Grab bag: The greatest overtime ever played

In the Friday grab bag:
- Debating the offside review
- What the NHL needs to do about expansion, right now
- Our obscure player is a good Kingston lad
- Comedy stars, which are basically all children this week because no NHL players did anything funny
- And a classic YouTube clip to remind us of how great the Rangers/Islanders rivalry used to be

>> Read the full post at Vice Sports

Signs you've hired a bad advanced stats guy

Needs sharpening.

The NHL’s summer of analytics continued this week, with the Edmonton Oilers becoming the latest in a long line of teams to add an advanced stats expert to their staff.

High-profile stats guys like Eric Tulsky, Tyler Dellow and Sunny Mehta have all been hired in recent months, with even the notoriously old-school Maple Leafs finally jumping on the bandwagon. And that’s just the hirings that have been made public – that there have reportedly been plenty more that have gone on behind-the-scenes. We’re suddenly in the middle of an all-out stats hiring frenzy, and if you’re an NHL team and that hasn’t hired an analytics guy lately, you’re feeling the pressure to catch up.

Of course, that has the potential to create some problems, since there are only so many elite hockey minds to go around. With a shrinking supply of truly qualified experts left, some teams that are scrambling to fill out their analytics department could end up hiring the wrong candidate.

That would be a shame, so I’m here to help. If you’re an NHL executive who’s recently brought on a brand new stats guru, here are some signs that you may have made a hiring mistake.

• No matter which player’s data you plug into his top secret proprietary formula, the result always just spells out BOOBIES on his calculator.
  
  
• He keeps making rudimentary and obvious errors, like relying on +/- or failing to consider quality of competition or giving $30 million to Andrew MacDonald.
  
  
• He designed a fancy database to crunch the numbers on every major trade made by any NHL team over the past few years, but it keeps crashing whenever it gets to Winnipeg because it can’t divide by zero.

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Grab Bag: More than a team

In the season' final grab bag (no really this time) (maybe):
- My picks for the five best and five worst FA signings
- The worst obscure player contract ever
- Did Don Cherry receive the Order of Canada?
- Comedy all-stars
- And the 1989-90 Washington Capitals lip synch their way through the legendarily awful anthem "More Than a Team"

>> Read the full post on Grantland

Ten key free agency questions

July 1 has traditionally been a day full of questions for hockey fans. Questions like: “Wait, he got how much?” And, “for how many years?” And, “are you joking right now?” And, “has everyone in this league lost their damn minds?”

Welcome to NHL free agency, which officially begins today at noon ET. In honor of the occasion, here are 10 more important questions to consider as we count down to the opening of the vaults.

1. How much did Thomas Vanek cost himself?

When Vanek signs a deal, which he’ll likely do early on today, he’ll be joining his fourth team in the last calendar year. He started the 2013-14 season with the Buffalo Sabres, and finished it with the Montreal Canadiens.

In between came a four-month stint with the Islanders, who gave up a hefty package to pry him out of Buffalo. They reportedly offered the pending free agent a seven-year, $50 million deal to stay in New York, but were turned down and eventually had to recoup some of their losses by sending Vanek to Montreal. The star winger went on to post a disappointing playoff run that had some questioning his work ethic and suggesting that he’d torpedoed his value.

This week, we’ll find out just how much Vanek cost himself. While it’s hard to imagine that he’ll get anything approaching the Islanders’ offer, he’s still in line for a big payday. ESPN’s Pierre LeBrun reported yesterday that up to 10 teams had made contact with the Vanek camp. One of those teams is Minnesota, which has been widely assumed to be Vanek’s preferred destination all along (he was a member of the Gophers squad that won a national championship in 2003). The Wild reportedly don’t want to offer a long-term deal, but Vanek may be willing to take fewer years for the right fit.

Of course, that could all go out the window if somebody decides to break the bank on a player who, it should be remembered, has been one of the highest-scoring wingers in hockey in recent years. He almost certainly won’t get Islander money, but somebody somewhere will be ready to pay up.

2. Where does Ryan Miller land?

The last time we had a Ryan Miller Watch, it was in an attempt to figure out which team would make a midseason trade for him. That team ended up being the Blues, which pulled off a blockbuster with the Sabres to bring in the former Vezina winner as what they hoped would be the final piece of a Stanley Cup puzzle.

We know how that turned out — after a strong start in St. Louis, Miller struggled down the stretch and the Blues coughed up the division title before going out in the first round against Chicago. That wasn’t all Miller’s fault, of course, but it was enough to convince the Blues to move on.

That leaves Miller as the top name available in today’s goaltending market. But that market is suddenly a very tight one, with few teams actually in need of a starter right now. And that has left Miller with far fewer options than you might have expected considering how much demand there was for his services just a few months ago.

One possibility that makes a lot of sense is Vancouver, and Miller has reportedly been visiting with the Canucks this week. If that deal doesn’t happen, it’s hard to find too many fits elsewhere around the league. The Sharks, Wild, or even the Penguins could be looking to shake things up in goal. The Flames could use help, and the Hurricanes could, too, if they find a taker for Cam Ward (which they won’t). But all of those scenarios come with question marks. And don’t forget that Jonas Hiller, another good goaltender with a strong résumé as a starter, is also available.

The betting here is that Miller works something out with the Canucks, but if those talks fall apart, he could be in for a long week.

>> Read the full post on Grantland

Is this the worst it's ever been? Part four

Randy Carlyle attempts to remember
what a smile feels like

Almost six years ago, the Maple Leafs were in a bad place. They'd missed the playoffs for a team record three straight years. The Muskoka Five situation had just unfolded. They'd fired John Ferguson Jr., but failed in their efforts to lure Brian Burke out of Anaheim. And fans were starting to wonder: Is this the worst it's ever been?

So I decided to find out. In what would go on to become one of the most popular set of posts from this blog's first year, I went back to 1983 and reviewed a quarter century of Maple Leafs misery, assigning a "How bad was it?" score to each season.

• Part one: the reign of Harold Ballard
  
• Part two: the Fletcher and Quinn years
  
• Part three: The JFJ era

The conclusion: Yes, it really was the worst that it had ever been. With a final score of 95/100, the just-completed 2007-08 season took the crown as the worst in recent Leafs history.

But that was a long time ago. In the years since, I've often heard from fans wanting to know when I'd update the series with entries from the Burke/Nonis era. I always figured I'd know when the time was right. Today, with news of Randy Carlyle's contract extension, I think that time has arrived.

And so, six seasons later, it's time for the sequel. Welcome to part four, as we try to answer the question: Is this the worst it's ever been?

2008-09

The good: The Leafs fail to hire a GM during the summer like they said they would, and head into the season with Cliff Fletcher still in charge. But it turns out to be all part of a master plan, as Brian Burke mysteriously becomes available a month into the season and is hired after all. He gives an entertaining press conference that introduces the word "truculence" to the sports world, and eventually has his own guys in place, like Ron Wilson and Dave Nonis. He also outbids Ottawa for college free agent Tyler Bozak, who projects as a possible third-liner someday.

The bad: Before Burke arrives, Fletcher makes a series of odd moves, like trading up to draft Luke Schenn, signing Jeff Finger and trading away Alex Steen. He also fails to get anything for Mats Sundin's negotiating rights, and gives the Habs a second round pick for some punk kid named Mikhail Grabovski.

The team struggles through another non-playoff year, finishing last in the Northeast while leading the NHL in goals allowed. Jason Blake is the team's leading scorer. The goaltending, led by Vesa Toskala and Curtis Joseph, is terrible. Burke should probably get to work on fixing that.

Sundin eventually signs with the Canucks, then comes back to Toronto and beats the Leafs with a shootout-winning goal. It's pretty much the highlight of the season.

How bad was it? 75/100. The team is terrible, but at least Burke seems to have a plan. For the first time in years, there's a palpable feeling of hope.

2009-10

The good: The Leafs draft Nazem Kadri, leading to one of the great draft floor moments of all time. In September, Burke trades three draft picks to the Bruins for Phil Kessel. Despite missing the first month, Kessel scores 30 goals andeveryone agrees that the deal will be a good one for the Leafs as long as the draft pick doesn't end up being unexpectedly high, like tenth.

Later in the season, Burke acquired Dion Phaneuf in exchange for a handful of spare parts, and also manages to somehow offload both Toskala and Jason Blake's contract.

The bad: Burke signs a ton of free agents, pretty much all of whom are expensive busts. The team loses its first eight games and is basically eliminated from the playoffs by Halloween. Toskala and rookie Jonas Gustavsson provide the team with almost historically bad goaltending, and as the season wears on, it becomes apparent that the Leafs could finish dead last and hand the Bruins the #1 overall pick. They avoid that, narrowly, but finish 29th instead.

How bad was it? 90/100. Just an awful year. Among the many, many awful elements of this season was the nagging feeling that Burke wasn't as smart as we'd all hoped he was, and the next few years was just going to be more of the same. But the Phaneuf trade inspired just enough confidence to keep this year out of "worst ever" contention.

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Beyond the DMV: Other ways NHL stars get preferential treatment

They told him he couldn't smile for his license photo,
so he thought about Marc-Andre Fleury in the playoffs

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It's August and there's not much happening in the NHL, which means it's time for the hockey world to find something completely harmless and blow it up into a manufactured controversy. Luckily, Sidney Crosby was kind enough to get the ball rolling for us.

In what's become a major story in Pittsburgh, Crosby was apparently allowed to skip to the front of the line at a local DMV over the weekend. This has led to accusations of preferential treatment and has some fans painting Crosby as a diva who can't be bothered to follow the same rules as everyone else.

It's all nonsense, of course. Expecting a celebrity to sit and wait for an hour while getting mobbed by fans would be silly. And besides, it's not like Crosby is the only NHL player who occasionally gets to experience the benefits of fame.

In fact, sources tell me that some of the biggest names in the hockey world often get special treatment:

Roberto Luongo - The managers at the moving supplies store never call security on him even though he goes in once a day to randomly yell "No I don't need any packing tape or boxes today thanks!" and then runs out of the room crying.

Dustin Byfuglien - Managers at the local grocery store have confirmed that they would let him cut in front of the other customers in the checkout line, in theory, if he ever left any food behind for anyone else to buy.

Alexander Ovechkin - Cops are always letting him off the hook for making illegal turns, since it's not like anyone could reasonably be expected to remember the difference between left and right.

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