The NHL Free Agent shopping mall opened for business yesterday, and while the Isles are expected to pass on the big names like Brian Campbell, Marian Hossa, and Mats Sundin, they aren’t about to sit out this pool party.
Addressing the team’s woeful powerplay, the Islanders signed defenseman Mark Striet away from Montreal yesterday. A solid move by Snow and crew especially when you look at the terms and $$ thrown at Campbell and Wade Redden yesterday.
With the supply of offensive defensemen dwindling quickly on the first day of free agency, Snow swooped in to grab the 30-year-old power-play specialist. Streit tied for third among the league’s defensemen last season with 62 points, including 13 goals (seven on the power play) and 49 assists.
“Mark solves our power play,” Snow said. “He was a player we targeted early on. He’ll come here and be a solid contributor on the blue line and obviously play a significant role on the power play. I see him as a top-four defenseman, but his play will dictate that.”
Some Striet highlights.
Call up your cable operator and tell them “I Want My DP TV!!”. The Isles’ netminder was a big part of the All-Star Game festivities this past weekend. Sorry for the delay in getting all these up…I was out of town again this weekend and didn’t get to watch the festivities until last night.
First off with Marty Brouder taking the weekend off, DP was named the starting goalie for the Eastern All-Stars.
During Saturday’s skills competition, DP started off the evening with a pair of goals (2 goals/4 shots) during the revised Obstacle Course event.
Next, DP robs Marion Gaborik of the Minnesota Wild during the Shootout event with a sweet toe save.
The Versus Network had DP mic’ed up all weekend, which led to this humorous exchange before Ilya Kovalchuk’s attempt in the Breakaway Challenge event.
Kovalchuk should light the puck on fire or light himself on fire, and then do a back flip on the ice.
With comments like that, Ricky might just have a career in hockey broadcasting in his future after he’s done with the Isles. However, Versus’ plan later backfired when they left DP’s mic on. DP stops Gaborik again during the Breakaway Challenge but tweaks his hip. As he skates over to the Bruins’ Tim Thomas to ask him to take his place, DP drops the F-Bomb on live TV. Good thing it was only Versus and only like 10 people were watching.
This also led to gasps of horror across Long Island at the thought of DP missing any games because of an injury during the All-Star Game. Isles’ PR head honcho, Chris Botta was swamped with calls, emails, and people at the All-Star game asking about DP’s status for Sunday’s game. DP assured everyone he was OK and ready to go.
With DP still mic’ed up for the All-Star Game, things did not start well. DP is chatting with the Versus play by play announcers as they drop the puck to start the game. Then there’s a lousy clearing pass by Montreal’s Andre Markov that ends up on the stick of the Western Conference’s Rick Nash who breaks in alone on DP and scores just 12 seconds into the game, an All-Star Game record. Ooops.
The good news is that was the only puck to get by DP on Sunday. Ricky made 12 saves in the period and his All-Star teammates scored 5 unanswered goals for a 5-1 lead after the first period of play. The East went on to win 8-7 on a Marc Savard goal with just 21 seconds left. Just a fantastic job by DP all weekend.
Finally, two more videos for you from Islanders TV, first here’s Ricky saying goodbye to Atlanta and headed back home. And finally, I’m not sure if this was part of the All-Star Weekend or not, but it was pretty interesting - McFarlane toys is going to add DiPietro to their NHL Action Figure line, here’s video of DP having his face scanned in for the modelers.
Be sure to check the Islanders Army recommended links to the right, I’ve added a lot of the Islanders Blogosphere’s coverage of the festivities. Especially Botta’s NYI Point Blank blog, where he has short Q&A interviews with some big hockey names like Stan Fischler, Adam Proteau of The Hockey News, Ray “Chicken Parm” Ferraro, and Greg Logan of Newsday.
Psst…whatcha doin’ next Sunday? Are you in Atlanta? Can you skate? Can you play goal?
What’s an All-Star Game without any All-Stars? We might just find out this weekend. Crosby’s out with an injury, starting Western goalie Roberto Luongo already decided to skip the game, and now starting Eastern goalie Martin Brodeur has decided to do the same…using the same lame “family” excuse that Luongo did.
Eastern Conference starting goalie Martin Brodeur on Tuesday pulled out of Sunday’s All-Star Game in Atlanta, citing personal reasons.
Boston’s Tim Thomas was named to replace Brodeur, who played in Tuesday night’s game against the Flyers at the Wachovia Center.
The other Eastern Conference goalies are the Islanders’ Rick DiPietro and Florida’s Tomas Vokoun.
“It’s a tough decision,” Brodeur said. “I’ve got some stuff going on with the family back home, so it’s something I just wanted to make sure I was here to take care of. It’s definitely a tough one. It’s such a great weekend to miss. That’s why I waited so long. I tried to avoid making that decision, but I think it’s for the best.”
Way to be fan-friendly Marty and give the fans what they want. Is your wife pregnant too, like Luongo’s?
The NHL All-Star Game fan ballots are now online. Vote for DP and Captain Guerin, the only Islanders listed on the ballot. I voted for Blakey too.
It appears the NHL is trying to avoid the Rory Fitzpatrick mess from last year. “To Nominate A Player Not on the Ballot, Select One From the List” it says. Excuse me if I’m wrong, but if someone is on that list…then they are on the ballot…aren’t they? So there are no write-in votes allowed this year.
Making matter worse are the inclusion of 10 NY Rangers players on that list, including super-studs like Colton Orr and Ryan Hollweg, but NO OTHER ISLANDERS?!? WTF?! Hello? No Comrie (leads the team in scoring), no Campoli (#10 in NHL defensive scoring), or anyone else wearing Orange and Blue. Well at least they left Sean Avery off the list.
[Update] From Uni Watch, here are this year’s All-Star jerseys. How lame and boring can jerseys get? Now you know.
[Update 2] As pointed out in the comments by reader Mike and also over at Islanders Outsider, the voting website has been updated and 15 Islanders have been deemed “Official NHL Approved Write-In Candidates”. Good work men!
You can now select Sean Bergenheim, Marc-Andre Bergeron, Chris Campoli, Mike Comrie, Ruslan Fedotenko, Bruno Gervais, Andy Hilbert, Trent Hunter, Radek Martinek, Richard Park, Miroslav Satan, Mike Sillinger, Andy Sutton, Josef Vasicek, and Brendan Witt. What, no Dubie?
