all make me really nervous when they're on the ice (particularly the first two). The "4th liners" (Primeau, Smith, Godard, Nilson) are all in the red, despite playing fewer, and softer, minutes on home ice.

Jarome has looked at lot like "Jarmoe" so far.

The upcoming road trip is ugly: Detroit, Dallas, Nashville, Colorado. The Red Wings, Stars and Predators have all been Flame killers the last couple seasons. I can't remember the last time Calgary won a game in any of those locations, in fact. If the team doesn't get their act together quickly, a 0-5-1 start to the season is distinct possibility.

Curtis McElhinney was injured in the warm-ups last game and will be out at least a week with a knee-injury. Im really starting to think the back-up position behind Kipper is cursed.

The "Pessimism" list could obviously longer, but I'll restrain myself to avoid comparisons to Chicken Little. It's too early, and the sample size too small, to get overly bent out of shape about anything. That said, I feel little more than dread and apprehension heading into Detroit tomorrow night. The Flames haven't measurably improved since being bitch-slapped by the Red Wings last Spring and we all know how painful those games were to watch...

Taratukhin Speaks Out

Andrei Taratukhin recently elaborated on his reasons for bolting back to Russia this summer.

Russian link here.

Relevent bits:

I wanted, of course, to play in NHL, but there was no hundred per-cent guarantee that I would remain in "Calgary". I have a wife, two children - it is hard to leave them constantly. The past season was very difficult due to problems with the visas. At first I didn’t get to see my children together, only separately. I didn’t get to see my daughter for the first time until she was already 6 months old! That’s no way to live. Plus, in Calgary there are now five key centers with the one-way contracts, and then me – on a two way contract. It could be assumed that the guys on one way deal would be more likely to be chosen for the team. To me they said there was a lot of movement at center. Also proposals from UFA’s. The team has good leadership, and is trying to win a championship. Good players, and a good coach who has taught me a lot. Even my contract was good. But I must have some stability. They conferred with family, and wife said: "give to remain here"!

I passed summer training camp with Calgary. And then they said to me that one, can, two players of farm club will remain with the Flames. And only when rumors started that I would remain in Russia, did the statements of Calgary management appear. They did begin to indicate in the press that I was one of the most promising rookies. - you do understand? They began to fuss only after I had left. What it was to be expected. We did begin conversation from the fact that none of the rookies made the NHL.

- Translation courtesy of Babel and poster 'Flashpoint' on Calgarypuck.com

A family man's preference for his home country is expected and predictable. The pertinent info for Flames fans is contained in the hilighted portion: Andrei's perception that his chances of making the team were slim echoes something I wrote back around the time his defection from the Flames was announced:

Taratukhin's possible flight is apropos to my previous post detailing my annoyance with the Wayne Primeau signing and Matt's recent post on the loss Giordano: Sutter's penchant for filling the roster with veterans over rookies, despite the fact the young players in question are a.) cheaper and b.) likely to outperform (or at least provide greater cap value than) the incumbent vet is proving to be a damaging strategy. The result is the draining of future assets as they bolt due to the perception that there is no room for them on the roster.

This is not an encouraging trend, to say the least.

At the time, I was unsure whether Taratukhin left over purely monetary concerns, but his flight combined with the needless signings of Nilson and Primeau (not to mention a smiliar loss of Giordano) raised alarm bells. This interview further validates my theory.

Some may see this as the Sour Grapes whining of a spurned Prima Donna. And that might well be true to an extent. But one only need look over his current Flames roster, or his acquisitions and signings over the last few years, to see that Sutter (and therefore, Flames organization) values veteran skaters to young players. Experience before exuberance. Naturally this is true of every GM to an extent...proven performance being a better bet than mere potential. But Sutter has seemingly pursued this preference to a damaging degree. Marginal NHLers such as Zyuzin, Amonte, Friesen, McCarty and recently Eriksson, Primeau, Nilson, Mark Smith and (potentially) Aucoin have taken their turn in Flames colors, many at the expense of a younger, cheaper, potentially more productive players in their stead.

Calgary currently has two players below the age of 25 on the roster - back-up Curtis McElhinney (24) and Dion Phaneuf (22). Sophomore David Moss is 25 and made the team last year thanks to a perfect storm of circumstances: strong showing in the AHL, plus Kobasew being ineffective and injured, plus McCarty being injured, plus Amonte being ineffective plus scoring in his first 3 games as a call-up. A lot of injuries and suck from the incumbents AND good AHL numbers AND a healthy dose of the Primacy Effect (also known as a "good first impression") had to conspire to get Moss up to the bigs. That's a lot of good breaks.

Finally, Warren Peters, who managed to make the club out of training camp (but was a healthy scratch last night), is also 25.

Sutter has done some good things for the club's developmental system since he took over. He re-stocked a prospect cupboard that was almost completely bare. He's established a strong AHL team. He's collected some decent players from later in the draft. But the whole thing looks to be stagnating thanks to a sort of glass ceiling erected above the kids heads. Prospects not named "Dion Phaneuf" are met with a sort of guarded ambivalence about their position in the organization, even if their performance seems to indicate they could contribute at the NHL level if actually afforded the opportunity (see: Mark Giordano).

Instead, veteran journeymen are used to plug roster holes, despite boasting higher price-tags and minimal ability. Ask yourself: why does Wayne Primeau deserve a 3 year, one-way, multi-million dollar contract? Why is he preferable to say, Boyd, Taratukhin or even Warren Peters? Sure, he has a bunch more experience, but many, many years in the NHL has proven one thing as evidenced by a glance at his stats-line: he's a mediocore player. At best. Same with Mark Smith and arguably Marcus Nilson, who was also re-signed this summer even though he was all sorts of brutal last year. And don't get me started on the 2 year, $3M Eriksson contract: a mistake that was stamped in the exact same footprint as the Zyuzin gaffe the previous year.

Take a look at a number of "contenders" rosters and register the contrast between their developmental policy and Calgary's...

- The San Jose Sharks have 8 players 24 years old or younger on their starting roster. And only one of them (Patzold) is a rookie. At least 3 of them are already counted on to be difference makers for the squad (Michalek, Carle, Vlasic).

- The Detroit Red Wings, an admittedly old team with lots of established vets, has two youngsters below 24 (Hudler, Filpula) on their roster, with Kopecky (25) and Brett Lebda (25) and Kronvall (26) and Henrik Zetterberg (26) just beyond the mark. All homegrown Red Wings players.

- The Anaheim Ducks won the Stanely cup last year with 21 year olds Getzlaf and Perry playing major roles as well as Dustin Penner (24) and Travis Moen (24). You can add Bobby Ryan (20) and Ryan Carter (23) to the mix for them this season.

- The Ottawa Senators are favored to be the best team in the East after making it to the cup finals last year. Their roster includes: Nick Foligno (18), Josh Hennessy (20), Patrick Eaves (23), Antoine Vermette (24), Jason Spezza (24), Andrej Meszaros (21) and Ray emery (24).

Clearly, not all these guys are rookies...but they were only a short-time ago. The organizations in question obviously made concerted efforts to develop their pups at an NHL level. They didn't sign doddering vets or marginal grinders when it was clear that a youngster could replace those contributions AND take a few valuable steps forward. They didn't bury them behind 30 year-olds with one-way contracts...

This is not a grave indictment of Sutter. I've really liked many of things he's done as a GM here in Calgary. But some cracks are beginning to form in the veneer of "hockey genius" that coats his tenure here. Rookies are fleeing and the payroll is soaring. One wonders how much currency remains from the '04 play-off run and whether it will be enough to sustain his reign should this season end up playing out like the last one.

Serenity Now!

Well that was a whole heap of garbage. Mostly.

Following the tradition of losing season-openers (and October games in general), Calgary turned in what can only charitably be called a poor effort last night: no real cohesion, an inability to execute basic plays, a lack of urgency and a half dozen remarkably bone-headed gaffes.

Let's start the finger pointing with Adrian Aucoin. He was $4M worth of suck. He looked like a guy that was pulled out of a beer league and asked to play defense in the NHL. He was directly responsible for the first goal against thanks to a series of blunders in his own end. He also took the slashing penalty that led to the 5on3 PP that in turn led to the Flyers second goal. Keenan eventually demoted him to the 3rd pairing (he began the night beside Regehr) with Anders Eriksson, and he still managed to look lost. By the end of the evening, Aucoin had pretty much played himself off of the PP and the PK. His performance made me lament the loss of Hamrlik and appreciate the play of Rhett Warrener. If you listened carefully last night, you could hear a distinct hint of laughter emanating from the East...Chicago fans haven't had a lot to laugh about over the last few years, so I don't begrudge them their mirth.

To be fair, it was one game. A very small sample size. Tanguay was pretty bad in his Flames debut last season as well and he rounded into form.

It's harder for me to give Aucoin the benefit of the doubt, however, considering he's been pretty bad for 2 straight seasons now. His acquisition was a big gamble and already it has "major blunder" written all over it. Danny Markov is still unsigned, right?

Not that Eriksson was much better. He saw butter soft minutes, only about 10 of them, and still managed to look the turd. His horrendous miscue that handed the Flyers the victory with 2 minutes remaining was just the icing on the cake. He had trouble handling the puck all night: picture two magnets with like poles facing one another. That was Eriksson and the puck. His performance made me lament the loss of Giordano and appreciate the play of Andrei Zyuzin (not really on the latter point, but at least Zyuzin was ever so slightly cheaper). That signing made little sense to me at the time and makes even less sense now. It's not like the Flames played Detroit or San Jose either...imagine what will happen when he has to face a team who's second line has better options than Joffrey Lupul. Terrifying. Oh well, at least he's a veteran, right??

There were lots of ordinary performances besides the horrible ones. Iginla and Tanguay were largely ineffective, especially at ES. Going into the game, I figured there'd be a good chance of Calgary's big guns eating the Flyers lackluster blueline/depth players for breakfast. Alas, they couldn't seem to get anything going. Braydon Coburn and Darien Hatcher were just too solid.

In addition, Jarome Iginla took 2 hooking penalties, including one in the final minute that pretty much washed out any chance of the Flames evening the game. Not the best game for the Captain.

I barely noticed Owen Nolan at all.

Wayne Primeau played all of 9 minutes and was still -2.

Bleh.

It wasn't all terrible though. Matthew Lombardi played decently (and was actually rewarded with increased ice-time! A foreign concept under Playfair). Damond Langkow managed 6 shots on net and 2 PP goals. Rhett Warrener was forced back into the top 4 once Aucoin proved his uselessness and he played pretty decently.

The best of a bad lot was Dion Phaneuf, and it wasn't even close. There's been some hand-wringing in the off-season by pundits and Flames fans over Dion's perceived "plateauing" last season, but, if last night is any kind of indication of how he'll perform this season, then the apprehension is unfounded. He led all Calgary skaters in ice time (31:20), including more than 4 minutes short-handed and 20 minutes at even-strength. He was no less than solid at both ends of the ice. He pinched at the right times and was physical at the right times. He singlehandedly penetrated the offensive zone more than once. Might be one of the best games I've seen Phaneuf play in a long time, in fact.

Overall, the Flames still have a ways to go. They didn't look like a good team, let alone the elite team that people rightly expect when looking at the roster. At times, they appeared to be skating in oatmeal and I probably couldn't count the number of outlet passes that were 3 feet ahead or behind their target. The entire squad also seems unable to bear down and bury scoring chances in and around the slot. That was something I noticed in the pre-season (especially in their loss to the Canucks at home) and it was still in full effect against Philly.

The good news is, Keenan's bench management seems less capricious and arbitrary than Playfair's thus far. Based on the evidence from yesterday, he has no issue demoting the anchors and promoting the effective players. He didn't hesitate to demote Conroy and Aucoin when it was clear they weren't getting the job done, for example. At least I can take a modicum of solace from that. For now. There will be little consolation if these kinds of performances persist for too much longer.

For Your Consideration...

Some Items of note heading into the Flames vs. Flyers contest tonight:

ITEM! The Flames haven't won a season opener at home since Roman Turek shut-out the Oilers 1-0 back in 2001.

ITEM! The Flames haven't scored more than 3 goals in a game since March 29th. That includes exhibition games.

ITEM! I attended all of the Flames home pre-season games except for the one against the Sharks. It was the only game Calgary won. I am attending the game tonight. Place your bets accordingly.

ITEM! Conroy was seen practicing between Iginla and Tanguay recently, while Lombardi was centering Peters and Nilson. Could be because Lombardi's wrist still isn't 100% or it could be because Conroy has Svengali-like powers over the Flames coaching staff.

ITEM! Nolan is expected to play this evening. I recently bet a friend of mine $10 Nolan would play less than 70 games this year, so I'm not sure how I feel about it. David Moss is the lone roster player who will be shelved due to injury.

ITEM! Yelle was seen on a line with Primeau and Godard at practice. GAG.

ITEM! Damond Langkow received 32 votes for the Selke trophy last season.

ITEM! Philadelphia already has a bunch of injuries: Randy Jones (Hip), RJ Umberger (broken finger), Scottie Upshall (broken wrist) and Joffrey Lupul (sprained wrist) all sustained some boo-boos during the pre-season. Of the four, only Lupul is probable to play tonight (which is fine by me).

ITEM! I have both Gagne and Knuble on one of my many fantasy teams. Should the game go as I expect it will, at least there'll be a silver lining (for me).

ITEM! During their "Season Preview", the pundits on the NHL Network declared the Flames will probably have issue "scoring goals this season". They thought the addition of Adrian Aucoin would likely help out the PP. Also, Alex Tanguay was not mentioned as one of the difference makers on the team...

A tad depressing I guess. I think my melancholy outlook is natural given the Flames decided lack of positive results over the last few months or so. Here's hoping they prove me wrong tonight.

The Predictions Post

I guess I should man up and post my regular season predictions for each conference. Without further Preamble...

Western Conference:

1.) Detroit - Great coach, amazing defensemen, two game breaking forwards and improving youth in a terrible division. Even a Hasek injury can't de-rail the Red Wings

2.) San Jose Sharks - Scary forwards led by two of the best centers in the league. Maturing youth crop, good starting goaltender and the Phoenix Coyotes to beat up on 8 times.

3.) Colorado Avalanche - Lots of goals, decent blueline, potentially adequate goaltending.

4.) Anaheim - Still have Pronger and Giguere. Perry and Getzlaf will likely take a step forward as well. Loss of Selanne will hurt and Bertuzzi still sucks though.

5.) Nashville - Reports of their demise have been greatly exaggerated. Still better than Chicago, St. Louis and Columbus.

6.) Calgary - Iginla, Phaneuf, Kipper and Regehr should be able to get this club into the post-season, whatever the Iron Mike effect turns out to be.

7.) Vancouver - Goaltending and defense too good to be denied.

8.) Dallas - On a downward slope. Coaching and Turco will sneak them into the post-season though.

9.) Minnesota - Could easily trade with Vancouver or Calgary depending on the Gaborik factor.

10.) LA Kings - Get a goalie, then we'll talk.

11.) St. Louis - Slowly climbing the ladder. Weight and Tkachuk aren't what they once were though.

12.) Edmonton - Too much youth, not enough defense. Or offense, come to think of it. Also, tough division.

13.) Columbus - Not enough anything on this club.

14.) Chicago - Samsonov and Lang aren't going to make the difference here. Havlat is guaranteed to be sidelined for 15 games.

15.) Phoenix - Worst team in the league by quite a wide margin I would say.

Eastern Conference:

1.) Ottawa - Might be the class of the league. Heatley, Spezza and Redden in their contract seasons. Top divisional rival (BUF) got weaker.

2.) NYR - Hard to not be impressed with a top 6 that includes Gomez, Jagr, Drury, Shanahan and Straka. Blueline is steady if unimpressive, but Lundqvist is the real deal. Should have an excellent PP.

3.) Florida - By virtue of winning the perpetually weak SE division. Florida has a couple of elite players in Jokinen and Bouwmeester, some maturing contributors in Horton, Weiss and Olesz and a decent complimentary crop (Dvorak, McLean, Allen, Stumpel) and some better than average goaltending in Vokoun.

4.) Pittsburgh - Crosby, Malkin, Gonchar, Staal, Whitney. Enough firepower to make up for defensive deficiencies. Scary PP.

5.) Buffalo - Took some hits in the off-season, but still have offensive depth and a good starting goalie.

6.) NJ Devils - Brent Sutter will squeeze every last ounce of effort out of this line-up. Brodeur is still a top 3 goalie and Elias/Gionta should bounce back.

7.) Atlanta - Kovalchuk and Hossa squeak them into the post season again. Lehtonen continues to improve.

8.) Toronto - Toskala and Blake manage to make enough of a difference.

9.) Tampa Bay - No goaltending at all, no forward depth and no Boyle for 6 weeks. St. Louis and Vinny can only play so much.

10.) Carolina - Staal bounces back, but there's still precious little defensive depth and I dont have faith in Ward.

11.) Philadelphia - Some improvement thanks to off-season moves. Not a lot of goals beyond Gagne-Briere-Knuble and not a lot of defense beyond Timonen-Smith. Biron is question mark as well.

12.) Montreal - "Difference makers" at forward are nightmares at ES (Koivu, Ryder, Kovalev) and no way do they repeat that PP performance this year. Markov, Komisarek and Hamrlik are good, but not good enough.

13.) Boston - Fernandez will be exposed by the Bruins. Chara can't play the whole game and there's precious little depth beyond him. Their forwards (Savard, Sturm, Bergeron and Murray) can outscore their opponents...on the powerplay.

14.) NYI - A lot of cast-offs (Comrie, Sim, Vasicek), 3rd liners and depth defensemen. And poor Dipietro, who is stuck in hockey purgatory for another 13 years.

15.) Washington - Ovi, Semin and Nylander will no doubt score some goals, but that's the Caps can look forward to. No real defense beyond Tom Poti and Kolzig ain't getting any younger.

That was harder than I thought, the 9-15 selections in particular (excepting Phoenix). Looking at the list now, I think I'm going to very wrong at the end of the year in a couple of instances. Oh well. That's why the games are played.

Season Preview

I wrote extensive previews for each NW Division team last year, something I'm disinclined to repeat this season. Instead, I've decided to instead produce a "quick and dirty" version. Enjoy.

Colorado Avalanche:

Ryan Smyth joins the highest scoring team in the Division. Another year of maturing youngsters Statsny and Wolski adds to the weaponry. Milan Hejduk has settled comfortably into 30-30-60 type territory and Sakic is an ageless, point producing wonder. Brunette will likely stick in the top 6 after his career season last year while Arnason and Svatos give the Avs a couple more options on the 3rd line.

On the back-end, Colorado has a decent top 4 consisting of newly acquired Scott Hannan, a healthy Jordan Leopold, well-kept secret Brett Clark (who saw some of the toughest minutes last year and did well despite playing in front of mediocre goaltending) and Karlis Skrastins. JM Liles needs to be sheltered, but brings some capable offense from the point on the PP a la Tom Preissing. Expect him and probably Clark and Leopold (assuming the latter actually plays) to have career years.

The primary question mark in Colorado is between the pipes. Theodore is still a shadow of his former self and will be a $5M back-up again this season. Budaj was more than capable during the Avs 4 week run to end the season, but he'll have to prove he can do it over the long haul this year.

The Avs are going to score a lot this season and their defence has been firmed up. If the goalie situation works out, expect them to challenge for the NW crown.

Vancouver Canucks:

The Canucks are the new Flames: Vezina candidate in net, deep blue line, terrible forward depth. The Sedin twins are the real deal and Naslund can still pot a few (although his days of being an elite winger are clearly over). After that...? Pyatt is a capable enough compliment to the Twins on the top line, but, then again, almost anyone tends to score in that role (see Anson Carter). Morrison continues his slide into obscurity and there's hardly two goals to rub together beyond the 2nd line.

The defense corps. is fairly impressive with Ohlund, Salo, Mitchell and Beiksa heading up the group. Some offense, lots of defense there. Krajicek and aging vet Aaron Miller round out the top 6.

Of course, the true stars are Roberto Luongo and the defensive minded system implemented by Alain Vigneault. Bobby-Lou+trap=wins as the team discovered last season. If he remains in top form and healthy, Vancouver will probably win their share of 1 goal games again this season.

The Canucks will be in the mix for the division lead all season - assuming the Sedins and Luongo stay healthy. Any sort of long-term injury to one of those 3 players sinks this team.

Minnesota Wild:

Lots of question marks for this squad. Will the Slovaks stay healthy? Will Backstrom repeat his performance from last year? Can someone step up to be the #1 center?

The Wild's forwards are decent when they're all in the line-up. Gaborik is an elite difference maker, especially with Demitra on his line. Brian Rolston has been a 30 goal guy since coming to Minny and Mikko Koivu is slowly but surely developing into a capable top-6 forward. PM Bouchard and Mark Parrish also add something to the scoresheet here and there.

Minnesota's back-end is fairly average, however. Kim Johnsson hasn't been the same since his injury woes in Philadelphia. Shultz, Carney and Skoula are all okay, if unspectacular, 4-6 type guys. Kurtis Foster has a howitzer from the point and Peterri Nummelin is a crafty puck mover, but neither are defensive stalwarts at ES. I have no idea what Sean Hill is doing on this team and Brent Burns is a converted winger. Minny seems to have a lot of the same thing and not enough prime shut-down guys that can be matched up against other team's big guns. Course, the stultifying Lemaire game-plan does seem to help in that regard.

Niklas Backstrom came out of nowhere and usurped Manny Fernandez last season. He put up some very impressive numbers (that tends to happen in Minnesota) and is now the undisputed starter for the Wild. Josh Harding will be backing up Backstrom and he looks like the real deal as well. Backstrom is a bit of a gamble, considering his limited experience in the NHL, but there's no reason to think his play will fall off to any great degree.

Overall, expect the Wild to be in the mix for a play-off spot. Where they end up at the end of the season will likely be mediated by the number of games Gabber manages to play.

Edmonton Oilers:

The Oil scored more goals than absolutely nobody last year. While I don't expect them to be the worst in the league by this measure again this year (hello Phoenix), I can't see them rocketing up the GF chart either. The stolen sophomore Dustin Penner joins Hemsky and, uh...Stoll and Horcoff on the front lines. Rookies Cogliano and Sam Gagner will also likely be expected to step-up and pop a few. Robert Nilsson may also get a turn in the top 6 and on the PP. After that, Edmonton has some character players (Moreau, Reasoner, Sanderson) and role players (Stortini) and little else. Two-way winger Fernando Pisani is out indefinitely with ulceritive colitis, further depleting the Oilers forward depth.

On the back-end, Edmonton added re-tread Dick Tarnstrom as well as puck-mover Jani Pitkanen and the immobile cannon of Sheldon Souray. The result will likely be an improved PP but chaos at ES. Veteran Steve Staios looks to be the de facto "shut-down" defender and Matt Greene will try to prove he can actually develop into the Smith replacement everyone up North is HOPING he can become. Not a lot of "defense" in this defense corps. it seems.

Dwayne Roloson has proven to be a decent #1 tender since being traded to the Greasers. unfortunately, he's on the other side of 35 and will likely be facing a lot of rubber again this season. One of Lowe's few good moves this off-season was the acquisition of Mathieu Garon, who should be able to play a good 15-25 games and take the pressure off the aging spaz should he begin to tire.

Prognosis: negative. The Oilers have too many youngsters and too few capable difference makers in a tough division. On the road, the Oil will likely be victimized by their lack of quality shut-down fowards and defenders. Roloson is a decent goalie, but is a few steps behind the likes of Luongo and Kipper (and perhaps Backstrom as well). Not quite Columbus or Chicago bad, but will most likely be watching the post-season from the sidelines again.

Calgary Flames:

????

Hard to pick a clear cut favorite again this season. Almost every team has obvious strengths as well as a few glaring question marks. Four out of five could contend for the division title, depending on injuries and other factors.

A Lasting Impression

The Flames lost 4 straight contests to end the 06/07 regular season. They limped into the play-offs and were soundly humiliated by the Red Wings, despite stretching the series to 6 games.

The Calgary team of last April was, by all measures, abysmal. They gave up a lot of shots, a lot of goals and didn't score many themselves. The talented individuals on paper didn't translate to a capable team on the ice.

Unfortunately, according to the available evidence, not much has changed over the summer. The Flames finished the pre-season on Saturday by losing to the Sharks 2-1. They managed only one win in eight games, that coming in a shoot-out. They were shut-out twice and scored a meager 13 goals over the 8 contests - a 1.6 GPG average. They surrendered 24 goals against, for a -11 GD. They lost several games to "lesser" rosters. They're record of 1-5-2 was only equaled by Pittsburgh (1-3-2) and Boston (1-4-1) and was surpassed by the rest of the league.

The Flames have won 3 games in their last 18 going back to April. And although Calgary boasted a top 10 offense last season, I can't seem to remember the last time they score more than 3 goals in a game.

Of course, this is probably overstating things given the relative importance of the pre-season. The Flames performance thus far, while not panic-inducing, is certainly disheartening. Particularly because it looks like they're going to start this season in the exact fashion they ended the last one. And I have BAD residual feelings about how they ended last season (for good reason).

I've slowly realized it was probably foolhardy to expect the summer months to erase the stain of failure from this club. Turning over a portion of the roster obviously wasn't enough to cure the Flame's ills. And clearly Keenan has only begun to institute his own environment in the club's dressing room and behind the bench. The (losing) culture that prevailed in April still prevails now and it appears that it might take more time than I personally anticipated to properly alter it.

I'm certainly not going to predict a season of failure based on a bad pre-season. But it's probably safe to say we'll be treated to another ugly October at the very least.

Sigh.