The ten most successful midseason goalie trades of the cap era, ranked

You can’t trade for a good goaltender during the season.

It’s become conventional wisdom in the NHL’s cap era, and it’s not hard to see why. If your team finds itself needing a goaltender, you’re almost by definition dealing from a position of weakness, so prices will be high. And the market is never all that exciting, for the simple reason that contending teams aren’t trading their goalies, and bad teams are usually bad because their goaltending stinks to begin with. So if find yourself needing an upgrade in net, you’re better off waiting for the offseason.

You’re hearing it again this year, as teams like Edmonton, Buffalo and Colorado could be in the market for a goalie, and teams like Boston, Columbus or Dallas could be shopping one. You’d think there could be a match there somewhere, but apparently not, we’re told. Reigning Vezina winner Marc-Andre Fleury? Sure, it sounds nice in theory, but those deals just don’t work out in the middle of a season.

The classic example is Ryan Miller. He was a fantastic goaltender, one who won nearly 400 games while building a resume that might get him into the Hall of Fame discussion. He won a Vezina in Buffalo, had a solid run in Vancouver, and finished his career as a dependable veteran option in Anaheim. But in the middle of all of that, there was the 2013-14 season, when the Sabres made Miller the rare star goaltender to hit the midseason trade market. The Blues won the bidding war, only to see Miller struggle down the stretch on the way to a first-round exit that spelled the end of his brief stint in St. Louis. The deal is widely viewed as a bust for the Blues, and as the cautionary example that midseason goalie trades are futile.

Except… what about when they’re not?

We can listen to GMs complain about how hard their job is, and we can hold up the Miller trade to prove them right. But the reality is that there have been several mid-season goalie trades during the cap era that worked out just fine. A few of them worked out great.

That seems like the sort of thing that calls for a ranking. So today, we’re going to look back on ten mid-season goalie trades that worked out best for the team making them. We’re looking for NHL goalies here, not prospects, which is to say that we want guys who played at least one big league game for each team that year. Trades only, not waivers (sorry Ilya Bryzgalov and Michael Leighton). And we’ll look at both the immediate impact a trade had on that season as well as whether the guy stuck around.

We’ll count down ten through one, based on a strict criteria of me just making this up as I go. And we’ll start with one that I didn’t even remember until I started digging into the research…

10. Cristobal Huet to Washington in 2008

The goalie: Huet was always a longshot to have an NHL impact. He was drafted in the seventh round in 2001 at the age of 25, and had a couple of solid years with the Kings. But a trade to the Habs during the 2004 offseason opened the door to more playing time, and he ended up leading the NHL in save percentage during the 2005-06 season. He was named to the all-star team in 2006-07, and was on his way to another strong year as the 2008 deadline approached.

The trade: With a young Carey Price emerging, the Canadiens sent Huet to the Capitals for a second-round pick.

The results: Huet took over the Caps’ starter job from a struggling Olaf Kolzig and played well enough down the stretch to get them into the playoffs by two points. They’d go on to lose to the Flyers in seven in the opening round, although Huet was fine. There was no long playoff run and Huet left as a UFA in the offseason, so this deal was hardly earth-shattering. But you could make a good case that it was the difference between the Capitals making or missing the playoffs.

9. Mike Smith to Tampa Bay in 2008

The goalie: Long before he was the 39-year-old expected to save the Oilers season, Smith was a promising 25-year-old goalie with 44 career appearances. He’d played well, even making the all-rookie team in 2007.

The trade: On the very same day as the Huet trade, the Stars included Smith in a package that also featured Jussi Jokinen, Jeff Halpern and a pick to pry Brad Richards and Johan Holmqvist away from the Lightning.

The results: Smith struggled when he first arrived in Tampa, but established himself as the starter for most of the next three years. In all, we won over 100 games for the rebuilding Lightning, helping them get back to the playoffs. He’d depart as a free agent in 2011, leaving the Lightning with a need for a new long-term goaltender that they’d end up addressing a little later in this list.

>> Read the full post at The Athletic

(Want to read this post on The Athletic for free? Sign up for a free trial.)

The 10 types of player/team reunions, and how often they work

Last week, we celebrated Valentines Day by encouraging you to break up. When things aren’t working out for a player on your favorite team, sometimes it’s best to just say goodbye, even if that means all sorts of ugly drama.

But there’s another side to that coin. Sometimes, two sides go their separate ways and then realize that they shouldn’t have. Often, that just leads to regret. But every now and then, everyone can swallow their pride and get back together.

That happens fairly often in the NHL. We saw it last week, when the Senators reacquired Ryan Dzingel. And we apparently came close to a much bigger example, with reports that the Penguins had given serious consideration to a reunion with Marc-Andre Fleury.

That one feels a little too perfect, and it might seem like it would inevitably work out great for everyone involved. But that’s now always how these things go, and getting back with an ex isn’t always the smartest move. Sometimes, it’s best to leave the memories alone.

So today, let’s sort through some complicated feelings about reconciliation by looking back through NHL history at some of the times that a star player has returned to familiar territory. We’ll divide them into 10 different categories, and see if some have better outcomes than others. (Spoiler alert: They do.)

The Final Bow

We’ll start with one of the most common reunions. In this case, a player spends a big chunk of their career establishing themselves as a star with a team. For whatever reason, they end up leaving, and maybe have success elsewhere. But then time catches up, and they find themselves at the tail end of their career, with maybe another season or two left in the tank.

They’re not a star like they once were, at least in any real sense beyond name value, but they can still contribute something. With the clock ticking on their career and (often) dwindling options for where to land next, they head back to the scene of their greatest success for what will probably be one last run. Not to win a Cup, since the team is bad, but just to close the door in a way that feels right.

Notable examples: Glenn Anderson in Edmonton, Curtis Joseph in Toronto, Rob Blake in Los Angeles, Kevin Lowe in Edmonton

If you’re not a fan of those teams, you might not even remember any of those comebacks. But that’s kind of the point – they’re for the player and the fan base, and nobody else even needs to know.

How it usually ends: They don’t put up great numbers, because they just can’t anymore, and the team isn’t very good. But nobody really cares, because sometimes it’s just nice to have a familiar face back in the fold.

Unfinished Business

A modified version of the The Final Bow, this category is another that sees a player return to a former team late in his career. But this time, while the player may not be the star he was in his prime, he’s returning to a contender. This isn’t about a bad team getting some sympathy PR by bringing back a familiar name. Instead, it’s a good team with Stanley Cup aspirations bringing back a name from the past as, they hope, one of the final pieces of a championship puzzle.

Notable examples: Doug Gilmour in Toronto, Dave Andreychuk in Buffalo, Justin Williams in Carolina, Sandis Ozolinsh in San Jose, Dominik Hasek in Detroit, Denis Savard in Chicago, Rick Tocchet in Phialdelphia

Also, Michal Handzus in Chicago at the 2013 deadline, although I’m not sure he really counts since he’d only played a few games there the first time.

How it usually ends: There are a wide range of outcomes here. Hasek and Handzus won Cups, albeit in diminished roles. Williams helped the Hurricanes get back to the playoffs, and they had a nice run. At the other end of the spectrum, Gilmour blew out in knee in his first game back with the Leafs and never played again. In between, you just hope the returning player will occasionally show you a few flashes of what they were in their prime, and maybe help you win a key game or two.

Unfinished Business, except it’s the Devils

Yeah, they get their own category.

>> Read the full post at The Athletic

(Want to read this post on The Athletic for free? Sign up for a free trial.)

The Leafs are the Best: An oral history of ‘The Passion Returns’ VHS video

“This has been… an unbelievable… turn of events!”

If you’re a Maple Leafs fan of a certain age, you know the moment. Those words conjure it instantly. They belong to Bob Cole, and they came from the immediate aftermath of Nikolai Borschevsky’s Game 7 overtime goal against the Red Wings on May 1, 1993. You can hear Cole’s voice, probably picture Borschevsky getting bear-hugged by Wendel Clark, or Cliff Fletcher’s ear-to-ear grin, or Brian Papineau going nuts with a water bottle. You’re right back in the moment, all these years later.

If you’re not a Leafs fan, your eyes have already rolled deep into the back of your head.

Look, I hear you. That 1993 run didn’t end with a Stanley Cup, or even a trip to the Final. But Leaf fans won’t shut up about it. Almost three decades later, they – ok fine, we – still go on and on about that season. It’s the most beloved Leafs team since the Original Six days, and it’s not even close. If you’re a fan of another team, you might be completely confused.

But if you’re a Leafs fan, you get it. And here is something else you almost certainly got: A copy of a VHS tape called The Passion Returns that came out later that year. You probably got it for Christmas, and had watched it a dozen times by New Years. And you know, to this day, that it is a masterpiece.

Everything about The Passion Returns is just about perfect, from the overly dramatic opening credits, to the heavy dose of early-90s dance music, to the heartstring-tugging epilogue after they lose to the Kings. It’s so over the top. The Leafs weren’t the only team to make a season-in-review tape in the ‘80s and ‘90s to commemorate a season where they didn’t even win anything (no really, save your punchlines, your team probably had one too). They were just the only team to reach the absolute peak of the art form.

It really was, as a wise man once said, an unbelievable turn of events. But how did this thing get made? And why? And why does it still resonate with so many Leafs fans, even almost three decades later?

We decided to find out, by talking to the people who made the tape, the faces that appeared on it, and the fans who loved every minute of it. And along the way, we’re also going to talk about a very unfortunate haircut, and, yes, whatever the hell that music video was.

————————–

The Toronto sports and media landscape in October 1992 would be unrecognizable to many fans today. The Argonauts were a year removed from playing home games in front of 50,000 people at SkyDome. The Raptors didn’t exist. The Blue Jays — who before the month’s end would claim their first World Series championship — were unquestionably the toast of the town, if not the entire country.

The Maple Leafs? After missing the playoffs earlier that spring, expectations were low entering the 1992-93 NHL season, despite the addition of Pat Burns behind the bench and the prospect of a full season with Doug Gilmour as their No. 1 centre.

Damien Cox, Toronto Star Maple Leafs beat reporter in ’92-’93, author, The Last Good Year: Seven Games that ended An Era: My expectations were not very high. It’s hard to explain to people now, but they really weren’t even a consideration to be a playoff team… we’re not even talking Stanley Cup. When the season started that year, they still didn’t have Dave Andreychuk. They had Grant Fuhr. Bits and pieces, but not anything solid. Gilmour wasn’t a superstar at that time. I don’t think there were any expectations at all.

Sean McIndoe, high school student in ’92-’93: I remember there being a little bit of optimism at the start of the season because they’d been OK down the stretch after the Gilmour trade. And more importantly, Pat Burns was going to come in and finally teach them how to play defense. Then they went out for the home opener and lost 6-5 and it was like, OK, yep, same old Leafs.

On television, every Maple Leafs game was produced by Molstar Communications, a subsidiary of Molson Brewery, who owned both the NHL’s national Canadian broadcast rights and the Maple Leafs regional rights. Regional games were aired on the Global Television Network across southern Ontario, while CBC carried national Leafs games on Hockey Night in Canada.

One Molstar employee in the fall of 1992 was 34-year-old, Mark Askin. Entering his seventh year producing games for Molstar on both CBC and Global, and as a lifelong, long-suffering Leafs fan, the Toronto native would bring a unique perspective to his work during the season, and in the summer of ’93 once tasked with a special assignment…

Mark Askin, senior producer with Molstar in ’92-’93: I grew up a Leafs fans. I remembered the night the Leafs won in ‘67. I remember the night Bobby Baun scored, I watched it on TV with my dad. My uncle and dad kept payments on season tickets. We’d go down in section 67, row B, seats 11 and 12. Fifteen-to-20 times a year. They were the highlights of my year.

In 1992, pre-internet, newspapers were at the peak of their power in terms of their ability to shape opinion and distribute information. TSN was the only 24/7 sports network in town. Toronto’s first all-sports radio station, The Fan 1430, was a month old when the Leafs season began.

Cox: There was a bit of rivalry between the baseball media and the hockey media and the baseball media were riding high. The CFL was looking south (for expansion), Rocket Ismail had come north. A lot of attention was on the States and in some people’s minds, baseball had become the preeminent sport (in Toronto). (Harold) Ballard had only recently died. By then you were 15 years of (the Leafs) being run into the ground and the Blue Jays were this professional organization with the biggest payroll in baseball. The Leafs were in a lot of ways, a joke.

McIndoe: I know it sounds crazy to today’s fans, but it’s true. The Leafs mattered, but the Blue Jays ruled. They weren’t just winning, they were signing all the top free agents and making the Yankees and Red Sox cry about how unfair it was that Toronto had all the money. And the town was going crazy for all of it. Then you looked at the Leafs and thought “Man, what if they got good too?”

Led by Doug Gilmour’s Leafs record 127 points, and a Jack Adams-winning performance from Burns behind the bench, the Leafs exceeded every pre-season prognostication by posting 99-points, good for third in the Norris Division behind the Chicago Blackhawks (106 points) and Detroit Red Wings (103). Despite finishing just four points back of Detroit, the Leafs were big underdogs entering their first-round series against the Red Wings and the league’s No. 1 offence.

Doug Gilmour, Maple Leafs forward in ’92-’93: People forget what you did in the regular season. People remember what you do in the playoffs.

Mark Osborne, Maple Leafs forward in ’92-’93: We were the underdogs. And yet there was a belief that because of Burnsie and our style of play that something positive would result of it.

Cox: Detroit was such a powerhouse or an evolving powerhouse. Toronto was not in the same class back then. Once the Leafs won Games 3 and 4, you went ‘holy shit.’ Even in Game 7, nobody thought they were going to win. Maybe they did, I don’t know. But once they beat Detroit, everything changed.

McIndoe: On paper, beating a team that was four points ahead of you shouldn’t feel like a giant upset. But these were the Leafs, so we all knew they weren’t going to pull it off. Then they did, and suddenly you looked around and the Hawks were out, the Smythe didn’t have a powerhouse for once, and you were like, ‘Wait a second, something could happen here.’

>> Read the full post at The Athletic

(Want to read this post on The Athletic for free? Sign up for a free 90-day trial.)

Grab Bag: The great goalie equipment debate of 2018 (and 1998)

In the Friday Grab Bag:
- Goalies don't like the new equipment rules, and think the changes are unsafe. OK. So now what?
- What may be my most petty Trivial Annoyance ever
- An obscure player with a ridiculously fake name
- The week's three comedy stars
- And a look back on the NHL's 1998 goalie summit, where they can really close to almost kind of doing something about the equipment

>> Read the full post at The Athletic

A look back at the classic Kings/Leafs game seven, 25 years later

The Stanley Cup final got underway last night, with the Vegas Golden Knights making their first appearance in franchise history. That’s not bad for a team that didn’t even have a roster one year ago. And it might suggest that making it all the way to the final isn’t all that big of a challenge.

As a counter-point, we have the Toronto Maple Leafs.

The Leafs, of course, haven’t been to a Cup final since 1967, a fact that serves as a source of angst for Toronto fans and a source of non-stop punchlines for just about everyone else. But while the team has occasionally been known to take a decade off every now and then, there have been times when the Leafs came close to ending their drought. And they were never closer than they were exactly a quarter-century ago.

Today marks the 25th anniversary of one of the most memorable games in modern Maple Leafs history: Game 7 of the 1993 Western Conference final against the Los Angeles Kings. The game took place on a Saturday night at Maple Leaf Gardens, and saw the Leafs face Wayne Gretzky and the Kings for the right to play the Montreal Canadiens for the Stanley Cup.

It did not go well for Toronto, with the Kings earning a 5–4 win to punch their ticket to the first final in franchise history. You knew that, of course. But to mark today’s anniversary, let’s look back at that game with 10 fun facts about that historic night. Well, “fun” here will be relative — if you’re a Maple Leafs fan, some of these memories won’t be all that much fun at all. But you’re used to that, so let’s dive in.

1. The Hockey Night in Canada broadcast started with the single greatest montage in hockey history

The pregame montage is a tricky thing. You want to get fans hyped for the game they’re about to see, but not go so far that you oversell it. You want to set a dramatic tone without drifting into the histrionic or maudlin. You want to relive all the key moments in the series so far, highlighting the main characters and unresolved storylines. You want, if at all possible, to use the theme music from the move Hoosiers.

Some montages work, some don’t. The one that ran in the moments before Game 7 was a masterpiece of the genre. So before we get into what happened that night, let’s set the stage:

OK, I’m ready to start flipping over cars. Let’s get to the game. (Spoiler alert: This is about where the good news ends for Leafs fans.)

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet

Assembling the NHL's all-time snub team

With the all-star rosters announced last week, everyone has spent the last few days compiling their lists of snubs. That’s pretty much an annual tradition at this point, and it’s all in good fun, even though a lot of the “snubs” are players who probably didn’t want to go in the first place.

But what if we aimed a little higher? What’s the best all-time roster you could assemble out of players who went their entire career without ever being recognized with a significant NHL honour?

We’re not talking midseason all-star picks here – with the one-player-per-team rule, those don’t really tell us much about who deserved what. Instead, let’s go with the big stuff. We’re looking for players who went their entire NHL career without ever:

1) Being a finalist for one of the major awards: Hart, Norris, Vezina or Calder; or

2) Being voted a first- or second-team all-star at the end of the season

You can call them the all-snub squad if you want to. Personally, I’m going to go with the Flying Federkos, in honour of the player who pretty much epitomizes the concept. Longtime Blues centre Bernie Federko scored 1,130 points over a 14-year career, which was good enough to get him into the Hall of Fame. But he never finished higher than fourth in all-star voting, and a 10th-place finish in 1986 was his best Hart Trophy showing.

So Federko’s our captain. But without getting ahead of ourselves, he’s not our best player, or even our first-line centre. And he’s far from the only Hall of Famer who’s going to make our squad. Let’s start up front, where there’s plenty of firepower to go around.

(All award-voting data comes from the invaluable Hockey Reference site.)

—

FIRST LINE

Centre: Ron Francis

Yes, despite a 22-season career that left him holding down spots in the all-time top five for points, assists and games played, Francis qualifies for our team. He did win some secondary honours, such as a Selke and three Lady Byngs. But he was never a post-season all-star, and never even finished in the top five in Hart voting.

How is that possible for a guy widely regarded as an all-time legend? For one, Francis was a two-way player, and they often don’t get the respect they deserve. But the bigger problem here can be summed up in two words: Gretzky and Lemieux. The two greatest centres of all time dominated the ’80s and early ’90s, leaving players like Francis and Federko — whose career overlapped theirs — with a tough path to recognition.

Winger: Mike Gartner

Despite finishing as one of only seven members of the 700-goal club, Gartner never earned so much as a single Hart Trophy vote during an 18-season career. And his best finish in all-star voting was fourth, which he managed twice.

Winger: Glenn Anderson

We’ll finish off our first line with another Hall of Fame winger who never received a Hart vote. It’s not hard to see why — during the Oilers glory years, Anderson was typically only the fourth-best forward on his own team. He came close to earning an all-star spot in 1986, but finished just behind Mats Naslund for second-team honours. It was one of five top-five finishes in Anderson’s career.

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet

Saturday storylines: Let's take it outside

Who wants a cold one? Tonight marks the return of outdoor hockey, as the Ottawa Senators and Montreal Canadiens meet at Lansdowne Park. It’s also a rare Saturday night without the Toronto Maple Leafs or Vancouver Canucks, while the three remaining Canadian teams get a tour of the Central.

HNIC Game of the Night: Canadiens at Senators

There isn’t much question over where most of the attention will be turned tonight, as the Habs and Sens take it outside at Lansdowne Park in what’s been dubbed the NHL 100 Classic. The game commemorates the meeting between the Canadiens and the original Senators in one of the first two NHL games ever played, way back on Dec. 19, 1917.

But while you can expect to see plenty of history on display, we can forgive these two teams if they’re focused squarely on the present. That’s especially true for the Senators, who desperately need a win to build some momentum after a brutal few weeks that’s seen them lose 12 of 14 to plummet well out of the playoff race. With rumours swirling of major changes on the way – and their GM being forced to deny that he’s about to fire the coach – the Senators are a team that desperately needs to start making up some ground.

They took the first step towards that on Wednesday with a win over the New York Rangers. The two points were important, but the way they were earned them may have mattered even more. Craig Anderson looked strong, Bobby Ryan was a force, Zack Smith finally scored and Matt Duchene may have earned his most important point as a Senator.

Almost as important: With a win under their belt, the Senators can now enjoy hosting the franchise’s first outdoor game, or at least go through the process without feeling like they can’t so much as smile. Still, the timing of tonight’s event isn’t ideal.

Between the losing, Erik Karlsson’s contract comments, a push for a new arena and rumours around ownership, conventional wisdom would say that the last thing this team would seem to need right now is even more distractions. But on the other hand, maybe that’s exactly what they could use. There are worse ways for an NHL team to forget its troubles than by getting out under the lights for a little pond hockey. And if a big crowd inspires Ottawa to collect a win against a division rival it’s chasing in the playoff hunt, even better.

Or they faceplant in front of a national audience. There’s that possibility too.

As for the Canadiens, their up-and-down season continues to defy any attempt at analysis. They lost three straight before beating the Devils on Thursday, falling back out of a playoff spot they’d climbed into possession of last week. The way things have been going this year, that means it’s time for everyone to write them off, at which point they’ll run off another win streak and surge back up the standings.

Outdoor games are always tough to predict – the puck bounces even more than usual, the weather can affect different players in different ways, and the whole endeavour often feels like it’s taking place as a separate piece of its own instead of as part of a larger season. For these two teams right now, that might be a good thing. The league might want tonight to be all about the past, but if the Sens and Habs can’t start banking wins soon, their playoff hopes might be history.

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet

Saturday Storylines: The Jets get their shot

We’re into double digits as we hit the 10th weekend of the NHL season. We’ve got a dozen games on tap, starting in the afternoon and lasting through a trio of late starts. Here’s what to watch for.

HNIC Game of the Night: Jets at Lightning

The Jets are in the middle of what’s been easily their best season since returning to the NHL in 2011. It might be taking a run at 1984–85 for the best Jets season ever, period. That’s not an especially high bar, but Winnipeg fans probably aren’t too worried about nitpicking right now, because for most of the year this team has been all sorts of fun.

Even after losing two straight to start this road trip, the Jets are still locked in a three-team race for top spot in the Central. But if there’s been a knock against them, it’s one we covered a few weeks back: they haven’t earned many signature wins. They had that one blowout over the Penguins, and they beat the Pacific-leading Kings, but for the most part their wins have come against a long list of also-rans and quasi-contenders.

That’s not entirely their fault, since in today’s parity-soaked NHL almost every opponent will be an also-ran or quasi-contender. But tonight, the Jets get their shot at an unambiguous Cup favourite when they face the first-place-overall Lightning.

Tampa’s been dominating the power rankings so far this year, ours included, and it’s not hard to see why. They’re stacked with talent, they score a ton, and they’re racking up wins. And they’re earning them — they’re the only team in the league right now that’s outscoring the opposition by better than a goal a game. They’re good.

The Jets are good, too, but you can forgive the hockey world for being a little bit slower to buy in. That could change with a strong showing tonight. We won’t go crazy and use words like “potential Stanley Cup final preview” here, but we reserve the right to change our mind if the Jets can go into Tampa and dominate.

And if seeing how the young Jets match up with the Lightning isn’t enough proof for any skeptics out there, stand by. Next weekend brings a home-and-home showdown with the Blues, and that’s followed by a game against the Predators. The Central picture is about to get a whole lot clearer, and for once the Jets have a chance to control how they fit into it.

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet

Podcast: Final countdown

In this week's episode of Biscuits, the Vice Sports hockey podcast:
- Dave and I relive one of the best game sevens in recent memory
- Seriously, we don't complain for like ten straight minutes
- Where do the Senators go from here?
- We look ahead to what could be a great Stanley Cup final matchup
- Just touch the conference final trophy
- Reader questions, featuring meat, bacon and media fist fights

>> Stream it now on Vice Sports

>> Or, subscribe on iTunes.

Five reasons why tonight's game seven will definitely be won by the Senators (or Penguins)

The Ottawa Senators came through on Tuesday night, holding on for a 2–1 win to stave off elimination and send the Eastern Conference Final back to Pittsburgh. And so, for the third time in this year’s playoffs, fans will be treated to a winner-take-all seventh game.

Who’ll win? We have no idea. In today’s parity-stricken NHL, anyone who tells you that they know who’ll come out on top in a single game is full of it. We’re pretty close to coin-flip territory here, and anything could happen tonight.

But of course, that doesn’t really cut it when it comes to analysis. The rules of sports writing say we’re supposed to dress it all up in absolutes. So let’s break out a gimmick that worked well for last round’s Pittsburgh/Washington showdown, and come up with five reasons why the Penguins are definitely going to win this thing. And then, five more for the Senators.

The Penguins will win because: They’ve been here before

The Penguins most recent Game 7 win came two weeks ago. That was when they went into Washington, shrugged off two straight losses, and drove a stake through the heart of the Capitals franchise. They also beat the Lighting last year in this exact situation: Game 7 on home ice in the Conference Final. And some of these players were around in 2009, when the Penguins won the Stanley Cup in a seventh-game classic with the Red Wings.

By comparison, the Senators most recent Game 7 win came... never. They've literally never had one in the history of the franchise. That seems like it should be impossible given how often Ottawa has been in the playoffs over the years, but here we are. And some of those losses have come in truly heart-breaking fashion.

Granted, most of that is ancient history for today's Senators roster; their last Game 7 came back in 2012. But the point remains: The Penguins roster is packed with guys who've been here before and know what it takes to win a do-or-die game. Most of the Senators have never played in a Game 7 at all, and a few of the ones who have won't want to remember how it turned out.

If you believe that big-game experience matters, this one is as easy a call as they come.

The Senators will win because: They're just about the perfect Game 7 road team

We always hear teams talk about how you play all season long to earn home ice in a Game 7. And sure, home teams have historically had an edge in a seventh-game situation. That's good news for the Penguins.

But not all road teams are created equal, and the Senators are just about the ideal team to go into an opponent's building and shut down the party. Much has been made about whether Guy Boucher's squad is boring, but that misses the point. In today's NHL, boring wins. And it's just about the perfect style for a big road game.

Maybe the Penguins come out flying and put this one away early. But it's not hard to picture a game where goals are tough to come by, and we're drifting into the second period or beyond still sitting at 0–0 while the crowd gets quiet and everyone starts muttering about how it feels like we're already in overtime. The Senators would be perfectly happy to play that sort of game. It's become Boucher's specialty.

For Clarke MacArthur the plan for game 7 is simple
"Bore them out of the building."

— Shawn McKenzie (@ShawnMcKenzieSN) May 24, 2017

For what it's worth, the Senators haven't won a playoff series on home ice since the opening round in 2007. In the decade since, all five of their series wins have come on the road, including both of this year's. They've been here before. They know what it takes to close out a team in their opponent's building. And if they need to, they're perfectly willing to be boring to do it.

The Penguins will win because: They've been the better team

It's the playoffs, so you could argue that wins are all that matter and by that measure these two teams have been equal.

But it's 2017, and we're smarter than that. We know that the scoreboard doesn't tell us everything, and by just about every other metric, the Penguins have been the best team in this series. They're outshooting the Senators by over five shots a game. They're dominating possession. Their special teams have been far better. And even if you want to be old-school and only point at the scoreboard, they're winning there, too, outscoring the Senators by a half-goal a game over the course of the series.

With the exception of the first period of Game 3, which featured several fluky goals, it's hard to point to any sustained stretch in this series in which the Senators have clearly been better. Meanwhile, in the last two games, Pittsburgh won a 7–0 blowout and followed that up with a dominant 46-shot performance on Tuesday.

Being the better team doesn't guarantee anything in today's NHL. But the Penguins are playing well enough to win, and they know it.

The Senators will win because: They have the best player

This sounds crazy. The Penguins have Sidney Crosby, the consensus top player in the world. They have the best player in every series they play, and will right up until they face Connor McDavid and the Oilers in the Stanley Cup final a few years down the road.

But this isn't about the best player in the big picture. It's about right now. And in the 2017 playoffs, Erik Karlsson has been better than Crosby and everyone else. If he can be that player tonight, the Penguins aren't likely to have an answer for him.

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet

Round two preview

Welcome to Round 2 of the NHL playoffs. It arrived a bit early, since the hockey gods cruelly deprived us of so much as a single Game 7 in the opening round, but we're happy to have it anyway.

The action gets underway tonight with the Western Conference, and tomorrow night with the Eastern Conference. And the previewing gets underway right now.

Western Conference

For years, the Western Conference has been the NHL's better half. That wasn't the case this year, and with the conference's two best teams in terms of regular season points already done, the path to the final is wide open.

Pacific Division: #1 Anaheim Ducks vs. #2 Edmonton Oilers

In this corner: The Ducks (46-23-13, 105 points, +23 goals differential not counting shootouts), who should be well-rested after sweeping aside the Flames in four games.

And in this corner: The Oilers (47-26-9, 103 points, +36), making their first postseason appearance since 2006. They went all the way to the final that year, in case you were wondering.

Head-to-head: The Oilers won three of five.

Dominant narrative: The up-and-coming Oilers face a veteran team whose window may be closing. If that sounds familiar, it was pretty much the same story line we had in the San Jose series. The Ducks' situation isn't quite as urgent as the Sharks', but it's not far off, thanks to an aging core that's locked into some long-term deals. It's not quite "now or never" in Anaheim, but in theory they should have a sense of urgency that the young Oilers may not be able to match.

Injury report: The Oilers are relatively healthy. The Ducks have been missing two key defensemen in Cam Fowler and Sami Vatanen, but it sounds like both men might be back for Game 1, which would be huge.

The big question: Does momentum matter in the playoffs? If so, the Oilers could be in trouble, because the Ducks have been just about unstoppable lately. They've won eight straight going back to the regular season, and haven't lost in regulation since March 10.

One player to watch: Ryan Kesler. The Ducks went out and traded for Kesler three years ago (and gave him a big extension that lots of us questioned) for exactly this sort of scenario. He'll be tasked with shutting down Connor McDavid, or at least with preventing him from single-handedly winning the series. It's no easy task, but Kesler earned a Selke nomination for his defensive work this year, and he's been around long enough to know how to target the other team's star. McDavid had four points in the first round, which would be fine for most players but was a disappointment for him. If Kesler can limit him early, frustration could set in.

Key number: 79. That's how many games Edmonton's Cam Talbot has started so far this season, including a league-leading 73 during the regular season. That's well above his previous career high of 53, and this is his first playoff run as a starter. Does he wear down eventually? He was very good against the Sharks with the exception of a Game 4 meltdown in which he gave up five goals on the way to a 7-0 loss.

Prediction: Oilers in six.

Bonus prediction that is oddly specific: At some point, Kesler does something to McDavid that leads to Milan Lucic making a show of wanting to fight him.

>> Read the full post at Vice Sports

Requiem for a hockey trade

Today is trade deadline day, which means you can expect to hear certain words repeated over and over. "Buyers." "Sellers." "Rentals." Those are the key terms on a day filled with bad teams flipping players to good teams in return for future assets.

But back in the old days, there used to be a different term that showed up occasionally on days like today: "Hockey trades."

To be honest, back then we pretty much just called them "trades," and they went something like this: Two teams exchanged players in a deal where both sides were trying to get better. Nobody was throwing in the towel and rebuilding, and nobody was sacrificing future assets for a short-term boost. Just two teams, both trying to improve their rosters right now, and using a trade to do it.

I know. Crazy stuff.

But it did happen. And we even sort of got one Tuesday night -- the Brandon Davidson/David Desharnais deal, while not anyone's idea of a blockbuster, was at least kind of hockey-ish. So today, while we wait for the rental market to heat up, let's look back at five true hockey trades from deadline history where there were no clear buyers and no sellers, just two teams trying to get the best end of a deal.

1989 – Mike Gartner and Larry Murphy for Dino Ciccarelli and Bob Rouse

Let's start back in 1989 with a classic hockey deal. No picks, no prospects, just a forward and a defenseman on each side of the trade.

Oh, and 75% of the deal ended up in the Hall of Fame. That's not bad for a day's work.

The deal saw Capitals GM David Poile trade away Gartner, at the time the franchise's all-time leading scorer, and Murphy, who'd been a Norris finalist less than two years ago. In exchange, the North Stars gave up their top goal-scorer in Ciccarelli and a hard-nosed blueliner in Rouse.

As it turned out, none of the players stuck around in their new homes all that long. Gartner was traded again at the 1990 deadline, and by the time Ciccarelli was dealt to Detroit in 1992, all four players had moved on. Still, at the time this was an impressive blockbuster, and in hindsight it's probably the most star-studded four-player deal in league history.

My favorite part of the lore of this trade: According to reports at the time, it was finalized exactly one minute before the deadline.

>> Read the full post at The Hockey News

The five types of goalie-for-goalie trades

The Maple Leafs traded Jonathan Bernier to the Ducks last week. Toronto moving on from Bernier wasn’t a surprise, but the timing and destination was odd, coming just days after the Leafs and Ducks had hooked up on the Frederik Andersen deal. That’s led to speculation that Bernier was part of the original trade all along, but remained on the Leafs roster long enough for MLSE to pay his signing bonus on July 1.

If so, that would kind of make Bernier-for-Andersen the latest in a long line of goalie-for-goalie trades, albeit it one with some valuable draft picks heading Anaheim’s way. The NHL has a deep history of this sort of deal, and that makes sense; there are only so many goaltenders out there, so it’s understandable that a team trading one away would want to acquire one in return. And as it turns out, those goalie-for-goalie trades often end up falling into some familiar categories.

Today, let’s look back at some of those moves. Note that we’re not looking for trades that simply featured goalies on either side, which will come as a relief to Habs fans dreading another rehashing of the Patrick Roy trade. Instead, we’ll focus on trades in which the goaltenders were either traded for each other straight up, or at least were clearly the primary pieces in the deal.

Here are some of history’s best goalie-for-goalie trades, and the categories they fell into.

The category: The change-of-scenery trade that comes back to haunt one of the teams.

Recent example: Five years ago, the Avalanche and Senators hooked up on a trade that saw Ottawa acquire Craig Anderson in exchange for Brian Elliott. Anderson was just one year removed from a great season, but was struggling badly and seemed headed to unrestricted free agency. So the Avs flipped him for Elliott, who’d yet to impress in limited duty as Ottawa’s starter.

The deal worked out wonderfully for the Senators; Anderson regained his form, signed a new contract, and is still the team’s starter to this day. The Avalanche didn’t fare quite as well; Elliott didn’t do much in Colorado, and was allowed to hit free agency that summer. He signed with the Blues, won the Jennings the very next year, and has been one of the league’s most dependable goaltenders ever since.

(A near-miss in this category: The Capitals trading Michal Neuvirth for Jaroslav Halak in 2014, then almost seeing Neuvirth lead the Flyers to a miracle comeback against them in this year’s playoffs.)

Other examples: Sometimes, a team has no choice but to move on from a goaltender. That was the case in 1988, when Edmonton goalie Andy Moog held out from the team all season. The Oilers finally moved him at the deadline, sending the veteran to Boston for youngster Bill Ranford.

Months later, the two teams faced each other in the Stanley Cup final, with Moog seeing part-time duty while Ranford watched from the bench in an Oilers win. Two years later the teams met again, and this time it was Ranford and Moog going head-to-head. Ranford won the matchup and the Conn Smythe, avenging what he’d seen as poor treatment at the hands of the Bruins.

The lesson: If you’re going to make a goalie-for-goalie trade, make sure it’s with a team that isn’t going to show up in the Cup final any time soon. So, good work there, Ducks.

>> Read the full post at The Hockey News

The five best trade deadlines by eventual Stanley Cup winners

Only one team ever truly “wins” trade deadline day, and it’s the team that goes on to capture the Stanley Cup.

That’s what they say, anyway. It seems like a pretty simplistic way of looking at things, if we’re being honest, since all a GM can ever be realistically asked to do is to put his team in the best possible position to win. Nothing is ever guaranteed in life, and the idea that you’re retroactively wrong to have even tried unless everything works out perfectly seems a little fatalistic.

But either way, there is something special to be said for the GM who swings for the fences at the deadline and then sees it all pay off in a Stanley Cup parade a few months later. So today, let’s give the spotlight over to the few who’ve managed to pull it off. Here are the five best trade deadline week hauls by teams that went on to win the Stanley Cup that same season.

#5: Detroit Red Wings, 1997

The Red Wings have a fascinating trade deadline history. They’ve been good for so long that no team has had more opportunity to load up for deep playoff runs. And since GM Ken Holland virtually never makes deals during the first four months of the season, that leaves the Wings with lots of work to do most years at the deadline.

And they’ve had some big ones, although with mixed results. They landed Matthieu Schneider in 2003 and Robert Lang in 2004, plus Todd Bertuzzi in 2007 and Brad Stuart in 2008. In more recent years they’ve gone after guys like Kyle Quincey, David Legwand, Eric Cole and Marek Zidlicky. And they had one of the greatest “load up and go for it” deadlines of all-time back in 1999, when they pulled off the Chris Chelios blockbuster while also adding a who’s who of grizzled veterans, including Bill Ranford, Ulf Samuelsson and Wendel Clark. But that team didn’t win it all.

Instead, we’ll point back to far simpler deadline. Back in 1997, the Wings (then under the guidance of co-GMs Jimmy Devellano and Scotty Bowman) acquired future Hall of Famer Larry Murphy from the Maple Leafs. That’s it. That was the whole trade. The Leafs were embarking on a youth movement and wanted to unload the 36-year-old Murphy’s hefty salary, so they didn’t bother to ask for anything in return.

They say you can’t get something for nothing, but the Wings proved that wrong. In this case, that “something” turned out to be five more seasons of solid play from Murphy, including back-to-back Stanley Cup runs. It’s hard to do much better than that.

>> Read the full post at The Hockey News

Grab Bag: There is such a thing as too much scoring

In the Friday Grab Bag:
- All these Steven Stamkos to Toronto rumors are stupid. Or are they?
- Should referees target known divers?
- An obscure player drops the gloves with a legendary pacifist
- The week's three comedy stars
- And a YouTube breakdown of the highest scoring game in the history of the NHL, which happened 30 years ago today.

>> Read the full post on ESPN.com

Can the Senators come back?

The NHL playoffs suffered their first casualty last night, as the Anaheim Ducks completed their sweep of the Winnipeg Jets with a 5-2 win. Two more are in danger of joining them on the sideline tonight, as the Predators and Canucks both trail their series 3-1.

But last night also saw our first team to avoid elimination, as the Senators earned a 1-0 Game 4 win at home to prevent a sweep at the hands of the Canadiens. Craig Anderson made 28 saves for the shutout, and Mike Hoffman scored the only goal midway through the third period, beating a screened Carey Price from the top of the faceoff circle. From there, the Senators went into lockdown mode, smothering the Canadiens so effectively that Montreal could barely get Price out for an extra attacker at the end of regulation.

That capped off a choppy, uneven and, if we’re being honest, fairly dull game. How dull? The evening’s most memorable moment probably came when the Senators took a second-period faceoff violation penalty, which was notable only because nobody could seem to remember the rule ever actually being applied before. When you’re spending the second intermission debating faceoff violations, the odds are good that you’re not watching an all-time classic.¹

But that won’t matter much to the Senators, who just needed to escape with a win after falling behind 3-0 in a tight series that had featured three one-goal games, two of which ended in overtime. They’d deserved a better fate, and it would have been hard to blame them if they’d let a sense of discouragement sink in, especially after an opening two periods in which Price looked unbeatable. But after the win, coach Dave Cameron explained that that wasn’t in the team’s nature.

“One of the keys of our team’s success is we say, ‘Stick with it,’” Cameron told Grantland. “Regardless of the score, regardless of who the other team is, regardless of who the other goalie is. That’s all we said after the second period, is, ‘Stick with it.’ And we did, and we got the result we wanted.”

So the Senators are still alive. But can they stay that way? After all, only four teams in NHL history have come back from a 3-0 deficit to win a series. With Game 5 in Montreal, the odds are still stacked heavily against the Senators. Chances are, last night’s win will be remembered simply for delaying the inevitable, if it’s even remembered at all.

But there are at least a few reasons to think that this Senators team might actually be able to pull it off. Not many, granted, but I can come up with five:

Craig Anderson: Andrew Hammond was the talk of the NHL over the final two months, replacing an injured Anderson and going on a history-making hot streak to lead the Senators’ late-season charge. All of that made for a great story, but it also made it easy to forget that Anderson is a pretty accomplished goalie in his own right. And while the Senators kept riding Hammond even after Anderson was healthy enough to play, a shaky first two games of the series prompted a switch back to the veteran.

Since then, Anderson has looked great. He shut the Habs out for 54 minutes in Game 3, before allowing Dale Weise to tie the game and later win it in overtime. Last night, he was able to finish the job. He didn’t have to stand on his head to do it, but he made all the saves when they were needed and is now sitting on a .974 save percentage through two games.

A hot goaltender is the great equalizer in the NHL playoffs, and right now the Senators have one. That gives them a shot.

>> Read the full post on Grantland

Weekend wrap: The trade market heats up

A look back at the biggest games and emerging story lines of the NHL weekend.

Theme of the Week: The Trade Market Wakes Up

We’re now two weeks away from the NHL’s trade deadline, and last week brought us the season’s first major deal. While we’re unlikely to see any moves over the next two weeks that rival that Jets/Sabres blockbuster in terms of size and scope, it stood to reason that the transaction page would start getting busy any day now.

“Any day” turned out to be yesterday, when we got our second major deal of the week: the Predators loading up for their playoff run by adding veterans Cody Franson and Mike Santorelli from the Maple Leafs. Both players will be unrestricted free agents in a few months, although either or both could re-sign with Nashville before the offseason. Franson is the main prize, a big right-handed defenseman with decent offensive numbers, while Santorelli is a depth forward enjoying a nice comeback season on a cheap deal.

In return, the Leafs got the Predators’ first-round pick, along with prospect Brendan Leipsic. Neither represents a sure thing, but they’re two decent future assets for a team that doesn’t have many to work with. The deal also signals that the Leafs are serious about finally starting a full-scale rebuild.

Who wins? That’s the beauty of these sorts of short-term rental deals. We get to hem and haw about it now, wait until we see how the season turns out, and then retroactively revise our opinions. If the Predators win the Cup, or at least come close, then they win big. If the Leafs … well, nothing good will ever happen to the Leafs, so we don’t have to worry about that.

We’ll do a more in-depth deadline preview in the days leading up to March 2, but this week, let’s spend a little time sorting out the buyers from the sellers.

Cup Watch: The League’s Five Best

The five teams that seem most likely to earn the league’s top prize: the Stanley Cup.

5. Chicago Blackhawks (35-18-4, plus-41 goals differential) The Hawks return to our list, largely based on the horrible things they did to Marc-Andre Fleury in yesterday’s shootout. That stuff will help them in the playoffs, right?

4. New York Islanders (37-18-1, plus-23) Tonight’s game against the Rangers is a first-round preview, because we’ve all agreed to make these teams play in the first round whether or not the standings say they should.

>> Read the full post on Grantland

Breaking down the league's goaltending controversies

Goalie controversies are almost always fun. There are two guys (or more), one job, and a whole lot of passive-aggressive sound bites about just wanting what’s best for the team. If we’re really lucky, the two guys involved actively hate each other, although that’s just an added bonus.¹

Goalie controversies are also relatively rare these days. Right now, roughly two-thirds of the league has a goaltending situation that’s more or less set, with one clear starter and a capable backup. For our purposes, that list includes teams with an established starter who’s currently hurt, such as Nashville, Detroit, and Columbus.²

That leaves 10 teams where the situation is somewhat more unsettled. These aren’t necessarily full-blown goaltending controversies in the classic sense, and the guys involved probably don’t hate each other, although it’s more fun if we go ahead and pretend that they do. But they are cases in which there’s at least some degree of uncertainty, so let’s see if we can figure out how they might end up.

St. Louis Blues: Brian Elliott vs. Jake Allen

In this corner: Elliott looked like a fringe NHLer over the first few years of his career, before a breakout 2011-12 season in which he won the Jennings and earned a spot on the All-Star team. He followed that up with an off year, but he’s been excellent in the two years since (not to mention stealing the show at All-Star weekend).

And in this corner: At 24, Allen is the goalie of the future in St. Louis. There was some thought that the future would arrive this year, but so far Allen hasn’t been especially impressive.

The battle so far: Elliott has clearly had the better season. The two goalies have split starts almost evenly, but that’s due to a knee injury Elliott suffered in November. That was the same injury that led to the Blues’ bizarre decision to bring in Martin Brodeur, which created the impression that they were hedging their bets on their established tandem. Brodeur was merely OK in seven games of action, and on Tuesday it was announced that he’s retiring.

On its own, the Brodeur situation may seem like a blip, one that was odd but ultimately didn’t disrupt the status quo in the long term. But there’s context here — this is the second year in a row that the Blues have added a big-name goalie during the season, following last year’s expensive trade for Ryan Miller. It sure doesn’t seem like the organization trusts Elliott to be the undisputed starter on a Cup contender, does it?

And the winner is: Elliott. It has to be, right? He’s done everything you could ask a guy to do over the last two years, he’s an All-Star, and as long as he stays healthy, the job has to be his. There’s no question about it. (Fast-forwards a few weeks to visions of “Blues talking to Hasek about comeback?” headlines.) OK, there’s not much question about it.

Carolina Hurricanes: Cam Ward vs. Anton Khudobin

In this corner: Ward has a reputation as one of the game’s top goalies, thanks to his Conn Smythe–winning performance in the 2006 playoffs. But that was nine years ago, and since then he’s been an average goalie at best, even though he’s paid as if he were an elite guy.

And in this corner: Khudobin is a late bloomer who was a backup in Minnesota and Boston before arriving in Carolina, where he was fantastic last year when Ward missed much of the season due to injury. It seemed like a good bet he’d end up as the starter this year, either by outplaying Ward or by seeing the veteran traded away by the rebuilding Hurricanes.

The battle so far: It’s been surprisingly even — Khudobin has been better, but not by all that much. And while Ward’s name comes up in trade rumors every now and then, the market for him seems to be lackluster given his contract.

And the winner is: GM Ron Francis, if Ward can play well enough to convince some other team to take his deal off Carolina’s hands. Assuming that doesn’t happen, this one looks like a split decision until next year.

>> Read the full post on Grantland

10 Fact About a Fun Team: The 1995-95 Blues

Ten Facts About a Fun Team is a new feature in which we’ll take a look back at a notable team and season from NHL history. That team may have been good. It may have been bad. But it was definitely interesting, and as such it deserves to be remembered.

When the St. Louis Blues signed Martin Brodeur last week, something about the move seemed vaguely … familiar.

The signing seemed like a curious decision, and one that was somewhat out of character for a Blues front office that’s spent years patiently building a legitimate Cup contender. The last time they tried to get fancy was the Ryan Miller trade and that didn’t work out well, so you figured the Blues would go back to being, well, the Blues.

But there was a time almost two decades ago when this kind of move — bringing in an aging, Hall of Fame–caliber veteran with a big name that he made elsewhere — was pretty much the Blues’ trademark. And during the 1995-96 season, it led to the creation of one of the most fascinating teams we’ve ever seen.

Of course, that year’s team had what we could politely call a “unique” vision at the top of the org chart. We might as well start there.

1. The 1995-96 Blues: From the mind of Mike Keenan

We need to start here, because all the madness that follows springs directly from Iron Mike.

The 1995-96 season was Keenan’s second as the coach and general manager of the Blues. He’d jumped to St. Louis after winning the Stanley Cup with the Rangers in 1994, citing a technicality in his contract and kicking off a debacle that ended up getting him suspended for 60 days. That suspension, and the half-season lockout that followed, prevented Keenan from wreaking too much havoc on the Blues roster.

The next year was different. With a full offseason to play with, Keenan went to work. He traded Brendan Shanahan for Chris Pronger. He signed Grant Fuhr as a free agent. He signed Shayne Corson, too, losing Curtis Joseph to the Oilers as compensation in the process. And a few weeks into the season, he stripped Brett Hull of his captaincy and gave it to Corson.

Hull didn’t especially appreciate that last move, and it set off a feud with Keenan that would be one of the dominant subplots of the season. Hull was the best player in franchise history and would go on to record his seventh consecutive 40-plus-goal season (not counting the lockout year), but Keenan didn’t like the winger’s offense-first style of play. To this day, it’s fair to say Hull is not a fan.

As the season wore on, the crusty coach/GM decided the franchise needed a new face. And so he did what any of us would do: He went out and landed the biggest star the game has ever known.

2. They traded for Wayne Gretzky

Any hockey fan can picture Gretzky’s greatest moments: smashing records and lifting Stanley Cups as a kid in Edmonton; bringing the game to a whole new segment of fans as a slickly marketed star in Los Angeles; taking one last victory lap as a classy veteran in New York. But you could be forgiven for forgetting that The Great One was also, briefly, a St. Louis Blue. Lots of hockey fans have.

With the 1996 trade deadline approaching and Gretzky playing out the final year of his deal on a bad Kings club, it became apparent that Los Angeles could end up moving its captain. The Rangers emerged as the favorite, but couldn’t close. That opened the door for the Blues, and Keenan got the deal done: Gretzky for Craig Johnson, Patrice Tardif, Roman Vopat, and draft picks.

That doesn’t sound like much, and in hindsight it wasn’t. Vopat was the centerpiece, a 19-year-old rookie who’d played 25 games in St. Louis. Johnson and Tardif were both young forwards. Of the group, only Johnson went on to any sort of productive career, although even that was mostly as a depth guy, and none of the players the Kings chose with the draft picks ever played in the NHL.

Keenan might have been a tyrant in the dressing room, but he knew how to win a trade. Gretzky was immediately named captain, relieving Corson of his duties. The idea of the greatest setup man in history being paired with Hull was almost too good to be true. Gretzky even scored in his first game.

And besides, there was little doubt Gretzky would feel right at home in the St. Louis dressing room …

>> Read the full post on Grantland

Is Daniel Alfredsson a Hall-of-Famer?

It’s not looking good for Daniel Alfredsson. The 41-year-old free agent has yet to rejoin the Red Wings, and it’s becoming increasingly clear that the back problems that bothered him throughout the summer are still an issue. While the Red Wings are willing to give the veteran as much time as he needs to make a decision, a return is becoming less likely with every week that goes by.

With Hall of Fame induction ceremonies taking place this weekend in Toronto, attention will naturally turn to potential future classes. And that makes Alfredsson’s status all the more interesting, because if his career ended today, he’d become one of those tough calls that make Hall of Fame debates so much fun.

So let’s do this: If Alfredsson has indeed played his last NHL game, is he a Hall of Famer? Here’s the case for and against.

For: His numbers are good

For forwards in the modern era, topping the 1,000-point mark has long been considered the minimum threshold to get into the Hall of Fame discussion, and Alfredsson clears that mark comfortably with a career total of 1,157. He falls short of the 500-goal mark, another milestone that bolsters a case, but he was never viewed as a pure goal scorer, and his 444 goals are within the lower range of what the Hall seems to consider acceptable.

Against: His numbers are good; they’re not great

Alfredsson’s career totals are decent, but they fall well short of sure-thing territory. He sits 51st in career points, behind guys like Bernie Nicholls and Vincent Damphousse who never even dipped a toe into serious HOF conversation.

That’s not an especially great comparison, since those guys played in a higher-scoring era. But nobody ever said these debates were fair, and some selection committee members might look at Alfredsson’s totals and feel underwhelmed when the comparisons start getting thrown around.

He also only topped 40 goals and 90 points once in his career. Basically, his numbers fall into that “consistently very good, rarely great” category that sometimes fails to impress voters.

For: Some comparable players are already in, or will be soon

One Hall of Famer who overlaps much of Alfredsson’s era and had similar career point totals is Joe Nieuwendyk (1,126), who made it in his second year of eligibility. Sergei Fedorov (1,179) is expected to get in once he becomes eligible in 2015, and Jarome Iginla (1,176) would make it if he retired today. Guys like Glenn Anderson and Joe Mullen are also in, despite playing in the high-scoring ’80s and putting up fewer career points than Alfredsson.

Of course, the most unavoidable comparable for Alfredsson is Mats Sundin. Those two have always been linked thanks to the Leafs/Senators rivalry, and because they were off-ice friends as well as teammates on various Swedish international teams. Sundin finished with significantly better career totals, including 564 goals and 1,349 points, but he had the benefit of playing a few years in the early ’90s. Sundin made it in in his first year of eligibility and nobody really batted an eye, so that would imply that Alfredsson should at least have a shot.

Against: Plenty of other comparable players aren’t

According to hockey-reference.com’s career similarity scores, Alfredsson’s two most comparable players are Jeremy Roenick and Keith Tkachuk. Both of those players have been eligible for a few years and settled into that perpetual “close, but not this year” territory, although Roenick, at least, has an outside shot to get in eventually.

Other guys with similar career numbers include Pierre Turgeon, Alexander Mogilny, Rod Brind’Amour, and Theo Fleury, not to mention a guy like Dave Andreychuk who’s well ahead of all of them. That’s a group of really good players, but none of them ever gained much Hall of Fame momentum.

(By the way, if you’re getting the sense that the Hall of Fame tends to be all over the map with the way it treats offensive forwards, you’re on the right track.)

>> Read the full post on Grantland