Red Wings - Rangers: Disappointment Pending

Yes, another in-game blog for no good reason

This week’s subject: Detroit Red Wings @ New York Rangers in the latest instalment of this highly-competitive (the Rangers roughly 1-for-the-last-145) Original Six match-up.

Pre-game

Thanks to unresolved televisual hardware issues chez LW, tonight’s clash is to be watched via (legit) online stream…As is customary, it turns out I’m getting the non-Rangers broadcast (grr), so I’m faced with FSN Detroit’s Ken Daniels and Mickey Redmond

A handful of 3rd/4th liners are highlighted in the preview…As if the Rangers would ever let a few no-name grinders dominate the game…The Wings are apparently 10-1 against the Rangers since 1999, so much better than I thought…Damned if I can remember anything about that “1” though

1st Period

Goaltending match-up: Jimmy Howard vs Henrik Lundqvist…Howard’s idol growing up was apparently Mike Richter – a fine choice…Coincidentally, Lundqvist’s bedroom as a child was covered with posters of Tim Cheveldae…Due to the Titanic NBA clash between the Nets (1-18) and Knicks (5-15) at MSG earlier in the day, bad ice is expected at MSG for possibly the first time in history

Quiet start…Abdelkader takes a roughing penalty six minutes in…A caption shows that we will be watching the best home PP against the worst road PK (the Wings somehow running at less than 70% away from home)…Of course, the penalty is killed off easily, the 2008/09 Rangers PP again appears to be gracing the ice tonight

A huge scramble in Lundqvist’s crease somehow ends up with the puck squirting right across the goal-line, avoiding several waiting sticks and skates…Few decent shots are reaching either goalie though…The Datsyuk/Zetterberg line keeps the puck in the Rangers’ end for what seems like a shift of around 8-9 minutes at even strength…The shift ends with a hooking call against popular ex-Wing, Sean Avery

Redmond wonders if any Swedish is being spoken between Tomas Holmström and Lundqvist as they are inches away from each other during the PP…Hmm, possibly…

• “Hej, Henke. Tycker du om Basshunter?”

• “Nej, Homer. Jag hatar honom. Men Roxette är jättebra. Jag kan inte se pucken!”

Lundqvist stands firm against several chances, despite now playing so deep in his goal, he is positioned behind the net-cam…The penalty is killed off

GOAL 1-0 Rangers (15:56)…Behemoth Brian Boyle tips in a centering pass from Chris Higgins…Against type, a strong drive to the net from Boyle gets rewarded as Abdelkader can’t get position on him

1st Intermission

Studio analyst Larry Murphy blames Ericsson for poor coverage and a lack of communication for the goal…Try a different network before blaming your phone, Larry…More references to the bad ice, just in case the 19 minutes of game-time spent by Daniels and Redmond in the first period weren’t quite enough to get the point across…Some brief NBA highlights reveal that the Pistons have a Swedish player!…Is there some sort of special tax break for Swedes in Detroit?

2nd Period

As we come back, a clip of an ovation for the watching Brendan Shanahan is shown…Possibly the only NHL executive to ever get that kind of treatment at MSG…At an early face-off, Avery bumps fellow fan-favourite Todd Bertuzzi a couple of times, saying little but flashing his familiar black gumshield grin…Maybe Sean should pick on somebody who is far more likely to take an undisciplined penalty than the notoriously placid Bertuzzi

Ericsson hooks a streaking Ryan Callahan from behind on a clean breakaway – penalty shot given…Callahan makes a pretty good move on the penalty shot, but Howard extends his left pad just far enough to save at the post…In a rare shift, Enver Lisin gets three shots off, but this merely shows his usual lack of finish…Apparently it is soon the 60th birthday of the Zamboni…of course, rinks were resurfaced in the 1940s by Chris Chelios dragging a metal bar behind him during pre-game warmups

FSN Detroit remind their viewers of the Rangers’ glorious recent history by showing a flashback to the 1994 Cup win…Still no doubt lagging behind the 20 times this will have been shown already tonight on the home MSG coverage (“The MSG Network: Where it’s 1994 every year!”)…Lundqvist makes a big stop on Zetterberg, but still a very quiet game overall, with a lot of offsides…Marc Staal takes a roughing penalty on Holmström (no prizes for guessing the location of the offence)

GOAL 1-1 (11:59)…A pretty routine kill, but four seconds after the penalty expires, Datsyuk squeezes a rebound through Lundqvist

Mike Del Zotto springs Higgins on another clean break, but Howard comes up with a big save…Still few great chances at either end as the period winds down…Marián Gáborík, in particular, has not been able to show much so far

2nd Intermission

Murphy suggests that Ericsson is lacking in confidence at the moment…Certainly, nobody would be stopping him in the street to ask for an autograph on the evidence of the first two periods…We are treated to a brief Shanahan interview…He says he starts his new job in the morning – no word on how long he has to fetch coffee for Gary Bettman and Bill Daly before progressing onto bigger things

3rd Period

Back-to-back stops early in the period by Lundqvist on Zetterberg and Datsyuk…Brad Stuart crushes Artem Anisimov with a clean hit at the blue line…As much as I think the blame on head shots that typically goes to the victim is way overblown, Anisimov really has to keep his head up in those situations…Zetterberg sticks his knee out a bit and catches Avery…sold a little bit by Avery, but clearly a penalty (it must be if the refs call something in Avery’s favour), despite the odd claims from Daniels and Redmond that it was a hip-check

During the PP, Aleš Kotalík misses a wide open goal on a broken play…Again, no success on the PP, but soon after, Bertuzzi comes through with the expected undisciplined penalty, clipping MDZ in the face with his stick…Another PP, another missed open goal – this time, Avery failing to finish by the crease following a rare passing play by the weak second unit

After a whole 28 seconds at even strength, the Wings go short again, Kris Draper called for tripping…by now, Redmond is railing against the inconsistency of the calls…On the bright side, the WIngs’ road PK is now running above the 70% mark…It increases further after another 2008 PP retrospective from the Rangers

Redmond remarks that the players “are playing like they have brooms in their hands”…I think it’s another reference to the effects of the bad ice, but he won’t know that the Rangers forwards always look like that…Avery drives hard to the net from the left-wing, leading to some confusion over where the puck ended up, as Avery claims a goal…A good time to go to commercials then…As we come back, the replay shows that the puck just bounced into the side netting from the outside

GOAL 2-1 Red Wings (17:57)…A pretty sickening blow as Cleary flings one into Lundqvist’s pads from a horrid angle, the puck somehow pinballing between his feet into the goal…We’ve seen far too many of these from Lundqvist this year – so this is what it’s like to be let down by your goalie…The play was started in the Wings’ end by a typically smooth defensive play and breakout pass by Nick Lidström

The Rangers soon empty the net, but Michal Rozsival is quickly forced into taking an interference penalty to prevent a breakaway and likely ENG for the Wings…Chances over?

GOAL 3-1 Red Wings (19:53)…Draper pots an empty netter on the PP, an assist going to the linesman blocking a Ranger pass up the boards for Draper to pounce on

Summary

A dull game in all…not a whole lot going on for long stretches

Another reasonable effort from the Rangers, much improved from the mess of the games a week or two ago, but they remain a team without an identity…They needed to tighten up and have (and now look much more like Tom Renney’s outfit than Team Torts), but pretty much nobody is scoring and they are getting killed by soft goals

The Wings finally win a game that I watch at the fourth attempt this year…Still not hugely impressive, aside from the defensive job they did on Gáborík and the performance of Howard, who is looking like an NHL goalie now (or at least filling the Ty Conklin role until Chris Osgood gets past this season’s regular season troubles)…Too many turnovers and a game that would have been lost to any number of teams with some better scorers

The Pain Game

Injury stats update – November 2009

[Looking for more up-to-date figures? For my latest update, try HERE.]

This is my second look for the 2009/10 regular season at which teams have been hit hardest by injuries by trying to place a value on the games missed by players due to injury/illness.

(The corresponding analysis as at the end of October 2009 can be viewed HERE.)

The concept again - multiply each game missed by a player by his 2009/10 cap charge, then take the aggregate of these figures for each team and divide by 82. This indicator of value lost to a team by injury/illness is called CHIP (Cap Hit of Injured Players).

Exciting new developments...

Following up on one or two suggestions that time on ice per game could be a better (or at least a different) indicator of player "value", I've made an attempt at illustrating a similar metric based on TOI/G alongside the CHIP numbers.

While acknowledging cap charge is a less than perfect measure of player, with a number of limitations and inconsistencies, I'm not totally sold on TOI/G as being any better overall (Tom Poti is more valuable to the Capitals than Alex Ovechkin. Discuss.) - it does provide a decent comparison and the results do vary from the CHIP rankings somewhat.

A quick summary of the new metric:

• TOI/G (through games played on 30 November) replaces cap charge as the measure of value in the calculation
• For goalies, TOI/G has been worked out as Total Minutes Played / Games Dressed For - i.e. a goalie playing every minute of 75% of the games, zero in the rest, would end up with a TOI/G of 45 minutes (or close to it, once you factor in OT and so on)
• This arguably overstates the worth of starting goalies somewhat, but it's simple and you could equally argue that a workhorse goalie is the hardest position to replace, so it's fair for them to have a much higher TOI/G figure
  
• Where a player hasn't played all year (e.g. Pavol Demitra, Mike Van Ryn) or where a player fairly clearly has a reduced TOI/G figure due to getting injured in their only game or one of very few games (Andrei Markov, Kurt Sauer), I've used TOI/G from last season (or further back if necessary)
• For each player, multiply games missed by TOI/G to get (for a more palatable name) Cumulative Minutes of Injured Player (CMIP)
• Take the aggregate of CMIP for the team and divide by games played by the team to arrive at AMIP (Average Minutes of Injured Players) - it feels more understandable expressing this metric as an average per game (whereas CHIP is a running total)

The figures...

The table below shows:

• Total CHIP for each team over the first two months of the 2009/10 regular season (through games played on 30 November)
• The player who has contributed most to the team's CHIP figure
• The number of players with a CHIP contribution of over $250,000 (think of it as being equivalent to a $1m player missing 20 games or a $4m player missing five games)
• Movement in CHIP ranking since 31 October
  
• AMIP for each team over the same period (e.g. an AMIP of 40:00 could be seen as the team missing two 20-minute per game players for every game this season)
  

10 second analysis...

Something in the water in Canada this year? The Flames are seemingly immune from the troubles afflicting their western Canadian brethren - being first in line at the clinic does have some advantages, it seems.

As bad as the Oilers and Canucks have had it, both teams are still behind the pace of the worst hit teams from last year - the Blues ended up with a CHIP figure for the year in excess of $16m. While the CHIP figures are pretty close for the two teams (the Canucks are actually marginally ahead on a per-game basis), the AMIP figures show a much bigger "win" for the Oilers. This appears to be largely due to a greater number of minute-munching defensemen getting hurt compared to the Canucks, whose biggest CHIP contributions come from Demitra and Daniel Sedin, who play less than top-four D-men.

Two teams that stand out as having inflated AMIP numbers relative to the CHIP ranking are the Thrashers and Islanders. Both of these teams have had starting goalies out for the whole year - though trying to find a season where Lehtonen and DiPietro have some sort of consistent appearance history to base a reliable TOI/G on is a task in itself...

Conversely, the Rangers fall down the rankings on the AMIP basis - perhaps suggesting some of their players have grossly inflated cap numbers. Who knew?

The Panthers will surely rise up both tables quickly if Keith "Slasher" Ballard can't remedy his directional anger issues.

The next lists are the top 30 individual CHIP and CMIP contributions:


Markov continues to lead the CHIP race but the brotherhood of injury-prone goalies leaps ahead of him on the CMIP basis.

Notes/Disclaimers

• Figures include (and are arguably distorted by) some players on long-term IR, such as Mike Rathje (there’s a fair argument that Rathje shouldn’t be on here, since I can’t imagine he’ll either play again or that the Flyers are missing him - and his TOI/G number from 1973/74 when he last played is clearly overstating his value a touch). They do exclude a few minor-leaguers who are or had been on the NHL club’s IR since pre-season
  
• There are undoubtedly a few inaccuracies and inconsistencies in there - I did the best I could with the information out there. Some corrections are picked up month-to-month too
  
• The cap figure doesn't really correlate very well to the "worth" of a player in some cases, e.g. where rookie bonuses are included this year, where players are seeing out an old (underpaid or rookie) contract or where players are horrendously overpaid
• Also, for any player who was acquired on re-entry waivers (e.g. Sean Avery, Randy Jones), the cap hit will only reflect that for their current team, i.e. 50% of the player’s full cap hit (shared between his current and old teams)
• I've once again stuck a full team-by-team listing of games missed and CHIP/CMIP numbers by each player on the web HERE
• Injury/games/TOI info courtesy of tsn.ca and nhl.com
  
• Cap info courtesy of hockeybuzz.com and capgeek.com

Six hours on Sunday

Another in-game blog

In what was possibly just a mechanism to ensure I stayed awake long enough to watch the game I wanted to watch, I made the rash decision to add to my highly irregular series of posted-after-the-fact in-game blogs.

On the slate: CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada doubleheader from last night – or really, Sunday morning for me. (Two games, from midnight to 6am? Not done it for a while, so why not?)

First up, Detroit Red Wings @ Toronto Maple Leafs in the Hockey Hall of Fame game, followed by New York Rangers @ Calgary Flames in the “Sean Avery Returns To Where He Said Bad Things” game.

Pre-game

As is common, the start of my broadcast is delayed by some thrilling college football action…Fortunately, the final 3 1/2 minutes of the game is actually completed within 10 minutes of real time, which is at least 20 minutes fewer than normal

Eventually we join the start of the ceremony at the ACC honouring the impending Hall of Fame inductees…A series of now-hobbling veterans slowly take to the ice…And after the Red Wings have finished skating on, we are introduced to the Hall of Famers in attendance tonight [cheap gag #1 out of the way]…this year’s inductees are then brought out: Brett Hull, Lou Lamoriello (I think the crowd were shouting “Lou”, but hard to tell), Brian Leetch (*bows down*), Luc Robitaille and Steve Yzerman (clearly the most popular with the home crowd)…All the ex-players look like they could still hit the ice, except for Hull, whose appearance suggests he’s glad to be free from the dietary restrictions of his playing days

The game is to be called by Jim Hughson and Craig Simpson in the booth, with shy, retiring Glenn Healy in the Pierre McGuire Memorial Shouting Zone between the benches

1st Period

Chris Osgood and Jonas “The Monster” Gustavsson between the pipes…A caption reveals the Leafs to have “White Finger” on defense – a nasty condition, that might explain some of the bad giveaways we see from the home team

A couple of early Leaf chances – Jason Blake, in a rare moment of non-goalie-running, hits the post from a bad angle with the net open…The Wings begin to exert some control with a few strong shifts towards the 10-minute mark, but…

GOAL 1-0 Leafs (10:34)…Wayne (not Keith) Primeau beats Osgood from the off-wing after Kris Draper tripped over himself at the blueline…Primeau’s first goal in 45 games…First point of the year for Colton (definitely not Bobby) Orr…Sometimes you just have to accept it when superstar players beat you on a goal…Also the first time the Leafs have scored first in a game since around 1983

A decent pace and no penalties through 15 minutes…Healy mentions that the Swedish Olympic orientation camp consisted of a trip to a U2 gig rather than the days of on-ice stuff the Canadians put themselves through – no Basshunter?! [Obligatory Basshunter reference out of the way]…Todd Bertuzzi takes a holding penalty – I’m guessing that isn’t his first in 45 games…Reference is made to Tomáš Kaberle’s impressive points haul this year – he must be making some genius look good for picking him up in the 15th and 16th rounds of his fantasy drafts

GOAL 2-0 (19:34)…Phil Kessel nets his first as a Leaf, tapping home from 1” out after Blake pokes a shot through Osgood’s legs…Kessel’s deadly wristshot on display there

1st Intermission

A more sombre Coach’s Corner than usual…Don Cherry presents his 5-point plan to reduce injuries from hitting then leads into an extended tribute to fallen Canadian troops (being the day before Remembrance Sunday)…Link HERE

2nd Period

The Leafs return to an ear-splitting roar from the heaving throng in platinum seats (er, perhaps)…A dodgy holding the stick call on Cherry’s favourite Ukrainian, Alexei Ponkahonksy…The Leafs PK is running at 70.7%! And it’s “getting better”, according to Hughson…I’d hope so…A good job Brian Burke’s teams always play so disciplined then, eh?…It’s killed off, but the Leafs right away get called for too many men on the ice

GOAL 3-0 (5:21)…As the penalty expires, Jeff Finger roofs one on a 3-on-2 rush…Another first goal of the year – Messrs Schenn, Wallin, Komisarek and Orr smell blood

Jason Williams goes down in ugly fashion at the end boards…Replays show his leg getting mangled right under him…He’s helped off the ice – looks very nasty…The Monster is playing well, but he’s not been under huge pressure…A clip is shown of Brad May coaching his 13-year-old son on his shot – May Jr might have to be in the line-up if Wings keep falling at the same rate…Bertuzzi has a son called Tag?!

Interference call on Draper…Nothing doing on the Leafs PP…Henrik Zetterberg and Pavel Datsyuk are now taking regular shifts together…Hughson and Simpson refrain from shouting “Two-Headed Monster!” every five seconds like those idiots Steigerwald and Errey do whenever Crosby and Malkin play together [obligatory shot at Penguins out of the way]…High-stick call on Mikhail Grabovski within the last two minutes…Williams has apparently been taken for X-rays and won’t return (no surprise there)

2nd Intermission

Mike Milbury due up! Joy!…He’s with David Shoalts and Pierre LeBrun with Ron MacLean on popular rumour mill, The Hotstove…Entertainment is provided by LeBrun’s demonstration of a prototype helmet-within-a-helmet (think a 70s, Butch Goring-style lid underneath a present-day model)…noted progressive Milbury simply laughs at it and is entirely unsympathetic…Milbury’s contribution to the regular headshot debate also largely boils down to: “Why are we talking about this again? It’s done. It’s not an issue.”

3rd Period

Two big stops by Monstret as the PP continues…Luke Schenn takes a penalty for interfering with Tomas Holmström (shockingly, in front of the Leafs goal), giving a brief 5-on-3 PP to the Wings…Another huge save on Zetterberg on the PK – the natives become restless and clamour for Vesa Toskala

GOAL 3-1 (5:59)…Dan Cleary scores his 100th career goal after being sprung clear by a nice saucer pass from Brian Rafalski…Comeback on?

GOAL 4-1 (9:22)…No comeback then…After a too many men call on the Wings, John Mitchell tips in a Kessel wrister on the PP, right after Kessel is stoned by Osgood after a perfect set-up from the Wings’ Darren Helm

No Mike Komisarek on the Leafs bench, according to Simpson, speculating that he was injured blocking a shot…Niklas Hagman is taken down while driving hard to the net – penalty on Brett Lebda

GOAL 5-1 (12:44)…Ponkahonsky shovels a backhand through Osgood’s five-hole…Lebda (now out of the box) not impressing Healy tonight

Mitchell takes a slashing penalty…not important enough for a replay to be shown, but Mitchell’s reaction in the box suggests he is not effin’ pleased with the call…Again, the penalty is killed off by the All-World Leafs PK unit…Update on Komisarek: a clip of a missed hip-check from the second period is shown – Healy surmises that his hip or tailbone (?) is hurt…The game drifts to its conclusion…FINAL SCORE 5-1 LEAFS

Summary

The Leafs actually looked like an NHL team – waaaay better than the team I saw implode in New York a few weeks ago…Conversely, the Wings are still struggling at both ends of the ice…The Monster was very good and will get the attention, but he didn’t have to steal the game

Post/pre-game

Before the real game of the night, there’s just enough time for Cherry to (a) state that New Jersey’s 100% road record is due to them having hardly any European players (yawn); (b) call Leafs fans that were booing a couple of weeks ago “jerks”; and (c) give grudging credit for the Leafs' change in fortunes to “Gufterson”

Disappointingly quiet on the Avery front so far…Usually CBC spend at least 45 minutes bemoaning his existence…A confirmed broken leg for Jason Williams…In other injury news, Cam Ward is said to be in hospital after taking a skate to the groin…Will there be any players left in the league by April? Maybe only cockroaches will survive…Avery versus Steve Ott for the Stanley Cup then?

The Rangers-Flames “tilt” (© Joe Beninati) is to be called by Mark Lee and legendary former Rangers starter-cum-backup-cum-outcast, Kevin Weekes

1st Period

Steve Valiquette is in again for the Rangers, with Henrik Lundqvist resting a (hopefully) minor injury…Miikka Kiprusoff in nets as usual for the Flames

Second shift of the game and Captain Clutch (to the hockey world at large) / Captain Invisible (to Rangers fans), Chris Drury is suddenly face-down on the ice…The replay shows that he was blindsided away from the play by a pretty cheap looking hit by Curtis Glencross…Drury gets up looking very woozy…New-found goal-machine, Chris Higgins is stoned by Kiprusoff

GOAL 1-0 Flames (3:56)…An Adam Pardy point shot is deflected by Daymond Langkow’s leg past a screened Valiquette…Game over already then, so I’m off to bed

OK, I’ll persevere…A Glen Sather sighting!…Looking confused? Check. Eating a cigar? Check. Yep, it’s definitely him…Pantomime villain Avery is predictably booed as he gets a touch of the puck…Weekes says that he looks tentative and (because?) he has changed to using white tape on his stick blade…The Rangers are actually carrying much of the play, against expectations – I’m still going for a 5-1 loss at this point though

GOAL 1-1 (17:16)…Another screened point shot finds its way into the net, this time from Dan Girardi…Good job I scrapped my planned earlier comment about how Girardi struggles to get his shots past shot-blocking forwards

An amusing moment, as Lee innocently says to Weekes (who lost his starting and backup jobs with the Rangers to the current incumbents): “Valiquette is the perfect backup for Lundqvist, isn’t he?”…The action resumes before Weekes has a chance to respond, sadly

1st Intermission

In an interview, Langkow says: “We were sloppy in our own end.”…a fine choice of words in the circumstances…More Milbury! He’s joined by Kelly Hrudey, clearly only working the West game, despite being in the studio in Toronto…Hrudey gives props to Prospal – liking Vinny’s surprisingly effective defensive play…The guys take another look at the Glencross/Drury incident…Hrudey calls it “dirty” before squirming out of it somewhat as MacLean and Milbury unsurprisingly defend it over subsequent viewings…Milbury, of course, calls it an “innocent” play

2nd Period

No return for Drury, as reporter Scott Oake notes he has had at least three concussions in the last five years…Lee gets excited by a clip of an almost-hit by Phaneuf on Avery in the first period…Er, nothing there at all, Mark

Enver Lisin breaks René Bourque’s stick with a slash and sits for it…On the PP, Brandon Dubinsky blocks a hard shot with his hand/wrist – once he can get off, he goes straight to the room…Great…Wade Redden takes a typically lazy interference penalty, putting the Rangers down two men for the 1,394th time this season…Ryan Callahan immediately breaks his stick on the 5-on-3, but the Rangers survive, in part due to a great shot-block by Girardi

The Flames’ David Moss picks up a weak interference call (like I care)…Big-shooting Aleš Kotalik crashes one off the crossbar…No PPG on this occasion for the Rangers – almost surprising when they don’t score these days, which is faintly unnerving…Robyn Regehr heads to the room after taking a shot to the foot – Don King starts making arrangements with the agents for Avery and Ott…Craig Conroy gets cut by a stray stick, but the refs miss it and play continues until Bourque takes a cross-checking penalty around 30 seconds later…Wait, now they call the high-stick too? Can the linesmen call that? (Apparently so, but it came across like they only called it after Conroy complained enough and/or they’d seen it on replay.)

GOAL 2-1 Flames (16:47)…Jarome Iginla wrists a PPG past Valiquette from a nice centering feed from ex-Ranger midget, Nigel Dawes

Kiprusoff makes a big stop on Lisin after a bad giveaway by Phaneuf in his own zone, then two more quickly on Higgins…Langkow gets called for slashing in the last two minutes…Yet more stops by Kipper during the PP…Weekes shows that Valiquette took a big snow-shower in the face right before Iginla scored

2nd Intermission

Just a brief highlights round-up, Milbury’s participation mercifully ending, with ex-Ranger midget P.J. Stock putting a shift in from his CBC cupboard

3rd Period

Confirmation that Dubinsky is not returning…I’ll be surprised if his hand isn’t broken…Brian Boyle as a #2 center? Great…Another interference call on Moss after Langkow’s return…Again, several good chances for the Rangers on the PP, but more key saves by Kiprusoff…A 200ft bouncer gives Valiquette some trouble, but hardly the near-miss that Lee seemed to see in his excitement

A feisty shift at last from Avery…He ends up taking a fairly decent hit from Phaneuf, but again not the massive collision that Lee described (which he acknowledges after a second look)…Olli Jokinen hits the post as the puck bounces back to him after a botched 3-on-1 break…A rare attack by the Flames at this point…Kotalik fails to convert a 2-on-1 rush with Higgins as Moss backchecks strongly (and avoids taking an interference penalty this time)…Girardi is “putting on a clinic” according to Weekes…The Flames immediately check into Girardi’s clinic to get priority vaccination against cancer and HIV

GOAL 3-1 (16:35)…A Marc Staal giveaway leads to another 3-on-1 the other way and an exchange of passes results in Bourque putting the game away…Dawes racks up his third assist of the night (24 assists in 121 games as a Ranger…grrr)

Valiquette is pulled with 2:30 left in the game…one last big save from Avery by Kiprusoff, but no major scares for the Flames…FINAL SCORE 3-1 FLAMES

Summary

A surprisingly strong effort from the Rangers in the circumstances…Just couldn’t get anything by Kiprusoff…If Drury (despite his ongoing invisibility) and Dubinsky (despite his ongoing inconsistency) are gone for any length of time – and it looks like they will be – big problems down the middle for the Rangers…Not that impressed by Calgary (unlike Lee and Weekes), but a good thing to win when not doing much…They’ve clearly been (re)Sutter-fied a great deal since last year

Ow, that really hurts! - an addendum

Further to the October update on CHIP numbers (HERE), I figured it wouldn’t be that difficult to produce some sort of basic analysis on where all these NHLers have been getting hurt. Er, obviously meaning what part of the body, not the location of the game in which the injury occurred (of course, the latter would merely confirm that the vast majority occurred in Philadelphia…)

The results (again covering games played through 31 October) are in the table below. I’ve just used the descriptions found in the player profiles on tsn.ca, so the figures will encompass all the inaccuracies and vagueness within them. It should give a broad indication, if nothing else, though.

I’m no doctor, so I’m not really sure what conclusions can be drawn from this, other than:

• Confirming the general evasiveness of NHL teams when it comes to detailed injury disclosure
  
• Suggesting groin strains are at least as contagious in NHL dressing rooms as H1N1 or outrageous facial hair

Ow, that really hurts!

Injury stats update – October 2009

[Looking for more up-to-date figures? For my latest update, try HERE.]

This is my first look for the 2009/10 regular season at which teams have been hit hardest by injuries by trying to place a value on the games missed by players due to injury/illness.

(My most recent piece on this, for the end of the 2008/09 regular season, can be viewed HERE.)

The concept again - multiply each game missed by a player by his 2009/10 cap charge, then take the aggregate of these figures for each team and divide by 82. This indicator of value lost to a team by injury/illness is called CHIP (Cap Hit of Injured Players).

The table below shows:

• Total CHIP for each team over the first month of the 2009/10 regular season (through games played on 31 October)
• The player who has contributed most to the team's CHIP figure
• The number of players with a CHIP contribution of over $250,000 (think of it as being equivalent to a $1m player missing 20 games or a $4m player missing five games)

Some familiar players feature (Hello, Messrs DiPietro, Modin and Gaborik!), but at this stage, the teams worst hit aren’t too similar to those that ended up at the top of the table last year.

Interesting to note, however, that the four healthiest teams from 2008/09 (Rangers, Coyotes, Kings and Ducks) are again towards the right end of the table so far in 2009/10. WIll this last, or will certain factors – Gaborik, agoraphobia, tripping over Ryan Smyth’s hair and a robust style of play, respectively – hinder these teams’ efforts to remain healthy all year?

The second list (as usual) is the top 30 individual CHIP contributions:


Markov is gone for a while, so expect him to lead this race for some time. Elias and Kessel (among others) are said to be on their way back. DiPietro? I reckon the Islanders might yet acquire three or four more goalies this year, just to make sure.

Notes/Disclaimers

• Figures include (and are arguably distorted by) some players on long-term IR, such as Mike Rathje (there’s a fair argument that Rathje shouldn’t be on here, since I can’t imagine he’ll either play again or that the Flyers are missing him). They do exclude a few minor-leaguers who seem to be on the NHL club’s IR
• There's probably a few inaccuracies and inconsistencies in there - I did the best I could with the information out there
  
• The cap figure doesn't really correlate very well to the "worth" of a player in some cases, e.g. where rookie bonuses are included this year, where players are seeing out an old (underpaid or rookie) contract or where players are horrendously overpaid
• Also, for any player who was acquired on re-entry waivers (e.g. Sean Avery, Randy Jones), the cap hit will only reflect that for their current team, i.e. 50% of the player’s full cap hit (shared between his current and old teams)
• I've once again stuck a full team-by-team listing of games missed and CHIP numbers by each player on the web HERE - knock yourself out...
• Injury/games info courtesy of tsn.ca
• Cap info courtesy of hockeybuzz.com and capgeek.com

NHL Premiere 2009 in Stockholm – Day Two

St. Louis Blues 5-3 Detroit Red Wings, 3 October 2009

Friday night’s season opener saw the Blues withstand some early dominance by the Wings to overturn a two-goal deficit in the second period with some opportunistic finishing, then hold on with some comfort in a more defensive third period. Game two on Saturday featured…well, pretty much the same thing in the end, strangely enough.

As before (see HERE), the following is merely a fairly unfocused stream of observations and highlights plus a fairly unfocused stream of amateur photographs. (I did manage to venture down to the glass – or near to it, at least – for warm-ups this time. I happened to be at the Wings’ end, hence the uneven spread of shots. No anti-Blues bias intended.)

• Expert planner that I am, meal time is once again spent in the Arena. A 77kr hot dog/drink combination providing far greater VFM than Friday’s caviar and pheasant.


• A second Håkan Andersson interview still doesn’t illuminate me any. Still seems like a decent bloke though.


• Culture vulture that I am (ahem), I should note that pre-game entertainment came courtesy of Swedish 80s rock throwbacks Bullet, an example of whose work can be found HERE. (Friday saw the not dissimilar Backyard Babies take the stage.) The crowd again are left mystified and disappointed by the absence of native Eurodance leviathan, Basshunter.


• An brief appearance by Mats Sundin in one corner of the rink, for a TV interview, starts a mild commotion in the crowd. A subsequent Darren Pang sighting in the same place does not.


• The newly-decisive Sundin later carries out the ceremonial puck drop, receiving a huge standing ovation from the crowd, who are clearly expressing relief that the next three months will be free of “Where will Mats play?” speculation.


• Battle of the backups tonight, as Ty Conklin and Jimmy Howard start.


• The Wings almost overwhelm the Blues in the first few minutes, taking a 2-0 lead and having another negated by a high-stick call. Conklin is quickly getting reacquainted with Tomas Holmström’s (and Dan Cleary’s) rear end.


• A much more physical game than Friday’s – Backes, Tkachuk and Stuart prominent playing the body.


• A big PP goal late in the first by Tkachuk keeps the Blues in the game.


• The game turns on two quick goals in the second period for the Blues – both clear scoring chances, but as the cliché goes, both efforts Howard “would like to have back”.


• A rare cheer for a Blues player when Patrik Berglund’s goal is announced.


• Again, the Blues aren’t put under huge pressure in the third period, this time adding an insurance goal (again on the PP – the Wings’ PK still looks a weakness).


• As one final chance passes, Johan Franzén demolishes his stick against Conklin’s goal. The typical impassive Swede.

NHL Premiere 2009 in Stockholm – Day One

Detroit Red Wings 3 – 4 St. Louis Blues, 2 October 2009

I’m both incapable and too lazy to (a) do some sort of informative travelogue thing illustrating the delights of Stockholm, or (b) provide an insightful write-up of the game itself, so…

The following is merely a fairly unfocused stream of observations and highlights from my attendance at Friday night’s game at Globen Arena in Stockholm, plus a fairly unfocused stream of amateur photographs. (Yes, I wasn’t sat that close. I will see if I can get closer to warmups for game two.)

• It was probably a mistake to take my chances by waiting to eat once I was inside the Arena. A ropey burger, a huge vat of crisps (potato chips, for the hard of English-speaking out there) and a Coke is standard Arena fare. Not really worth 153kr though – I might rethink my strategy on Saturday…


• The 100kr programme is nice enough, but I’m a few decades away from being able to understand most of it. Who could argue against it saying Roman Polák “är stark som en oxe” though?


• Similarly, I’m not sure I followed much of the pre-game interview with Red Wings über-Euroscout Håkan Andersson, but he seemed like a decent bloke.


• Interviews throughout the evening were conducted by a coach-turned-TV host (apparently) Niklas Wikegård, who couldn’t resist poking fun at the American announcer’s pronunciation of his name (Why-ker-guard rather than Vee-ker-gord).


• There’s some sort of huge luxury box/restaurant area on my left in the Arena, with a curtain that can be pulled across to cover it. Not in use tonight, but sure to be used when New Jersey and Columbus play here next year.


• Hearts in mouths for Blues fans as injury-on-skates Carlo Colaiacovo performs a slow-motion stumble into a team-mate and down to the ice during warmups. He turns out to be OK though.


• Very pro-Wing crowd (a lot more Wings jerseys in evidence around the city before the game too). Lidström and Zetterberg win the popularity contest by a long way.


• On the Wings’ first goal, referee Bill McCreary sets a perfect pick (maybe throwing in a slight hold too) on the ox-like Polák, allowing Kris Draper to burst to the net untouched.


• The Wings’ second goal is a short-handed breakaway for Kirk Maltby, nicely finished. These kids Draper and Maltby have some good speed. They could stick in this league.


• Ville Leino should score some goals this year if his wrist shot is that good.


• Chris Mason keeps the Blues in the game in the first period then completely robs Johan Franzén in the third to preserve the lead.


• Markus Näslund is among the celebrities shown in the crowd at one point – he strangely looks bored out of his mind, chewing gum. An expression no doubt honed while playing on the Rangers’ powerplay last year.