The 2013 NHL Season Thread

[spartacat_12]

Craig Anderson got decked tonight, not sure how long he'll miss.

Boy this team just can't catch a break. Thankfully it's only an ankle sprain so he's just day-to-day. The hockey gods aren't that cruel.

So I Googled, 2013-14 NHL realignment. Most indicate a Winnipeg-Columbus swap. Is this what it is looking like? I haven't been up to par on realignment.

Before the realignment talks slowed down last year I had been hearing that. IMO this move makes the most sense. I feel like more casual hockey fans in Columbus will watch the road games when they aren't finishing early the next morning. It's tough for a young generation of hockey fans to grow up following a team when a portion of their games are starting past their bed time.

[The_Admiral]

People overstate this problem. They play most of their road games in Central Time. Those games generally start at 8 or 8:30 and end at 10:30 or 11. That's reasonable. Everyone can't watch every game. No one is above having to take a road trip to the west coast.

[IceCap]

Wouldn't switching Nashville and Winnipeg make more sense? Nashville seems like it should be in the Southeast, and Columbus seems like it should be in the Great Lakes heavy Central.

[Sodboy13]

Brad May on Sportsnet tossing red meat to the lower rungs of the Canucks' fan base. He managed to imply that getting elbowed in the back of the skull is just a risk inherent with lacing up in the NHL, therefore it should not be punished, adding on an "Honestly, I don't even know if it was a penalty!" while suggesting perhaps the call was favorable star treatment.

A slumming Mike Keenan decided to add kerosene to the inferno of stupid, with the old "I think Marian Hossa is an honest player, but if he's embellishing that to draw a call, or have a player suspensioned (sic)..." Yeah, if he was, staying off the ice for the rest of the game was a bit excessive on his part, you turdbasket.

[Still MIGHTY]

Leafs are first in the league in hits, fights, and PIMs. Pugnacity, testosterone, truculence, and belligerence!

That's a Burke-built, and more importantly, Carlyle-coached team for you.

Enjoy the wins now, because Carlyle losses are insufferable.

[Kramerica Industries]

Wouldn't switching Nashville and Winnipeg make more sense? Nashville seems like it should be in the Southeast, and Columbus seems like it should be in the Great Lakes heavy Central.

And bring boring Trotz-puck to the Southeast?

I know that the SE Division isn't exactly good or filled with traditional hockey markets, but that's just a cruel suggestion.

[IceCap]

Wouldn't switching Nashville and Winnipeg make more sense? Nashville seems like it should be in the Southeast, and Columbus seems like it should be in the Great Lakes heavy Central.

And bring boring Trotz-puck to the Southeast?

I know that the SE Division isn't exactly good or filled with traditional hockey markets, but that's just a cruel suggestion.

I prefer to think of it as isolation

[Kevin W.]

Brad May on Sportsnet tossing red meat to the lower rungs of the Canucks' fan base. He managed to imply that getting elbowed in the back of the skull is just a risk inherent with lacing up in the NHL, therefore it should not be punished, adding on an "Honestly, I don't even know if it was a penalty!" while suggesting perhaps the call was favorable star treatment.

A slumming Mike Keenan decided to add kerosene to the inferno of stupid, with the old "I think Marian Hossa is an honest player, but if he's embellishing that to draw a call, or have a player suspensioned (sic)..." Yeah, if he was, staying off the ice for the rest of the game was a bit excessive on his part, you turdbasket.

More of the same. How pathetic.

[Sodboy13]

Well, Cal Clutterbuck's done. Dirty knee-on-knee business by Taylor Hall, or a clean, high-speed hit in exactly the wrong spot?

[NEW.ERA]

Didn't see it. Was Taylor down in the corner rolling around?

[TalktoChuck]

Well, Cal Clutterbuck's done. Dirty knee-on-knee business by Taylor Hall, or a clean, high-speed hit in exactly the wrong spot?

From the replay it looks like it was Clutterbuck's knee on Hall's hip/thigh, which is why Hall didn't get hurt as well.

[drdougfresh]

From our comrade Puckguy14 on Twitter:

[Sodboy13]

A still-frame can be a very deceptive thing, but from that 1/30th of a second, it looks like both are focused on the puck right before impact. Not swayed one way or another on this one just yet.

EDIT: I've seen the full-speed replay, and the few seconds before impact, several times now. At bare minimum, it was reckless with injurious consequences, so it should probably be a game or two.

[NEW.ERA]

I should probably read better and watch the actual incident. I honestly thought it was Clutterbuck to Hall, what would give me that assumption.

[drdougfresh]

Full video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQLmcxZXsmw

[Brendan]

Jannik Hansen is still whining about being suspended. "Now I have to have this on my record! I've never even been suspended in my life! Hossa was flopping!" This team, it will never end.

Jesus Christ, he was most likely asked a question and answered it. What you're doing is whining. He made a fair point about how his reputation has now changed. He has played hundreds of cleans game and now because of one reckless play people are going to think he's dirty even though he's not, just like Duncan Keith isn't all of a sudden a dirty player because of one incident. Hansen probably didn't think he hit Hossa very hard either, which is probably the case since Hossa did practice today.

I really wanted to stay out of this but It just got too hard.

[ninersdd]

I gotta wonder about Hossa's long term ability to keep playing, it seems like he's extremely vulnerable to any head contact. He could easily get another blow just as hard as

the one from Hansen from any random hit or incidental contact.

Thanks, concern troll!

It's most likely just my bias from them being the team I watch more than the other 29, but it feels like the Blackhawks are routinely abused with no recourse. The stuff like Thornton on Toews or Mitchell on Toews or Torres on Hossa or

Canucks on Everyone get all the attention, but there's all the little stuff. I mean, I can tell you that Marcus Kruger gets destroyed more than Mr. Bill. And yet there's nothing they can really do about it. The whole "fight to show you won't

take it" thing doesn't work because they have fought and still kept taking it. And straight-up going after offenders doesn't work, because no one liked to fight John Scott and Bollig/Mayers just get instigator penalties when they do. (Which always raises the question, which fights are not instigated? Do the fighters need to mail

each other identical memoranda of intent and have them postmarked on the same day for the fight to be considered uninstigated? In fact, isn't it more apt to say that when a person lays a hit so dirty that it requires the opponent's teammate

to abort the game's fundamental premise of putting the play object in the designated space in order to just rush over and start beating the crap out of the guy, that that fellow has done the instigating? It's such crap.

So what is to be done? I mean, under the Bowmans' watch, this is always going to be a finesse team (or in the case of 2011, as much finesse as Dale Tallon's Salary Cap Capers

allowed). And that should be okay; this is the kind of team that the NHL should want at the forefront, not the plugapaloozas in Phoenix and Nashville that make the game unwatchable. I don't want to sacrifice a roster spot for a goon,

even if it did work. But man, this team just takes a lot of crap.

Well Toews did instigate a fight with Thornton last week(and wasn't tossed when he could've been), so I guess they're even now.

Your talking about goons, it's like the Sharks recalled some guy called Pelech who sucks and just fights and has no skill whatsoever. It made no sense as to why the team called him up.

HAHAHAHA! Ole Matty Pelech, enjoy him.

Once a former first rounder from Darryl Sutter's stable of picks.

I was scratching my head as to how he went in the first round.looking at his career scoring stats, which are poor, but apparently he just switched to forward this year from defense, so that makes sense. Still though, as you know he has absolutely no business being on an NHL roster.

[Kevin W.]

Jannik Hansen is still whining about being suspended. "Now I have to have this on my record! I've never even been suspended in my life! Hossa was flopping!" This team, it will never end.

Jesus Christ, he was most likely asked a question and answered it. What you're doing is whining. He made a fair point about how his reputation has now changed. He has played hundreds of cleans game and now because of one reckless play people are going to think he's dirty even though he's not, just like Duncan Keith isn't all of a sudden a dirty player because of one incident. Hansen probably didn't think he hit Hossa very hard either, which is probably the case since Hossa did practice today.

I really wanted to stay out of this but It just got too hard.

It's not the first time Hansen's cheap-shotted someone.

[The Six]

Detroit, Columbus, and Nashville should all be in the East. Just toss a couple of expansion teams into Cascadia to even it out.

[charger77]

Leafs are first in the league in hits, fights, and PIMs. Pugnacity, testosterone, truculence, and belligerence!

That's a Burke-built, and more importantly, Carlyle-coached team for you.

Enjoy the wins now, because Carlyle losses are insufferable.

You'd think that Stanley Cup they won would ease some of that pain.