Fighting Should Remain Part Of The Game

For well over a century, violence in hockey has been debated hotly by all participants in the game – the players, the owners, the media and the fans. For most of that time, the debate has centred on the fighting aspect of hockey but in the last ten years, and in particular the last two or three, most of the debate has been about "head-shots" and the concussions that have plagued the sport.

For those of us that follow the game closely, there's no need to get into another discussion about concussions in particular. They're bad for the player's health. They're bad for the game. Unfortunately, in a contact sport, they're here to stay, if somewhat lessened by new rules that are too recent to properly gauge the overall effect.

To me, the interesting phenomenon is how quickly the quest to "clean up the game" has gained traction amongst the game's most rabid fans (from bloggers to Twits to phone callers on radio shows), while that same sentiment has largely received a luke-warm response from those directly involved in the sport, ie; the players and the owners.

For years, the press, led by The Hockey News (who have been beating the drums about reducing fighting and concussions in hockey since at least the 80's under several different managing editors) seemed to be on an island of public opinion, ignored by fans who flocked to the rinks to see teams like Broad Street Bullies and the Big Bad Bruins, and ignored by the players who grew up thinking there was no other way to play the game.

Now that has changed somewhat. The mainstream press is almost uniformly appalled at on-ice violence despite accusations that an "old-boys network" at mainstays like the CBC relies on violence for ratings. The "Don Cherry mentality" basically survives with the namesake alone in the mainstream punditry, with odd exceptions like Mike Milbury, who was known to wield a pretty good shoe when beating the crap out of fans at Madison Square Garden. It seems the press has done a good job selling their message because a clear majority of interactive fans also feel that hits to the head during what was once a normal function of the game – bodychecking – can no longer be tolerated and there are now some respected voices strongly advocating a blanket ban on hits to the head, which will ultimately mean fighting will be disallowed in hockey. That's not a conspiracy theory. That's just logic.

For years the "anti-fighting forces" (for lack of a better term) in the press were getting nowhere by simply advocating a ban on fighting in the NHL. Fans loved it, the players felt it was integral to the game and the board of governors were completely silent on the subject.

But now instead of opposing fighting outright, opponents have found a back door into public opinion, and that's hits to the head. With medical research finally catching up to what was once the black-hole of information on concussions, the harmful of effects are there for everyone to read ad-nauseum during the hockey season.  Like anything else, once the negative effects of something are shown clearly to the public, the public will demand that something be done about it.

It's hard to find an opinion now in the "hockeysphere" that prefers the NHL maintain the status quo on hits to the head, and over the next few years you'll begin to see that in regards to fighting as well.

Now on the other side of the game where the owners and the players reside, opinion is not as movable.

The NHL was essentially forced to institute the head-shot rule simply because the press and the fans were in a frenzy that was beginning to overshadow the game itself.  Don't mistake that for a change of heart. It was a move made out of necessity to try and put the focus back on the ice, not with just the players well-being in mind. There have been some strong voices within the NHLPA clamoring for heavy penalties on dangerous hits but not as many as you would expect if you read the first page of the Globe and Mail sports section everyday which was transformed into a de-facto medical journal for all of 2010-2011.

Now if you bring up the subject of fighting in the NHL, you'll find even fewer players advocating the end of it. In fact, you'll find many more voices arguing for the abolishment of the instigator penalty and an increase in fighting. That's likely because they feel the instigator penalty protects the "super pest" type of player who can go around delivering dangerous hits without fear of facing the consequences from his fellow players.  We've heard it all a million times.

Clearly, the appetite for reducing violence in hockey, whether we are talking hits or fights, is at a near maximum level in the press and amongst the fans (to a slightly lesser degree), but it is only starting to  gain traction amongst the people actually involved in the game on the ice and in the boardrooms.

Which brings me to my ultimate point here.

Where does this need to scrub clean a traditionally rough and tumble sport come from? Are the motives purely a desire to protect the well-being of the athletes? I often doubt that motive. Most fans were on the side of the owners during the last lockout and were clearly not concerned with the well-being of the players when the subject came to money or their work conditions. In the current climate, NHL players are more often despised for the money they make than they are celebrated for the entertainment they provide. You can't be concerned about the players one minute and not give a crap if they have guaranteed contracts the next. Yet many do. I find that absurd.

Is the impulse to make the game cleaner stem from people not liking real violence in their entertainment? I think that's legitimate and I can see how that can be a concern, especially in a family environment. Hockey has always been violent and occasionally players will step outside the boundaries of what is considered acceptable, creating an impression that the next Marty McSorley incident is just around the corner, despite the fact that these acts are extremely rare. Some people like the artistry of the game and not its counterpart physical aspect. Fair enough.

But how far does the NHL have to bend to please this demographic? Depends on who you ask. If the majority of fans want fighting out of the league, you can be sure that fighting will eventually be banished because, like all things, it comes down to money. The day the NHL can't make money off their current product is the day they change the product.

Yet that day hasn't come. In fact, that day will probably never come. The NHL is raking in record revenues and just signed the biggest television contract in its existence. And that is with the heavy stigma it already carries - that stigma being that the fans and the press constantly bad mouth the product to the point where it has become an obsession. No other major sport has so many people calling for constant change to the very fabric of the game. Yet the NHL survives and thrives in a hostile environment created by what should be their biggest supporters. That's a significant achievement. Most governments can't do that.

Clearly, with the advent of blogs and other social forums, there are more voices than ever expressing their opinions on the game, both educated and ignorant. Yet each voice believes they are right. Who should we be listening to? The people who actually play the game or the people that pay to watch it (99.9% of whom have never played at the NHL level or even close to it).

There is a sentiment out there that somehow the fans should have more say in the game because they are the ones that shell out the money. How many times have you heard people say "We pay their salaries"?

For one, that's faulty logic. The owners pay the players. Fans simply buy the product, just like they buy Coca-Cola or dog food at the grocery store. You don't hear consumers saying they should have a say in the policies of Coca-Cola. It's ridiculous to think it's any different with the NHL. The fans, despite their comforting allusions, have no ownership over the business of hockey.

However, the basic principles of capitalism still apply here. If you don't like the product, don't buy the product. The result will be that the business changes its product or it goes out of business.

Ultimately, fans will decide if fighting stays in the game or not when they vote with their wallets. So far, the verdict is that the game stays pretty much the same because it's making money hand over fist.

Here's a humble suggestion from this scribe: Enjoy the game for how it is today. There are ample amounts of both skill and physicality that make the game completely unique amongst the other major leagues. Fighting will always be debatable but is it really worth getting rid of completely, especially the spontaneous bouts that come from passionate competition?  There is such a thing as protecting the heritage and fabric of a game that has existed in an exciting form with both skill and fighting longer than any of us have been alive.

Times change and so do attitudes, but we are, after all, talking about entertainment here. Nobody is putting a gun to someone's head and saying they have to go on the ice and fight. Players take on this career of their own free will and they are heavily compensated for the risks they take, even fighters. There will always be a human toll in a contact sport. There's a human toll just by going to Dairy Queen on a Sunday afternoon. These are the risks that athletes take when they want to be paid by a professional team. It's not like someone gets to the NHL and says "Whoa, I could get punched in the head? Nobody told me about this!"

Why do we feel the need to regulate the game to such a degree that we take nearly all the danger away from the sport? Isn't that part of its appeal in the first place?

I for one do not look forward to the day when the NHL is so spit polished that Gordie Howe wouldn't be able to recognize it.

Yearbook Time Machine

Within the next couple of weeks the newsstands will be filled with all the various NHL poolie and yearbook magazines, and info-starved hockey fans will drop 10 bucks per magazine without a second thought, myself included. In fact, I've collected a sickening amount of these mags over the years and I took a quick peek at a few of them tonight and pulled this 97-98 version of the Sports Forecaster, featuring, then as now, a Toronto Maple Leaf on the cover for the Ontario version - Felix Potvin was just beginning to play out the string of his Leaf career, soon to be replaced by Curtis Joseph. The Sports Forecaster was a mag ahead its time simply because they gave scouting reports on most regular players on an NHL roster, something the Hockey News and the official NHL Yearbook didn't do back then.

Seeing that this is largely a Sens-centric blog, here's a look at the Senators section. You might see a few familiar names, as well as a few that you've either never heard of or completely forgotten about. Of course, the 97-98 season would end with the Senators winning their first ever playoff series (against Martin Brodeur and the Devils, causing coach Jacques Lemaire to resign from the team for the first, but not the last time.) and then go on to lose to the Washington Capitals in the second round. The Caps would go on to lose to the Detroit Red Wings in the Stanley Cup Final. (Click on photos to enlarge)

There's a lot of great stuff in this book, such as the debate over who was the NHL's best player at the time, between what they called "The Fab Four" - Jaromir Jagr, Paul Kariya, Eric Lindros and Peter Forsberg. Only Jagr will play in the NHL this year. The other three were forced to retire from injury (that season, Kariya would take that all-time cheap shot crosscheck to the face by Gary Suter).

But the highlight here is the "Dirty Dozen Awards" which celebrate the worst in the NHL for the previous 96-97 season. It's interesting to note the tone here. This kind of ultra-sarcastic writing is really a pre-cursor to the hockey blog boom that would happen in the next decade, in particular the tone of the very successful blog Puck Daddy. It seems commonplace now, but you didn't really read stuff like this back then. The climate was a bit more stuffy in 1997 with all the hockey writing done by tenured hockey journalists who tended to save their best jokes for the bar after deadlines had been met. Now this style has pretty much become the norm as NHL personalities get roasted every day by the snarkiest minds you can imagine across thousands of blogs mostly trying to write in the same sort of modern hip style.

Of note here is the "Mel Bridgman Award" for worst general manager. This was named, of course, after the Senators first GM whose most famous quote will always be "Ottawa apologizes". This is great stuff if you remember the players and situations these awards refer to.

Wayne Gretzky's Rocket Hockey

Forgot all about this old beauty that's been collecting dust in my closet. When you get that metal puck going, it's insanely fast and crazy, as can be seen about 20 seconds into this You Tube clip.



The 80's ad. "Batteries not included because they're NOT NEEDED".

Hockey Hair Heaven

Every year when I get the new NHL Official Guide and Record Book, one of the first sections I turn to is the back of the huge tome where they have the index of retired players. The reason? Hockey hair heaven.

On every page of the index are a handful of old black and white player photos that were obviously picked by someone with an eye for classic hockey hair and in particular, 1970's era sideburns, moustaches and portraint shots where the player is just downright drunk, or at least heavily hungover, which was probably common in those years (see Vic Teal and Mike Amodeo below).

With the new guide coming out sometime in the early fall, my battered and well-read 2010-2011 version is soon to be put to pasture. But I've always wanted to do a post on these amazing old-school portraits and I finally got out the scissors and cut out a few strong highlights from this year's book (not as strong as years past but there are still a handful of classics). Among the notable names here are recent Cup winning Bruins coach Claude Julien with a wicked middle-part, Hawks coach Joel Quennville who looks exactly the same as he does now, Scot Kleinendorst, the older brother of Bingo Sens coach Kurt K., Oilers GM Steve Tambellini with a perfect feather and stache combo, as well as legendary Senators player Frank Finnigan with an even more legendary side-part and wave. My favourite though has to be ex-Wings goalie Vincent Riendeau with a haircut that looks like it was moulded in a sheet metal factory. Here they are, in all their faded black and white glory (click on images for bigger viewing size).

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Kovalev - Pure Gold

"My opinion of Ottawa journalists is that they don't watch hockey at all. When they fly with the team and go through the [metal detector] at an airport, their bags are filled with beer."

-     Alexei Kovalev speaking to Sovetsky Sport via Puck Daddy

That is truly one of the funniest things I've ever heard a hockey player say to the press, regardless if it's true or not.

Love him or hate him (and it seems this guy is almost universally loathed in Ottawa – but not by me), you have to give Kovalev some respect for being his own man, no matter what the situation, in a hockey world that generally frowns upon athletes with strong, stubborn personalities.

Seriously, this guy is incredible. His nickname in Montreal was "L'artiste", but some of the players in Ottawa liked to call him "The Most Interesting Man In The World" in tribute to that guy from the Dos Equis beer commercials.

Kovalev flies planes, he moonwalks for the fans, he used to collect Troll dolls, he throws coaches under the bus like they were nothing more than shoeshine boys, he tells the media and the fans to "get out of my head" and now he lays down an "Ottawa reporters are too busy drinking beer to watch the actual game" crack, which is sure to become legendary amongst the pub crawling, wing eating, beer guzzling world of NHL journalists who love nothing more than swapping these kinds of stories during long lonely nights in Buffalo.

On top of that, after telling the Ottawa press he wanted to retire a Montreal Canadien two summers ago, moments after signing with the Senators, he was at it again telling the Russian press that he wants to retire an NHL'er after just signing a two-year deal in the KHL.

Simply amazing.

You know, apropos of nothing, maybe the real problem with Alexei Yashin is that although he was a pretty good villain in this town, he was always boring. He always said the right thing in the minimum amount of words. In short, he was a robot. An evil, greedy robot who sucked everyones will to live within a 200 km radius of the Ottawa Valley.

But Kovalev isn't a robot. He's got that "too cool for school" vibe thing happening but when he's of the mind, he'll let it all hang out with some of the things he's willing to say. That's what villains are supposed to be like. They need to be more like the Joker, less like the "sweater-vest and smile" Stephen Harper.

It's probably no surprise that Kovalev wasn't shy about putting a few more knives in Cory Clouston's back, but perhaps the biggest reveal of the article on Puck Daddy was the Sovetsky Sport interviewer bringing up Sergei Gonchar by saying "I asked Sergei Gonchar what game model Ottawa had. The defenseman could only throw his hands up."

To which Kovalev responds "In two seasons I still couldn't understand the ideas of our coach Cory Clouston."

If it's any consolation to Kovalev and Gonchar, nobody else could either.

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Ye Olde Bodycheck Magazine

I wouldn't say I'm a candidate for that Hoarders show just yet, but my wife keeps telling me I have way too much crap, and occasionally I'll pretend to sort it all out which basically consists of me opening a box and finding incredible stuff I haven't looked at in ten years and vowing to never throw it out while my wife drops f-bomb after f-bomb on me as I cower in the basement.

And recently I came across a small bundle of those old Bodycheck magazines, which was the official publication of the Ottawa Senators in the early years published by Jim Steel and had local trivia whiz Liam Maguire as one of their main writers. I believe at one point it was distributed by the Ottawa Citizen but was discontinued sometime in the mid to late 90's only to be resurrected some years later as a playoff-only magazine. To be honest, it's near impossible to find much info about it but if someone can fill me in on the history I'd like to hear it. (You can view a complete 2008 version here).

With the Senators about to embark on their 20th NHL season and planning a series of heritage events (including a jersey that they cruelly did not reveal at today's press conference), here's a quick look back at some of the more garish and dated highlights of the Bodycheck mag that filled the gaps in our Senators knowledge before the internet made us all a bunch of jaded know-it-all's.

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A cover from Alexei Yashin's rookie season in 93-94 which shows Mark Messier about to spear him in the groin. True story: I used to collect Yashin hockey cards almost exclusively and during the late 90's I lived in Toronto for a few years and became a regular at Legends memorabilia shop on King Street. I became pals with the guys working there but they used to tease me mercilessly for being a Yashin collector but I remained defiant, saying Yash was going to be one of the best players of his generation. Now those cards are completely worthless and I wonder if those guys still think back and have a good laugh at how much money I dropped on those damn things.

How many of you actually remember Dave Hannan? He played only 34 games for the Sens in 97 but was a bit of a big deal in town for a while because he won a Cup with Colorado the year before. The designer got a little cheeky there with the crooked K.

Before the Team 1200 (and its predecessor OSR), the games were on CFRA. Very strange to see the Expos and Rough Riders logos here. This town used to be a hardcore Expos/Rough Riders zone.

Back in those days the big prize among players was getting involved with a car dealership (as this beauty Mario Lemieux ad can attest). In fact, it's still a big thing today too.

Jacques Martin knew a hell of a lot about golf in his days with the playoff challenged Senators. That joke was super-lame and way too easy. I apologize.

Dave McLlwain deep into the early 90's Garth Brooks inspired look. He actually had a great season in Ottawa when he scored 43 points in 66 games in the 93-94 season and was one of only a handful of players to play for both the Leafs and the Sens (try and name the others). He ended up playing pro hockey until 2009 when he finished up in Europe. Not a bad career at all.

Bodycheck always had the full page posters which were on the walls of many a kid in the mid-90's. Can you believe how young Wade Redden looks here?

Bodycheck was not known for its wit but this pic gives a cool view of what it was like to play NHL hockey in the Civic Centre with that big half-wall on one side of the rink. I'm sure guys like Jeremy Roenick just loved to play against someone like Daigle. Total bloodbath.

Even Peter Sidorkiewicz had endorsements in this town. It's hard to explain just how excited this town was in 1992 to have an actual NHL hockey team again. Sylvain Turgeon was treated like a Hall of Famer wherever he went.

More Yash. Someday the Sens will wear a version of this sweater again. Mark it down.

And finally, the obligatory photo spread of the fans. Guess which photo should have been left on the cutting room floor? Or at least had a bra photoshopped in. Seriously, that's nasty.

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Brushing Up On History.... Sens Fans Finally Get The Gear They Want

As the Senators get ready to reveal a retro "Heritage Jersey" on Thursday, it reminded me that I've been hoarding a few interesting photos that a friend working for the Canadian Archives shared with me. Not many people actually take the time to check out the vast amount of photos and memorabilia collected in the Archives but here are a few Ottawa hockey related items that you don't see very often.

The Rideau Hall Rebels (Vice Regal Parliamentary Hockey Club) circa 1890 posing in a photographer's studio (the same room another picture featured on their Wiki page here was taken four years later). Note the tiger rug on the floor. This is the team Lord Stanley watched his sons play for and which gave him the idea for the Stanley Cup. Not too shabby.

The Glebe Collegiate hockey team circa 1938. I graduated from the same school 58 years later. Not...too....shabby.

Frank Finnigan hockey card (front and back) circa (1933-1934?) I don't have the exact date of this card but the Senators moved to St. Louis in 34 and the back of the card mentions the 32 season when he was on loan to the Toronto Maple Leafs. So that puts this card in a two year window right around 33 or 34. For the first time since then, the Senators will be donning their historical "O" symbol. #Nottooshabby.

The following two examples are not from the Archives, as far as I know, but I found these on the web a while back and can't remember where. Anyways, in the spirit of the thing, here's a couple more vintage Senators cards with the old sweaters. A little shabby.

And if you really want to go back.... we can't do without a Brad Marsh hockey card thrown into the mix.

The great thing about the Senators introducing a Heritage jersey with the "O" logo is that on some nights, they can skate onto the ice in a sweater they can be proud of and that properly reflects the rich history of hockey in the capital city. Here's an easy prediction: It won't be long before they make the "O" logo and the barber pole jersey's a matching home and road combo with their current red sweater becoming their "alternate" jersey. It will all come down to money. If the new sweater sells like it should, the team will keep going with it, just like they did in Edmonton and Buffalo with their own nostalgic sweaters. There's a lot of young fans in this city but there are even more adult fans who don't want to walk around sporting a cartoonish logo on their caps and shirts. They want traditional gear that can match up with the Habs and the Leafs and the rest of the original six. Remember when they came out with those black, red and white barber pole scarfs a few years ago and how they couldn't keep them on the shelves? Everywhere you go in Ottawa you see people wearing the "O" logo on their ballcaps. It's a no-brainer for the organization to finally go with what the fans have been wanting for years, but it's also surprising that it took them so long to figure it out.

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More Secrets Revealed?

Some random notes from the dog days of summer:

The big news the past couple of days has been the Sens 3rd jersey leak from the Icethetics blog which shows a poor quality black and white "photocopy" of the complete uniform design (allegedly). If this is the sweater (and it sounds like we'll find out on Thursday from the Senators themselves during a media event scheduled), then it certainly has my approval. But something seems a little weird about the whole thing. Why would someone go to all the trouble to provide a crummy looking "photocopy" and not a colour version if they were going to all the trouble of leaking it? And if this was an official document handed out to alumni members straight from the team, where's the All-Star logo? Where's the stripes on the hockey pants? And haven't we all seen this template before? Looks like the kind of template anybody with Microsoft Paint could doctor. Now, it's probably a real leak and I'd be willing to bet it's the real deal, but until the Senators throw one on the table, I'll withhold my judgment....And that brings us to the other big mystery, and that's the fate of the new scoreboard for Scotiabank Place that was promised, denied, then promised again, depending on who you believe. The guys over at Sens Town dropped a tidy little scoop last week about that very scoreboard but we still wait for any official word from the team about it and when/if it might be installed. I find it truly bizarre how secretive the organization is about this issue. To be fair, they've put up a blanket denial whenever asked, but maybe Cyril Leeder should let everyone know exactly what's happening at Thursday's press conference just so everyone can stop trying to guess. If they can't put it in for this season, fine. Most season ticket holders will accept that if they know improvements are on the way down the road. If the illustrations provided are accurate, people should be pretty happy with the new look. Hopefully the guys putting it up aren't the same ones who built the Bluesfest stage…....Speaking of which, Cheap Trick just cancelled a show in B.C. because the stage was built by the same company who built the one that crumpled on top of them in Ottawa in July. Now I can understand Cheap Trick's point of view here, but are these guys so wildly popular right now that they can afford to just cancel shows like they were Oasis or Guns N'Roses in their brawling primes? As far as I know, no one had heard the name Cheap Trick for the past twenty years until their stage went el foldo. You don't hear about April Wine cancelling gigs do you? Or Loverboy? No, cuz they got bills to pay. And 17 fans to entertain…..

….The NHLPA should help out their future union members and try to force the NHL to ban these pre-draft interviews that have gone completely out of control. Now these kids have to fly to different cities like Ottawa and do on-ice workouts for teams that in all probability won't even be able to draft them. Only a few clubs are doing it right now, but what's to stop every organization from wanting to do the same thing? I realize it's not mandatory and a prospect can decline the invite, but if they do decline, they end up looking bad. It's borderline ridiculous when these guys are already put through the meat grinder at the Draft Combine. And if teams still insist on doing these, maybe they should refrain from dressing them up in official gear. No one wants to see pictures of Gabriel Landeskog wearing Sens equipment and practice jerseys floating around the internet for years. It's the NHL's own version of the "Dewey Defeats Truman" headline (well maybe that's pushing it, but you get my drift)….

…..I find it hard to believe the Edmonton Oilers didn't improve their goaltending over the summer. They have some good kids up front with star potential and some key veterans like Ryan Smyth and Andy Sutton to help them along. But those positives can be quickly cancelled out by terrible goaltending. Nikolai Khabibulin is currently spending 30 days in the slammer and his best years are well behind him in Tampa Bay and Phoenix. Devan Dubnyk is a former first round pick but he hasn't had a winning season since 2007 when he split time between the East Coast league and the AHL. It sounds like the Oilers have total confidence in Dubnyk and maybe they'll be rewarded for their patience like the Red Wings were with Jimmy Howard. Or maybe they sink this year because they can't keep pucks out of their net and guys like Taylor Hall start to get used to losing. Rebuilds are great, but at some point you have to start winning important games or you can start to tread water again. Just ask the St. Louis Blues or the Columbus Blue Jackets, both of whom recently hit the panic button in the midst of their own "rebuilds from hell". Maybe the Oilers have one more year of grace anyways, but losing will get old rather quickly even with the high profile draft picks that come with it…..

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Black Aces Joins Civilization

Yes, I get the irony here.

After taking a few shots at the Twitterverse in a post here, I decided I should actually spend more than 5 minutes checking it out and, lo and behold, I realized that there was more to it than maybe I originally thought.

So I sold out and joined up. I've already gotten the gears from friends. Feel free to say I told you so if you want.

Anyways, I figure I could add another dimension to Black Aces by doing this and once the season starts I'll probably be completely addicted and my life will fall apart. If you're a reader of Black Aces, take the time to follow me over there and hopefully I can do something interesting with it and make it worthwhile, especially when the season starts and there's more to talk about. It won't just be about hockey either. Expect a few Dio, Dylan or Stones links if I've had a few cold ones on a Saturday night. Or anything else I might regret in the morning.

Here's the link to the Black Aces Twitter home page: http://twitter.com/#!/BlackAcesOttawa

Also, if you think you're brave enough, follow me over at Yo! Henry Moses (http://twitter.com/#!/YoHenryMoses), a project that will eventually be in book form. Warning: following Henry Moses can lead to severe brain damage.

Sens In July

Time to wonder what new coach Paul MacLean has in mind as he plays with possible forward lines in his head leading up to training camp. I'm certainly no mind-reader, but as a substitute, this is a general idea of what I think could happen, although these lines look uncomfortably similar to what Cory Clouston would have had if everyone was healthy. A new coach brings in a different mindset and some of the duos we've come to take for granted may not even get a look together in training camp with different people in charge.

Anyways, for what it's worth, here's my best shot at what this team will look like in October:

Forwards

Michalek – Spezza – Butler

Filatov – Regin –Alfredsson

Foligno – Greening - Smith

Condra- Konopka – Neil

Spare: Winchester

Defense

Gonchar –Karlsson

Phillips - Rundblad

Cowen – Carkner

Spare: Kuba

Goalies

Anderson

Auld

To me, you have to keep Butler and Spezza together. They looked dangerous at times down the stretch and Spezza is always best when he has a sniper riding shotgun. Butler may not be Dany Heatley, but he's still got a cannon and a knack for getting open for a chance. Michalek is the sort of hybrid grinder on that line but he can get you 30 goals in a good year when he's not busy breaking every bone in his body.

I see Regin as this team's second line centre and having a big rebound year. It seems natural to put Filatov on a line with Alfie to make sure that the kid is playing the game the right way and gets off to a good start. It's hard not to play well with number 11 on your line as we've all seen in the past. Playing on the second unit may allow Filatov a little more room to breathe at the start instead of facing everyone else's best defenseman shift after shift.

Then it gets tricky. I think Greening could be the big centreman this team needs (while they wait for Mika Zibanejad in Sweden), even if that means both Foligno and Smith continue to play on the wings despite being natural centres. This looks like a grind line but if Foligno can get his game together, they could score a few goals (although I'm not very confident Foligno has that upside anymore).

Konopka has got to take faceoffs so that essentially pushes Winchester out of his spot for now, even though he's one of the best at controlling the puck along the boards. Condra isn't a natural left-winger but he's got to fit in some place, and Neil seems entrenched on the right side.

The big temptation was to imagine a fourth line of Neil, Konopka and Smith, which would create chaos every single game, but they probably want to spread that toughness around a little. It would also mean that one of Neil or Smith play on their wrong side. Neil could shift over to left-wing because he's a right handed shot but his game isn't one-timers, it's digging for pucks along the boards.

Where does Stephane Da Costa fit in? Good question. For now, the AHL seems to be a likely destination, especially with that trio of one way contracts given to Condra, Greening and Butler.

As for the defensive pairings, I can see MacLean loading up on offense with Gonchar and Karlsson as big minute guys, but can they work together? The Senators now have three right-handers in Karlsson, Rundblad and Carkner (four if Brian Lee sticks around) and I can't see them being paired up together. So that's how I came up with these duo's, although Kuba remains a real wild card. If he's healthy and confident, it's hard to keep him out of the top six. It's entirely conceivable that at least one of either Cowen or Rundblad prove they aren't ready for the NHL, and that would bring Kuba back into the mix and leave room for Lee as a spare.

If that's not enough, you have Eric Gryba, Patrick Wiercioch and Mark Borowiecki close to being ready.

It still feels like the Senators may have one more move up their sleeve, and are just waiting to see how Rundblad and Cowen do in training camp before making a trade of some sorts.

Yashin Resurfaces Like Godzilla - Various Cities In Panic

Just for the sheer hell of it, and for the sake of some much needed mid-summer conversation, can you imagine if the "one NHL contract offer" that agent Mark Gandler said his client Alexei Yashin has been tendered was from the Ottawa Senators? Strangely, is there a team more in need of a second-line centre than the locals in red and black?

Obviously, this is about as outlandish as the search for Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster and Rupert Murdoch's moral integrity, but stranger things have happened in the NHL.

Signing Yashin would completely fly in the face of the organization's focus on youth and rebuilding, and that is probably the biggest clue that the Senators wouldn't go near their former franchise player, but his skills must remain tempting for some general managers.

Jaromir Jagr is coming back. Nicklas Lidstrom is still playing. We await word on Teemu Selanne. Yashin is now 37 and is years removed from the NHL, but I have no doubt he could play well in this league with a modest contract and lower expectations.

My main curiosity is how Senators fans would welcome him onto the team. Would there be more of those "Nobody Paid Me To Be Here" signs from the fans? Would they cheer for him? Would the NAC send out a donation card and promise to hire his family for real this time?

These are the kinds of stories you can actually mull over for a while in the summer.

What's Alexandre Daigle doing lately?

If this "one NHL offer" is legitimate (and I'm not about to accuse Gandler of lying due to his sterling reputation in the business*), then it may just be a GM trying to:

a) desperately hit the cap floor
b) catch the all-time Hail Mary pass of risky signings
c) or trying to prolong Mike Milbury's psychological torture

If you had to guess the team, who would you take in a money bet?

I'll take the New York Rangers. Yashin could be an upgrade on the departed Vaclav Prospal. Glen Sather is weird enough to try it. My pal said it would be the Capitals.

Dark horse? How about Dallas.

The sure bet? It won't happen at all.

It's All Good, Neil'er...

...you're in great company.

Okay, maybe Jimmy Swaggart doesn't belong here, but when you're talking about crying, you can't exclude the all-time world champion.

But you gotta love it when tough, emotional leaders like Chris Neil or Mark Messier let it all hang out. Neil is going to pick up right where Mike Fisher left off at Rogers House, and he's now one of the last leaders left on the Ottawa Senators. Expect a big year.

Geez, now I'm getting emotional. Maybe I should watch a non-emotional movie ... I don't know, something like Rudy.

Twitter Mania And Illiterates Like Me

So Bobby Butler signs a two-year deal in Ottawa. Mark Parrish signs. Sweatt. Conboy. Everyone goes crazy trying to be the first to break it on Twitter or on their blogs and in the end, no one really cares one way or the other about the actual information, but only the way it's delivered and who delivered it.

Twitter sounds like an interesting phenomenon, only I can never understand anybody's tweets. Filled with acronyms, abbreviated words, misspellings and outright jibberish, these tweets have somehow become the standard for breaking hockey news. I tried reading both Bob McKenzie's and Darren Dreger's feeds every day and it nearly shattered my sanity.

But I'm not bitching about it. I can still find out what happens on TSN or ESPN or THN (Christ, more acronyms), but that usually makes me the last guy to know.

I could turn to the guy next to me in the office and say "Hey, Bobby Butler signed for two years – one way" and he'd look at me like I was a complete asshole. "Uh, yah dude. That was like ten minutes ago. Do you even follow hockey? Your blog must suck."

And he'd be correct of course, if the measure of a good blog is breathlessly parroting the details of a minor RFA signing (acronym hell) two seconds before everyone else. In that regard, then yes, this blog should be eradicated back to the hole it came out of in 2007.

Meanwhile, the summer rolls along quite peacefully for us non-Twitter users (all seven of us). I'm the only guy on the bus reading a paper book while everyone around me reads from a hand-held flat screen. Sometimes when I get off the bus, I can hear them all laughing at me, "Did you see that guy? What an asshole!" and I shake my fist at them in the rain. I'm the only guy on my block who noticed the mailman was on strike.

Anyhoo, wake me when training camps starts or when one of Ottawa's defenseman steps on the ice for the first time in September and immediately breaks his leg like Filip Kuba did last year. Now that's news worth getting worked up about. Then again, he'd already be healed by the time I find out utilizing my ancient methods of research….

Tough Guy Jitters

Ever since the moment Zenon Konopka signed with Ottawa yesterday, the chatter started on the blogs and the boards that this is somehow a sign from the Gods that either Chris Neil or Matt Carkner could soon find themselves on their way out of town.

Reading this stuff first thing in the morning is like accidentally spooning rat poison into your coffee instead of sugar, but hey, people are entitled to their conspiracies and never ending rumour obsession.

It's like people believe there is some secret rule where you can only have three roster spots for tough guys and one more in the boat means one has to go overboard. Not sure where this belief springs from, but it's rather condescending to guys like Neil, Carkner, Konopka and Zack Smith and presumes that all they can do is fight and take stupid penalties. Which, of course, is complete B.S.

Konopka's signing, to me anyways, is a sign that GM Bryan Murray and new coach Paul MacLean actually want guys like Neil, Smith and Carkner on the ice more this year, not less. Neil has evolved from a middle weight enforcer into a hell-on-wheels menace who crashes the net and leads by example. Smith is a Neil clone but with a little more upside and better wheels. Carkner is a prototypical 15 minute a night defensive defenseman who plays a simple game that coaches love and has the added bonus of being perhaps the scariest fighter in the NHL today. Why would the Senators feel any of these guys are expendable? It doesn't make sense. If I'm wrong, I'm wrong and I'm sure you guys will let me know about it, but I just don't see it.

The Boston Bruins won a Stanley Cup with a team that was twice as tough as Ottawa will be this year. In that town, tough players with character are celebrated. In Ottawa, they are merely tolerated and treated like relics of an old-school style which has gone out of fashion by new-school fans who are extremely uncomfortable with on-ice violence. So why do NHL general managers keep signing tough players anyways? Why did the Islanders re-sign Trevor Gillies? It's not because they're stupid. It's because NHL general managers know that intimidation is still a big part of winning hockey games, even if some skittish fans wish it would go away.

That's not me pontificating. That's just the way it is. If it wasn't, the enforcer would be extinct. So would the pests like Sean Avery and Maxim Lapierre (who just signed a big deal in Vancouver, one of the least physical teams on the planet who let their star players get punched in the face repeatedly and did nothing about it).

Which brings me back around to the point of this article in the first place. Konopka's signing only gives room for guys like Neil and Carkner to play more. It doesn't threaten their role on the team.

Mind you, if a soft team like Vancouver offered Ottawa a top-six forward for someone like Neil or Carkner (highly unlikely, nee impossible), then Murray might take the bait. But these guys aren't leaving the team just because they signed someone else who actually knows how to body check.

Some may see Carkner's job more threatened by incoming rookies like Jared Cowen and David Rundblad, but it's important to remember that just because us armchair coaches already have them penciled into the lineup doesn't mean they will actually make it. And if they do, it's more likely that Filip Kuba would be the casualty and not Carkner. If Kuba comes back and totally reverses his recent decline, then maybe Carkner ends  up sitting more often. I'm just not sure that's really in the cards. Even if Carkner is your seventh guy, it's a hell of a lot better than having Brian Lee as your black ace.

There are certainly guys in danger of losing their jobs this year, but to me their names are Kuba and Lee. I don't see Jesse Winchester or Peter Regin losing their spots just yet at the forward ranks. In fact, I'm picking Regin as the comeback player of the year. I stand by my view that Regin could be the next David Krejci. He had a sophomore slump. So have 500 other NHL players over the years.

But here we go again. It's early July and already people are panicking and ingesting rat poison.  There's a long time to go without hockey. Let's try and act like normal human beings for at least a few months.

Konopka Brings His Act To Town... And Other Strange Rookie Dinner Tales

I like the Zenon Konopka signing, most of all because I like watching tough hockey teams who stand up for each other, but where are all these forwards going to fit?

For arguments sake, let's say the top 12 forwards are:

1. Alfie
2. Spezza
3. Michalek
4. Filatov
5. Foligno
6. Neil
7. Regin
8. Butler
9. Winchester
10. Greening
11. Smith
12. Konopka

You might argue a player here or there, but that's a good approximate of what we will probably see (Ryan Shannon must now be officially out).

Where does that leave Mika Zibanejad, Stephane Da Costa, Erik Condra and Roman Wick? And that's not to mention that GM Bryan Murray says he wants Jakob Silfverberg to stay in North America. Da Costa and Condra in particular are going to be in tough to make a lineup that they may have expected to be on opening night. Zibanejad can go back to Sweden with Silfverberg and it would probably be the best for them anyways. But at least Murray has created some heavy competition here among the forwards, but if Nik Filatov somehow doesn't work out (even though my guess is he will), the Senators will be a little bottom heavy with third and fourth liners and lacking a distinct threat past their first line.

But why get nervous in July?

As for Konopka, I once worked at a fairly decent restaurant downtown Ottawa and was working the night the Anaheim Ducks had their "Rookie Dinner" here in town during the 2005-2006 season. There are a lot of insane stories I could tell about that night, but I don't think it's wise to subject my readers to such abject debauchery. Yet I remember Konopka very well. He had just been called up to the NHL a few nights before and was one of the official rookies along with Ryan Getzlaf, Corey Perry and Francois Beauchemin (who had played some previous NHL games in seasons past but was still considered a freshmen and fit enough to pitch in on the enormous bill).

Let's just say Konopka is not a shy person. This guy was the life of the party, running around the room and causing all sorts of madness, making a greying Scott Niedermayer shake his head a few times (that I saw) and leading the rookies at the front of the room in a sing-along which was part of their initiation. Guys like Perry and Getzlaf looked at their feet uncomfortably and warbled out of tune with goofy smiles but Konopka held his head high and sang his heart out in front of veterans like Keith Carney and Sami Pahlsson.

It was quite the sight, and later on Konopka was the victim of a vicious sour cream shoe-check administered by Mr. Pahlsson.

My gut feeling is that Konopka is going to be an important part of that dressing room, now that he's a proven veteran, and it will also let Matt Carkner and Chris Neil stay on the ice more often, rather than having to platoon nights throwing the gloves.

Right away he'll be a fan favourite due to his Ottawa 67's and Brian Kilrea connection, and he's an underrated player who can usually break pucks loose in the corners, or at least leave a few bruises if he loses the battle.

In short, you'd rather have a warrior like Konopka wearing your uniform than seeing him line up against you with that shit-eating grin plastered all over his face, warning you to keep your head up in the corners.

I'm sold.