KK Members Blog

KK Members Blog

Shoot the #%$! Puck, Kaberle

10/23/2010 at 7:08pm EDT

This isn’t the first time someone has told Tomas Kaberle to shoot more. He may be a world-class offensive d-man. He may be able to move the puck up the ice and quarterback a powerplay better than almost anyone on the planet. But his shortcoming as an offensive d-man is his reluctance to shoot the puck.

Kaberle ranks 52nd in the league in Shots on Goal among defensemen with 10 on the season. Let’s do the math here. 30 Teams. 2 Defensemen on each team’s top PP unit on the points. That’s 60. Take away 2-3 d-men away from that number for guys like Ovechkin and Kovalchuk manning the points as forwards. Kaberle ranks 52 out of approximately 57 guys on the points of top PP units. By the way, his partner on the point, our Captain, ranks 1st among all d-men with 24 SOG.

Now there will be some among you who say, “well, Kaberle’s job is to set up Dion’s shot on the right or Kessel’s shot on the left.” Well, there is no light way to put this so here it is: You are idiots. This conversation is for people who actually understand hockey.

As of today, our Powerplay ranks 16th in the league at 14.3%. The Rangers drew 10 minutes in minors on Thursday, yet we failed to convert on one. And Kaberle is largely to blame.

Leafs Game Day: Toronto at Philly (7:00 pm EST)

10/23/2010 at 11:43am EDT

Leafs (4-1-1) at Philly (2-3-1)

The Leafs have something to prove this game. After a 4-0-0 start, the Leafs have lost the last two games: An overtime loss to the Islanders which the Leafs dominated from start to finish but could not pull out the W; and a regulation to the Rangers in which the Leafs looked more like the team from last year than the team that began the season with the franchise’s best start in almost two decades. Which team will show up?

Storylines:

Orr vs Boogaard

10/22/2010 at 3:27pm EDT

Colton Orr
Height: 6’ 3”
Weight: 220 Pounds

vs

Derek Boogaard
Height: 6’ 8”
Wight: 257 Points

For those who didn’t see the fight:

Leaf Nation and Charlie Brown

10/22/2010 at 2:59pm EDT

The heart says: This year is different. This year the Leafs will be a top 8 team in the East.

The head says: on paper, the Leafs are the worst team in the Northeast, and that means another year out of the playoffs.

We fall in love with the Leafs too easily. Already there is clamor around the city about the playoffs. Talk radio is flooded with how fast, how much more defensively responsible this team is. People are posting the current NHL standings on Facebook Profile pictures, calling for Kessel to win the Rocket Richard, calling for Giggy to win the Vezina.

Leaf Nation is the Charlie Brown of the NHL. We keep believing Lucy won’t take the playoffs away. But she will. And we will fall flat on our faces once again.

Sunday's Weird Stats

10/17/2010 at 3:48pm EDT

Division

..........

Games

...........

points

.............

%

Atlantic…..........25…..............24….......... .480
Northeast….......23…..............25….......... .543
Southeast…......21…..............28….......... .667
........................69…..............77….......... .558 Eastern Conference Total

Central…..........23…..............30…........... .652
Northwest…......17…..............20…........... .588
Pacific…..........19…..............23…........... .605
.......................59…..............73…........... .619 Western Conference Total

Discuss amongst yourselves

DIRTY HITS, GOONS & WHY THE NHL CODE WORKS

10/15/2010 at 4:02pm EDT


Following his reckless boarding of Buffalo Sabres’ Jason Pominville Monday night, the NHL handed down a two game suspension to the mad Swede which will make his next game back against?…you got it, the Sabres. This was not an accident by the NHL disciplinarians.

How much is that NHL Center Ice Package again?

Whether or not the hit was dirty or intentional is a topic best left for the A.M. sports radio crowd and others who will use this as just another bullet point in their “Concussions Bad” or “Hockey Violent” PowerPoint presentations. Thankfully, Pominville is not stretched out in some Buffalo area hospital bed in traction, and equally important in the cosmic sense, Niklas Hjalmarrson will get his chance to back up just how tough a guy he is on Saturday night at the United Center. Only this time, the players will actually get to see him coming.

World Junior Championships in Buffalo

10/06/2010 at 5:10pm EDT

I’ve got tickets to all games played in Buffalo for the WJC. I’m looking to trade my usa tickets for someones Canada tickets.

5 Reasons the Kings Can Win the Pacific Division

09/15/2010 at 8:20am EDT

In recent years, the #1 seed in the Western Conference has been synonymous with both the Pacific Division and the San Jose Sharks. It would seem likely that this will be repeated again in 2011.

This article will suggest that not only will San Jose not take the first seed in the West, they will not even win their own division, as it is now the time for the Los Angeles Kings to do just that.

Here are the five reasons that the Kings can take their rightful place on the throne in the Pacific:

And The Bill Just Got Steeper

09/14/2010 at 11:21am EDT

Add a hefty $3 million fine and the loss of two draft picks to the list of what New Jersey Devils have lost in their pursuit of Ilya Kovalchuk.

The Devils will lose a 3rd round pick in 2011 and a 1st rounder in one of the next four years as a punishment for trying to test the limits of the rules.

Excessive, sure, but there’s a price to pay for pushing the envelope the farthest, especially when you do the pushing in the direction of Gary Bettman.

What have the Devils already given up?

More Kings Interviews

09/04/2010 at 11:03am EDT

Yesterday Paul (KK) posted a bit of an interview with Anze Kopitar with links to the rest of it on lakings.com. There were 2 other interviews that were related to Kings fans by Rich Hammond on his blog LA Kings Insider

First was an audio interview with former Kings forward and current TV color commentator Jim Fox as he appeared on XM Radio’s Power Play show. Here are 2 links:

Jim Fox Podcast

Jim Fox Twitter Audio

About More Than It Seems

09/03/2010 at 10:40am EDT

When the NHL rejected the original Ilya Kovalchuk deal, clearly more was at stake than a talented UFA left winger.

Numerous media members labeled this a serious test for the then—and probably still—rudderless NHLPA. That ugly seven-letter word ending in “out” started to appear again.

Part of the League’s motives were revealed when Arbitrator Richard Bloch named other contracts on the league’s radar.

Now, with the Larry Brooks story last night, it’s clear this isn’t as much about a contract as it is about the NHL taking the power back.

Kings Gearing Up For Hockey Fest

09/02/2010 at 9:58am EDT

I’m sure most fans outside of Los Angeles will be surprised to hear that the Kings host an annual event for their fans called Hockey Fest. It coincides with the opening of rookie camp and all Kings fans can attend for a small fee. Season ticket holders get a discount.

From Rich Hammond’s LA Kings Insider blog here’s the schedule for this year’s event scheduled for Saturday, September 11th:

For those wondering about what the Kings’ “Hockey Fest” will look like this season, here’s a rundown of exactly how the day is scheduled to go. All events will take place at the Toyota Sports Center in El Segundo. Tickets are available for $20 (or $15 for season-ticket holders).

Having Any Second Thoughts?

08/31/2010 at 11:02pm EDT

The fact that the Ilya Kovalchuk impasse will drag out at least another day shouldn’t come as much of a surprise. It would have been naive (read: I was naive) to believe reports that an answer would come from the League today.

This will-he-or-won’t-he question has lingered since the superstar left winger was traded to New Jersey in February. It stayed unanswered through weeks of courtship from the Kings and Devils in July and it could remain that way—God, forbid—if this contract is dismissed once again by the suits on Sixth Avenue.

Somehow, it doesn’t seem like that will be the case this time.

If Nick Kypreos was right on Monday, and this new deal really is two years shorter and more reasonably spread out in terms of payout, this might finally all be over.

But, how do Devils fans feel about that?

The Phil Kessel Effect

08/31/2010 at 8:19pm EDT

I heard a caller on the radio the other day talk about the effect the Phil Kessel trade has had on the Toronto Maple Leafs. Most people think that the trade was a disaster for the Leafs, but I was a proponent of the trade when it first happened. However, I did not think Brian Burke needed to give up 2 first round picks to get Kessel because he had the threat of the offer sheet and only needed to give up a first, second, and third round pick if he were to go that route (I know Burke lashed out at Kevin Lowe for the Dustin Penner offer sheet, but the biggest issue he had with Lowe was that he didn’t approach him first about a deal; he felt blind sided). That being said, I do not want to sit here and discuss how good or bad that deal was. Back to the caller, he made what I thought to be a great point, he essentially said that if Burke did not make the Kessel trade, some of the other deals he made later in the year probably would not have happened since the Leafs would have most likely been tanking the season and playing for Taylor Hall or Tyler Seguin. So to judge Burke solely on the Kessel trade would not be fair. You need to look at the effect of that trade on the other moves he has made and I tend to agree with him. Thus, the Leafs most likely would not have made the Phaneuf or Giguere trades, which essentially brought the Leafs their young captain and also ridded them of bad contracts (Blake, and I would argue Stajan, and White as well).

10 Things You Didn't Know About the KHL

08/31/2010 at 6:55pm EDT

1. That all team members are required to bunk in dorms that are built into each
arena, prior to a game the next day. Ideally, this allows players to focus on the task at hand, rather than any domestic or social outlet. This isn’t quite as stringent as the Soviet era, where Central Red Army players were required to live and train together in a secluded facility for eleven months of the year.

2. That legendary National Team Coach; Viktor Tikhonov started his career as a defenceman for the Air Force team. His coach; Vasily Stalin; son of Joseph Stalin.

3. That many Soviet-era teams were made up of players from the army, KGB and trade unions. Moscow Dynamo was comprised of KGB agents, Spartak was made of of trade union members and Central Red Army was comprised of…you guessed it…army members.

4. That the emergence and strength of the KHL is partly due to the fledgling oil
and steel industries in Russia. Many oil and steel tycoons invest in or own a KHL franchise.

The Current State Of The Los Angeles Kings

08/31/2010 at 1:34pm EDT

I’m going to avoid calling this a “season preview” as I think I share the belief of most Kings fans that Dean Lombardi will make at least one more move this offseason that will alter the starting lineup. Instead I’ll take a look at the current team to try to identify what I believe are the strengths and weaknesses.

Forwards:

Top 6: Right now the top 6 forwards of the Kings appears to be Dustin Brown, Anze Kopitar, Ryan Smyth, Wayne Simmonds, Jarret Stoll, and Justin Williams. Micheal Handzus and newly signed Alexei Ponikarovsky could also push for playing time on the top 2 lines, depending on their production. Last year the Kings were tied for 9th in 5 on 5 goal scoring ratio at 1.07, tied with Pittsburgh. They were 7th in the league on the power play scoring the 5th most PP goals in the league with 64.

Going Streaking?

08/31/2010 at 1:09pm EDT

There are a lot of very good reasons to peg the Ottawa Senators at 10th in the East this year. Can the geritocracy of Alfredsson, Gonchar, and Kovalev be dominant over the full course of an 82-game schedule? Is Peter Regin for real? Have Michalek and Kovalev’s injuries fully healed? Will anyone on Ottawa’s defense corps hit anything this year?

Does Ottawa need to buy Pascal Leclaire a Popemobile to ensure his safety off-ice?

Also casting a long shadow over Ottawa’s chances at making the playoffs is the improvement of other teams in the East. While I may have my doubts about the various alchemies being employed in the Southeast Division and New Jersey, I think it is fair to say that the East is now beginning to resemble the West in that the distance between the eighth seed and those on the outside looking in will be much closer than at any time in recent memory.

Brent Burns...What Happened?

08/30/2010 at 11:21pm EDT

Two seasons ago I was watching the Minnesota Wild play the Calgary Flames when Brent Burns was dubbed by Jim Hughson as a rising defensive star who was in the same class as Dion Phaneuf and Mike Green. He was a sure thing to play on Team Canada in the upcoming Olympics and had just signed a long-term contract.

Today I ask myself what went wrong. Injuries, to start with. In the last three seasons Brent’s games played have gone like this: 82, 59, 47. Young players, especially those playing on the blueline, need playing time to develop and Burns hasn’t played enough to do that.

Secondly, Coach Lemaire screwed with his head by playing him at wing whenever Jacques felt like it. The Wild, as always, lacked a scoring punch and Lemaire felt inclined to play the gifted defenseman at wing to see if it would ignite the team. All it did was take Burns out of his natural position and forced him to play in a spot where he didn’t succeed.

And finally, most of us are coming to the realization that Burns just isn’t going to be a great player. He’s certainly got the tools, but sometimes I question his makeup. Does he have the grit to make a #1 defenseman? It looked like he did in the playoffs against Corey Perry and the Ducks a few years ago, but I haven’t seen that since.

Burns is a good player, don’t get me wrong, it’s just that I don’t believe he’s going to be a great one, and unfortunately that’s not what the Wild want to hear.

Everyone has to get their start somewhere...

08/30/2010 at 11:11pm EDT

So what’s going on in the world of minor league hockey? Anyone? No one knows? I’ll never quite understand that. I get that the AHL lacks the big names that the NHL has, but the game is the same. In some ways I think it’s better, though in the end I do care about the Stanley Cup a whole heck of a lot more than I do the Calder Cup.

Every year around this time I glance at the rosters of junior hockey and minor league hockey teams. I do this because I know that someday, one of them might be on my favorite team. Some of them could end up with their names on the Stanley Cup or in a race for the league scoring title. They’re unknown to me now, but maybe not in a few years.

Howard, Crosby, Doughty… All three are well known around the league now, but look back 5 or 6 years and they were pretty much unknown. They’re rich and famous today, but they got their careers started by riding buses and washing off in a shower with no hot water.

So this year, in the middle of all the stress, anxiety and joy of this years NHL season, don’t forget your local minor league team. You might catch a glimpse of future (or even past) greatness. And when you see one of those guys screw up and you think, “Wow, he sucks.”, don’t forget that we all gotta start somewhere.

And you can’t beat the price of admission.

Giguere's Presence Paying Immediate Dividends

08/30/2010 at 10:42pm EDT

After enduring a devastating 5-3 comeback loss to the Vancouver Canucks on January 30th last season, Brian Burke took action by accentuating the Leafs lack of accountability within the organization. Burke wowed the hockey world by orchestrating separate trades to acquire former Calder and Norris Trophy nominee Dion Phaneuf and former Conn Smythe winner and Stanley Cup Champion Jean-Sebastien Giguere. Burke also managed to unload the ugly contracts of Vesa Toskala and Jason Blake in exchange for former Conn Smythe winner and Stanley Cup Champion Jean-Sebastien Giguere. Most of the talk during the fallout of the trade were focused around the acquisition of Phaneuf and the unloading of Toskala and Blake, but the addition of Giguere was perhaps the largest gain to further the betterment of the franchise. He has only been with the Leafs for a few short months, but his impact to the Maple Leafs organization has paid immediate dividends.

Giguere is coming off a disappointing season in which he began as the backup in Anaheim behind Jonas Hiller. He only began to regain his status as a bonifide starting goaltender after being reunited with Brian Burke and godly goaltending coach Francois Allaire in Toronto. Giguere posted only 4 wins, along with a bloated 3.14 goals against average and 0.900 save percentage in 20 games with the Ducks. His numbers drastically improved upon arriving in Toronto, where he managed back-to-back shutout in his first two starts with the Leafs. His 6 wins in 15 games with the blue and white wasn’t overly impressive, but showed that he is still capable of carrying a team.

NHL's Extra Credit Breeds System of Inequity

08/30/2010 at 7:17pm EDT

The concept of academic extra credit has forever puzzled me. Despite the occasional motivation to exploit it, the notion of offering additional points as a means of atonement for under-performance has always felt fundamentally wrong to me.

Academic instructors typically distribute a syllabus at the beginning of each semester which, among other things, outlines the course’s key dates and includes a grading plan which specifies a value by which a student’s performance is ultimately evaluated. The National Hockey League has such an outline which contains similar criteria; although the NHL refers to theirs as a season schedule.

Like the aforementioned syllabus, the NHL’s season schedule consists of key dates otherwise known as games in which the league’s students—referred to as teams—are tested with points awarded dependent upon performance in those “exams”. While the number of tests each team receives is equal, the tests’ cumulative value is not.

How can this be you ask? Extra credit, of course.

Burke Gets a Bargain in MacArthur

08/30/2010 at 3:41pm EDT

In my column from Friday, I suggested the Maple Leafs take a run at free agent Tim Kennedy after Buffalo gave him the pink-slip. Yet a few hours after posting, this – or the addition of any scoring forward – seemed unlikely. As he often does, though, Leafs GM Brian Burke surprised me with his ability to make the best of a bad cap-situation

A trade with Tampa Bay late on Friday added Matt Lashoff to Toronto’s defense corps, bringing their number of NHL-level d-men up to nine and pushing them within $1.5 million of the cap ceiling. Although Lashoff has only played 63 NHL games over the last four seasons, he’ll have to clear waivers this season to be sent down to the AHL, so it looks like the Leafs want him for big-club duty.

By Saturday though, Leafs GM Brian Burke pulled the trigger on a deal that looks even better than what I was proposing with Kennedy. Left wing Clarke MacArthur – another Sabres product – signed with Toronto for a steal at $1.1 million,after Atlanta walked away from his $2.4 million arbitration award. After posting career numbers in both games played (81) and points (31), the 25-year-old is just entering his prime.

While only a year older than Kennedy, MacArthur already has 208 NHL games under his belt, leaving him far more experienced at this level than Kennedy, who has only played in 79. Add in MacArthur’s points-per-game average at 0.42 over Kennedy’s 0.33, and the fact that Toronto will still hold MacArthur’s RFA rights after this season, it’s clear that Burke is getting the most bang for his team’s buck.

With less than $400,000 left in cap space, it’s looking like RFA Christian Hanson will be the odd man out on the Leafs roster. I’ll keep tabs on this story as it develops.

Team USA North

08/27/2010 at 4:15pm EDT

The fate of Head Coach Ron Wilson is a major issue looming over the Maple Leafs as the new season approaches. His job is secure for now, but consensus is that if the Leafs put together a start as poor as last season’s, Wilson will be out by December.

The work Wilson got out of the Leafs in 09-10 was some of the worst the city has seen in years, but in a three week stint in February, Wilson coached a rookie squad of Olympians all the way to overtime in the gold medal game against the best team in the tournament. Observing the levels of focus, commitment and execution Team USA brought to each game, it was clear the bench had bought into what Wilson – and GM Brian Burke – were selling.

The Olympic Games left Leaf fans hoping the momentum these two old soldiers brought out of Vancouver would carry over into the Leafs dressing room. In order to capitalize on their success, the path is clear for Burke: to get as many Team USA members as possible on Toronto’s roster. No easy task, as the Olympic squad was made up of some of the best young talent in the game, but Burke was able to capitalize on the Chicago’s cap-crunch and add Kris Versteeg to the Leafs’ Team USA members Phil Kessel and Mike Komisarek, who sat out the tournament with injuries.

In Defense of the Shootout

08/22/2010 at 5:48pm EDT

When the National Hockey League first instituted the shootout coming out of the lockout in 2005-06, immediately there was a line drawn in the sand. To one side were those in favor of an ending more satisfying than a tie and to the other, those who labeled the shootout a gimmicky, “skills competition”.

From the start it was obvious that I was in that first group. I was enthralled by the individual show of skill. I wasn’t alone. The other 18,198 people in Madison Square Garden seemed equally riveted, standing unprompted, and remaining that way throughout.

The shootout shone a rare spotlight on individual talent. Without it, would we have gotten to see so many variations on the Datsyukian Deke?

2010 NHL RDO Camp Yields Mixed Message

08/20/2010 at 4:28pm EDT

NHL officials, general managers, and media members convened in Toronto Aug. 18-19 at the Maple Leafs’ practice facility in a veritable who’s who of league power players. They gathered to observe 33 projected top 2011 draft prospects competing in scrimmages designed to allow NHL Vice President of Hockey and Business Operations Brendan Shanahan and his staff to experiment with 28 prospective rule changes and variations.

Nearly all of these proposals are either too bizarre or radically progressive to ever be heard from again (one faceoff circle centered in each zone, draws conducted by whistle rather than puck drop), but a few caught the eye of those in attendance and the Twittersphere was abuzz with speculation. Much of the discussion centered on potential changes to the icing rule in the quest for increased safety.

What caught my eye, however, was what I perceive to be contradictory philosophies employed in the support and/or rationalization of some of these proposed changes.

The debate over touch or no touch icing has been on the radar of this born and bred Minnesotan since Kurtis Foster’s leg was shattered in a March 20, 2008 collision with San Jose’s Torrey Mitchell as the pair chased down an iced puck at the Shark Tank. The event immediately brought the issue to the forefront of league discussion.

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