IKnowPhysics

Yep, TSN's calling it: http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=419104

Two game suspension for you.

I was a big Nascar fan for a few years starting at about age 8, then lost interest in motor sports, despite remaining a "car guy." I started watching F1 this season (in HD with surround sound, I might add). Fascinating and entertaining. It's immediately obvious that three time champion Sebastian Vettel is a dick.

Yeah, the more I think aboot it, the more I like it. Take your best senior ref at his retirement from on-ice work, offer him double his salary, put him in Shanahan's position. Make it the ultimate uber-referee position. Then you have a true supplemental discipline czar that lays down the ban hammer like Judge Mills Lane layed down the gavel. Fair, tough, and universally respected*. When you want a Supreme Court Justice, you hire an experienced judge, not a convict. *Among boxing professionals and televised court circuits.

For what it's worth, which is nothing, Kerry Fraser thinks Nash's hit on Kopecky not resulting in penalty and suspension was horseshit. http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/story/?id=419086 Edit: Actually, there was redeeming comment from a user buried in there, calling for Fraser as Shanahan's replacement. Let's ignore the specifics. Refs at the pro level spend a lifetime trying to be as unbiased as possible; players are the opposite. Would former or promoted league referees be better suited than former players as the head of the player safety committee to dole out fines/suspensions/supplemental discipline?

Sounds like John Madden.

Not on the list!

Lot of speculation going into that one. Here's the original "report" from Jim Matheson: Davis then tacks on, claiming he talked with Matheson: Also, Jon Cooper looks like he was hired to the Syracuse Crunch, Tampa's affiliate, away from the Norfolk Admirals... He's listed as head coach for both teams: Crunch: http://www.syracusecrunch.com/staff.aspx?staff=39 Admirals: http://www.norfolkadmirals.com/release_story1.php?id=1930

And lack thereof. Columbus: Klesla, Leclaire, Nash, Zherdev, Picard, Brule, Brassard, Filatov, Voracek. All of Columbus' picks until 2008, all top-10 picks. Gracias.

Win now, win always. You want good players on the team? Trade for them or sign them. You want good players out of the draft? Draft well. You want the top pick? Trade for it or be compensated off of an offer sheet. To me, the inherent differences between a 1-3 pick and a 16-23 pick and the risks associated with the chance of success of selected players, including development, signing, and injury, and factoring the time it could take to develop the player into a useful contributor does not outweigh the damage to the organization in terms of revenue loss and damage to the perception of the team by free agents, holders of NTCs, and potential coaches. But more than that, the act of winning this season, would demonstrate that this team is capable, on some level, of winning. Ron Rolston would likely remain a candidate for a long term HC position. Darcy Regier would likely remain in employ. There would be much more convincing evidence about which players are committed to performing well, winning, and remaining with us and which players are losers to be shed of. If you lose flat out, you may not learn anything. Was it worth it to fire Ruff? Should we hire Rolston? Was Darcy the problem all along? Do you fire him and look for a replacement? Were the players underperforming? Were they never able to perform? Which ones? All of that becomes less clear with a dogshit record, and the path forward becomes less educated and more desperate. The chance of making mistakes that damage the franchise in the long term or cause long setbacks are greater in a total rebuild scenario, which is likely the scenario after a 1-3 pick. You think you might be the more competitive team by attempting to get the 1-3 pick, but what's really happening is that you're making a wager. You're betting 1-3 years of watching bad hockey, possibly worse than this season, on one 18 year old when there are so many less risky ways to acquire good players.

Guy Boucher fired by Steve Yzerman in Tampa. There's immediate speculation from several analysts that the leading candidate for his replacement is Lindy Ruff, who served as Assistant Coach for Team Canada, under Steve Yzerman, who served as GM for that team. Guy Boucher was the youngest coach in the league at the time of his hiring and had only one year of professional, non-NHL coaching experience. Lindy Ruff would likely be the best option if Tampa decides to seek a veteran coach. Ruff coaching against us in our division next year? No sir, I don't like it. edit: Derp: http://forums.sabrespace.com/topic/21777-boucher-out-in-tampa/

Regier?

Just a pleasant Friday off reminding me why working 9/80s are the ######.

"Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence."

Filppula played against some tough competition last year and put up good numbers, but his possession number were trash. Maybe you put him at 2nd line C and slip Enzo, who has great poession numbers, to his wing.

Vyacheslav Kozlov and future considerations. What, too soon? I would take Ian White and either Patrick Eaves or Brendan Smith for Stafford and a 4th. White's stock obviously has taken a hit since Lidstrom retired. I feel like there's a more useful return for Stafford coming from somewhere else though.

Outstanding game, certainly one the more entertaining games this season. Great competition from both teams. Finally a complete three-period effort from the Sabres, and fighting back from behind to boot. Defense looked much better out there tonight in general. Good steady play from Ehrhoff, Myers, and Leopold all game long. Foligno played a very intense game, I think he's been learning from Ott.

Those unscientific mutha######as.

Troof. It's still a little early yet (maybe before we see what shakes out at the deadline, draft, and July 1) to judge Ennis long term at C. Myers is a good pick; he's almost right there for me with Pominville, Ott.

That's about right. Ott's freely interchangelable with Pominville in this game for me right now. I'm not surprised that no else said Ennis, but I believe in him.

This is the part where I'm really supposed to go off the deep end and and say ###### like "you gotta give up something to get something" or "you undervalue our players," whichever's convenient, to qualify all of my ######. Apparently nothing we have is of any value. We've played ourselves into player asset bankruptcy! Woe is us! --- Sneaky sneaky. I couldn't say for sure that they woudn't trade a work-in-progress franchise defensemen for a right-now franchise goaltender and what might turn out to be a pick in the 31st-37th overall range. Hell, throw a 3rd rounder on there too since I'm making ###### up anyways. Bonus: Miller's a brand name that could be useful in selling hockey out there. But E-L does look good, he'd be a great guy to build a very strong back end around for years to come, and he takes the pressure off of Myers a little.

Good effort, OP. I appreciate time and thoughtfulness put into new ways of looking at statistics. What stood out to me a little, is that the three stats you tracked: the first is determined in a major way by games in which a team allows more than three (which correlates strongly to winning/losing, of course), the second is defined by a team winning/losing the game, and the third correlates strongly to the team winning/losing. As a result, I am totally unsurprised by this- sort of: I would suggest that any team's winning percentage, if that's what you used to define living and dying, would track those three stats because of their correlation to winning/losing, but not necessarily as a result of the performance of the goaltender. It's sort of akin to comparing two goaltenders' performance over a season by comparing the number of wins- there's several other factors and the causal relationship isn't necessarily intact. It seems like these stats could make ANY team live and die by their goalie. If there's evidence to the contrary of what I'm supposing, ie a goaltender was considered by the stats to be elite that belonged to a losing team OR a winning team that has a starting goalie that's bad in these stats, I'd be interested to see that.

I'm not usually one for zany trade ideas, but I'd think about the following: Offer Drew Stafford and Jordan Leopold to the Anaheim Ducks for either Jonas Hiller straight up or Victor Fasth and Bryan Allen. Maybe toss in a late round pick to Anaheim on top. Offer Ryan Miller and a 2nd round pick to the Phoenix Coyotes for Oliver Ekman-Larsson. Perhaps try to pull Marcel Goc out of Florida for a reasonable price.

With those two goals, Steve Ott now has nine points in his last ten games.