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By Zach Schiff  January 25, 2010, at 9:36 am  I will update later today about the Rangers game in Montreal. For the record, it’s the 1st time I’ve seen them lose in an opposing building (not including the Nassau Coliseum). I saw them win in Nashville, New Jersey, Philadelphia, and Montreal before the 6-0 disaster I witnessed first-hand Saturday night.
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Do you know the differences in Dan Carcillo and Donald Brashear? Carcillo has 6 goals and 6 assists this year; Brashear had no goals and 1 assist. Carcillo dresses for games while Brashear stays nice and clean in a suit and tie. Carcillo wins fights (his record this year is 7-3-2, including beating Marian Gaborik and losing to Sean Avery last Thursday) while Brashear skates away from confrontation. In fact, the last fight Brashear won was against Jared Boll of Columbus three days before Thanksgiving. Brashear’s record this year stands at 3-4-2.
As for Brashear’s claims that he wouldn’t fight Carcillo – “I don’t even fight a guy like Carcillo. I don’t think he’s in my league.” – and then his claims that he isn’t a guy who only goes out and fights staged fights… well, what? Do you fight everyone or will you only fight heavyweights?
“If I would have played” Gaborik would not have been fought by Carcillo, Brashear said. Oh yeah? If you’re out there fighting people like Matt Carkner, Eric Boulton, Eric Godard, and Shawn Thornton, is that really a deterrent for people like Carcillo? Will he not get under Gaborik’s skin just because there is a chance that Brashear might lose a fight to Aaron Asham or Ian Laperriere?
Did Brashear’s presence in the first half of the season stop any team from running over Henrik Lundqvist? Were they afraid he was going to go after Ilya Kovalchuk or Johan Hedberg, or did they know that, no matter what, he would fight Boulton and leave everyone else alone?
Like what Carcillo did or not, he got the Flyers an extra 2 points that night. He got the best player on the team to thrown down his gloves and fight him. He threw an entire team off their game, because they then stopped trying to score and started looking for revenge. The only person nearly capable of getting under a team’s skin like that on the Rangers’ roster is Avery. Not Brashear.
Guess what, Donald. Carcillo might not be in your league for long – because he’ll still be in the NHL for the next decade.
By Zach Schiff January 18, 2010, at 12:54 pm Next Saturday, I will be venturing into Montreal to see the second game of the Home & Home with the Canadiens. Okay, it’s a home-and-home with 2 other games in between, but still, it stands to be more intriguing than a home game against Tampa Bay and a game in Philadelphia.
So, which jersey should I wear?
Should I go with the autographed Dan Girardi jersey?
The autographed Sean Avery?
Superstar Marian Gaborik?
New addition to my collection Vinny Prospal?
I normally like to wear Sean Avery jerseys when I’m in other buildings.
I did it in Nashville last year about a month after the Rangers got him back on re-entry waivers, and a few fans yelled “Sloppy Seconds!” at me. To recap, I am not Sean Avery, I just wear the jersey. And the Rangers won that game.
I wore it in New Jersey amid death threats from the upper level (directed at me, my friends, and Scott Gomez, playing his first game in Jersey since signing with the Rangers). Those were quieted when the Rangers won the game.
I wore it in Philadelphia, where some kid tried to body check my friend. “How could you wear a Sean Avery jersey in Philly?” one cigarette-smoking man asked me. Well, the Rangers won that game.
And I wore it in Montreal on Super Bowl Sunday when the Giants beat the Patriots. As I was on the escalator, there was a man in a Mike Komisarek Habs jersey in front of me. We had an awkward silence, then discussed what it would be like to really date Elisha Cuthbert. The Rangers went down 3-0, then won that game 5-3.
Should I keep the tradition alive, or change things up?
By Bryan Berg January 1, 2010, at 10:26 pm As soon as the Winter Classic ended, you knew everyone was going to start gushing about what a wonderful event it was – even if there was a whistle approximately once every six seconds during the first two periods. This one, hot off the presses, is entitled “NHL Sets Higher Bar with Latest Classic“.
For Marco Sturm, it was his son wanting to stay on the ice at the family skate the day before the Winter Classic.
Doesn’t every kid want to stay on the ice when the session is over? I mean, I’m 28 years old, and when the sessions at Cantiague Park end, I start to cry and beg the attendant for five more minutes on the ice.
Maybe it was James Taylor’s lyrical version of the national anthem.
Isn’t EVERY version of the national anthem performed by a singer considered “lyrical”?
It is not a stretch to suggest that for every Boston Bruins player, every Philadelphia Flyers player, every coach and manager, and the 38,112 who jammed into the Fenway Park stands, there will be a separate memory of the Winter Classic that they will tuck away forever.
OK, first of all, this is a one-sentence paragraph. Second of all, this isn’t even possible. Third of all, people are going to have exactly two memories of this game – it was cool to see a rink at Fenway, and the Bruins won in overtime. In that order.
First, would this audacious plan work? The Buffalo experience on Jan. 1 2008, answered in the affirmative.
Fun fact – if the Winter Classic didn’t debut in Buffalo, it would NEVER be held there. Somehow, I doubt the allure of Ralph Wilson Stadium could attract non-hockey fans.
Corporate sponsors are clamoring to get on board and NHL teams are now bidding to host the event.
Keep this sentence in the back of your mind.
“It is a cornerstone of the strategy we began over three years ago to build scale and connect with our fans in ways we haven’t done before, using all of the platforms available to us,” commissioner Gary Bettman said Friday.
Except, of course, ESPN. This game was listed ninth in ESPN.com’s top stories just an hour after the game was over, behind non-stop college football coverage. That’d probably change if ABC was airing the game. Not saying it’s fair, but that’s the way it’d be.
Success is said to breed success, but at the same time, the bar has been set extremely high and the risk of backsliding, of having an event that doesn’t measure up and therefore becomes subject to criticism or disappointment, goes up.
The bar was never NOT high. Last year’s game set the bar as high as it was going to go. This year’s game just happened to have a better finish. Now, every Winter Classic will have to be held at an iconic stadium and feature two major-market, media-friendly teams.
The NHL has for the first time opened up a bid process to come up with a host for the 2011 game.
Hey, this sounds familiar! I think I read this somewhere before.
The process will force teams to think outside the box in suggesting venues and activities that will “wow” the league.
I’d imagine the bids of teams like Nashville and Columbus will be pieces of paper stating simply, “We know we have no chance of ever getting a Winter Classic. However, we’re submitting this so we can tell our fans we’re in the market for a Winter Classic someday.”
The New York Rangers, for instance, are the only U.S.-based Original Six team that has yet to play in a Winter Classic, and it is important they are involved given their heritage and importance to the league.
Wrong. A GOOD Rangers team is important to the league. The current Rangers team doesn’t do anything for the casual fan outside of New York. It’d be like putting the Knicks on a Christmas Day game… oh wait, nevermind.
Yankee Stadium may not be a possibility, though, with word college football will be using the facility over the holidays; so, the league must consider ways for the Rangers to host a game somewhere else or invite them to play in the contest as a visiting team.
Let’s also not forget that the new Yankee Stadium has been open for exactly one year. A game there isn’t what it would have been a year or two ago. I’d rather see a Winter Classic at the decaying carcass of Giants Stadium than at new Yankee Stadium.
One memory many fans will cherish from Friday’s Winter Classic was watching former Bruins great Bobby Orr skate onto the ice as the team’s honorary captain. Former Philadelphia captain and GM Bob Clarke was the Flyers’ honorary captain, and to see the two Hall of Famers skate to center ice together for the ceremonial puck drop was a nice moment.
It was also a “nice moment” when Clarke pulled the ultimate dick move, “winning” the ceremonial faceoff despite being the road team. What a prick.
Are we saying that places like Tampa, Atlanta, Carolina or Phoenix should never have an Outdoor Classic?
What’s an Outdoor Classic?
Wrigley and Fenway were no-brainers, but now it becomes more difficult to find those iconic venues.
This is actually a good point. I guess there’s a first time for everything.
The game also has to celebrate its biggest stars, and that’s why we don’t have any problem with Pittsburgh and Sidney Crosby being involved in a second game, or Detroit hosting a Winter Classic in the near future even if the Red Wings have already been in one.
We are guessing it is a formality that wherever the game is held next year, the Washington Capitals and Alex Ovechkin will be involved in some way. It is mystifying that three events have passed without the Caps being involved.
You can bet that Ovechkin and Crosby will each play in three Winter Classics before they retire. God forbid NBC and the NHL promote the other teams in the league.
In the end, the challenge of maintaining the Classic’s magical spark isn’t about being fair, it’s about making the right choices.
Awesome. So teams like the Islanders will always be stuck playing second fiddle to the “big” teams and attractive venues. And the “right choices” will always be what yields the biggest TV ratings, not what hockey fans want to see. Get ready for Rangers-Capitals next year, which will be followed by some regurgitation of past Winter Classic matchups. Thank goodness NBC is here to expose the unheralded talent in the NHL.
By Bryan Berg December 30, 2009, at 12:16 am The 2008 NHL Winter Classic was one of those events we’ll always remember. The novelty of an outdoor game, the snow falling, the almost-too-perfect ending with Sidney Crosby scoring in the shootout. The 2009 NHL Winter Classic was no less entertaining, with a resurgent Blackhawks team and the defending champion Red Wings taking over Wrigley Field. The 2009 game showed that the Winter Classic was a sustainable commodity, something that could get the casual sports fan to take an interest in the NHL. Most true hockey fans, though, had the same thought – as great as the Winter Classic is now, if there’s a way for the NHL to screw it up, they will certainly do so.
Fast forward to this year. The debate over who would play in the 2010 Winter Classic was red-hot, which is usually a great sign. Hockey fans had high expectations for the third installment of this event, and with good reason. So when the NHL announced that the Boston Bruins would be playing the Philadelphia Flyers at Fenway Park, many were a bit underwhelmed. Sure, Fenway Park is an iconic venue, but Bruins vs. Flyers?
Many have pointed to the Flyers’ sorry start to this season – 38 points in 38 games, 13th in the East – as proof that the NHL screwed this one up. My thought is that the NHL didn’t screw anything up. Instead, NBC stepped in and got who they wanted – as in, who they thought would pop the best rating. The far more appealing Bruins-Canadiens matchup was shelved, and instead we get Bruins-Flyers, a matchup of two teams who have no rivalry whatsoever and combined to win exactly one playoff series last year.
A Bruins-Canadiens Winter Classic would have done so much to promote the event as a true hockey event. The Montreal Canadiens have one of the richest traditions in all of sports, maybe even more rich than that of the almighty Yankees. Casual fans might not be able to name one player on the Canadiens roster, but they know the team and understand something about the their history. They could come to understand the Canadiens-Bruins rivalry (assuming the NHL and NBC promoted it) and get into this matchup, giving the Canadiens the same respect they’d give to any well-known NHL team. Lastly, and most importantly, including the Canadiens in the Winter Classic would have been a huge bone thrown in the direction of the Canadian teams, who got the ball rolling when it comes to outdoor games and deserves to be part of this event going forward.
Of course, that’s when NBC stepped in. I can picture the conversation…
GARY BETTMAN: For the 2010 Winter Classic, I’d like to have the Bruins host the Montreal Canadiens at Fenway Park.
NBC EXECUTIVE: The who?
GARY BETTMAN: The Montreal Canadiens.
NBC EXECUTIVE: What are they, an expansion team?
GARY BETTMAN: No, sir. They’ve been around for a hundred years. They’ve won 24 Stanley Cups. They may well be the most famous…
NBC EXECUTIVE: Hold it right there. I don’t know what you’re talking about with all this Montreal nonsense, but I’m not interested. This is NBC, damn it. We only show games that include the Penguins, Capitals, Rangers, Bruins and Flyers. Hey, Bruins and Flyers, that’d be a great matchup, no?
GARY BETTMAN: Not really.
NBC EXECUTIVE: Well, that’s how it’s going to be. If you think about it, it doesn’t really matter who the Bruins play. ESPN will see that a Boston team is involved and promote the hell out of it, so neither of us will have to do anything.
GARY BETTMAN: Good point. Besides, we don’t really care about our Canadian audience anyway.
NBC EXECUTIVE: Then it’s settled. It’ll be Bruins-Flyers at Fenway, and I’ll tell you what. We’ll put you in our NFL studio show for Wild Card weekend. We already have 30 analysts on that show, what’s one more?
(Both Bettman and the executive laugh uproariously, then roll around in a pile of money.)
OK, so maybe it didn’t go exactly like that. But it may as well have. In the mean time, the NHL is already doing everything it can to weaken its “flagship event”. (Editor’s note: Anytime your “flagship event” isn’t your championship game/series, you’re in trouble.) Bettman has talked about creating an outdoor game solely for Canada, largely because he knows there’s no way in hell NBC is letting a Canadian team anywhere near the Winter Classic. With more than one outdoor game in any given year, the NHL seriously risks ruining the uniqueness of the Winter Classic. It might be running against crappy college football games, but the viewing audience still needs something new and fresh to watch.
Sadly, NBC doesn’t do “new and fresh”. NBC does “whatever will get us the highest TV ratings possible”. So, while the 2010 Winter Classic might be about the Bruins and Flyers on paper, it’s a bit different to diehard hockey fans. Years from now, we may look back at the 2010 Winter Classic as the year the Winter Classic changed from a hockey event to a TV event – the year the NHL gave its huge showcase event to NBC in the name of ratings and advertising dollars. You know what the worst part is? The only thing that’s surprising is that it took this long.
By Zach Schiff December 5, 2009, at 2:34 pm Four years ago, you could have said the Rangers would get 2 points in this weekend’s back-to-back games, one in Buffalo and then home against Detroit. They could’ve beaten the Sabres but would have been mauled by the Red Wings.
Three years ago, you could’ve written this weekend off as a total loss. The Sabres were flying on the wings of Danny Briere and Chris “More Than 2 Goals in 22 Games” Drury, and the Red Wings again would have mauled them.
This year, it could be interesting.
The Sabres are flying high at 16-7-2 and are on a 4-game winning streak. They are also 9-3-2 at home, while the Rangers are 6-7-1 on the road. However, the Rangers are well-rested and have arguably the best player in the league playing for them. If Marian Gaborik scores another 2 goals tonight and Henrik Lundqvist shows up with a good performance, they can steal 2 big points from a conference rival.
The Red Wings, however, are just 3 games over .500 and are breaking even on the road. Old incarnations of the Wings have mauled the Rangers every game. There was a cold January game in 2006 where Brendan Shanahan buried them for 2 goals (the Rangers lost 4-3, but there was a late 3rd period goal to make it seem closer); there was a game when Shanahan was a Ranger where the Rangers were winning 3-1 and then stopped playing and lost 4-3 (that was the night Sean Avery was traded to the Rangers); and then there was last year, where Aaron Voros scored 2 goals and the Rangers still lost, in overtime (Aaron Voros… two goals? What?).
Though the Red Wings are struggling, so are the Rangers, and the Rangers do have to travel back from Buffalo in order to play this game. Detroit has a game in New Jersey tonight; traveling from Jersey to New York, however time-consuming the traffic may be, is not as bad as a flight home from Buffalo.
This weekend is really a crapshoot. If I was guessing, I would say they win in Buffalo and get mauled by Detroit. However, knowing my betting record, they’re going to beat Detroit but lose tonight to Buffalo.
Hey, maybe back being in Buffalo will wake Chris Drury and Ales Kotalik up.
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In answer to reader Eric the Lev, who inquired if I thought John Tortorella would get fired like John Stevens – no, I don’t. It’s way too soon to tell if he will last. The team is suffering injuries and are still treading water. However, I think the tide will have to sway in his favor soon to save some more jobs.
In my opinion, the GM should be gone. One coach (Tom Renney) didn’t work. Another one is having problems. Time to point the finger at the man who signed Wade Redden, Michal Rozsival, and Chris Drury to a total of $19M per season, isn’t it?
I also don’t know why Stevens was fired from Philadelphia. The team is doing decent and most of the team is performing well. They don’t have good goaltending yet are staying competitive in games.
I think he was fired because of pre-season expectations. Everyone predicted the Flyers to be great and go deep into the playoffs, yet they have a weak blueline (including overrated Chris Pronger) and poor goaltending (although Ray Emery and Brian Boucher have been playing better than I thought, they still aren’t a top-notch tag team). So they fire the coach, bring in Peter Laviolette, and hope for the best. Bad move.
By Bryan Berg October 5, 2009, at 6:45 pm
There are a lot of people out there who write about hockey. Unfortunately, many of these people are awful at their jobs. Channeling the spirit of Fire Joe Morgan (but with a lot less snarkiness), here’s our response to a recent article that was particularly loathsome.
Some teams in the National Hockey League have a reputation of struggling between the pipes, and the Ottawa Senators were one of those teams. But now with Pascal Leclaire in net, they can finally say they have a number one goaltender – maybe for the first time in the history of their franchise.
This would be a good time to mention that the title of this piece is “Emery-Flyers Marriage A Good Fit For Both Sides“. As in, neither the Ottawa Senators nor Pascal Leclaire were mentioned. The Senators, by the way, have had above-average goalies for this entire decade, be it Patrick Lalime, Ray Emery, Martin Gerber or Dominik Hasek. And if Hasek isn’t a number one goaltender, I don’t know who is.
The Philadelphia Flyers are another one of those teams that have been plagued in goal since Ron Hextall left the team in 1999.
I know I said in my season preview that the Flyers haven’t had a great goalie since Hextall. But they’re hardly “plagued”. They just happened to have a number of goalies that didn’t have very long shelf lives. Since Hextall left, Brian Boucher led them to the 2000 conference finals, then Roman Cechmanek finished second in the league in GAA for the next three years. Cechmanek was followed by Robert Esche, who finished fifth in GAA in 2003-04. Does that sound like a “plague” to you? Me either.
OK, maybe they haven’t had a ton of luck since the lockout, but they had stellar goaltending for the first half of this decade. It just happens that that stellar goaltending has come from a bunch of different people.
In the last 10 years, the Flyers have really struggled to find a goaltender that can do the job and now they have Ray Emery who seems to be a much different guy then last year based on opening night.
A different guy? What does this even MEAN? Has he converted to Islam? Does he tell different jokes in the locker room before games? It’s okay to say he was a whiny bitch in Ottawa, but now he isn’t.
He shut out the Carolina Hurricanes in the season opener
Good for him. But I was wondering how he did when the Hurricanes were on the power play.
and did a particularly good job when the Hurricanes were on the power play.
Wow! That’s amazing, especially since the Flyers had the league’s 6th best penalty kill last year, while Carolina was only 18th on the power play. It must have taken a Herculean effort for Emery to shut the Hurricanes down.
It’s obviously going to take longer than one game for the Ray Emery experiment in Philadelphia to work
BUT HE WAS PARTICULARLY GOOD ON THE POWER PLAY!!!
but at this point in time, considering what his cap money is
According to NHLNumbers.com, Ray Emery is the 29th highest paid goalie in the league at $1.5 million. Goalies making less money than Ray Emery:
- Chris Osgood ($1.45m)
- Martin Biron ($1.4m)
- Jonas Hiller ($1.3m)
- Scott Clemmensen ($1.2m)
- Steve Mason ($0.9m)
- Semyon Varlamov ($.85m)
- Jonathan Quick ($.57m)
- Pekka Rinne ($.725m)
Just about all of these goalies have either had better careers than Emery or have more potential than Emery. So let’s stop pretending he’s on some great contract. He’s got your typical take-a-flier contract (see Biron, Martin). If he sucks, no biggie. If he does well, he’ll cash in elsewhere. This is the NHL equivalent of Michael Vick’s contract with the Eagles, only no dogs were killed.
and considering that he came back with a lot to prove after having been in exile for all intents and purposes in Russia, it’s going to be a good move for the Flyers to have this guy.
Emery signed with the KHL on July 8, 2008. He could have competed for a starting job in the NHL if he really wanted to. Instead, he went to Russia, dominated an inferior league, and suddenly he’s a valuable commodity? If you say so.
The Emery-Flyers marriage is a really good fit for both sides. In other words; a team who desperately needs a goaltender to step up and do something for them and a goaltender who desperately needs a good team to surround him and allow him the opportunity to get back in the good grades with the NHL.
I’m not sure what it means to “get back in the good grades” with someone. But hopefully it means Emery does well. If he doesn’t, it could get ugly. Emery couldn’t handle things in Ottawa. Philly fans are a bit more… um… angry than Ottawa fans. Thankfully, we have seen that the Flyers and Ray Emery are a match made in heaven and that Ray Emery will go 82-0 with 82 shutouts as the Flyers sweep through the playoffs. After all, he was particularly good on the power play.
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