Well I'd figure I'd get this one out while watching the Pittsburg/Ottawa game this afternoon. I don't know if anybody else was watching but they had curling on before and it ran late so they waited for curling to finnish. It was kind of a piss-off because curlings not exactly a main attraction sport and they've been pushing this afternoon game all week. They should have just split screened it but no we had to see each boring shot full screen. Oh well! Another slow day and nothing big going on but heres so fars new.
->Owen Nolan of the Minesota Wild has suffered an undisclosed upper body injury but is expected to miss atleast 2 weeks. I'll try and get more on this one as it comes.
->Yet another injury with Oilers Sam Gagner who suffered a mild concussion in Dallas Wednesday. The Oilers apparently are taking this very slow and don't expect him to be rushed back. My estimation is probably a week and a half.
->The final conclusion to the Sean Avery ordeal is in and the NHL has handed him a 6 game suspension. The Dallas Star's will not appeal the suspension but the NHLPA will. According to reports the NHLPA feels the suspension was a bit too harsh for a few selected words. Rumours have it that this season the NHL brass has had all eyes on Avery waiting for a moment like this to try and settle him down.
->The KHL has decided that they are going to try a familiar All-Star game format this year when they played their annual all-star game. On January 11th the game will be played outdoors in Moscow's Red Square in keeping with the outdoor game trend. The game's roster format has been chosen as well and will be a Russia vs the World format which is pretty interesting since alot of foreign players has now been lured to the KHL. Former Islander Alexei Yashin will be the team captain of the Russian side while a former Ranger Jaromir Jagr will captain the foreign teams squad. The rosters will be released mid-December. I'm personally excited for this one because I really do believe the KHL officials are playing this exactly how they should. Their marketing former NHL stars agains't their former league and using their name's which had been made popular in North America to stir a buzz and grab headlines in North America. Another interesting thing is that they are showing they can keep out with the lastest hockey fads by showing the NHL and North America that they arn't the only ones who can market an outdoor game. The KHL isn't budging, I truely believe this summer it could present another dangerous threat to the NHL. Especially if they expand to Europe like planned. I can wait to see how this is going to play out. Tomorow afternoon I will debut my Team Yashin (Russia) roster and who I expect to make the squad. There's alot of familiar faces, more than I expected. Tuesday I'll preview my prediction for Team Jagr and the Foreign side.
*Rumour*
->Last little thing is that Corey Murphy noise is starting to happen. There are a few teams that are trying to make something happen with the Florida Panthers for the offensive specialist. Corey Murphy is an extremely talented offensive defenseman and clearly can work a power play. Although he's undersized and a bit injury prone a few teams who are desperate to get things started have shown interest. Two that I've heard are the powerplay struggling Montreal Canadians and the well just struggling Sens. Montreal loves these kind of players, with Mark Streit being gone and nothing clicking on the point he could easily be a good fit for an already talented line-up who needs someone to set-up Kovalev and Markov. Ottawa on the other hand has been just plan struggling and all season have been pushing for an offensive defenseman to replace Redden. Alexander Picard is a complete bust and Brendan Bell clearly isn't made to play at this level. Kuba's good but he needs help. This could be a good fit and I know Bryan Murray is ready to start shopping Antone Vermette a Jacques Martin favorite. Stay -tuned on this one.
Well that's it for now but a final comment to anyone who watches CBC broadcast games. Has anyone else noticed that P.J Stock can barely get a sentence together? I enjoy his commentary because he's been through the grind of the NHL and really knows the players sides but he sounds like a punch drunk boxer sometimes. Today he took about 3 minutes to say "Maxime Talbot knows what hes doing and know he has two players....". they should use him more to his strengths and use him for their rumours and breaking stories instead of trying to break the game down sentence by sentence or more like word by word.
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