EHM The Blue Line

I'm curious tu see if the Pens gonna lose again tonight. They really struggle since Malkin is injured. Last year when Crosby got hurt everyone was like omg the Pens are going to have some difficulties with Sydney injured and Malkin step up and make win the team, but now it's Malkin out and Crosby don't do a darn thing he was on a 4 or 5 games pointless streak until yesterday, it's seems that Malkin surpass Crosby.


Oups just saw on TSN that Malkin will be back tonight!

Franck wrote:Didn't Oliwa assault his wife/girlfriend with a hockey stick? I think I read that somewhere.

Yeah, I heard about it, but I'm not sure if it's ever been confirmed. I did some searching and the only information I've managed to find is from Polish tabloids. If anybody cares to share a link to any credible source, I would be more than grateful.

Franck wrote:As for him being a psycho, you could argue that he would have never got his name on the cup if he wasn't. Only reason he was in the NHL was because he could beat people up.

I totally agree. That's the only reason. But what I meant is that one would expect a professional player to be able to distinguish between what happens inside a rink from his private life. And here we're speaking of one of the country's best-known players, who could have easily become a role model for kids starting to play the game. Hockey is not too popular a sport in Poland, and it could certainly do with a little promotional support from a Stanley Cup-winning guy. Too bad it's not the case with Oliwa.

Círyatan wrote:That Oliwa punch on Marshall was brutal; I didn't remember it, actually...

It wasn't a punch per se, it was a butt-end. It was basically a crosscheck to the face. I remember watching it live. It was a premeditated assault that should have been prosecuted, but this was pre-Bertuzzi-Moore and it didn't result in lasting injury.

Bruins give up the game tying goal vs the Pens with 0.4s left on a 3 on 2 after missing the empty net with several attemps, Bergeron somehow managed to break his stick on the back check. Needless to say Pens won it 6-5 in OT scoring into an open net after Thomas and Wideman fumbled the puck behind the goal on a simple dump in.
B72 ->

That was just heart-breaking, Danny. To go from thinking they had the game won, to see the game tied, to seeing in lost in OT was such a wide sweep of emotions. The way they lost it just made it worse.

And to top it all off, I didn't start Wheeler on my fantasy team tonight and he had a goal and an assist.

bruins72 wrote:That was just heart-breaking, Danny. To go from thinking they had the game won, to see the game tied, to seeing in lost in OT was such a wide sweep of emotions. The way they lost it just made it worse.

And to top it all off, I didn't start Wheeler on my fantasy team tonight and he had a goal and an assist.

I wasn't expecting anything but a loss in OT after THAT tying goal. Seriously, if I had an account at an online bookie I'd just put everything on the Pens to win it and I'd just walk calmly away from the TV and book a trip to Hawaii.
Was an exciting game though. Team looking better recently than at the beginning of the season. Goaltending and defence have been great for the last 10 games or so, not counting this one obviously (although Timmeh did have a good game), forecheck and transition game have been close to what we've seen last year the past 5 games. Still lacking creativity upfront though, suppose it's gonna improve with Savard back and Krejci out of his slump, seen glimpses of it already tonight. Bruins need it badly, they lack an elite goal scorer with the ability to score out of nothing and create his own offence. They are not getting enough clear scoring chances as of now, not even close, to win games regularly.

btw, I don't get how Wheeler gets an assist on that goal. Ryder just stole the puck off the Pens player's stick and put it top shelf. I might have to watch that replay again.

bruins72 wrote:And to top it all off, I didn't start Wheeler on my fantasy team tonight and he had a goal and an assist.

I'm not complaining.

I wonder if the Habs still got a defence after allowed 55 shots to Nashville. They just lost 2-0 though even with Price in front of the net.

Círyatan wrote:I totally agree. That's the only reason. But what I meant is that one would expect a professional player to be able to distinguish between what happens inside a rink from his private life. And here we're speaking of one of the country's best-known players, who could have easily become a role model for kids starting to play the game. Hockey is not too popular a sport in Poland, and it could certainly do with a little promotional support from a Stanley Cup-winning guy. Too bad it's not the case with Oliwa.

Good thing you guys had Czerkawski as well then, eh?

How are things going with young Polish players these days? Is there anything good on the way or have we seen the last of Polish NHL players for a long time?

Franck wrote:

Círyatan wrote:I totally agree. That's the only reason. But what I meant is that one would expect a professional player to be able to distinguish between what happens inside a rink from his private life. And here we're speaking of one of the country's best-known players, who could have easily become a role model for kids starting to play the game. Hockey is not too popular a sport in Poland, and it could certainly do with a little promotional support from a Stanley Cup-winning guy. Too bad it's not the case with Oliwa.

Good thing you guys had Czerkawski as well then, eh?

How are things going with young Polish players these days? Is there anything good on the way or have we seen the last of Polish NHL players for a long time?

Czerkawski was great player (is he still playin' in Europe?). Other good Polish-born player, who played in Finnish Sm-league and Finnish national team is 29-year-old Tomek Valtonen, who retired in september cause of bad injury. But he just born in Poland. Other Poland-born former Sm-league players are Kenig brothers, Max and Kasper. Kasper was selected top rookie few years ago, but todays he plays somewhere in German divisions (not in Del, maybe 1. bundesliga).

But those three haven't played in Polad, like ex-HIFK-forward Jermu Porthen, who went to Poland this season and ex-Jokerit-forward Arto Koivisto went too.

Lil' off topic

Just a little bit.


The Avs have been destroy 8-2 agaisnt the Canucks. Since their last ten games the Avs seems to slow down a bit, i hope they will step up and begin to win again!

Franck wrote:How are things going with young Polish players these days? Is there anything good on the way or have we seen the last of Polish NHL players for a long time?

I'm not an avid follower of the Polish Hockey League, so I'm not necessarily the best guy to answer that question. But I haven't recently heard of anyone special.

Jypfan92 wrote:Czerkawski was great player (is he still playin' in Europe?). Other good Polish-born player, who played in Finnish Sm-league and Finnish national team is 29-year-old Tomek Valtonen, who retired in september cause of bad injury. But he just born in Poland. Other Poland-born former Sm-league players are Kenig brothers, Max and Kasper. Kasper was selected top rookie few years ago, but todays he plays somewhere in German divisions (not in Del, maybe 1. bundesliga).

Czerkawski was quite a player in his prime. He's retired, unfortunately. Shame, but what can you do, eh?

As far as I know, the Swedish goalie Stefan Liv is also Polish-born, but enough of this off-topic talk

philou21 wrote:The Avs have been destroy 8-2 agaisnt the Canucks. Since their last ten games the Avs seems to slow down a bit, i hope they will step up and begin to win again!

Raymond's pretty hot recently. Plus a hattrick from Henrik I thought he would slow down without his brother, but fortunately he has not.

The Hurricanes finally end their losing streak with a win over the Wild! darn i was wondering if after 14 defeats they will win some day.....so now with 3 victory just need 16 straight win to go back to .500.

That was one hell of a game...not. One of the worst high scoring games I've seen the last couple of years. Just generally bad hockey all around. Whatever, I don't really know why I even started watching it in the first place.
Well whatever helps the Bruins get Hall

Hey Danny... have you read the reports saying that the B's and Savard are close on a deal. We'll probably seen it by the end of the month.

Yeah I did, I'm not quite sure about the credibility of the sources though. Reports say he's looking for around 6m p/a, at least 4 years. Cap hit seems reasonable, I'm worried about the years however, unless the deal is supposed to be heavily front-loaded. They could try one of those Hossa-type deals, since the league doesn't really seem to care about blatant cap cirumvention

Hey Danny, what is a Hossa type deal? I mean that sincerely not sarcastically.
Thanks.

markiemark66 wrote:Hey Danny, what is a Hossa type deal? I mean that sincerely not sarcastically.
Thanks.

A contract stretching over many years where most of the money is paid in the first few before the salary is decreased significantly in later years to make the cap hit smaller.

Danny wrote:Yeah I did, I'm not quite sure about the credibility of the sources though. Reports say he's looking for around 6m p/a, at least 4 years. Cap hit seems reasonable, I'm worried about the years however, unless the deal is supposed to be heavily front-loaded. They could try one of those Hossa-type deals, since the league doesn't really seem to care about blatant cap cirumvention

I don't know what his sources are but I believe the article was written by Kevin DuPont of the Boston Globe and he's a top notch reporter. With some of these contracts it really makes me wonder who's hitting the road after this season. Will they deal Bergeron (one of their better forwards this season so far) or maybe no re-sign Wheeler? The cap isn't expected to go up for next season, is it? Something has got to give.

bruins72 wrote:The cap isn't expected to go up for next season, is it? Something has got to give.

Right, the cap doesn't seem likely to be increased. And Bruins currently have three classy centres that can play on the top two lines, so perhaps either Bergeron, Krejci or Savard will have to go.

Círyatan wrote:

bruins72 wrote:The cap isn't expected to go up for next season, is it? Something has got to give.

Right, the cap doesn't seem likely to be increased. And Bruins currently have three classy centres that can play on the top two lines, so perhaps either Bergeron, Krejci or Savard will have to go.

That's the tricky part! Obviously, if they re-sign Savard, they intend to keep him. So then it's between Krejci and Bergeron. They just re-signed Krejci over the summer, so I wonder if they'd trade him a year later. Krejci hasn't been that great so far this season. But then again, he did have hip surgery over the summer, so that could explain a slow start. Bergeron has been making a lot of the last couple years and was either out or not very effective due to his concussion injury. Right now though, he's looking a whole lot better. He seems to be just about back to being the player he was before the injury. He's been one of Boston's best forwards this season and he's a great 2-way player. So you wonder if they want to trade him away. And how long does he have left on his current deal? I think he's got 1 more year left after the current one.

Right, technically Bergeron has got two years left. He might have earned his big contract and certainly his health problems have not been his fault, but it's still a business and as much as I like him I can't see the justification for him to demand similar money to re-sign to what he's making now.
I don't know whether it was really Dupont who broke the Savard story initially, however I tend to believe he got it elsewhere. Either way, saw a cap chart somewhere on HFBoards, doesn't really look that bad, I think it assumed Wheeler and Stuart re-signed for 4.5m combined and they were left with like 7-8m for 4 roster spots, albeit one of them for a top 6 player.

Hmmm... the situation doesn't sound as bad as I thought. I just hope they keep Bergeron. I just really like him and would hate to see him go elsewhere. You're right though. I can't imagine he'd be asking for a contract similar to his current one when it's time to re-negotiate.

Even if Savard is a really good player, i will keep Bergeron and Krejci at Boston. Both of them are young and full of talent, Savard is 30-31??? So go with the young and let Savard go this summer and sign Wheeler instead.


And for the salary cap i think it is suppose to lower. I really hope the cap will drop, that's when some GM who give stupid contracts to some players will see they are in trouble after this.

Keep Savard and Krejci. Bergeron is a career 2nd liner with injury problems. When Savard is done, Krecji should be ready to be a #1. Right now if you got rid of Savard...Boston does not have a go to centre. It shows in their play without him. Big time. Savard is a star.