B's lose in OT, 3-2

Kept from posting during the winning streak due to superstition. It's probable that there was a direct correlation between the win streak and the lack of new posts here at Vf311.

• Hurricane O'Reilly's doesn't have Captain Morgan? wha...??
• No Bergeron last night and it showed. I think we went 0 for 1,000,000 on faceoffs. Okay, I just checked, the B's actually beat the Pens at the faceoff dot, 29 wins to 27 wins. But let's not let the facts get in the way of my misinformation dissemination - Bergy took a personal day to wax his eyebrow and the B's paid dearly for it.
  
• Jackass in front of me and his brat kids were standing about 3 seconds before the Krejci goal that tied it, missed the goal. 1st goal, though, Lootch was just a huge beast, screening Fleury so he never saw Chara take a shot.
• Power play still looks anemic. Things appear smoother with Kaberle around, but they're just not getting anything into the net. It's weird.
• I like the snarl that has appeared in Nathan Horton's game. I'm not sure what has caused this, but it results in him being engaged in the flow of the game, therefore he's taking more shots and beating on people in the corners, looking to make hits, and generally causing a ruckus. It's probably the Lootchian influence. Still, I was watching Lootch & Krejci at the other end of the ice when Horton beat? Craig Adams down.
  
• Shawn Thornton had a rare loss, fighting the much bigger Mike Rupp. Rupp is just a big dude. Rupp is 6'-5", which reminds me of Blake Wheeler. Imagine if Wheels played with Rupp's physicality (or if Rupp played with, uh, Wheels' offensive, uh, finish?) That would be some kind of power forward, yah?

That's a dude. Look at that perm, boinging away. Look at that Letang jersey. Thankfully, he was quiet & respectful. But too many Pens fans (frontrunners) were at the game last night, ruining everything. Also, spied some Nordiques jerseys (huh?), and Whalers jerseys. Son, if you're wearing a Whalers jersey out in public, you're pretty much admitting to the world that you've given up on life.

• Gregory Campbell is due to haul ass on some poor sap's face. I dunno if he got a stern talking to from Poppa Soup, but he's been quiet with his fists lately.
• Bob McKenzie (TSN) chips in with some PHX to Winnipeg talk. So does Darren Dreger ...anything to get rid of Confederate Flag hockey. I'm convinced that the only reason for warm-climate hockey is so the players/coaches, etc. get to play golf during the season.
  
• Is "McKenzie" to Canada what "Chang" is to China? NO. According to this, it's not even in the top 20. Nothing like obliterating a stereotype. Now I feel empty.
• When the B's fire Claude Julien, is the Herald going to use the banner headline "De-Claude" on the back page? I should copyright that shit right now.
• It irritates me to see Seguin pull up on delivering checks, not big checks, but just checks against the boards. It is this whiff of Kesselosity that's in his game that really annoys me. In a somewhat related note, Taylor Hall blew out his ankle the other night in his first fighting major of the season.
• Nice open-ice hit by Seidenberg on Letang, later negated by Seidenberg's assist on the Pens winning goal.
  

Horton Needs a Beatin'

Minnesota mused last night, "just watch Nathan Horton during his entire shift. He just kind of skates around, watches things happen, doesn't hit anyone, doesn't engage anyone in any puck battles..."

Nathan Horton (6'-2", 230lbs) was directly responsible for 2 of Buffalo's 4 goals last night as the B's lost, 4-2. Horton needs to spend some time on the bench and de-Wheeler-ize himself a bit. So does Seguin. Seguin is completely chicken-shit out there. These guys simply do not want to work in the corners. They make me long for the days of Peter Schaefer and his crazy work in the corners. Suck as he may, Schaefer always emerged from the corners with the puck. Which just goes to show you how important our 4th line is. Without Thornton, Campbell, and whoever's been busted to 4th line duty due to suckage (right now it's Wheeler), the B's would much easier to play against.

Why does this team hate us? They play great on the road (14-5-4) and suck balls at home (12-9-3).

I had written (yet another) substandard post last night briefly discussing the B's sweep of the Whalers. I clicked "publish post", then fell asleep, nothing came up. You're not missing much. Speaking of which, saw a Ron Francis Whaler jersey last night in 309. Horrible. I didn't attend the MLK day matinee, probably a good thing, what, with the restraining order imposed upon me by the pasty-white Whaler fan collective.

Chiarelli loves www.capgeek.com, as revealed Wednesday on Toucher 'n Rich. "They're usually wrong, but they're really good. But they're usually wrong."

Check out this cool panoramic photo of the Garden before a B's game from what looks like Section 312 or 313. (from Universal Hub)

The disparity between the won-loss records of Rask and Thomas is just plain wild. Thomas is heading towards a record-setting season (22-4-6), and could come close to challenging the modern (within the past 30 years) record.

Prague Random Thoughts

So we've had two regular season games on at the time I'm usually watching the English Premier League.  Actually worked out well since the EPL had the weekend off for an international break.  Some random thoughts based on the weekend's action...

Enough already with starting the season overseas:
This can't be helping the NHL.  They can't even sell out the rinks and they have to be spending a lot of money to have 6 teams over there.  The only positive I can see in it is it would be a great excuse for a European vacation if I was independently wealthy.  Since I'm not, I just think it blows.  It takes away a home game for us season ticket holders and it has to be tough on our Bruins.  It's also dumb that we don't see the Bruins play again until Saturday.

Would have been nice to visit and take in a couple games

Comcast sucks:
I'm stuck with Comcast where I now live.  I had DirecTV for years.  Comcast's NHL Center Ice has maybe one game per night in HD and they charge more than DirecTV does for everything.

Nathan Horton is on the 2nd PP Unit:
This boggles my mind and will likely change.  I also don't like seeing Matt Hunwick on PP1.  The PP definitely needs some work.  The Bruins are actually fortunate Phoenix didn't score 3 or 4 shorties in the two games.

The Bruins D has me tempering expectations for this season:
From 1 thru 6, the Bruins D just does not stack up with many of the so-called contenders.  Multiple guys will have to step up their games this year for everything to come together.  Don't be surprised if there is a trade after Ference's groin gives way.

It's nice to have a healthy Chara and Lucic:
Remember last year when Chara was taking little wristers from the point because of his hand injury?  Remember how Lucic never looked like himself after the high ankle sprain?  They both look like more like the 2009 version now.  Chara was also flattening people and getting involved in the offense.  When Marchand found him with a brilliant pass in the 1st period on Sunday, I had to laugh at how he had no idea what to do against Bryzgalov though - that's alright, that's not his game.

It's going to take time for Tyler:
Steven Stamkos looks poised to join Crosby and Ovechkin as an elite superstar in the NHL.  Remember what he did in the first half of his first year?  Next to nothing.  Stamkos turned it up in the 2nd half of his rookie season and that's what we need to hope for from Tyler.  Let's be honest with ourselves, he was nearly invisible this weekend until Michael "Vick" Ryder found him on the post pattern for the breakaway.

Nice debut for the new guys

Horton will lead the team in goals:
Going out on a limb here.  His hands are so good.  Man it's nice to have a sniper again isn't it?  As the Mayor pointed out, he's on pace for 120.  After watching him this weekend, 40 to 50 certainly isn't out of the question.  We'll see if his propensity to take nights off shows up this year or not.  At least he doesn't have a propensity to take seasons off like Mr. Ryder.  Horton has figured in 4 of the 5 goals on the season with his assist on Lucic's goal.  You can't beat that start.

Attaboy Timmy:
Looked good.  Had one of his floppy moments in the 2nd period, but made all the saves and his team certainly played better in front of him.  It will be interesting to see how the playing time shakes out this season.  This blogger projects neither goalie will exceed 50 starts barring injury to the other.

Blake Wheeler is still awful:
I hope this changes because we need the guy to be better, but he is horrible and he's bringing Bergy down with him by being on his line.  He was even bringing Jordan Caron down on Sunday.

Jack made a great point late in Sunday's broadcast:
...when talking about bringing Caron in for Paille today - making players accountable for a poor performance.  Remember last year when Claude kept sending the same bums out night after night even though the effort wasn't there?

Way to go Peter:
Chara and Bergy's combined cap hit this year: $12.25M
Chara and Bergy's combined cap hit the next three years: $11.5M
You have to like locking up these core players and reducing their combined cap hit.  I was actually hoping they could reduce Chara's numbers on the back end of his contract to reduce it further.  According to capgeek, the final two years are $5M and $4M respectively.  Seeing as how he'll be 40 then, I would have thought they could have reduced that some - not Lou Lamoriello/Ilya Kovalchuk style, but some to bring the cap number down further.

I'll take the 2 points after Saturday's debacle.  Good start to the season.  Horton looks awesome, Seguin gets his first, and Chara and Bergy are locked up.

Wideman for Horton

Peter pulled one off. He took one of his problem children (Wideman) and traded him to Florida for their own problem child: Nathan Horton. Florida GM Dale Tallon stated that Horton made it clear he wanted out as soon as he took the job. According to Darren Dreger's tweets, the complete deal is as follows:

Florida Gets:
Dennis Wideman ($3.875M cap hit for the next two seasons)
Boston's 15th Overall Selection on Friday
Boston's 3rd Round Pick in next year's draft

Boston Gets:
Nathan Horton ($4M cap hit for the next three seasons)
The rights to RFA Gregory Campbell (role player at best)

Here comes Horton

 

Peter cashed one of his chips in (the 15th overall selection) to hopefully improve the Bruins offense this season. There has to be more to come now. As Matt Kalman also said, he now almost certainly has to dump a forward salary or Timmy's salary to make room to sign some help on the blueline. The hot rumors have been Marc Savard, but I don't know how willing Savvy will be to waive his no-trade clause to most markets out there. Is Savvy being shopped because the Bruins are figuring Seguin will be their guy on Friday? Is Savvy being shopped at all or is it just a bunch of ridiculous rumors out there? The Horton rumors proved to be true however. This blogger is still hoping for a Thomas trade. The Bruins could do some nice things with their blueline if Timmy's $5M cap hit was off the books.

Horton has had flashes of brilliance over the years, but has mostly been disappointing given his pedigree (3rd overall pick in 2003 behind Marc-Andre Fleury and Eric Staal). It is troublesome that the Bruins brought in a guy with a penchant for taking nights off, but then again, they got rid of one too. They are also married to him for the next three years so here's hoping that playing in front of a full house in a better hockey market will motivate the kid (turned 25 last month) to bring his game on a consistent basis. Over the years, when watching him, I've alternated between "this kid will be next year's breakout star" and "did Nathan Horton play tonight?"

Psychologically, Wideman had to go. He wasn't going to succeed here again which is a shame because he was so good two years ago. Peter had to do this and I'm surprised he found a way to be honest. This is how trades get done - when two GM's have guys they want to get rid of that fit the other's needs (and Peter can throw in a valuable 15th overall draft selection). That's why I was hoping Paul Holmgren wanted to get rid of Jeff Carter because it's obvious they need goaltending. Now if you look for trading partners for Thomas it would be to net a top 4 defenseman one way or another.

Late-breaking news has it that next year's cap number will increase which is great news for the Bruins and will help with their situation on the blueline.