Sir_Boagalott

Wll think of this way. If Ballsillie did buy the Habs and was somehow able to make them the Kitchener Upper Canada Habs how long do you think it would take for the NHL to move one of the leagues shittiest teams to Montreal? If Ballsillie could ever move the Habs at the end of any season by the time the next season started there would be another franchise in Montreal. The league would probably even let a city and ownership swap happen similar to how the one owner sold his team and bought another one. They would probably make sure the Habs would stay put and the other team goes to Kitchener. Either way Ballsillie would win.

Hahaha, D'oh you beat me to it. Good thing Hamer is OK, but I knew that. I was watching the game on the Fox feed and it showed a close up of Hamer on the bench talking to the trainer and I could read his lips saying "I'm ok" as he keeled over a bit and grimaced in pain. I'm just happy the Habs woke up with 41 seconds left in the 3rd. They have to stop being this generous but I guess if there is a team that needs some gifts its Columbus.

If Gillette was ever planning to sell the Habs now would probably be the optimal time to sell. Dont forget that the cliche is to buy low and sell high. The Habs are definitley at a high right now. How much did Gillette buy the Habs for? 200-250 mil, he could probably sell then right now for 500-600 mil, not too shabby of a return. Ballsillie has pissed off Betman and quite a few owners with threats of litigation etc but I think they would allow him to buy the Habs. I highly beleive their main concern is him moving an American team to Ontario. I cant see the Habs finishing their 100 season off as the Kitchener Upper Canada Habs.

Hmm, thats interesting info. I didnt know there was such a rule. I guess it somewhat makes sense because in the majoroty of the cases this rule would apply to the players in the AHL dont have as much NHL eperience as Denis. Its kind of an odd situation having a 3rd string goalie in the AHL who makes so little who has played 10 seasons in the NHL. I doubt there are many players in the AHL that this rule would apply to. I imagine most unproven 18-19 y/o would be making more money than Denis. I think Denis only agreed to such a low contract out of desperation. Bob was probably the only GM in the NHL that called his agent. Denis was also probably betting on the Habs trading Halak at some point and with such a low contract he can be brought up at any time and would end up playing for his favourite home town team.

Its not that at all though. From interviews I've seen and read about Wellwood is that he is kind of a intellectual loner wierdo type. He never watches TV but he reads a lot. I'm not sure if he even plays video games so he's not a "couch potato". Wellwood has had 2 hernia surgeries already so the last thing he wants is a 3rd so he made sure he was well rested and fully healed this time. Not to mention he broke his foot so that got him even more out of shape. Wellwood is definitely offensively talented. I've always said that he would be great with Higgins and I still stand by that. They both seem to have an odd unconventional style so Higgswell would most likely work really well together. His 2nd goal last night was pure beauty.

Hahaha, no doubt though. Parise was one of two players who have had multiple multiple goal games against Price. At this point I cant see any significant goalie trades. I wouldnt be surprised at all though if the Devils went out and picked up Aubin off Philly but that wouldnt be considered significant. I think the Laffs were silly to get rid of Aubin and the Devils have had several previous great experiences in picking up ex-Laff goalies the Laffs were dumb enough to toss away.

Ya, the shipped had sailed with Bergeron. I only mentioned him in a past tense. If Bob had picked him up over the last 2-3 years we probably wouldnt be having this conversation today but then again Bob probably might not have signed Hamer or traded for Tanguay if Habs had picked up Bergeron. Bob wont be trading for him anytime soon and I dont think Mini would get rid of him at this point anyway. I agree he is more of a PP specialist but he isnt a huge defensive liability IMHO. I think its more of his small size that several of his NHL coachs didnt like. NYI were a much better team after they picked him up and realistically the Ducks didnt really need him but Im pretty sure Mini likes him. Either way Bergeron will be a UFA at the end of this year so maybe Bob can coax him into signing for 1.5-2 mil to replace Dandy or possibly Cube.

Seriously, how does that work. Out of all of the players in Hamilton I was fairly certain Denis would have to clear waivers for sure.

Not sure if this would be a solution to this particular problem but I would have really liked if Bob had picked up Bergeron when he was available. I have always liked what Ive seen of Bergeron and he seems to have a decent enough shot from the point. Plus the price would have been right. He has been traded twice now for 3rd rnd picks and doesnt even make 2 mil per yr. Bergeron is 28 now and is just starting to reach his prime.

I'm not saying the KHL is leaps and bounds better than the AHL but its probably close to being at par or slightly better. After all there are lots of NHL caliber players in both leagues. My point is that in Russia the Russian players have a huge advantage over being over here. Your reasons for why its a bad thing are the same reasons I have for it being a good thing. You mention English and culture shock. In Russia the Russians will understand their coaches perfectly, in AHL not so much. In 3 years am I the only one who thinks his English will be better? He will have had 3 more years to learn English all the while being able to fully understand what their coaches are telling them over in Russia. Euro players who develop over here never get as good as the would have been had they stayed in Europe. Thats basically a fact and the IIHF even came out with a study that proves it. All the creme de la creme of the Euro players all got that way in Europe. All of them. I highly believe that the IIHF had merit to make such claims in their study. Plus think of it this way. The N.A. players only have N.A. leagues to reach their potential in. Having your AHL team full of Russians hampers a teams N.A. players development because the Russians actually have another choice of where to develop. The N.A. born players dont have this choice so having the Russian players in Russia only helps everybody because now 3 more N.A. players will be getting their chances to make the NHL in Hamilton all the while the Russians continue to develop over in Russia. Not to mention in AHL they are trying to devolp everybody so I doubt any 1 player would get 25-30 mins/game at the expense of the other players they are trying to develop but in the KHL they could easily be given a lot more ice time than would be possible in the AHL.

Yep, and if the KHL ever expands to the rest of EU or N.A. they might actually have to pay the fines. Personaly in a wierd way I think this is a good thing. Even the IIHF has said that the Euro players are better off playing back home. The majority of all the top Euros all have the same thing in common: they all played the majority of their hockey back home. By the time Valentenko's Dynamo contract is up he will be 24 and should be primed and ready for NHL action probably more so than he would be if he stays here. I'm hoping in 2-3 years the Habs will have more matured players like a Datsyuk and Gonchar who will show up out of nowhere and make the team. By that time they will be mostly forgetten about and off the prospect charts and will be like an added bonus. In the mean time 2 other non Russians will be getting a chance to get NHL ready in Hamilton. This way when Hamer and Marky's contracts are up the Habs should have multiple D prospects ready to make the jump. Also Valentenko and Perizhogin wont be green and considered rookies to high caliber hockey from being seasoned in Russia. Hopefully both get lots of playing time over there and are on teams that have long playoff runs.

Toronto could never have a 2nd hockey team. Sure there are definitely enough hardcore hockey fans that could easily sell out 2 NHL arenas every night but if the 2nd areana wasnt showing the Laffs on a huge ass screen than nobody would go. A 2nd team in Toronto would be a godsernd to hockey fans there but I highly doubt many would switch religions and accept them. Face it the Laffs arent the Laffs because their fans arent loyal. The are the way they are because their fans are the most loyal. If the Laffs finished dead last every year the ACC would still sell out every game with the fans beleiving that this will be the year the Laffs will win the Cup. However Southern Ontario could have another hockey team, it just cant be in Toronto. I beleive Mississauga could support a NHL team but with the royalties they would have to pay the Laffs that would make it really hard because it would cut into any profits enough that it might not be worthwhile. I'm not sure if a team in Mississauga would have to pay Sabers royalites or not but I know a team in Hamilton would have to pay both so that makes it pretty much impossible there. Kitchener is really the only city that is large enough and has a big enough surrounding population that could handle a NHL team and its far enough away that they wouldnt have to pay the Laffs or the Sabers any royalties. Thats the biggest problem, potential royalties any new Southern Ontario team would have to pay existing teams. I'm pretty sure Windsor or London would have to pay Wings, and Kingston would probably have to pay Sens. All 3 arent really big enough anyway and it would be hard to pull it off without any royalties. As for any other Canadian cities Winnipeg does have a chance but it looks like they screwed it right up by building a new arena that isnt large enough so they would have to make yet another new arena. Unfortunately Quebec City has absolutely 0 chance of ever getting a team back. The primary reason is that there is nobody trying to get one. Every hockey and business person there knows its impossible. There isnt enough people or big business there for it to happen. I would love to see a team in Halifax but it needs to grow significantly before that could be suggested and there isnt a lot of jobs or growth out East to see that ever happening in the next 10-20 years or ever.

I missed most of the 2nd and was wondering what happened. I only saw the last 5 mins of 2nd. I caught all of the 3rd period though, that was great. I had a feeling they would pull it off but when there wasnt a 4 min pen for the Kovy high stick I wasnt so sure if it would still happen. For almost half the 1st period I had semi forgot that this was a road game. There was a crazy amount of Habs fans there. In every corner you could see almost solid red from all the Habs fans. When the Habs scored and you look in the crowd you could see the majority of the people jumping up and down. The Habs have an unfair advantage over all the other teams because they actualy have some home games on the road. In games like tonights they are basically home games. Also the Habs finaly got chincy in the 3rd and actually went ahead for good and didnt relinquish a point like they did in the Buff and Bos ties.

Demote Bob to towell boy. I definitely agree that Lats can be frusterating but unfortunately at this point it is what it is. Lats cant be sent down anymore nor should he be at this point even if they could actualy do it. That ship has sailed. However I beleive that at some point that they should have sent him down, either in his 1st year or last year. The Lats situation truely sux0rs because now its to late to do anything and you should all know the shitty reality of it by now. Its happened too many times before him. Habs get fed up waiting and trade him for his lacklusture play and he instantly becomes the stud some of you beleive he will soon be. I agree that Lats does have a lot of potential but unfortunately he doesnt seem to want to achieve it in Montreal.

I watch the Habs too and sadly have to agree with you but with other teams they have much higher success rate at odd man rushes. The Habs truely are quite sad at them and seriously need to practice them. It would be silly for anybody here to argue that the Habs fail to capitalize on a lot of their chances because they do. However I await rebuttles on this. A 3 on 1 is only as hard to stop as the 3 make it and so far the Habs have made it pretty darn simple for the goalie to stop them. Most 3 on 1's that arent goals it isnt because the Dman made a great play or the goalie made a wicked save its because the 3 screw it up themselves. Thats the primary reason why 3 on 1's arent always goals.

Argue all you want about symantics. I said generally, which isnt absolute. Not all 3 on 1's are goals. Good for you. The chances of the goalie stoping a 3 on 1 is more related to how well the Dman plays it and how crapily the 3 players handle it. Most 2 on 1's should be goals 75% of the time. 3 on 1's should be even higher. However a 3 on 1 with the Habs a bloody inanimate pylon could break it up because the Habs always screw them up themselves. Hell by the looks of it they wouldnt even score if there wasnt a pylon because the goalie himself could use his stick to intercept and knock away the pass because the Habs are standing right at his feet. There generally is only 3 ways a 3 on 1 isnt a goal: 1) amazing play by Dman to break it up 2) great goalie makes amazing highlight reel save 3) the 3 screw it up themselves So far the Habs have had four 3 on 1's and have achieved 1 goal and even on that lone goal the Habs did in fact acomplish 3) but Kovy's amazing shot managed to produce the goal anyway. Generally on a 2 on 1 the player without the puck shouldnt drive to the net as fast as possible. He is there to be passed to so they need to be in a position to accept said pass. IF a 3rd player is trailing a 2 on 1 they should drive hard and fast to the net to look for any rebounds. Not the 2nd guy. Generally on a 3 on 1 the puck carrier should never shoot the puck. Yet so far this year thats exactly what the Habs have done because the other 2 players are never in a position to accept a pass. On a 2 on 1 or 3 on 1 the non puck carriers should never postion themselves between the puck carrier and the Dman. Thats the Dmans job and they seriously need to stop doing their job for them. This is an extremely basic hockey fundamental but here I am having to argue it.

I have to admit that I found the irony amusing when Price got the delay of game penalty and RDS poped up on the screen: Carey Price - re tarde le match. Habs still seem to be to fast and rush 2 on 1's and should definitely practice them and 3 on 1's too. Kovalevs goal on that 3 on 1 was lucky and no other Habs probably would have been able to make that shot. Generally a 3 on 1 should be a guarenteed goal unless the D man makes an incredible play to break it up. However with the Habs 3 on 1's are rarely ever goals and the Dman could be a pylon and it would be same no goal result. On a 3 on 1 the player carrying the puck shouldnt have to shoot. What the heck are the other 2 guys doing? Thats like the entire point of a 3 on 1. After all a 3 on 1 isnt supposed to be a break away with 2 guys right there to hug him after he scores. Use the other 2 players on a 3 on 1 please. That'd be great. Ironicaly Lats was a half step too slow on the on 2 on 1. As high scoring as the Habs are they are definitely missing a lot of opportunities. If they can start capitalizing more on these lost opportunitities than we should be in for a long year. If not it might not end like how we all hope.

I liked Grabs a lot and was sad to see him go. However he really did need to go though. Just like Samsanov Grabs would have become a cancer to the Habs organizations and cancer needs to be removed at the source asap before it spreads and does further damage. Teams cant have players around who arent happy and cause problems because it is contageous. The best thing to do is get rid of them. The Habs needed to get rid of Ribs too but for a different reason. The Habs had too many smallish "little girl" Centers at that point and I agree with Bob that it was smarter to get rid of the better known Ribs than to trade Pleks. We had all seen enough of Ribs antics to know what he can accomplish and we are just starting to see what Pleks can do and I fully agree that Pleks proably does have more potential. Like said the Habs are way better off with a large veteran centre in Lang than with a unknown smaller guy like Grabs for a prolonged playoff run.

From what I have seen so far is that the Habs still look like they are racing to the goal line on a lot of chances and always screw it up because they are out of position when the play actually happens. Unfortunately this doesnt just occur on PP. When they arent racing to the goal line they are standing at the goal line instead. There arent many occasions when you can actually score standing right beside the net at the goal line. You need to be in front of the net to be able to accept a pass from behind the net and be able to score. Those little 2-3' passes from a player behind the goalie to a player parallell to the goalie will hardly ever produce a scoring chance. Standing at the right side of the net you can only score just off the right side of the post. However if you stand 3-4' in front of the golaie you can actually shoot anywhere on the net. Its infinitely harder for the goalie to stop a shot from a player who is in front of the net. Case in point is look at Koivu's last PP goal. The only reason why he got it was because he was standing 3' closer to centre ice compared to where he usualy stands near the goal line. This has been happening for several years now too. Its not a race, feel free to slow down sometimes. Also I would love to see the Habs get off a shot on a 3 on 1. In the last several years every 3 on 1 the Habs have resulted in no shot at all and that truly is pathetic. 3 on 1's should be a guarenteed goal but the Habs cant even seem to be able to get off a scoring chance. Even on most of the Habs 2 on 1's the Habs would make McCabe look like a trophy candidate because the Habs screw it up themselves by driving to fast to the net putting themselves between the puck carrier and the other teams D which is exactly what the other team wants. Slow down and stop cutting off your own passes. The optimal shooting locations are in fact out in front of the net and not at the feet of the goalie.

I've been saying this all summer and am still saying it now. the A.K.'s shouldnt be played together. Lil A.K. should have had 30+ goals last year but just missed that mark. Why? because he passes to Kovy way too much when he himself should just shoot. Lil A.K. idolizes Kovy and Kovy is the well known veteran sniper so instead of lil A.K. shooting he wants to pass to Kovy. Lil A.K. will never become a 40 goal guy as long as he plays with Kovy because he passes to his sniper idol to much. It seriosuly hinders lil A.K.'s progression playing him with Kovy. I am stunned that I seem to be the only one who wants to see the Habs best line in the year they barely missed the playoffs put back together. i.e. Higs - Pleks - lil A.K. Over a 15 game span that year the all were avg 1 pt/game so why not let them see if they could all each get 80 pts in 80 games. I seriously dont think Higs will hit 80 on any other line, Pleks might, lil A.K. probaly could but together they all might be able to hit 80. Kovy should play with Sergei instead. Plus playing the A.K.'s together is basically putting all your eggs in 1 basket. Why play the 2 guys who have the hardest fastest and most accurate shots on the same line? It makes no sense.

They do and its called Cambellnomics. Its a better way to see who is really more valuable. Just looking at points and stats doesnt always show who is more valuable. When you look at 2 20 goal scorers you dont know which player is better unless you look at the Cambellnomics. For example the 1 20 goal scorer could have got all 20 goals in shutout blowout games where as the other guy could have 20 game winning goals and you would never know by the stats alone. Cambellnomics gets its name from its inventor Cambell from The Hockey News. Cambellnomics rates Goals as 1 point, and Assists as 0.5 points. Then the points are rated not just when they occur in a game but what the score was when they occured. ex 1st goal of the game is worth two points. Likewize goals in blowout games where the player is basically just padding their stats because it has 0 effect on that game are worth just 1. Go ahead goals and tieing goals are worth 2 but scoring when its 6-0 to make it 7-0 is only worth 1 because your team would win regardless of that 7th goal. That 7th goal truely has no effect on the outcome of the game. More info: http://www.thehockeynews.com/articles/1499...rt-toppers.html

Kosto should have tried through his own legs on that one instead of the spinaramma move. Ducks 2 on 1 well played by Komi.

Lang could have stopped the 2nd goal had he not just glided on his lame back check attempt.

Yep, I agree. It would be silly to trade Halak. There is power in numbers. Look at all the recent teams that were powerhouses. None of them are anymore and the trend is that all gave up their insurance goalies. i.e. Ducks - Bryzgolov, Sabers - Biron, next Hasekless Wings? Detroit wont repeat this year if Osgood gets injured. I've always said Biron > Miller and most people on this board laughed at me. A lot of people have the impression the Flyers knocked the Habs out of the playoffs last year. I beleive it was Biron. I wouldnt trade Halak untill his contract is nearing an end. Hell I would even consider trading Price with the way Halak has been playing. Bob should get together with their agents and sign one of them long term. Whichever one values themself the least is the one Habs keep. Seriously though Price would definitely get way more return than Halak. Price could probably get 3 1st round picks and I'm not sure at this point if Halak would get 1 1st. Personaly I would even start doing the baseball percentages routine as to who starts each game. Play the numbers game and use their stats to decide who gets to start which game. i.e. with a left handed batter put in a right handed pitcher. In regards to hockey crunch the stats and know which goalie is better at what and play them accordingly. ex if Halak is better against teams that drive hard to the net he gets to start against teams that do that, or if Price is statistically better under prolonged PK situations play him against teams that get the most PP's or teams that at really good at keeping the puck in your end, etc. Whichever goalie has any statistical adv to give Habs best chance at a W gets to start.

Jeebus. I saw him play tonight and that aboot sums it up. Petes won 4-3 in OT. It sucked because they scored with just a few seconds left and at that point I was wanting to see how he would fair in a shootout. 2 of the goals werent overly good goals and for sure on the one a regular sized goalie would have had it. Overall a lot of the fans around me seemed as neverous as I was whenever the Sting would take a shot. He really looks uncoordinated out there but the fact he is there does say a lot. When he get used to being this size he should loose that and become pretty good. He isnt bad he just looks kinda strange and out of place out there. The Petes did give up 50 shots and they only scored 3 so thats not to bad. Surprisingly there wasnt lots of good chances either way. None of the players looked overly impressive or NHL caliber yet anyway. Just his size makes him look odd because his blocker and trapper look like little kids equipment compared to his huge leg pads. No clue how he can even play goal, who makes equipment that big? That sort of why it looks funny too because he's so large it make his glove like really small but its has to be regular size its just not porportional to his size. Whenever there was a scrum around his net and he stood up he towered over everybody and by quite a bit. It was totally noticable. My buddy had the tickets given to him by his boss and isnt into hockey and it didnt take him long to say holy crap how tall is that guy. It doesnt look like he puts up with sh*t either. On several occaisions when he was poked he would shove the guy back or stand up and everytime the Sting player would vacate the area fast. I knew he was tall but damn you dont realize what that means untill you actually see the guy and standing by the net. Its crazy sick how large this guy is. The people who beleive that all butterfly goalies are susceptable to top shelf over the shoulder shots have clearly never seen Missiaen. Even when on his knees in a butterfly this guys shoulders are still at or above the crossbar. :puke: Only when he is bending over forward could you get the puck over his shoulders. One of the Sting actually managed to do it with Kovalevesque precision. I was sitting by the halfboards at that end when he did it and all of us literally gasped and were like what just happened, how the hell did he do that because Missiaen takes up that much room in the net. Nobody thought there was room for the puck to get through but buddy somehow managed to do it. By the time Missiaen is in his mid 20's his career should be interesting. It should only be a matter of time before he stops looking so uncoordinated and when that happens he could be crazy because its almost impossible to get the puck over his shoulders when he is on his knees. He could just hang off the one post and wave his glove hand around and cover 99% of the net.