Metal Reviews

Roster freeze? So no trading is allowed right now?

Yeah, over the christmas and new years holiday there is a roster freeze. Meaning that no trades or players being waived for like 2 weeks. You can call up guys from the AHL but only if there is an injury.

Interesting.

I hope those green dudes keep showing up to Canucks home games. Also what's with Vancouver crowds and retarded chants? First they cheer Luongo by almost booing him, now they're like... chirping?

Who would've thought that we'd blow the caps out at any point this season? The new lines of Mo's has been absolutely terrific and their last four periods have made us nine goals. Moving Eric Staal to winger on the second line and Brandon Sutter to center the first have proven extremely effective. At least in terms of getting our superstar going. Staal has been playmaking ever since he came back from that nasty injury and seems to be working better on wing than he has on center for a long time. He was involved in five of six goals last night, and it's amazing to see that we now have two scoring lines.

Ruutu - Sutter - Whitney
Staal - Cullen - Jokinen

That two high speed lines, and just imagine that first one with Cole replacing Ruutu.

Jokinen, Sutter, Ruutu and Whitney leads the team in goalscoring, and I think Sutter definitely has proven a man for the future. He has always been predicted to be a thirds line-grinder but has caught everyone by surprise and scored a bunch of goals this year as well as showing a lot of speed (ala Cole). In addition to this he's on awesome penalty killer. Certainly a future A, if not a C.

Yeahyeah, I know it's only been two games, but it's nice to see things finally showing signs of turning.

If things turn around too much then no chance at Taylor Hall, Tyler Seguin or Cam Fowler. It sucks to not make the playoffs and not have a top 5 pick, trust a Leaf fan on that.

Woohoo! That's 5 out of 6 on our road trip! I gotta say, I'm really liking how everything has come together. Now that nearly all our players are back, particularly Markov and Gionta, the team looks really good- great on the powerplay, more than one line that can score + Metropolit, and just a better all around performance. Not to mention that both our goaltenders are playing great these days, especially Halak, who had an amazing 4 game streak. Now, there are a few problems. We take way way way too many fucking penalties- at least we have a good PK, but still, it catches up to us, making us take goals and tiring out our star players. We've also had a habit recently of being outshot by 2-1 margins, which is a major problem- now, I know that shot totals don't count for that much in the end if the shots themselves are bad, but consistently being outshot will lead to stupid goals eventually. Thankfully our past two games we've been much better with this, thanks again to our defence getting back to normal and the Gionta/Pouliot/Gomez line, which is looking like a fantastic supplement to Pleks/Cammy/Kostitsyn. Man how I love Gionta.

What did you guys think of the Canadian roster? Spoke with Evan about it last night. I like how both Bergeron and Jordan Staal got picked, since both have been great this year, especially Staal who's been huge for the Penguins. I feel great for him. I also did find it odd that Green wasn't picked, but I do understand as he's not the best with the puck.

You guys look scary good anyways, but so does the Russians. Should be a great olympics. The US roster awaits.

Jordan Staal didn't get picked. Your boy Eric Staal did. Which, no offense to him, but I find to be kind of a weird pick. I would have taken out him and Bergeron and at least put in Stamkos. Otherwise, I'm happy.

TSN said Jordan got picked? Or have I misread something?

I know Eric got picked, and will probably wing Getzlaf I guess. He's not been getting a lot of goals for us, but after being moved to wing he's had a lot of assists. I think he's had two per game ever since he came back. And that's pretty neat.

Huh. Nhl.com's account of the roster doesn't have J. Staal on it.

http://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=511636

The only thing I could find about him on TSN was this paragraph:

Bypassed were Washington's Mike Green, the NHL's leading scorer among defensemen; Calgary defensemen trio Jay Bouwmeester, Robyn Regehr and Dion Phaneuf; Tampa Bay forwards Martin St. Louis, Steven Stamkos and Vincent Lecavalier; Ottawa forward Mike Fisher; Philadelphia forward Jeff Carter; and Pittsburgh forward Jordan Staal, Eric's brother.

Sorry dude, looks like he's out.

yeah I know... Read up on it. Would liked to see him there though.

If Canada loses I am moving to the States.

Speaking of Canada and the US, the juniors play each other tonight, winner gets a bi to the next round. Eh!-O Canada Go!

Stupid goddamn cheer...

I'm cheering for Sweden because they've got the most Canucks. Go Sedins go!

Olympic Hockey is fun because all the top players are there. But in the end, would I prefer Team Canada get the Gold, or the Montreal Canadians get the Cup? I'll go for the latter. I'll enjoy watching hockey at the games a lot, but I'm not going to cry too much if we lose. Though hopefully we'll at least get into the top 3 this year...

It would be cool if there were only like 8 teams in the NHL so every game was like Olympic hockey.

Don't have to drop to 8 just get rid of the southern teams like Atlanta, Nashville, Pheonix and one of the California teams. Also be rid of other struggling teams like Columbus and one of the Florida based teams. Drop to 25 or so teams and have a dispersion draft so all the good players and prospects end up on teams that actually matter. Then when teams start to get loaded with talent expand again! Rinse and repeat.

seeing as how you live in Quebec, this does not surprise me.

Dude, I'm probably less of a seperatist than you are, seeing as how I've had to deal with the fucking issue my whole life. I'm a Canadian first and and a Quebecois second. I just also don't generally give a shit about the Olympics, which as someone I know pointed out, is an excuse for 19th century style nationalism and which ends up driving countries apart rather than bringing them together (and come on... do I give a shit about skiing? And gymnastics? Umm... No.). But hey, I watch the hockey because it's damn good hockey and of course I'm gonna support my team. But nothing beats the Stanley Cup finals- 7 games, the best team wins, a team composed of players from all over the world.

What makes that cheer even more sad is the fact that it was part of an advertising campaign by Pepsi. Praise be to corporations to help solve our national identity crisis.

A chance for the Edmonton Oilers to land Taylor Hall is about all I have to look forward to this season...oh and the Olympics.