Needs more Red Sparkles

As it seems I'm stuck with the mantle of dispersing the Ty Conklin news and as he is now, in fact, a Wing (I'm still not over this, it makes me laugh every time I see it), here would appear to be the first look at his Red Wings mask, though he hasn't (yet, anyway) been using it in practice:


Rather matte for Conks, although it does seem to be in a similar vein as his Pittsburgh mask - quite a bit less shiny than what he wore in Buffalo.

Ken Holland is a Mad Genius (I Hope)

Wow. WOW. It's days like these you're happy to be a Red Wings fan. While a multitude of other teams out there are frantically racing around buying and selling and freaking their fans out, the Wings have sat back and made a few careful, smart, slightly shocking, deals. The other teams I follow frequently (the Leafs and the Oilers and to a lesser extent the Capitals - thanks Capschick) as well as many other teams in the league have made drastic roster changes, lost players unexpectedly, gained players unexpectedly, and set the fans on edge for what will be very different teams next year. Not so with the Red Wings, who once again have given us every reason to continue being confident in everything from the team to the management to the owners - and anything you can imagine inbetween.

First and foremost, Andreas Lilja
The Wings resigned Andreas Lilja to a two year contract worth $2.5 million. Lilja hasn't always been perfect, but despite all the grief he's gotten for a few boneheaded moves, he honestly hasn't make a substantial amount more mistakes than a lot of other defensemen, especially for the level of play expected from him - and it's easy to look bad when you're playing next to Nick Lidstrom, right? It's just unfortunate for Lilja that his mistakes always seem to wind up in the spotlight as gamebreakers. Nevertheless, he's been around the Wings for a while, understands the team philosophy, and can contribute as a fifth/sixth defenseman. He's also very affordable, and is receiving only a small raise over the 1 million he made for the past two season. The only problem with this signing in my mind, considering the next move the Wings made, is that it perpetuates a huge logjam of defensemen and creates the potential for a promising young kid to be lost.

Bringing Back B-Stu
After the Lilja signing, the chances of the Wings resigning UFA Brad Stuart, acquired from LA at the trade deadlline this past season, seemed slim. By the morning of trade deadline day, he was still unsigned and it seemed likely that he'd hit the free agent market where he could possibly make quite a bit more than Detroit was willing to offer. And then, just before noon, the news hit that he had indeed agreed to come back. The contract is for four years averaging $3.75 million per season - a little more than the Wings wanted to give and a little less than Stuart wanted to make. TSN reports the deal also includes a no trade clause for the first two years and a limited no-trade clause in the last two:

Stuart has moved around a fair bit in recent seasons, getting traded from San Jose to Boston in 2005 (as part of the Joe Thornton trade), from Boston to Calgary in 2007 before signing in Los Angeles as a free agent last summer.

It will be nice for Stuart, after all that, to get to settle down for a while. I had thought he was more than likely lost, so it was a great surprise to see that he'd decided to stay after all - and a testament to the environment surrounding the Wings that he chose to accept less to play for a team that seemed to tap into his potential. After struggling with the Kings (21 points and a minus-16 in 63 games) he clicked with Niklas Kronwall on the Wings (2 points and a plus-6 in 9 regular season games and 7 points and a plus 15 in 21 playoff games wherein he averaged over 21 minutes of ice time per night) and became an integral, top four part of the Wings' already stunning defense. He clearly liked his time here, and the way the Wings treated him (letting him travel back to LA for the birth of his second child comes to mind) and with Rafalski, Stuart, Kronwall and Lidstrom (because lets face it, even when his contract is up he isn't going anywhere unless he retires), our top four defense is locked up for a good long time. And in fact it was both family and his partnership with Kronwall, as well as tasting Stanley Cup victory, that brought him back:

“It’s been a tough couple of years from having a family and having to move around a bit, spending a lot of time a part,” Stuart said. “To be able to stick in Detroit for four years, I’m real happy about that. It’s not just about you anymore. It’s about the family and some times you have to make sacrifices to make everyone happy.”

[...]

“It was a pretty big factor. I really enjoy playing with him,” Stuart said of Kronwall. “We seem to have a pretty good chemistry. That's not always easy to find, so that was pretty important to get a chance to continue that. I'm excited to get going next year.”

Unfortunately the resigning of both of them does have it's downfalls in that the Wings now have a surplus of defensemen. Outside of the top four and Lilja, Brett Lebda will be back as well as Chris Chelios (though he's accepted a much lesser role and won't be playing as often as in the past) and then there are Derek Meech and Kyle Quincey, neither of whom can move back and forth between the AHL without clearing waivers any longer - and neither of whom aren't likely to be snatched up should they have to. On a personal level, Quincey is my favorite Griffin and I worry for his future with the organization - not because they want to lose him, but because they may have to. And then of course there's Jonathan Ericsson who's leaped from Mr. Irrelevant to the number one Wings prospect and could easily play in the NHL this season - but is stymied by not having to clear waivers and will likely remain dominating the AHL instead. Still, it's hard to find fault with either of these signings, even if they do have a small downside.

Jimmy Howard: Conkblocked
Since Dominik Hasek announced his retirement, it's been one of the biggest questions in Detroit - will Jimmy Howard, the "Red Wings goaltender of the future" for so many years, finally get his NHL chance? The answer appears to be probably not quite yet, as the Wings signed former Penguins backup goaltender Ty Conklin to a one year, $750,000 deal. It's a one-way contract which means the likelihood of Conks being sent down to the AHL in favor of Howard is slim. Holland's opinion:

"Ty Conklin has the inside track, but if Jimmy Howard is the obvious No. 2 guy (in training camp and the preseason), we'll reassess,'' general manager Ken Holland said. "Do we carry three (goaltenders)?''

Despite his rocky past with the Oilers, Conks looked incredibly solid with Pittsburgh last year when Marc-Andre Fleury was sidelined by an ankle sprain (18-8-5, with a 2.51 goals-against average and a .923 save percentage, which ranked second in the NHL last season). Aside from that, he and the number one guy Chris Osgood should get along well as both possess seemingly very casual demeanors, and it'll also be interesting to see how a goaltender like Conklin plays behind the sort of stellar defense Detroit possesses - look for some gaudy numbers. Another good decision by Holland.

WHAT JUST HAPPENED?
Free agency had slowed down a little. Day One was pretty predictable as far as the Wings went, and aside from hearing that management had been looking into both Leafs captain Mats Sundin (which seemed unlikely given the offers he'd received from other teams) and at bringing back Todd Bertuzzi, it seemed as though perhaps the Wings would be done. And then, as I was pulling out of the Tim Horton's parking lot at 12:43 pm when I received the following text from a friend who'd been updating me all day:

"Hossa: 1 year, 7.4 million. DETROIT."

I stopped, stared, processed, and replied, eloquently, "WHAT?" Yes. Marian Hossa signed with Detroit, one year, $7.4 million. This sort of signing is what really puts into perspective how good your team really is. Hossa was offered nearly as much over five years by the Penguins and $9 million by Edmonton for a multi-year deal as well, and instead opted to come to Detroit for only one year, where the likelihood of him resigning after the season is virtually nil, as the Wings must then resign Henrik Zetterberg and Johan Franzen. This effectively underlines what pretty much everyone already knew: Hossa wants to win a cup, and Hossa wants to win it now.

Brilliant. Hossa scores goals, plain and simple - and while he's not quite the two-way player most of Detroits forwards are (frankly the only downside I could possible see to this signing is if he doesn't mesh well with the team and upsets chemistry - but Detroit has a habit of bringing out the best in players), goals are never a bad thing. The team had some extra money lying around for the upcoming season and they managed to negotiate their way into becoming a heck of a lot more dangerous. How, we might never know - but is anyone complaining?

Here's another thing I like about Detroit's management of their players: Hossa was offered 7.4 million because, reportedly, it was the most Detroit would pay any UFA. No one was allowed to come in and make more money than captain Nick Lidstrom. While it's not a big deal or anything, that sort of loyalty shown to a player who deserves it as much as Lidstrom is just another example of why players stick with this team.

Finally, one hilarious bit from the Wings report of the signing:

The Red Wings’ inability to get secondary scoring last season was constantly scrutinized in the media.

[...]

Landing Hossa, who has scored 299 goals and 349 assists with a plus-85 rating in 701 career games, should address secondary scoring.

Only with the Detroit Red Wings could Marian Hossa be considered secondary scoring!

Last but not least
Are the Wings done with free agency yet? Not quite, as they have to deal with making offers to Darren McCarty and Aaron Downey, should the pair be brought back (they're expected to) and Valtteri Filppula, an RFA, whose deal will likely not come until further down the road. And who knows what else may await - Hossa was certainly unexpected, there could always be more, however unlikely. But rest assured, already the team has shown the rest of the league that it is ready to come back bigger, sharper, scarier, and more devastating than before. Congrats, Ken Holland, and thank you!

More to come...

Along with coverage of the resigning of both Andreas Lilja and Brad Stuart (yay!) but this just had to be fate right?

Ty Conklin signs a one year deal worth $750,000 with Detroit.

It should really be worth noting that I was so in a tizzy over this (Good? Bad? Love it? Hate it? I just can't stop thinking that for me personally it's hilarious.) that I stopped at two banks on the way home from work, where I heard about it, and left my ATM card in the ATM at not one of them, no, at both banks. Thanks a lot, Ty Conklin.

Please, faithful readers, don't steal my identity.

Oh no....oooooh no..

Dear Ty Conklin,

If you are in net against the Hurricanes tonight, I wanted to give you some words of comfort and support in facing your old demons:

You are not the only one scared of Rod Brind'Amour's face. Or his wraparound scoring technique. Please for the love of god stay in the net.

Lots of love,
Elly


p.s. I like the new pads. Flashy.

I Like a Little Hockey in my Fighting (Wings 2, Ducks 1)

I didn't count actual number of scrums that could have - and for the most part did - lead to full-blown fights in last nights Wings/Ducks battle - the third of the season - but it was a lot. Sorry, Finny, but the Ducks are an unnecessarily vicious team, as proven again in just the first twenty minutes of the game. (And have you noticed how evil they all look? Ryan Getzlaf? Chris Kunitz? I'm looking at you guys. I'm also beginning to think secretely they wanted to get rid of Dustin Penner because his big smiley bearlike self just doesn't seem to fit in with the theme.)

Right off the bad, hardly more than five minutes in, one-time Wing Todd Bertuzzi ran Dominik Hasek over for no discernible reason. He was given an extra penalty for it (which balanced out the one Johan Franzen took defending his goalie - a completely acceptable one given how dangerous the play was), but you have to wonder what he was thinking, if it wasn't simply a blatant attempt to injure.

Shortly thereafter, Ducks captain Chris Pronger had a go at it with Dan Cleary - which he started off by not punching, but instead scratching Cleary with an open palmed-swipe at his face, ending up with the result of Cleary's eye swelling shut. He left the game and did not return - can't blame him for his few second of turtling. Before the end of the period, Doug Weight tried to drop the gloves with Brett Lebda as well, but Lebda didn't take the bait. The first period was ridden with penalties (a combined 34 minutes of them) and shots of the penalty box teeming with Ducks - four, at one point.

The Ducks seemed to settle down a little bit after the first period, but this didn't stop Sean O'Donnell and Aaron Downey from going at it. The level of physicality remained high, and it was nice to see the Wings retaliate well and not buckle under it, as they're so often accused of doing. (It was also nice, however, to see that Jiri Hudler has gotten a little bit smarter about picking his battles; at one point it looked like he was set to lay a monster hit on Pronger, before he slowed up and realized just maybe that wasn't the smartest idea in the world.)

The Wings capitalized on the several power plays provided by the penalty-fest only once, resulting in a Brian Rafalski goal - his 9th of the season, which ties a career record for him. The other Wings goal was from Val Filppula, who for whatever reason always seems to play some great games against Anaheim. Tomas Kopecky, who has seemed rather quiet lately, made a spectacular pass to him after Francois Beauchemin broke what seemed like he's twentieth stick of the evening to put the Wings up two. Unfortunately, Dominik Hasek's shutout bit was ruined in the third (I blame you, CC) when Chris Pronger managed to connect with the net.

FSN Detroit was having technical issues throughout the game, most noticeable toward the end when the feed froze on the last faceoff - I inferred that we won thirty seconds later when it cut back in to a lot of Wings jumping all over Hasek.

The Wings finished up the road trip 3-0, despite the absence of Henrik Zetterberg, but his absence is still worrisome, especially when his current claim is to feel all of "2% better." Luckily he has plenty of time to rest up through the All Star break before the Wings meet up with Tracy's Coyotes this coming Wednesday.

Other Notes

During intermission, the FSN Detroit crew interviewed former Wing-now Duck Mathieu Schneider about his time in Detroit. One of the things they asked him was what he missed most about the city. His response? "The pizza." To which the announcers prompted, "Little Caesars?" Schneider agreed. Mike Ilitch would be so proud.

Sports are notorious for throwing out odd, obscure stats - but sometimes they hit on some interesting ones. Like last night, for instance, when an announcer remarked that in his 16 years in the league, Nick Lidstrom has taken one roughing penalty. Wow.

Around the League

Elly passed this along to me this morning - I do believe everyone needs a little bit of cute, soccer-playing Conks in their life.

The league decided on four games in Europe for this coming season - Ottawa/Pittsburgh twice in Stockholm and New York Rangers/Tampa Bay twice in Prague. While I'm happy to see my favorite little Petr Prucha getting to play a game in (almost) his home, I'm started to get more than a little frustrated at all these Eastern teams. I know it was the Western Anaheim/LA match up in Europe last season, but come on, is there a reason it couldn't be 50/50? I'm not actually interested in either of these matchups - for the most part because neither actually impact my team. That's not great marketing, guys.

Things that make me happy.

The Red Wings losing their past two games to Minnesota and Ottawa do not make this list, and thus will only be given a cursory mention - I missed both games TOCing Bronco hockey (don't ask about the miserable losses), though I did record the Ottawa game and do intend to watch it eventually, but you can read all about at On the Wings, where Matt did a great job recapping it.

The Wings take on the Atlanta Thrashers tonight and I will probably miss the majority of it as well - but I'm hopeful that it will be the end of this marginal losing streak.

Meanwhile, the NHL makes me happy. Why?

• Chris Osgood still looks like he's still twenty because of Noxzema.

• Steve Schrader suggests things like that the Wings could "spark some interest in their stars" by "offer[ing] to help fans assemble their stuff from Ikea." Henrik Zetterberg can put together my oversized leaf canopy any day.
  

• Andrew Raycroft doesn't want to watch the Leafs suck either:
• 
  

• Ty Conklin is now 10-0-1 with .949 sv% and a 1.72 gaa. What on earth is going on? (Also I am famous on the Pensblog, but I think my sign pales in comparison to this beauty in the center. I kind of wish I'd come up with that.) Yahoo suggests, "If Conklin continues to play this well, look for him to remain the Penguins' starting goaltender even after Marc-Andre Fleury returns from his high ankle sprain." I can hear Elly wailing from here. Conklin is also the deciding factor in my move from dead last to 8th of 12 in the IPB fantasy league. Seriously. He did more than Vinny Lecavalier. I don't get it either.
  

• The Oilers are winning! Perhaps it can be attributed to Ales Hemsky's recent dental decision - I don't know, I sort of liked the toothless look, and I still miss his curls, but you know what? This I can live with.

• I can skate backwards (okay this has nothing to do with the NHL but I just succeeded today, leave me alone)!

All in all, hockey is good, isn't it?

15 minutes

Steph, my lovely co-blogger, is famous!

But first, a little back story.

As any of you who have spoken to me lately may be aware, I am in deep psychological pain over the fact that Ty Conklin, the man who has become something of a long-standing running joke on NPI (in the most loving of ways, of course) is basically now filling the bright yellow pads of the starting goaltender role for my most beloved Penguins...and doing a fine job at it, to boot. Conks, who's stats so far this season are finding him solidly leading the Pens and undefeated, had puck handled his way into Steph's heart early last year with his tenacity to stay in the NHL (and Syracuse) and keep on playing, even for a myriad of teams. Meanwhile, I chorkled at the thought of him, once more, playing in the NHL post-season, and cried as the Oilers that spurned him rattled around at the bottom of the well. I made comments that I hoped that when they played the Islanders, that MAB stayed far away from Miller. And now, after being signed by my own team (something which made me wail louder than a long-tailed cat in a rocking chair factory), he is saving the very team I swore would never start him.

Steph, bless her heart, meanwhile made sure to rub it in at every available opportunity - and rightly so, since she never gave up on his little goalie self, even going so far as to make amusing and funny signs for him when she went to see Syracuse play...and now, due to his sudden, and deserved, popularity, incriminating photos of these humorous signs have shown up on The Pensblog, which is the best place to find great photoshops and people with painful signs. I'm sure more will be appearing soon, and I'm even thinking of submitting one of Conks myself....but I'm not sure I can pony up to admitting that maybe, just maybe, he might actually be good for the Pens. I'll give him this, though: he really can handle the puck. I just wish he'd do it without leaving the net in ulcer-inducing spurts and bounds.

Congrats Conks, and Steph as well, I hope you both enjoy the fame good goaltending and a great sense of humor can provide!

My Team is Awesome.

I know, it's been a little while. A busy, ridiculous while.

But honestly, what else is there to say? How many times can we praise the Eurotwins' slick moves, rave about Osgood's awesome surprise success, revel in the massive secondary scoring output - and the list goes on? Last week the Red Wings finished out the first half of the season with a 4-1 win against the West's second place Dallas Stars that gave a franchise record 30 wins in 41 games. Since then, they've tacked on another 3-0 victory against the Stars and a (finally!) 3-1 win over the Blackhawks. Like those numbers? Here's some more.

• The Red Wings have a current total of 67 points in 43 games. Second place in the league is Ottawa (58 in 41), in the conference, San Jose (52 in 41), and in the division, St. Louis (45 in 39)

• The team's record against non-division opponents is 25-1-1. Um. Wow. The only losses to teams not in the Central Division are an early loss to Anaheim, and a shootout loss to Edmonton.
  

• Henrik Zetterberg is 7th in the league in points with 54, only 8 behind league leading Vinny Lecavelier - despite missing a few games in December/January. He also has 28 goals, fifth in the league.

• Pavel Datsyuk is 9th with 52 and has 36 assists, tied with Nick Lidstrom for fourth in the league.

• Speaking of Nick, he leads the league in +/- with 34 and is the only defenseman who in the top 30 in points.

• Meanwhile Chris Osgood leads the league in both GAA (1.68) and SV% (.932), and is fourth in wins with 19, which is pretty spectacular for a goalie who is essentially one half of a tandem.

Battle of Alberta noted the following stats about the Wings as well:

• Goals for per game: 1st in WC (2nd in NHL behind Ottawa)
• Goals against per game: 1st in WC (& 1st in NHL)
• PP%: 1st in WC (2nd in NHL behind MTL)
• PK%: 5th in WC at 86.4% (5th in NHL)
• Plus/minus: 1st in the NHL
• Shots for per game: 1st in WC by 4.0 (1st in NHL)
• Shots against per game: 1st in WC by 1.4 (1st in NHL)

The Wings are always expected to be a strong team, but this is over and above what anyone could have expected. Personally I'm absolutely grateful to be able to watch such an amazingly talent group of players and follow the success of an awesome organization like the Wings.

Maybe we will eventually have an off year. But this certainly isn't it. I'm happy to report I've decided to echo the success of my NHL team, and the current success of the namesake of my fantasy team. Maybe their success is rubbing off on my first place finish this week, or maybe I'm just balancing out Elly's run in the basement:


So how about a hand for Ty Conklin; 7-0-0 this season with a 1.99 GAA and a .939 SV% and named the NHL's 3rd star of the week.

And while we're at it, one for my boy Ales Hemsky for taking down Sheldon Souray and winning the Hot Off 2008.

...Really, NBC?

I wasn't going to bother watching the Winter Classic until I heard about who was in net for Pittsburgh. And now I'm glad that I made it home for the third period, if only because I turned my TV on to hear the announcers proclaim:

"That's a real strength of Ty Conklin; playing the puck."

Seriously. Seriously?

(I'm glad to see he got it done, though, guy deserves a break.)

I'm sorry.....what?

The gods are laughing at me, aren't they?

So happy when it's not his fault.

Thanks to the inability of the train I spent 6 pm to 10 pm on to miraculously have cable, and even more miraculously have Versus (the S383 would totally kick its ass, just ask HG), I didn't actually catch any of the Ottawa/Buffalo game tonight. But what I've gathered to be the important thing is that Buffalo stayed alive to fight through at least a Game Five.

And also that Ty freaking Conklin is REALLY DAMN ADORABLE.

Uh. Right. In other news Chris Pronger won't be showing his ugly gap-toothed mug tomorrow evening, as the league handed him a one game suspension. I'm surprised, but happy with the decision. Apparently Pronger was less so. Who would've figured, Prongs bitching about something? I think he's still just mad about the pants. Should've listened, Chris, should've listened.

Duck Season Officially Open

WINGS CRUSH DUCKS 5-0
Series 2-1 in Wings' favor
(What on earth was I on when this said Sharks? Remind me not to post at 3am)

First off, is that Valtteri Filppula using one of those sticks that Datsyuk's stirred up so much noise about? I haven't noticed it in the games - has anyone else? It's too late for me to feel like looking up pictures and checking right now, but I couldn't help but see at least that he was carrying one in these celebration pictures tonight.

On to the game - that was the kind of thing you don't expect to see in the playoffs. Especially by the time you hit the WCF. In a beautiful 5-0 effort by Hasek and the Wings, we moved up 2-1 for the series and showed that we can not only take a beating, we can dish one out like the best of them.

The Wings' offensive effort was brilliant, especially compared to the past couple games where it would have really been nice to see a little more. Babcock shuffled the line around a bit (and also gave Tomas Kopecky a chance to play, after being out injured since December 19th) and it looks to have worked like a charm - not only that, but once again our potential for scoring depth made a great showing. Franzen broke out with the first goal, followed up with a nice shot by Homer - a wristshot and not the sort of goal we're used to seeing from him, which only made it more satisfying - a tip in in front of the net by Bertuzzi, another Holmstrom goal, and finally to top off the evening, my other rookie Filppula stepped up and knocked one in to bump us up to five. Not to mention the statistic when you factor in assists - of the 18 members of tonight's roster, 10 notched points.

The Ducks, on the other hand, couldn't seem to stay out of the box, which really hurt their offensive chances - I'll admit, Pronger raging at the referees made me a little bit happy.

Make that face all you want, Prongs, it didn't get you your pants back and it won't make the refs take pity on you either.

He and Baby Nieds took a really nasty shot at Holmstrom, knocking him down and sending him back to the lockerroom with two cuts on his forehead. It looked worrisome for a bit, but luckily Homer was back in the third period. I'm skeptical on the call - Niedermayer got a five minute penalty for boarding and a game misconduct, but Pronger, that jerkbag, walked away with nothing.

As for goaltending, Dominik Hasek was brilliant in net tonight, notching him yet another playoff shutout. He made several excellent stops and even using some of his patented wandering out of the net, successfully poking the puck away from a couple different Ducks. The announcers commented that he must have been getting bored - and rightfully so; the Ducks were outshot 13-2 in the second.

J.S. Giguere, on the other hand, looked a bit shaky at the beginning, and (much to my delight) was pulled in the second, allowing Ilya Bryzgalov another shot at playoff glory.

Sure they weren't as cute as Luongo and Sabourin, but what can you expect from Ducks.

Unfortunately, he let in the first shot that was taken on him (though to his credit I don't quite know how the Ducks let Valtteri Filppula get quite so far into the zone to begin with). He didn't look bad, however, which made me happy. Duck hatred I may have, but I really do have a soft spot for Bryz and I'm not the only one:

Me: Okay Ilya like, spins. when he gets back up and they're moving the puck away he just sort of makes little circles and it's really adorable.
Elly: Ilya does this cute shoulder roll thing....so cute.

And there's even a Facebook group dedicated to his Score interview. The poor guy, this must feel like flashbacks to last year's WCF - I can just picture him sitting there in net, muttering to himself about closing the door. (To note, I really wish there were more Knob Hockey happening this year).

Now we just have to wait and see if the Wings can keep this up again in Anaheim Thursday - I have faith!

---

Speaking of goalies I have odd attachments to, tomorrow could be Ty Conklin's last game of the season - by the looks of things, the poor guy isn't even getting to suit up and stop some pucks during practice over in Buffalo.

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Having finally been home for a playoff game, I took a bunch of pictures and was finally able to have something to submit to the Japers' Rink View From Your Playoff Seats project - they were nice enough to feature my favorite on their page, so I wanted to take a minute to pimp the project in general for anyone who hasn't heard about it yet.

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Finally in a quick Tigers update just because this is getting called our biggest win yet and I can't help but be happy over it, the boys took on the Red Sox in Boston tonight and upset them 7-2. Verlander had a strong evening, pitching for 7 2/3 innings and and my boy Magglio Ordonez lit up the stadium with a home run that brought in three. Go Tigers!

Whip your Conk out!

"Cocklin" was first discovered and put to use (okay shh I am aware this is full of inaccuracy and exaggeration) by the drunk guys behind me at the Crunch game (where it ranked slightly more clever than Popperle/"Potpourri" and Pushor/"Pushover" and light years beyond Methot/"ME HOT"), but it appears that the magical world of Facebook is now horning in on their creativity with yet another play on words linking Ty Conklin to a particular bit of anatomy. Granted the Facebook group seems just a bit less hateful... I, of course, had to join, and then felt it was also my duty to spread around just how little it takes to amuse me. Especially seeing as how I couldn't come up with anything clever for his March 30th birthday.

Look, he shaved! Just as I was just coming to terms with the scruff and even admitting it wasn't bad looking, ask Elly!

That said, this is the post where I say I hate the Sabres. Or no, I don't even hate them, I just feel nothing toward them. I don't particularly dislike them, but I have no reason to cheer for them either. And they're within mere fractions of points of my Wings' President's Trophy. But okay. You got me. Fine. I love Ty Conklin. And if the damn Sabres take that trophy, like they're poised to do, I'll be content in having won in the West, in having at least smited the stupid Ducks and their stupid Chris Pronger, because I'll be thinking of happy little Ty Conklin getting another chance - maybe - and hopefully not fucking it up. (Although, CapsChick has assured me that she'll be cheering for her boys to pull of a win, so I totally don't need to be worrying, right?)

That said, I still haven't entirely forgiven you Conklin. Don't push my love.

Randomly, why is it that he continues cycling through all my friends' teams? From Skye's Magic Wands - er, Blue Jackets - to Drea's Sabres...what's next, one of 'ly's Pens come this summer? (I'm so lucky she's in Pittsburgh right now, she might literally implode at the thought).

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And while we're on the topic of ex-Oilers, Lauren Pronger ruined our season, did you hear? I mean I've been saying that since the beginning (just ask Elly!) but hey, now I have whole newspapers rallying behind my spiteful little opinion! I think Covered in Oil sums the whole thing up the nicest, but I do feel the need to echo - why on earth is all of this showing up eight months afer the fact like some new brilliant discovery? And sure, we were all pissed too, but I wonder just what's going to come of that beautiful little divorce-advocating quote. Good plan, that one.

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Happier news exists as well today, though - in the form of Pavel Datsyuk signing a shiny new 7 year contract with the Wings. Christy has a collection of reactions, both her own and those of most of the rest of the Wings blogosphere - all I can offer in return is approval of the move and confidence that those floundering playoff years aren't anything to be worried about.

‘’This contract was extremely important to me,'’ Datsyuk said. ‘’Especially since I have been a Red Wing since 2001."

Isn't it nice to have players who want to stay?

Wings lose, Leafs win and..... Ty Conklin!

I'm still cable-less so once again I can't offer anything about the Wings game tonight, as I didn't see it (working on that, I swear - a friend told me today that if I snuck into his dorm before they lock the doors 10 pm I could probably scored the lounge tv and free wireless and if my class hadn't gotten out at something like twenty after I would have been desperate enough to try). What I do know is that Christy already has a game recap up at Behind the Jersey and Hockeygirl (who is ONLY my friend again because she cheered on Belak for me tonight, another thing I didn't get to see myself) is probably gloating over at Double D(ion) if you're interested in (I know, I know, but we're trying to be well-rounded, right!?) a Flames perspective. I also happen to know that it was a 2-1 loss and Valtteri Filppula couldn't come up quite as well on his birthday as my other rookie Huds did on his - but he did notch at least an assist.

On to more important things, which is to say, Ty Conklin's Buffalo Sabres goalie mask officially exists!

For other views, look no further than WGR550, bringing us all sort of Sabres excellence. You can now all pretend I never uttered that phrase.

Conks insists that he's "not a mask guy", but in looking back, the guy's had quite a few different ones with his various teams - and they get progessively more and more full of glitter, too, I swear. And since I'm still not on page one of the google search results of his name, I present you with a journey through Ty Conklin's various masks. Mostly to prove that they get progressively weirder and glittery-er and because MWORO's Drea encouraged me. Are there any other goalies with this much shiny other than maybe Roli and his gold plated cage?

For the record, I just didn't have the energy required to dig up pictures from his Green Bay or college days. So when he first started with the Oil/Hamilton he had the customary white mask which he then apparently traded in for one that was navy blue with Oily stickers.

The first year he was still playing for Hamilton more than Edmonton obviously, and so came along this bulldog-covered helmet with little oil drops on it. Thus also begins his habit of having "CONKS" on his masks - I was so worried when the new one didn't have it, but then I saw the back and realized it was there after all, just not in its normal position.

This was his first official Edmonton mask - I rather like it, though the top is a little boring, but the sides are nice. Except what is with goalie masks having terrible fonts on them? Roli's lucky his name works so well with the Oilers logo.

At first he just wore his Edmonton mask with a SKODA sticker plastered over the front of it, for Team USA, but that turned into this..which perplexes me a little. I don't think I have any clue what's going on on it, except that sort of angry penguin looking birdthing wearing a hat. Not sure about this one, Ty - and they only get more questionable from here out.

Finally, the mask Conks wore last season with the Oilers. Perhaps the extremely weird choice of a random skull was symbolic of the eventual result of his season; we'll never know. At any rate I was never quite able to understand what this had to do with, well, Oilers. The inclusion of the riggers on the side helped a little bit....but that greenish-blue skin tone just isn't healthy at all. Zombie riggers? Perplexing...

Finally, Conks gets signed by the Bluejackets in the off season and apparently with a new team comes a new love of shiny, not to mention colorful (this one looked real good with the Sabres uniforms, if you weren't lucky enough to catch it before he switched). It actually did look nice in person - at the very least you couldn't miss him on the ice. I'm pretty sure he literally chiseled out some of the red from the B and used it for the eyes of the Buffaslug on the new one.

And that ends this horribly entertaining (I know, I know) and informative waste of time. It was sort of interesting looking back at all those masks though - I'm tempted to do it with a goalie people actually care about! Suggestions?

(Also, and I can't believe I'm saying this.....go Canucks, tomorrow. Ooooh it burns.)

Hockey Night in America 2.0

This is going to be one of those utterly disjointed posts in which I say a lot of little very random unimportant things about hockey that I've come across in the last couple days because they build up when I think I've spammed enough lately until eventually there are about ten things I want to mention and they eat at me until I just sucked it up and do it. Also, I apparently have to have something to do with myself during the commercial breaks while I take advantage of Spring Break meaning being home where I have Hockey Night in Canada at my disposal. So, here we go!

• Yesterday at the game I ran into Christy from Behind the Jersey and didn't even realize it at first - but both of us saw the same row of empty front row seats on the glass and thought it was too much of a tragedy to leave them empty. More importantly, after we got kicked out of those seats, she trekked over to the other side of the arena, while my friend and I just moved back a couple rows - and she got a front row view of Nik Lidstrom with his 200th goal and even made the paper. Congrats Christy - we should have followed you!

• I nabbed this gem from On the Wings, but it might be my new favorite Mike Babcock quote ever (certainly one of the more simple, coherent things he's said). Speaking on Jason Williams' two goals against his former team:
• "It’s good to see him score, too. What the heck.”

• Finally I noted this little blurb thanks to Ansar Khan, but apparently last night my little rookie Jiri Hudler got confused because the Wings were wearing their away whites to accommodate Chicago wearing their black jerseys, and showed up for warmup with his red helmet on, which got a laugh out of the Wings and Blackhawks both, until Robert Lang finally informed him of his mistake. Considering I do almost nothing during the warmups by try to nab the best pictures I can of the kid, I decided I probably had photo-documented evidence of this, and upon going back through them I realized indeed I did:

There he is right out of the dressing room with the red helmet...I lost him for a second after that, and when I noticed him again (though I didn't catch this at the time) there he was with the white helmet. Maybe he predicted that I'd laugh at him when I realized this, because before disappearing off the ice he took a nice last slapshot right at my face.

• I watched the Toronto/Buffalo game and wasn't thrilled by the end result - but I was ridiculously glad to see Darcy Tucker back after so long. Raking Leafs has everything I could say on the Kaberle hit yesterday already covered, and also mention the one thing I do love about it - watch the video, grimace at the awful hit, and then notice Darcy, who didn't dress for the game, come out and bitch out Janssen. I'll always love him. Also to note, Sherry of Scarlett Ice has discovered the secret behind Campbell's disciplinary methods. If only it weren't so true.
  

• Don Cherry was dressed very tastefully tonight - and with a tie of Blue. It was really kind of precious in this bizarre way that I don't really want to think of Cherry in.
  

• The Oilers played Flames tonight in only the second Battle of Alberta I've actually been able to see this year. It was nice to get to see them in those retro jerseys. I'm worried about Hemsky after that hit in the first - it didn't look bad but he didn't return, and that's the last thing they really need right now. (Maybe, though, he just realized how unbecoming the retros are on him...kidding, kidding. Ales is always gorgeous.) More importantly, I think this game requires a nice big round of PISAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANI! And a link to this. Man, if only he could get back whatever he had during the playoffs last year again...

• I hate Calgary a little. But I love those announcers for the phrase "activate your stick".
  

• Drea of MWORO pointed out to me this afternoon, in what is almost a neat little segue from talking about the Oilers, that if you google Ty Conklin, you pull me up on page three. So in a bemused attempt to bump myself up a bit, I bring you two things I managed to dig up today, the first being Green Bay Gamblers bobbleheads (no, seriously), and the second a story that ran in the Portsmouth Herald back in 1999 and I defy you to tell me there's nothing cute about it:

• "Ty has always been a little spacey," [his mother] says.

  "Lynn was driving Brian and Ty to a game. They were about 10 years old," Beth Conklin says during a telephone interview from the family's home in Anchorage. "Brian was always extremely focused. He would get into the zone before games. He was sitting in the back seat looking straight down and Lynn asked him what he was doing. He said, `I'm getting into the game.' Ty thought that sounded pretty good, so he said, `I'm getting into the game, too.' And he started looking down.

  "Well, about three minutes later, Ty's head pitched forward. He had fallen asleep."

And with that I think I've probably covered just about everything, or at least I've determined this to be far long enough already.

Can you believe his luck?

Ty Conklin, having been kicked out of Edmonton after a crushing game one last year, to Columbus where we all laughed at his luck and then might have just bust a gut when he got knocked down to the Syracuse Crunch and honestly died over his lackluster record with them even, is, as of this morning, a cup contending Buffalo Sabre (while Marty Biron heads over to the Flyers).

Someone explain the world to me, it all just stopped making sense.



Edit:

• Detroit Red Wings pick up Todd Bertuzzi for a draft pick and a prospect so far undisclosed - uhhhm....
  
• Toronto Maple Leafs pick up Yanic Perrault for Brendan Bell and a 2nd round pick - I'm a little more okay with that.
  

The Oil is still slick (and Ty Conklin...well...he tries?)

I've been slacking lately with all the hockey that's been going on in my life, so I'm willing to bet this post will escalate into something ridiculous, length-wise. Most importantly I was at the Red Wings/Oilers game last night, which probably turned out to be the best NHL game I've seen all season. I wasn't taking notes, but I do have observations - though most of the are admittedly Oil based since (ashamedly) I was paying more attention to them, but hell I can see the Red Wings anytime!

• Seeing that Yzerman banner up there with the little C on it for the first time...I think I teared up again. Not to take any credit away from Nik because he's doing wonderfully and I couldn't have asked for a better replacement, but I'll never stop missing Stevie Y.

• 

• I'd seen earlier in the day that Pisani and Tjarnqvist were likely to play that night, but when I went down to take pictures during the warmup and saw them both my heart just rose a little bit - the Oilers needed that.

• Smid is SO TALL. I've known this, but seeing it in person was still ridiculous - for some reason as babyfaced as he looks I just picture him to be like...well at the very least no more than Ales height, and then he's got another four inches. Also he was really feisty last night in a good way, picking little scrums all over the place and sticking up for his teammates - though I think my favorite was him bitching at Cleary (the word fuck was involved) and then immediately quipping "...sorry" and kind of glowering and nodding his head adamantly at the guy.

• Ryan Smyth is SO LOUD on the ice. I was up 15th row off the faceoff circles and I could hear him yell "HORC! HORC OVER HERE!" like he was standing next to me.

• The Oil started off worrisome - after two quick goals from the Red Wings I was starting to panic a little - even though honestly if my home team won I wouldn't be that upset - and wondering if I'd be getting to see Jussi play tonight. But then they pulled it back together and stopped taking inane penalties (what on earth was that mess in the first period? Though Raffi did take two unnecessary penalties later on to cut off Oil powerplays, as per usual.) played defense. I know, I know, the Oilers played defense! And strong defense too - these looked like two evenly matched teams out there.

....what?

• I really think announcers should be forced to learn IPA and all player names be given to them thusly. Ryan Smyth with a long i sound on the y, Valtteri FilPPULA after he explicitly asked them to place the stress on the other syllable, Toby Petter-son, and most importantly Alexis (ALEXIS!?) Hemsky didn't need to happen, especially with the frequency they did.

• Hemsky is just beautiful to watch on ice. I couldn't actually believe it when he fell over on that quasi-breakaway at the end, because he'd just been that fluid and gorgeous with the puck the whole rest of the night. (I will refrain from making the "needs to shoot more" comment because I know by now that he will not.)

• It could be argued that Dom cost the Wings this game in a way - that take out at the knees poke check move of his is impressive when it works, but lately...well, it hasn't. And Marty Reasoner got a garbage goal for his attempts this time. And then he tried to do a similar ridiculous thing in the OT which had us all out of our seats SCREAMING at him (the guys behind me had a brilliant hilarious conversation that included the line, "GET BACK IN THE NET YOU FUCKING RUSSIAN!" Geniuses).
  

• Roli baseball-batting the puck at the end of regulation - I love him so much. I wish I'd gotten to see him do it in play, but I wonder, considering he cites Dom as where he learned this from, if he did it on purpose because of that.

• I was almost surprised to see Hemsky get a shot in the shootout but it was amazing to watch all the same, even though Dom stopped it. Smytty, of course, pulled off the only goal the whole time. What surprised me, though, was the way the Wings played the shootout at all - Zetterberg flubbed his shot, but then Pavel came out and tried to pull off the EXACT same move (which Roloson played beautifully), an admirable attempt if he was thinking that maybe Roli wouldn't expect the same thing twice - but then Williams did the same thing too? That one I'm not quite sure I could buy.

Overall a great game, a win the Oilers needed and a point to put the Red Wings up still on top of the Predators. (Speaking of whom, it's nice to note, which I only have because it was mentioned at On the Wings, who will also probably have a more Wings-centric, less Oil-biased recap of this game sometime today, that Peter Forsberg wasn't on the ice for any of the Preds five goals in their last game, and is, in three games with Nashville, without a point and -1. It makes me happy inside - let's hope we can hold up playing them tonight.)

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In other news of my hockey ventures, on Wednesday I dragged a friend of mine up to Grand Rapids to catch a Griffins game against the Syracuse Crunch....namely because the infamous Ty Conklin would be in net for them and I was not about to pass up that chance (and with perfect timing, too, as he got called up to the Blue Jackets the next day). I confess, I have this latent pity-filled love for him ever since...well actually I'm not sure when the hatred turned into love. And as Griffins tickets are about $10 and you can generally move up all the way to the glass (we did, right up against the Crunch bench) why not?

I haven't been to an AHL game since I was younger and used to catch Marlies games sometimes, but this one was an excellent game to be at. It fell in somewhere between NHL action and the CCHA Broncos games I'm used to (speaking of which we are kicking ass; five straight wins to head off into the playoffs), and the fans around us really got into it. Ty played an admittedly good game (I PANICKED whenever he went around behind the net - that, I don't think, will ever stop) even though it ended in (barely) a shootout loss, and only one of the goals he let in was sort of awful - and everyone looked like they were having so much fun. Popperle looked good in warmup and Konopka laid on a few nice hits. The Griffins were sharp as well; Matt Ellis is going to be quite the player and Syvret was playing good as well.

This felt almost painfully symbolic.

It was nice seeing the farm team play - a little like looking into the future. I'm hoping to get up there and catch a few more games this season now.

The important ending to this story is that yours truly, after wandering around the stadium about five times in hopes that we would miraculously find the players leaving the building, stumbled on Ty and a Crunch friend heading out the front gates - and actually, after a minute of staring senselessly at my luck, nabbed him to chat for a few minutes and take a picture. Friendly guy, ridiculously cute in street clothes, and more than willing to help out a girl who made him a ridiculous sign (Elly said she wouldn't be happy unless "You can Ty me.....to your BED" happened - so it did.)

Not that I've forgiven him or anything. But seriously. It was pretty hilarious.

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Lastly, as the trade deadline looms ever closer players are getting thrown around really weirdly (Anson Carter for the Canes' fifth round pick?) but a few signings have brightened my day that I never thought would - the Bruins keeping Sturm being one of them, but namely the St. Louis Blues picking Manny up for two more seasons! If you would have told me that at the beginning of the year I would have cried a little....but after seeing what he's done for that team and how he's getting a chance to prove himself (and doing it!) I'm ecstatic to see he'll retain the starting position he deserves and get the chance to turn this team around. Also, here's a really touching article about him.

And that's it for me, finally - GO WINGS!

Curiouser and Curiouser

Hockey just doesn't make any sense at all to me today.

First, Detroit clinches a victory in New Jersey this afternoon (that game weirded me out, by the way, as only a Saturday afternoon hockey game can do--waking up with the knowledge that in only a half hour, hockey would be happening, while not unwelcome, is unsettling). This in itself would not be particularly weird; Brodeur of the goalie kung-fu does lose a game every once in a while, and Hasek (while I'm still not entirely convinced understands the fact that it's easier to make saves when not on one's back) has been playing as strong as ever, still in line with his best NHL season ever. He's also got to be somewhere near in line with his record of most penalties in a season--this game alone netted (no pun intended) him one for playing the puck over the line, at which he broke his stick on the ice, which just landed him an unsportsmanline conduct. But the overlying fact remains that Detroit hasn't won a game in New Jersey in thirteen years. From the first game of the day, you knew it was going to be weird.

Elly was at the Pens game tonight, and thus I had no one here to spam via instant message about all the other craziness, but it happened all the same. I was happy to see Toronto up 2-1 midway through the first, but when when I checked back at the end of the period and saw 5-1 I was thoroughly confused--and it just kept going! 9-2 by the end with a hat trick for Kyle Wellwood, two Sundin assists...hell nearly the entire team got a point for something tonight. I really wish I'd actually been able to watch that game, as for something to go that right, the Leafs must have remembered how to actually play some hockey for at least a little while, especially against an offensive team like the Rangers. Maybe they realized just how good it felt not to suck. Nine goals in one win is a nice change from nine goals in seven losses.

Equally surprising was the Islanders 6-0 victory over the Thrashers, not that I saw any of that either. A number of the games tonight were oddly high scoring though (Bruins over Panthers 6-3, Habs over Pens 6-3--which I'm sure Elly will have plenty of those on when she gets home--...I'm going to start thinking we're playing NHL2K7 here.)

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In other news, the man we thought would probably never play another NHL game (and to be fair, even this game was only with the Columbus Blue Jackets and thus probably doesn't actually count), Ty Conklin of Cup Finals Game One Loss Fame (seriously, do we have a count of how many times this blog has linked to that clip?) got to play at least one more game on NHL ice tonight. Or at least a period or so of one. He even stopped all but one shot. Congrats, Ty--Edmonton may not have forgiven you, but at least you haven't inspired the hatred of anywhere new, yet. Unless Syracuse follows their AHL team enough to take offense to a 10-2-1 record.

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Prompted by a mention in a post over at Battle Of Alberta, I'd just like to say that this has been a year for amazing line names. We all know how I feel about the Money Line, but Atlanta's Meat and Potatoes line (Bobby Holik, Brad Larsen and J.P. Vigier) about which I swear Vigier is quoted somewhere as saying they're "nothing new or pretty but they always taste good" but I can't find it, came up yesterday or so, and today Phoenix's OMG line (Oleg Sapyrkin, Mike Zigomanis, and Georges Laraque) is my new favorite, if only because of the article surrounding it--the image of Laraque giggling is just too much for me. I don't know if anyone's calling it this officially, but the Czechs-Mex line of Hemmer, Torres, and Sykora also makes me smile. And not just because it puts Sykora and Hemsky together.

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And, injury report!

• Ales Hemsky has returned to Edmonton's lineup, starting against Colorado yesterday night despite rumors that he'd be out until past Christmas, and he played a strong 15:30, too. Now if only we could get Smyth back too--but let's hope the return of those two doesn't mean the players who've stepped up lately (Horc, Torres, Stoli, Pisani, Smith) back off again.
• My goalie Manny Legace's back, as well, and started tonight for St. Louis--who put up a good fight, tying Nashville 2-2 before losing in a shootout. I'd have worn my jersey if I had it here with me.
  
• Valtteri Filppula took a hard hit the other day and broke his collarbone. The end result is 1/3 of the Money Line being out for ten weeks after successful surgery which is especially unfortunate considering how strong he's been playing so far.
  
• Darcy Tucker disappeared after hurting his hand tonight and didn't come back for the rest of the game--let's hope it's nothing.