Kukla's Korner

You’re The GM - How Much Do You Pay Bobrovsky?

Blog: KK Hockey By Paul

05/23/13 at 10:25 AM ET | Comments (0)

from Aaron Portzline of the Columbus Dispatch,

It has been about a month since the Blue Jackets’ season ended and two months since contract talks between the club and goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky started, but the sides are no closer to reaching a deal.

“We’ve talked. We’ve exchanged ideas,” general manager Jarmo Kekalainen said this week. “But we haven’t made any progress, really. It’s been pretty quiet for a while now.”

Bobrovsky, 24, can become a restricted free agent on July 5, and he’s due a big raise from the roughly $1.7 million a season he made in his entry-level deal, including salary and bonuses.

continued

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  Tags: sergei+bobrovsky

Wings Loaded With Homegrown Talent

Blog: The Malik Report By Paul

05/23/13 at 09:56 AM ET | Comments (5)

from Cam Cole of the Vancouver Sun,

There is something vaguely unfair about the Detroit Red Wings.

The lineup they iced for Game 3 of their Western Conference semifinal series against Chicago on Monday had 15 players who were either their own draft picks or who were Red Wings property before anyone else got them.

That's 15 out of 20, and if forward Darren Helm and defenceman Danny DeKeyser were healthy, the number would be higher.

This, despite having not had a top-10 pick in the draft since 1991 (Marty Lapointe), and only two inside the top 20 in the 22 seasons since then - in each of which, by the way, the Red Wings have made the playoffs.

Oh, and just to rub it in a little, the Wings' system includes the NCAA college defence-men of the year in the CCHA (DeKeyser) and WCHA (Nick Jensen), the top defenceman in the Canadian Hockey League (Ryan Sproule) and one of the QMJHL's two or three best rearguards, Xavier Ouellet.

continued

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Hockey Takes A Backseat In NYC

Blog: KK Hockey By Paul

05/23/13 at 09:45 AM ET | Comments (2)

from Dan Shaughnessy,

Hockeytown, this is not.

The New York state of mind is not focused on the neutral zone trap. It’s hard to be a Rangers fan in the city. Spike Lee and Whoopi Goldberg don’t splice Rangers footage into their films.

Sure, the Rangers have fans and sellouts and Original Six tradition, and they even won a Stanley Cup back in 1994. But I have been here since Monday and I am here to tell you that there is no buzz in this town for the New York Rangers. The House of Blueshirts is the hockey house of blues.

It’s not just because the 2012-13 Rangers can’t score goals, have no power play (2 for 38 in playoffs), and are teetering on the brink of elimination. No. It was like this in the days leading up to Tuesday night’s de facto clincher by the Bruins.

The Knicks are the big deal here. The Yankees are a big deal. And the Giants. Even the Jets.

The Rangers? Not that big of a deal. They get sketchy coverage in the local papers. They aren’t a hot topic on sports radio. Except for their All-World goalie, Henrik Lundqvist, they lack star power.

continued

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Rangers Need Some Edge To Their Game

Blog: KK Hockey By Paul

05/23/13 at 09:33 AM ET | Comments (0)

from Larry Brooks of the New York Post,

The Rangers have been shorthanded just 21 times in 10 playoff games, and just 17 times since the 7:00 mark of the second period of Game 1 in Washington. Twice in the last five matches — Game 6 against the Caps and Game 3 against the Bruins — they went entire games without being down a man.

That goes beyond discipline. That goes to a lack of initiating and responding and it goes to a fear of playing on the edge. And now they’re on a ledge.

Down 3-0, it almost impossible to see all the way up. But if the Rangers are going to go down, at least they don’t have to be so polite about it.

more

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GDT - WCSF Game 4: Red Wings (2-1) host Hawks (1-2) 8:00

Blog: Abel to Yzerman By Jeff OKWingnut

05/23/13 at 09:11 AM ET | Comments (8)

So I hear there is a big game at The Joe tonight.  The Wings can put a stranglehold on this series, and you just know that the 'Hawks will be under serious pressure for this game.

LGRW

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Red Wings-Blackhawks Game 4 set-up: Wings must calmly rebuff Hawks’ best efforts

Blog: The Malik Report By George Malik

05/23/13 at 03:08 AM ET | Comments (5)

The Detroit Red Wings face off against the Chicago Blackhawks tonight (8 PM EDT, NBCSN/CBC/97.1 FM, and FSD will air a post-game show; tonight is also the "Fill a Boot" night fundraiser to help the family of Dearborn firefighter Brian Wohlke) knowing that "things will move pretty fast" from here on out. Starting with Game 4 this evening, this series will switch to the familiar play-every-other-day format, with Games 5, 6 and 7 scheduled to take place on Saturday (8 PM, NBC), next Monday and Wednesday...

So the two-day breaks' worth of bluster will soon be behind us (there were two practice posts, an evening multimedia post, injury updates and multiple discussions of the Wings' rebuilding-on-the-fly status for a reason; for the record, it's going to get up to 60 today with scattered showers, but the low for tonight's forecasted at 37 degrees, so the ice should be much better at the Joe, too), but Wednesday's practice chatter did end in something of a flourish from Chicago, where the Hawks still insist that they must play "angry," and where Joel Quenneville's decided to jump-start his power play and his team's scoring by adding Bryan Bickell as a net-front presence and prescribing more Andrew Shaw to get in Jimmy Howard's grill, respectively.

The Hawks didn't absolutely insist that the series will head to Chicago tied 2-2, but they came pretty close while speaking with Comcast Sportsnet Chicago's Tracey Myers...

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Video- Coach’s Corner From Wednesday Night

Blog: KK Hockey By Paul

05/23/13 at 12:31 AM ET | Comments (0)

Ron MacLean pointed out Crosby cheating in the faceoff circle, Don Cherry discussed the first period of the Pens/Sens game, defensemen getting their stick in the way of a shot and the 4th-liners in the playoffs.

Cherry then went on to talk about Milan Lucic and Joe Thornton and MacLean talked a little about the refs in the playoffs.

Cherry then talked about the dismissal of Vigneault in Vancouver and feels Gillis threw some of the coaching staff under the bus.

Filed in: NHL Teams, NHL Media, Hockey Broadcasting, CBC HNIC, | KK Hockey | Permalink
 

Video- What Is Alfredsson Trying To Say?

Blog: KK Hockey By Paul

05/23/13 at 12:09 AM ET | Comments (6)

The last question asked on this interview is the one the twitter world has been talking about the last hour.

Make sure to follow the recent timeline of Erin Nicks' twitter for discussion and clarification.

Filed in: NHL Teams, Ottawa Senators, | KK Hockey | Permalink
  Tags: daniel+alfredsson

Paul MacLean keeps it brief after Senators’ loss to Pittsburgh

Blog: KK Hockey By George Malik

05/22/13 at 11:44 PM ET | Comments (1)

The Ottawa Senators had a rough night in their own barn, dropping a 7-3 decision to the Pittsburgh Penguins, who now lead the teams' second-round series 3 games to 1, and Yahoo Sports' Sean Leahy reports that Senators coach Paul MacLean held a short press conference. Short doesn't begin to describe it, but its description would probably read longer than what MacLean had to say:

And I quote: "Um, it's, uh, I think everything's right here" (shows game summary to press), "It's 7-3, see you in Pittsburgh. We're going to Pittsburgh, and we're coming to play. Have a good night."

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Holland, Babcock and the Red Wings’ players discuss ‘rebuilding on the fly’

Blog: The Malik Report By George Malik

05/22/13 at 11:10 PM ET | Comments (6)

Over the course of the both the Red Wings-Ducks and Red Wings-Blackhawks series, Ken Holland and Mike Babcock's roles on Detroit's "rebuilding on the fly" season (which, as the Oakland Press's Pat Caputo noted this afternoon, does not involve tanking to be bad enough for long enough to stockpile high draft picks like the Blackhawks did), and with the Grand Rapids Griffins advancing to the AHL's Western Conference Finals, Martin Frk dazzling at the Memorial Cup and the team adding to its stockpile of drafted prospects by bringing over Calle Jarnkrok (temporarily), Teemu Pulkkinen (permanently) and signing Nick Jensen and Mattias Backman recently (and adding free agents like Damien Brunner and the rapidly-headling Danny DeKeyser hasn't hurt, either)...

The Wings' NHL and AHL rosters don't necessarily lack talent or depth, though they're certainly not the Blackhawks.

Now the story about Mike Babcock heading to Anaheim instead of succeeding Scotty Bowman isn't necessarily as gruff as Ken Holland told the AP's Larry Lage earlier today--Babcock was coaching the AHL's Cincinnati Mighty Ducks in the 2001-2002 season, and when Babcock approached Holland stating that he wanted to coach the Wings, Holland told Babcock that he simply couldn't hire a coach with no experience as opposed to stating that the team "doesn't hire interns"...

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