Blogging about the New York Islanders, the NHL and everything else hockey
The NHL Tournament of Logos blog has graduated from logos and is moving onto determining the “best goalie mask” with a series of polls. Today’s matchup pits the Isles’ own Wade Dubielewicz vs. Nikolai Khabibulin. Sorry Doobie, but I H-A-T-E that stupid %$#^@&*! Gordon’s Fisherman logo with a passion…I had to vote for “The Bulin Wall”. Get your vote on either way, and check the Tournament of Logos blog often to see how the voting turns out.
We haven’t covered the possible Yankee Stadium NHL outdoor game very much here this season, despite talks about the game coming closer and closer to reality. That’s because every article about the game has the Rangers scheduled for the game in permanent marker, while the list of possible opponents is written in pencil, with the Islanders at the bottom of that list. The NHL (and NBC) suits feel a NYI/NYR outdoor game is too NYC-centric and won’t draw any interested outside of the metro area. It’s really not looking good for the Isles to take part in this game if it happens. However, the Isles now have one notable supporter in their corner - ESPN’s “Bucci” - John Buccigross makes a case to include the Islanders in his latest blog column. We’ll take all the support we can get, even if half of Bucci’s support is based on pity for our fallen franchise.
The Rangers-Islanders rivalry would light up a rink, burst through the television screen and earn very good ratings. It is one of those regular-season games that truly feels like a playoff game. Thats what makes any outdoor game better. A hard-hitting, meaningful battle is the cherry on top of all the Yankee Stadium marketing the game will receive.
You might find two other U.S.-based teams with a rivalry close to Islanders-Rangers, but you wont find a better one. And having the game in New York makes the most sense if its Islanders-Rangers, as much sense as a Blackhawks-Red Wings game in Wrigley Field or a Penguins-Flyers game at Penn State.
It is good sense and would help a franchise in need of a little help, a franchise that has a passionate owner who had a passionate-GM-turned-good-television-analyst make very bad trades. Sports are meant to be played, watched and experienced with passion, but administered with cold, calculating thought. The Islanders learned that the hard way.
Cmon, NHL, give the Islanders a break. Give them a reason to believe, some faith, some hope. Everybody will win. Even Oleg Kvasha.
James Mirtle has tallied the official NHL injury reports to determine the number of games lost to injuries this season for each team. It shouldn’t be much a surprise (Sim, Sillinger, Bates, Witt, Satan, Campoli, etc…) that the Islanders are currently in 4th place, right behind the Bruins. The Bruins however are the only possible playoff team near the top of this list.
Rk Teams Games Lost NHL pos. 1 Florida 362 22 2 Chicago 330 24 3 Boston 305 14 4 N.Y. Islanders 302 26 5 Edmonton 291 21
From NewYorkIslanders.com
“I’m extremely happy to have reached an agreement with the Islanders for the 2008-09 season,” said Comrie early Tuesday morning. “I love being an Islander and wanted to stay. The management and the coaches have shown great belief in us as players and I am honored to be a part of this organization. I would like to thank Garth Snow and my representative, Ritch Winter, for making this a deal that both sides are comfortable and happy with. I look forward to the rest of this season and I’m thrilled to be an Islander for at least another season.”
The 27-year old Comrie has played in all 63 games for the Islanders this season and has recorded a team-high 45 points. The native of Edmonton has scored 18 goals (second to Bill Guerin) with a team-leading 27 assists.
I’m at work all day, and will try to update with any significant Islanders news. However for the absolute latest trade deadline news, check out these Blog Box Bloggers who are at the Coliseum all day today. I’d already scheduled vacation days on Thursday and Friday so I can move, I couldn’t bag today as well. Have fun today bloggers!
The 7th Woman
[Update] Here we go…things are heating up. No Islander moves yet, but the Sabres’ Brian Campbell and Lightning’s Brad Richards are on the move. I don’t think Voice of The Islander Fans is at the Coliseum, but they are doing a good job with updates.
Real quick, work to do, just a few good links today I wanted to share. Great Friday afternoon reading materials.
First up, Barry Melrose Rocks gives us the Best Hockey Scenes in Non-Hockey Movies
The criteria are fairly simple. Miracle and Mystery, Alaska are hockey movies. Happy Gilmour is disqualified because, essentially, it’s a movie about a hockey player. Also out is, other than Slap Shot, my favorite hockey movie of all-time: The Van Damme good Sudden Death. (I always wondered how many different “Die Hard in a ____” settings they went through before settling on the Stanley Cup Finals. “Sir, the North American Tiddlywinks Association has rejected our request to film at the Squidger Bowl.” “Dammit, get me the NHL!”)
Next, the New York Times SlapShot Blog takes a look at one of hockey’s greatest traditions…the face-wash!
The face wash is a baiting tactic that has been around since gloves were invented, or, as the Devils television announcer Chico Resch said, “since hands were invented.”
“It’s a pride issue,” said Resch, a former goaltender, who played for the Islanders and the Devils during his 14-year N.H.L. career. “If I keep trying to rub my hands into your face, you’re going to get angry. The face is sort of an untouchable territory.”
But face washing, if done judiciously (or out of sight of a referee), is perfectly legal. The 222-page N.H.L. rule book addresses such gross misconduct as spitting, head-butting and hurling racial slurs, but only the most egregious of face washers risk an unsportsmanlike-conduct penalty. So everyone does it.
And finally, in honor of Hockey Day in Canada this weekend, Sean Leahy gives us his Top 10 Don Cherry suits. No words could possibly do this story justice, so I’m borrowing this stunner from Sean’s blog which comes in at #3.
Keep your Pimp-Hand strong Don Cherry. You rule.
Interesting stats over at PuckThatHit.com where they’ve divided up all the goalie’s salaries by the number of saves they’ve made this season. DP comes in #16 at about $2500 a save, a little bit cheaper than Lundqvist ($2600), Brodeur ($2900), and a whole bunch cheaper than ex-Islander Roberto Luongo ($3700).
With only 27 games played and $6 million in salary, Jose Theodore is robbing the Avalanche blind at $6000 a save. With 18 wins and a .930 save percentage, Boston Bruins All-Star Tim Thomas is an absolute steal at a $1 million salary and $600 per save.
Top 3 Goalies
$520 Jason LaBarbera (Kings)
$594 Timothy Jr. Thomas (Bruins)
$635 Dan Ellis (Predators)Bottom 3 Goalies
$4365 Marty Turco (Stars)
$4876 Nikolai Khabibulin (Hawks)
$6000 Jose Theodore (Avalanche)
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.
TONIGHT! (tonight..tonight..) LIVE! (live..live..) It’s a battle to the DEATH! (death..death..)
OK, not really. But “cage match” certainly sounds a lot cooler than “internet radio show”, especially when it’s said in a “monster truck announcer” voice.
One of my favorite hockey websites (don’t call it a blog) out there is LCS Hockey. LCS started as a just an online newsletter back in 1994 that I stumbled across during some of my earliest trips on the information superhighway. The newsletter ended in 1999 but the site re-launched in 2002 with a more traditional website format. The LCS Empire has now expanded to their own radio show, and Michael Dell has invited me to be on the show tonight.
Look at the pretty banner they made just for little ol’ me! You can catch the show LIVE tonight at 9:30pm or click the same link to catch a replay of the show after it airs.
Michael Dell and co-host Jim Iovino are Pittsburgh Penguins fans, so expect some discussion about Sid the Kid’s injury before I ask them if they’d like to sign Ty Conklin to a 15-year $67 million dollar contract.
And if you’re not familiar with LCS Hockey, take a look at their classic newsletters or something more recent like their take on All-Star Snubs, or this follow up post where they throw all the NHL players out of the All-Star game and replace them with sitcom characters. I can’t believe Dell resisted the temptation to throw Alf on the squad, he’s a sucker for furry, cat-eating aliens.
Another day in the NHL and another multi-year, multi-million dollar contract being signed. The Washington Capitals locked up super-stud Alexander Ovechkin to a 13-year $124 million dollar contract yesterday.
Crazy. Insane. Asinine. All these words were thrown around last year when Islanders owner Charles Wang signed Rick DiPietro to a 15-year deal. Here’s another word for you…trend! Philadelphia signed Mike Richards to a 12-year deal just a couple of weeks ago, now Ovie, who’s next? Sid the Kid is already locked up for another 4 seasons, but surely we haven’t seen the last mega-deal of this new NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement.
Ovie gets $9 million a year for the first 6, and $10 million a year for the last 4. That buys a lot of Crocs, or even some real ^$@%! shoes.
In addition the awesome graphic above that I borrowed, our friends at FauxRumors had a nice write about Wang and Ovie’s deal. FAUXRUMORS: Wang: Visionary or Nut? Great title.
1) When it was announced late yesterday that the Washington Capitals have extended the contract for their super star left wing Alex Ovechkin to an unprecedented 13 years we couldn’t help but wonder if Mr. Wang was quietly chuckling to himself. After all, until this year such contracts were unheard of in non-Islander quarters.
2) You may recall that earlier this season the Flyers extended the contract for forward Mike Richards for 12 additional seasons. Is there a trend developing here? Did the NY Islanders/Wang know something that others didn’t last year when they signed Rick DiPietro to a 15 year deal? As we wrote after the Richards deal, many fewer folks derided the Flyers for that contract like the hockey media did when the Isles gave Ricky his. Now, only 16 months later Charles Wang is looking more like a visionary and less like a Kook (at least on this issue)
They have 4 more points to make…check out the whole article.
Hey everyone, Happy New Year! Welcome to 2008! The year the Cup returns to Hempstead Turnpike??
I am back from 5 days of being buried in the Vermont snow (18+ inches!!) with no internet access whatsoever. I’ll admit, I tried to get online with my laptop and cell phone but it was just too slow to be usable. Props to Tommy for minding the fort while I made drunken snow angels and ran my own liver into the boards from behind.
5-2? 4-1? Who are these guys and what did you do with my New York Islanders while I was gone? Those scores were a pleasant surprise.
I caught the first period of the Winter Classic on Tuesday before possession of the remote control was vetoed out of my hands by the rest of my skihouse. It looked like a ton of fun - for the fans and the players. I’m ready to start camping out for tickets to Isles/Rangers at Yankee Stadium next New Year…NOW!!
Anyways, here’s the news this morning. Corey Witt, NYI Media Relations Coordinator lets us know that DP practiced this morning and is ready to return to action tonight vs. Florida.
Here’s the round-up from today’s morning skate at the Coliseum…
The probable match-up in goal tonight is Rick DiPietro for the Islanders and Craig Anderson for the Panthers. Anderson was one of two Panthers to skate this morning and it didn’t look like it was because the other skater needed someone to shoot at.
DiPietro is thinking about wearing a new set of pads tonight. He’s been testing out a new prototype from I-Tech, which are pre-curved/broken in. Since they’re a prototype, they are all white.
Hmmm….coincidence or conspiracy? Was DP really hurt or was he just on a five day bender with Murph in Vermont?? Don’t worry DP, your secret is safe with me.
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