Hale? SRSLY?

Hah.

Phoenix is such a depressing team

I haven't been able to actually watch any of the recent Flames games, for a variety reasons ranging from being just plain busy to business trips to the surprising hockey void of New York City. Three teams and sixty channels in my hotel, and not a single clip of hockey. They are not worthy. I'll have to suffer that again next week. NHL.com needs to provide their Centre Ice Online/GameCentral service on a daily basis, that would be perfect. Or if I subscribe to NHL Centre Ice, I should get the online service included. I feel ripped off. Anyway...

What I have been able to do is look at the numbers, the statistics, and read the feedback of other bloggers. And I hear good things. And I see good numbers. Even the game against Anaheim, the feedback I've heard were the players were tired but still played well. Kipper looks Kipper-like. Good things, good times. The bandwagon is filling up again and people are happy. Who wouldn't be, after a 6W streak?

The season is very young, but it is much more promising now than it was a week ago. If you had told me a month ago Bertuzzi was playing as he is right now, I'd have kicked you in the nuts and called you a moron. I don't even hate the guy anymore, but I'm a softie like that. If you wear the Flames jersey and you put out, you're my best friend. That's been the highlight of the season thus far for me. I really, really love our powerplay with Cammalleri, Bertuzzi, Iginla, and Phaneuf. They're all good physical players and can create some havoc, my prediction is the Flames' powerplay will ultimately end up in the top ten. No longer will I sigh and cringe when we get a powerplay.

I was all excited to watch hockey again tonight, until I discovered we were playing Phoenix. It's such a depressing team, it really is. Full of awful European players and a couple washed up Canadian ones (I still do like Shane Doan, but I feel bad for him now), all in the most boring colour scheme imaginable with a pedestrian logo that looks more suitable for a childrens' basketball team than a professional hockey team. No one cares about Phoenix, not even most of their players. Someone needs to end that team's suffering, not to mention the pain it causes all of their opponents for having to face Phoenix. It doesn't even make sense to play hockey in Phoenix. Snowbirds aren't the best hockey fans.

I'll multitask tonight -- watching the election results and the game. But both will be pretty predictable -- an Obama-Flames win tonight against opponents from Arizona that no one really cares about. Do you think McCain even knows his state has a hockey team?

Amateur Night

There's several views from several angles, and I've had to perform the excruciating task of looking at several views of this on YouTube, but for your viewing pleasure this Saturday, I'm able to present the following:



Two questions:

After his Guitar Hero pwning of his Flames teammates earlier this season, and this latest performance, is there anything Nystrom can't do?

Why was I not told earlier? (I only found out from cracking open, of all things, the morning paper)

Um. So I wisely (in retrospect) opted to go out and do other things last night, thus missing the Flames going down by a goal in the first 35 seconds of the game. I don't think any of us were too surprised... the boxscore last night shows all the hallmarks of a typical Flames game this season.

Weak start, penalty parade, meh. It would be nice if we could start playing in the first period, just like the other team does.

I'm looking for them to bounce back against the Coyotes tonight. We know the Coyotes are a much better team than in prior years, so it'll be a nailbiter. Expect it to be close, maybe even go to a bonus round.

All stars

I'm not actually going to talk that much about the all star selections - Dave was really miffed that Iginla got as few votes as he did, but hey, whatever.

Congrats to our boys for making it to the hyped up shinny game of little importance.

What I want to know is, can Dion race luggage trolleys with the kids like last year? Can he?

No? Oh well.

I've been digging around and tripped on this dandy of an interview from Andrew Ference. There's Africa again, he talks about his scrap with Crosby, the fantabulous Cup run of '04, and makes this observation, which jibes well with all the Give-Iggy-the-Hart rumblings:

Jarome in my books is a better hockey player than Crosby because he does those things. He will fight, he will lay his body on the line and take the hit and not complain if someone hits him and stuff like that. The superstars of the league should have to do that because they're hockey players, they're not ice-skating princesses.

(Not that here, we don't love Sidney Crosby. Just there won't be a lot of love forthcoming while he isn't on any of our fantasy teams, and if we've said it once, we've said it a dozen times: He ain't no Marcus Nilson.)

Which brings us to tonight. Oooooo. Phoenix. While they're not quite as irritating as they were back when they were the Jets, this year's edition of the Coyotes is nothing to sneeze at. They're a pretty respectable 11th place, not even last in their division, and with scoring threats like the dangerous Derek Morris, and the superb Steve Reinprecht...

What?

Oh. Um. Well. Where was I?

There will be no cakewalk tonight. I still expect our boys to come out ahead. Somewhat. Expect Lombardi to go minus (again), and Phaneuf as well. Warrener will improve from the outing in LA (he'd better!). And the winning goal will come from the Iggy/Huselius/lucky bystander line.

3-2.

New Uniforms

Entering a code in NHL 08 unveils what appears to be new uniforms for all the teams, including those who have yet to unveil them.

Let's start with Edmonton's ugly threads. The orange striping looks mildly awkward, and I'm sure the fact that player numbers are to be appearing on the biceps will not help.

Next up is San Jose.

St Louis:

And Phoenix's jersey somehow became slightly less ugly:

Source: Calgary Puck.

Sunny side up!

I know....I know...

The proof won't be in the pudding until we actually win on the road. It would have been easy after the last week, for the Flames to have let an easy one get past them, with Phoenix visiting.

While they didn't exactly stomp on the jugular vein of the visiting club, they seemed to have a better time of staying disciplined, and staying focused on the win. I know we're all obsessed with their road record, but lately, I've been worried that they do look shaky at home. That was better, though admittedly, Phoenix isn't the same kind of team as the other teams we'll see this homestand. I don't know how Noodles stays so sharp between starts, but he looked pretty good out there.

The more I think about it, the more I like the changes we've made to the roster. Primeau looks awesome out there, and Stuart fits in better than other additions we've made to the roster. With the addition of these two, and Conroy, some of the guys we already had on the roster (I'm thinking of Lombardi and Zyuzin specifically) have had to work a lot harder to justify the kinds of minutes they're playing.

And as Duncan noted, the price has definitely been right. I don't think Sutter will make a move today - I think the market has become overvalued, and he's too smart for that.

Some of the moves have been interesting... with Vancouver getting Sopel and Smolinski, they're starting to resemble the 2004 Flames more and more. Not sure what Atlanta was thinking giving up Coburn for a rental, but they're clearly another team going all-in to make it to the post-season.

Anyways...hang onto your pants for the rest of today - we got a big game going tomorrow.

Killing Me Softly (Phoenix Pre-game)

Is there anything more boring than writing a pre-game entry for Phoenix? Yes -- reading one.

As such, this is the extent of the pre-game entry. Go Flames!

But what's really exciting are the trade deadline shenanigans. Atlanta way overpaid for Keith Tkachuk, and it's going to set a ridiculous benchmark for all forthcoming trades. Good thing Sutter made his moves in advance of the deadline.

I'm pretty sure Sutter is done, player-wise. I simply don't forsee him giving up anything else for a short-term upgrade. I'm still of the opinion that Playfair may not be coaching this team for much longer. He's had all season to turn the road record around, and it's worse now than any other time. Something's gotta change, and a little Sutter would work some magic on reducing our shots against and sloppy defensive play.

Leanne also tells me that she is incredibly excited Mark Messier will be bawling like a two year old getting weaned tomorrow night. Because he's a big baby.

Agggggghhh!!

The hatchet needs to fall

It is utterly infuriating how the Flames find ways to lose road games. I've thought about this so much this season -- why can't we play on the road? The simple answer is, it's the coach. Jim Playfair isn't a coach that has any Stanley Cups or even deep playoff runs in his future.

We've got an awful overtime record and -- seemingly impossibly -- an even worse shootout record. It's a tie game with a minute left, offensive zone face-off...who does Jimmy put out on the ice? Why, of course, it's Friesen, Yelle, and Nilson. Atta boy Jimmy.

It's gotten to the point that our road games suck so bad, and Playfair is so stupid, he's willing to put 6 year old children in Halloween costumes on our blue line to "shake things up". I'm just waiting for him to get frustrated without a goal in the 1st period and start putting Hamrlik up as a centre and Huselius as a d-man. Instead of focusing on what wins us games at home, he's more concerned about changing what we do on the road. Which is certainly not the same thing, because one leads to winning ways and the other leads to unpredictable stupidity.

I'm going to say this now, with grim confidence: if Playfair is not fired, it's going to be a first round exit. And then Playfair will be fired.

Here's hoping Sutter knows what needs to be done to fix our team's road game.

Don't get mad...get even (Phoenix Pre-Game)

Aren't we all glad it's not the Avs tonight?

Not much to say. I think the suddenly burgeoning Flames blogosphere has dissected our shortcomings (especially on the road) quite adequately.

I have every reason to be completely negative. Hell, I found out yesterday that my birthday's the same day as Ryan Smyth's. But instead, I'm going to dwell on the positives. I can find some, I think. Somewhere...

We've come a long way, baby: Anyone remember what they were doing, February 2004? Weren't we anxiously waiting to see if we were getting a playoff spot? Now we're just bitching 'cause we're not in first.

Going off the deep end: Remember our team last year? Yeah, them? The guys who didn't score? The guys who, if you shut down Iggy, were going to play a 1-0 game? Remember those guys? Don't they have like, two or three lines now who can be legitimate offensive threats? (Not talking about the defensive game. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not...)

Offensive enough? Despite the so-so play of the last month, we're still fifth in the league for goals for. Teams that are ahead of us have guys named Briere, Crosby, and Heatley. Um, and David Legwand. But anyways. (Not talking about goals-against. Not talking about goals-scored at home. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not...)

Anyways, I think that missing gear, that killer instinct, that intense, mean-and-ugly play will be back. 5-1 for the good guys.

Cheer up, y'all!