Dallas Stars, Los Angeles Kings, Phoenix Coyotes 8 comments

Pacific division preview

By on September 24th, 2007

Over the next week I am going to be posting brief reviews of what we can expect from each team in the NHL for the upcoming season. Included will be some team strengths and weaknesses as well as some question marks for what to look for and a final outlook. The question marks will be an indication of what might occur and if it does they could finish better than I expect. Finally, once all the previews are complete I will post my final standings predictions. So, lets start off in the Pacific Division.

Anaheim Ducks
Strengths:
-One of the best goaltending tandems in the league.
-The experience of winning the Stanley Cup.
-Young talent in Getzlaf, Perry, Ryan.
-Chris Pronger (and Niedermayer if he returns)
Weaknesses:
-For whatever reason, recently teams that make the Stanley Cup finals have struggled the following season.
-The loss of Selanne, Niedermayer and Penner takes a lot away from last years cup wining team.
-Questionable health of newcomers Bertuzzi and Schneider
Question Marks:
-Will Niedermayer or Selanne return at some point?
-Can Bertuzzi become the 25 goal, 60+ point guy the Ducks need him to be?
-Will they eventually trade Bryzgalov for some help elsewhere.
Outlook:
-The Ducks should easily make the playoffs but defending the Stanley Cup is going to be difficult with the current lot of players as they likely haven’t adequately replaced the performances of Selanne, Niedermayer and Penner. Of course, that all changes should Niedermayer return because the Ducks would then have an insanely good defense that no team could come close to matching.

Dallas Stars
Strengths:
-Goaltending with Marty Turco and Mark Smith.
-One of the better defensive teams in the league.
Weaknesses:
-They will struggle to score goals.
Question Marks:
-Can Mike Modano, at age 37, return to a point per game player after a sub-par year in 2006-07.
-How much does 37 year old Sergei Zubov have left in the tank to anchor their power play.
Outlook:
-When you look at the Dallas roster you wonder how they managed to have back to back seasons of 112 and 107 points but you have to give them credit for getting them done. It is probably fair to expect more or less the same this season and a playoff spot but unless they can figure out how to score some goals they can’t be considered a true cup contender.

Los Angeles Kings
Strengths:
-Young talent in Frolov, Cammalleri, Kopitar, Dustin Brown, Patrick O’Sullivan, Jack Johnson and Jonathan Bernier.
-Added some good depth (for the short term) with the signings of Nagy, Handzus, Calder, Preissing and Stuart.
-Lots of salary cap space going forward to continue rebuilding process.
Weaknesses:
-To say goaltending is a weakness is an understatement. They were bad last year and probably their best goalie Mathieu Garon walked via free agency. That leaves Jason LaBarbera, who had a solid year in the AHL last year but isn’t generally highly regarded, a very weak backup in Aubin and a 19 year old prospect in Bernier.
Question Marks:
-Will they risk Bernier’s confidence/development and give him an opportunity to play or will the trade for a goalie (Martin Gerber??).
Outlook:
-This is no doubt going to be a transition year for the Kings. I can’t see them making the playoffs, or even being close, but as a franchise they are headed in the right direction. They have lots of young talent and I expect them to be big players in next years free agent market as they have a lot of cap room and the free agent market has the potential to bee better than this years (Dany Heatley and Marian Hossa being two potential prime targets).

Phoenix Coyotes
Strengths:
-Hmmm. Shane Doan maybe?
-They have some decent talent on defence with Jovanovski, Michalek, Ballard, Morris and Boynton.
Weaknesses:
-Pretty much everything but mostly they lack any top end forwards outside of Doan who is more of a second line player.
-Several backup goalies but no starters.
Question Marks:
-How bad will this team be?
Outlook:
-There isn’t much positive going to happen in Phoenix this season so the best Coyote fans can probably hope for is a last place finish and the first pick in next years draft.

San Jose Sharks
Strengths:
-Quality and depth of forward with Thornton and Marleau being one of the best one-two center tandems in the league and Cheechoo and Michalek providing some scoring from the wings.
-Excellent young talent in Michalek, Bernier, Carle, Pavelski, and Vlasic.
Weaknesses:
-The defense lacks a true #1 guy and the loss of Scott Hannan will be felt.
-Overall experience and/or depth at forward, on defence and in goal.
Question Marks:
-How quickly can San Jose’s young players really take their game to the next level.
-Can Nabokov stay healthy and/or will San Jose acquire a quality backup for him?
Outlook:
-The Sharks have the makings of a really good team but they are still missing some parts, particular a true #1 defenseman, and some experience this will hold them back from being true top tier Stanley Cup contenders. I think they need another year or two.

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Exposing Pierre McGuire

By on September 17th, 2007

There are a few people in the media that I really dislike and Pierre McGuire is one of them. It’s not that I don’t think he is knowledgable about the game of hockey (like Steve Simmons who I aslo dislike) but just that he often everexaggerates everything and/or he panders to his audience. For example, when he is on Ottawa radio he often puts down the Leafs because that plays well in Ottawa. He does that much less so on Toronto radio. But some things he has said in the past 2 days really has me wondering about his sanity.

1. On Friday he said he thought that the Chicago Blackhawks have a chance to be in the playoff race. That’s a pretty bold statement for a team that finished with 65 and 71 points the past two seasons and will likely need closer to 95 points to make the playoffs. It’s even more bold when you consider that the only moves of significance they made was signing Robert Lang and Yanick Perreault and trading Adrian Aucoin for Andrei Zyuzin and picking up Sergei Samsonov for a couple of fringe players. I am sorry Pierre but those moves plus the addition of Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews is not going to be enough to turn the blackhawks around unless you think both Kane and Toews will be the next Sidney Crosby next season. But even Sidney Crosby didn’t turn the Penguins around in year one. The Blackhawks have next to zero chance of making the playoffs.

2. This morning he stated (in the context of how difficult it will be for the Leafs and Canadiens to make the playoffs) that Washington will also be in the playoff fight. Now I think this is a bit more viable than the Blackhawks prediction because I think the Capitals added more this off season (Nylander, Kozlov, Poti, and top rookie Backstrom) but I don’t think even that is enough to move them from 70 points to the 90+ points it will take to make the playoffs.

3. In the context of how tough it will be for Toskala to play for the Leafs he mentioned that he will be playing for a team with a weak defense and for a team that will struggle to score. Now, as you all might know, I don’t think the Leafs have a weak defense (and goaltending was their problem) but at least McGuire has the team goals against average to use to back up that statement. But a weak offense? This is a team that finished 8th and 7th in goals scored the past 2 seasons and just added a 40 goal scorer and should get more games played by Wellwood and Tucker this year. The Leafs are not an offensively challenged team.

I am going to be interested to see where he predicts the Blackhawks, Capitals and Leafs will be when TSN has their season preview show in a few weeks. Any bets that he says that Washington and Chicago have little chance at the playoffs and the Leafs have a chance?

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Bell Suspension: New Policy, inconsistent discipline, or piling on?

By on September 13th, 2007

I don’t think it is a stretch to say that yesterday’s 15 game suspension of Mark Bell was a surprise to everyone because it seemed to come out of nowhere. There is no real precedent for the NHL to suspend players for their off-ice conduct and certainly not with a suspensionof the magnitude of 15 games. So my question is, why Mark Bell, why now?

To review, prior to last season Mark Bell was caused an accident while driving impaired and to make matters worse, he fled the scene of the accident. This past summer he plead guilty and will face up to 6 months in jail time which he will serve at the conclusion of this NHL season. It seemed that the Judge didn’t feel it was necessary to punish Bell more by forcing him to miss part or all of the NHL season. But apparently Gary Bettman didn’t see it the same way.

“Playing in the National Hockey League is a privilege, and with that privilege comes a corresponding responsibility for exemplary conduct off the ice as well as on it,” said NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman.

Gary Bettman’s reason for suspending Bell is because he didn’t conduct himself in an exemplary way off the ice. So the question I have is, what is exemplary conduct? Is drinking and driving but not causing an accident exemplary? If not, shouldn’t Jay Bouwmeester be facing a suspension in the very near future for pleading guilting to driving while impaired? Apparently this is not the case and driving while under the influence of alcohol does fall within Bettman’s view of ‘exemplary conduct’ since Ian White never received a suspension for his DUI charge or subsequent charge of driving with a suspended licence. Does driving recklessly and at high speeds causing an accident and killing someone fall within Bettman’s view of exemplary conduct? Apparently so as current Ottawa Senator Dany Heatley was never suspended when he plead guilty to vehicular homicide. And what about underage drinking? Is that exemplary conduct? Apparently so as Jordan Staal has yet to receive a suspension or any other punishment from the league.

One could easily argue that Bell’s suspension is warrented and that what Bell did is at least as bad or far worse than the other cases I described above, but if what Bell did is worth a 15 game suspension (and Bettman said it would ahve likely been more except Bell has shown good progress in turning his life and his alcohol dependency around), wouldn’t one or all of the other cases I described above be worthy of at least a game or two suspension? I would think so. To me this Bell suspension wreaks of piling on and probably a bit of not wanting the NHL to look soft on the conduct of its players in light of the Michael Vick situation and how the NFL handled that (indefinitely suspending Vick). I will try not to get into a debate as to whether Bell should be suspended but unless Bettman is going to follow through and suspend guys like Bouwmeester and Staal then I can only conclude that the idea of suspending players for off ice conduct is not a new policy and is at best inconsistent discipline or at worst piling on and in either case is just more evidence of Gary Bettman’s incompetence as a commissioner.

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Eastern Conference Team Ratings

By on September 12th, 2007

Based on the same forumula as the western conference ratings, here are the eastern conference ratings. As usual, if you disagree feel free to post your thoughts and if you can back up your arguement, who knows, maybe you can get me to change my mind.

Forwards Defense Goaltending Total
Talent Depth Exp. Talent Depth Exp. #1 goalie Depth Exp. Score
Ottawa 10 6 7 8 7 7 8 7 6 53.2
Buffalo 8 8 6 7 8 7 8 7 6 52.8
Pittsburgh 10 8 6 8 7 6 7 6 6 52.5
NY Rangers 9 7 8 6 7 6 9 6 6 52.2
Toronto 7 8 7 8 9 7 6 6 6 50.7
Philadelphia 8 8 6 7 7 7 7 7 6 50.3
Florida 7 6 5 7 7 6 9 6 7 49.5
New Jersey 7 6 7 6 6 7 9 6 10 49.5
Montreal 7 6 6 7 7 7 8 7 6 48.8
Atlanta 9 6 7 7 5 6 8 6 5 48.0
Carolina 8 7 7 6 7 8 6 6 6 47.0
NY Islanders 6 7 7 6 7 6 8 5 6 46.8
Boston 7 6 6 7 7 6 7 6 6 46.5
Tampa 9 6 6 8 6 6 6 5 6 46.5
Washington 8 6 5 6 6 5 7 6 7 45.2
Dallas Stars, Detroit Red Wings, Los Angeles Kings, Minnesota Wild, Nashville Predators, NHL, Phoenix Coyotes, St. Louis Blues, Vancouver Canucks 13 comments

Western Conference Team Rankings (Updated)

By on September 11th, 2007

I was going to write up team by team reports, and I may still do that for some teams, but I decided to first post some numerical evaluations of each team in nice and easily readable table format. I have divided each team up into Forwards, Defense and Goaltending and then divided each of those groups into Talent, Depth and Experience/Leadership and ranked each of those nine categories based on a score out of 10. I then summed up all 9 categories to get an overall team score. Below are my results for the western conference. Let me know what you all think. For the most part I am happy with them but if you can provide a good arguement I may consider making slight modifications.

Note: I made the assumption that Niedermayer will not play for the Ducks and I also factored in a few long term injuries (i.e. Steve Sullivan is expected to miss 3 months due to back surgery).

Update:While working on the eastern conference (and in conjunction with Triumph’s comment) I have decided to tweak the overall formula. The new forumula will weight experience significantly less and also give more weight to #1 goalie and less to depth (Vancouver, Calgary, New Jersey, etc. hardly need a backup goalie). This is the new updated table.

Forwards Defense Goaltending Total
Talent Depth Exp. Talent Depth Exp. #1 goalie Depth Exp. Score
Detroit 8 5 7 10 8 8 8 6 10 54.3
Vancouver 7 6 6 7 8 6 10 7 6 52.5
Anaheim 7 7 6 9 6 8 8 7 8 51.8
Dallas 6 7 7 7 7 8 8 8 7 50.3
Calgary 7 6 7 8 7 6 9 4 7 50.2
San Jose 9 7 7 6 7 5 8 5 7 49.8
Minnesota 8 6 7 6 8 7 7 6 4 47.5
Colorado 8 7 7 7 7 6 6 6 5 47.0
Edmonton 6 6 5 7 7 6 7 7 7 46.0
St. Louis 7 6 7 6 7 6 7 6 6 45.8
Nashville 6 7 6 7 7 6 7 4 5 45.2
Los Angeles 6 7 6 7 7 7 5 5 5 43.0
Chicago 7 5 5 5 5 4 7 6 7 40.8
Columbus 6 6 6 5 5 5 6 6 6 39.7
Phoenix 4 5 5 7 7 7 5 6 5 39.2
Toronto Maple Leafs 4 comments

Joke of the Day

By on September 5th, 2007

When I read Eklund’s stuff I don’t know whether to laugh or cry (because what he writes is so horrendously rediculous) but today I’ll laugh and make Eklund the Joke of the Day!

From the infamous Eklund on ‘Swing Players’ for the Leafs:

Tony Salmelainen. Someone I trust, who knows Fins better than almost anyone else, tells me that this signing will be the best late summer signing of them all. Tony is a huge talent in the making that just needed a little more time to develop to the North American game.

Someone should let Eklund know that the Tony Salmelainen that the Leafs signed is the same Tony Salmelainen that played 57 games for the Blackhawks last season and impressed them so much that they traded his salary to Montreal for the mega-malcontent known as Sergei Samsonov after which Montreal promptly bought him out of his contract. He is known more as a ‘skilled’ player and if the offensively deprived Blackhawks and Canadiens don’t have any interest in him I wouldn’t expect him to make much of an impact in the NHL any time soon. As for adjusting to the North American game, well, he has played 70 NHL games and 201 AHL games over 4 years so he has had ample time to adjust. At best he is a depth/injury replacement player but more likely than not he spends most of the year with the Marlies.

And if that weren’t enough, here is Eklund’s bold prediction:

Mark Bell nets 35 goals.

His best year is 25 goals and 48 points. Even the most optimistic Leaf fan doesn’t think he is capable of that. I am not even sure Mark Bell thinks he is capable of that.

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Good and Bad Off Season Moves…

By on September 5th, 2007

Ok, it’s time to get back in hockey mode and start looking to the upcoming season which is less than a month away. But first, let me look at a handful of good and bad off season moves.

The Good

Ryan Whitney: While Whitney doesn’t get the media attention of his teammate forwards Crosby, Malkin and Staal, he is one of the best young defensemen in the NHL and had an excelleny year last year with 14 goals, 59 points and a +9. The Penguins made a very smart move locking up Whitney for the next 6 years at a respectable $4 million per season. In a few years they could have a Norris contender in Whitney for about half of what other top defensemen will be making.

Tomas Vokoun: For a price of a couple of draft picks the Florida Panthers went out and picked up one of the best goalies in the NHL. Florida had mediocre goaltending last year and missed the playoffs by 6 points. With Vokoun in net and with some improvement from some of their other young players I expect the Panthers will have an excellent shot at a playoff spot this season and will contend for the division title.

Smyth/Hannan: The Avalanche are a team that made a big splash in the free agent pool but aren’t getting a lot of recognition for doing so. Not only did they sign two excellent players, but they may have signed the most valuable of the top free agents. Ryan Smyth and Joe Sakic will provide the Avalanche the best leadership both on and off the ice than any other pair in the NHL and Hannan is a nice defensive defenseman that should help out the Avalanche in their own end. If Budaj continues his improvement in goal, the Avalanche could be cup contenders once again.

Toskala: The price was fairly high but the Leafs addressed their most pressing need with the acquisition of Vesa Toskala. While Toskala is still unproven as an NHL starting goalie, he will most certainly be better than Aubin and will give coach Maurice with a pair of goalies (with Raycroft) so that he can go with the hot hand. The Leafs missed the playoffs by a single point and adding Toskala should easily make up that point and get them into the playoffs.

Keenan: The Calgary Flames big spash of the summer was bringing in an experienced, hard nosed coach in Mike Keenan. Keenan will have the team playing harder, tougher and better defensively which is what took them to the Stanley Cup finals a few years back. Keenan will coach more like how Sutter did and I expect the Flames will be an improved team this upcoming season because of it.

Preissing/Handzus/Nagy/Calder/Stuart – There were rumours that the Kings were going to get into the fight for the high priced free agents (Drury, Briere, Gomez, Smyth) but instead they probably went the smarter route and signed a number of cheaper second tier players. The Kings have some quality talent in Cammaleri, Frolov, Kopitar and others so didn’t really need more talent. What they really needed was some depth and experience to mentor that young talent and take some pressure off them and that is exactly what they added.

Todd White – I don’t know why, but I just really like this move by the Atlanta Thrashers. White is a good two-way player who has enough skill to skate with the talented players that the Thrashers have (he has played with Hossa in Ottawa too) and because he is smart defensively he complements those offensive players perfectly. The Thrashers didn’t have a lot of money to spend but made a smart move in signing White to a $2.375 million/year four year deal.

The Bad Moves

Drury – I like Chris Drury. He is a good, solid, 2-way player with good leadership skills. Problem is, he is a second line player now being paid like a first line star. He might score the Rangers 30 goals and get 65 points, but that isn’t the kind of output I would expect from a $7 million player. For that money they could have signed Peca for the leadership and defensive ability, kept Nylander to keep the successfull Jagr-Nylander-Straka trio in tact (and be certain to keep Jagr happy), plus had some money left over to bring in a quality defenseman.

Hartnell – Hartnell will certainly bring some toughness to the Flyers who have converted themselves to a softer team recently but $4.2 million for a guy who will get you 20-25 goals and 40-45 points? That’s a bit much

Lang – There are some teams out there that can just never seem to make a smart move or the mvoes they make never work out. One of those teams is the Blackhawks. They made a splash a few years ago signing Khabibulin but he has been a flop. Last year they made a splash trading for and signing Havlat and while he started off great, he got injured as he always does. This year they didn’t make quite the same sized splash signing Lang to a 2 year $8 million contract but the return on investment will be just as bad. Lang’s production has fallen from 79 points in 2003-04 to 62 points in 2005-06 to 52 points last year and at 36 years of age, that is more likely an irreversable trend than not and Lang has never brought much else to the game than his offensive abilities. Lang is done as an effective player in the NHL and the Blackhawks just made another bad move.

Toskala – Trading for Toskala was a smart move by the Leafs, giving an unproven goalie (as a starter) an extension at $4 million per year was not a smart move. I just don’t see the benefit to signing Toskala now to that large contract rather than waiting to see how he does as a starter. Even if Toskala came in played excellent and took over the starting role from Raycroft (as the Leafs hope he will do), it is unlikely that he would command much more than $4 million if they signed him in January but the risk would be dramatically lowered. It just smells Gerberesk.

Hamrlik – It is questionable whether Hamrlik will be worth his $5.5 million salary cap hit next season, but I am almost certain he will not be worth anywhere near that $5.5 million salary cap hit 4 years from now at age 36. From Kovalev to Samsonov and now to Hamrlik, Montreal seems to be good for one bad signing every summer.

LA Kings goaltending – While I think the Kings made some good moves at forward and defense, they failed to address their most pressing need of a top goalie. Until they do so, they will be a mediocre team at best and all but certain to miss the playoffs.

Other questioinable moves: Briere ($$, length of contract). Timonen ($$, length of contract). Sarich ($$). Penner (cost of compensation). Rafalski (length of contrtact), Nylander ($$, length of contract).

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WCCO Radio Interview

By on August 8th, 2007

It’s a bit late and I apologize for not announcing beforehand so you all could listen live but back on July 16th I did my first radio interview on WCCO 830 News/Talk radio in Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota. We talked a bit about the big free agent signings as well as the new CBA. You can listen to an mp3 of the interview here. Considering it was my first radio interview I think it went fairly well and I am hoping to do some more once we get into the hockey season.

NHL 58 comments

RFA Signings to make Draft Picks Less Valuable

By on July 30th, 2007

A lot of people have said that in this new salary cap world the draft has become more important. I am not one of those who thinks this and if RFA signings like what the Oilers have done with Vanek and Penner become commonplace draft picks will become even less valuable.

The premise behind believing that the draft is now more important with the salary cap is that you no longer can buy a lot of expensive free agents to fill out your roster and if you draft smartly and can get some cheap quality young players on your roster you will be at a huge advantage. First off, I disagree with this premise from the start because unless you have one of the top picks and can draft a super-talented player, your draft pick is unlikely to make the NHL until they are 20-22 years of age and then it usually takes a year or two before they become top contributors on a team. This is especially true for defensemen and goaltenders. Players can now become unrestricted free agents at age 27 so for most players you would only get at most 3-4 productive years before they become unrestricted free agents and become expensive to resign. This differs from the old CBA where a team held a players rights until age 31 which includes most players prime years.

The other thing that has changed under the new CBA is the compensation required for restricted free agents has been reduced. This summer the Edmonton Oilers tried to pry Thomas Vanek away from Buffalo at a cost of 4 first round draft picks. Under the old CBA it would have been 5. They are also trying to pry Dustin Penner away from the Anaheim Ducks for $4.3 million per season which will cost them just a first, a second and a third round draft pick as compensation. To put that into perspective, the Atlanta Thrashers gave up Glen Metropolit, a first, a second and a third round pick to St. Louis to rent Keith Tkachuk for a couple months of service. So for the price of what some teams were paying for rental players the Oilers can get a quality young player in Dustin Penner for the next 5 years.

So with that in mind, one has to wonder why more teams wouldn’t take the route of signing restricted free agents. I suspect you will start to see it become more and more common especially for players worth up to (approximately) $4.6 million where compensation is no more than a first, second, and a third round pick. When this starts to happen it is going to drive up salaries for players aged 23-27. This is going to mean you won’t be able to draft players have have them on your roster cheaply for much longer than a couple of years and when you can’t do that, draft picks become less and less valuable as there will not be a lot of difference between paying your 24 year old drafted player $4.5 million than signing an equally talented but more experienced 27 year old unrestricted free agent for the same money. Good drafting isn’t the key to winning under the new CBA, good pro-scouting and smart team building is.

NHL 15 comments

Favourite Player list

By on July 26th, 2007

Well, it is the dog days of summer and there isn’t much happening around the league right now so I figured why not start posting some lists to maybe spur some mid-summer discussion. So here is my first one which is a list of my favourite players on every team. Well, maybe not always my favourite players, but rather some players who I like, or who I admire how they play the game, or who is highly underrated, or just someone who I think people don’t know much about when they really should.

Anaheim – Ryan Getzlaf – Size, strength, speed, talent. He’s got everything.
Atlanta – Slava Kozlov – One of the more underrated players and has developed into a solid leader.
Boston – Patrice Bergeron – Plays with enery and passion.
Buffalo – Thomas Vanek – The next superstar of the NHL and Buffalo won’t be dissapointed matching Edmonton’s offer.
Calgary – Dion Phaneuf – Maybe the best all round defenseman after the big three (Pronger, Niedermayer and Lidstrom)
Carolina – Rod Brind’amour – Good offensively, excellent defensively, a great leader. He does everything well.
Chicago – Jonathan Toews – There isn’t much to like in Chicago so may as well go with a future star and world junior hero.
Colorado – Joe Sakic – What’s not to like about Sakic.
Columbus – Fredrik Modin – You never hear much about him but he has put together a respecatable career.
Dallas – Brenden Morrow – Does everything well and is an excellent leader.
Detroit – Tomas Holmstrom – Does the dirty work so few players are willing to do.
Edmonton – Steve Staios – There isn’t much to like on the Oilers so why not go with the last remaining veteren.
Florida – Olli Jokinen – If he were in a major market he’d be a superstar.
Los Angeles – Michal Handzus – Not speedy but when healthy is highly effective at both ends of the ice.
Minnesota – Wes Walz – Every team needs a Wes Walz type player.
Montreal – Mike Komisarek – Might make mistakes by being over agressive but he plays the game hard.
Nashville – Shea Weber – Shoots hard, hits hard, plays hard. Future top tier defenseman.
New Jersey – Martin Brodeur – The main reason why New Jersey has won 3 Stanley Cups in the past dozen or so years.
NY Islanders – Ruslan Fedotenko – The Islanders lost a lot this off season but the addition of hard working Fedotenko was a good move.
NY Rangers – Marek Malik – Highly underrated as a defensive defenseman. He’s one of the best.
Ottawa – Chris Kelly – I love his work ethic, his speed and his passion for the game. One of the better penalty killers in the league.
Philadelphia – Simon Gagne – Nobody stands out so I’ll go with the Flyers best player.
Phoenix – Kevyn Adams – An excellent forchecker and defensive player.
Pittsburgh – Ryan Whitney – He hasn’t gotten the attention of Crosby, Malkin or Staal but he is going to be a star player as well.
San Jose – Mike Grier – Plays hard and smart and will chip in some goals. Buffalo really missed his energetic play in the playoffs.
St. Louis – Lee Stempniak – Nobody really knows him yet but he is going to be a consistent 30+ goal scorer.
Tampa – Martin St. Louis – Gotta love what he has done with his career after floundering early on.
Toronto – Nik Antropov – I have defended Antropov for a long time and if he could just stay healthy I am sure he’ll prove me right.
Vancouver – Brendan Morrison – I briefly chatted with Morrison many years ago on ICQ (when he was still at Michigan) and I have followed his career ever since.
Washington – Alexei Ovechkin – I am not sure anybody has more fun playing hockey and scoring goals than Ovechkin. I love his enthusiasm.

So that is my list, what are your thoughts? If there are any other hockey bloggers reading this I challenge you to put together your own lists and be sure to post a link to it here in the comments so we can all compare favourite players.