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Which is why I have been pushing the 'Maltby in the press box' lineups. Unfortunately, Babcock doesn't call me to ask my opinion. Which is probably good, because he would totally hear it about putting Hoodlum and Flapjack on the top two lines full time.

I was wrong..he collected a cool ten million in 97-98.

Yeah...but he looked worse tonight than he has most of the year.

Well, it's possible to get each of those markers individually, so getting all three should be theoretically possible. As far as has it ever happened? I doubt it, unless 15 of Doug Crossman's 18 PIMS in 1992-93 were from fighting...which is impossible.

Wow...Malts did NOT look good tonight.

Moore did not run away. Moore fought Matt Cooke earlier in that same game. Moore was paying attention to the play and had begun to skate up ice with the play and away from Bertuzzi whe nbertuzzi yanked on his jersey, punched him in the back of the head, and drove him to the ice face first, breaking his neck. Had Moore been running away, he likely would have went to the bench the moment Bertuzzi challenged him, rather than simply ignoring him and playing hockey, as he did. Moore figured Bertuzzi was just yapping and that he wouldn't go nuts on him (as happened). With Lemieux, Lemieux KNEW some form of retribution was coming, and that McCarty would be involved. Even if he did sort of get jumped, it wasn't on the unexpected level that Bertuzzi was.

Compare Milbury to Kevin Lowe. Tell me all about how Lowe has dumped his star players for shoddy return because he couldn't afford them, and then tell me that Milbury doesn't have the exact same reason for trading guys like Palffy. The very moment Milbury had any sort of budget to work with, he turned the league's worst team into a team that nearly won the division with a couple key moves. The Islanders team he built will likely make the playoffs for the fourth time in five years this season since the team was purchased by Charles Wang and the ridiculous budget restrictions were lifted--Milbury's budget for most of his tenure on the Isle was usually around $25m, comparable with Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Edmonton or Calgary. Four teams known for trading star players because they couldn't afford them. If those four teams get a pass on making bad deals where they give up the far superior player in a cost cutting move (Jagr for scrubs, Guerin for Carter, Weight for Reasoner, Kozlov for Piros, MacInnis for Housley) why doesn't Milbury? Deals Milbury is criticized for: Palffy for Jokinen. Olli Jokinen has developed into a top talent i nthe league. Yes, he did it after leaving the Isle, but to argue that he wasn't a fair trade for Palffy is silly. Bertuzzi/McCabe for Linden. Linden was a higher end guy in the league with great all-around ability. Bertuzzi was nothing but a goon and was regressing as far as his offense is concerned. McCabe was very expendable on the Isles defense that already had several better offensive defensemen. Nobody could have predicted Linden would flop like he did, and Bertuzzi's rise to the top was never going to happen in New York the way he was going. Luongo/Jokinen for Parrish/Kvasha Milbury had to deal Luongo after picking Rick Dipietro, who did better in their comparable years on the Isle than Luongo did. Jokinen totally flopped in New York, and Parrish and Kvasha were big, strong, young forwards who would come to New York and do well. Chara/pick(Spezza) for Yashin Chara was a depth defenseman on the Isles and was not doing himself any favors. Yashin was, at the time, an elite talent in the league and a 27 year old Hart trophy contender who was among the league leaders in points and goals, and was big and strong. Let me put that another way: This summer, would you trade a first round pick and Lilja for Marian Hossa? I sure as hell would. Milbury is not the best GM in the world, but he's done a respectable job given his circumstances. He certainly has outperformed quite a few of his peers.

From Wikipedia: Did he have an injury or something? I tough he was an ok depth player at the NHL level. He certainly could totally own the AHL. EDIT: Apparently the Lumber Kings play in the YZERMAN division of the Central Junior A Hockey League....

Campbell is the guy in charge of the on-ice product. Yes technically Bettman is his boss, but Bettman doesn't have major involvement in things like rules and officiating, or player discipline. That stuff is all handled in Campbell's office. Bettman's job deals primarily with things such as CBA negotiations, TV deals, and the like. The off-ice business stuff is why Bettman has his job in the first place. He was hired to run the business side of the league because when the league had a president handling both sides, and the business side was run by a hockey guy, the business side was run like crap.

What I would do: Hudler/Zetterberg/Holmstrom Filppula/Datsyuk/Bertuzzi Calder/Lang/Franzen Maltby/Draper/Cleary Sammy could take the place of either Malts or Cleary for a more offensive look. Kopecky unfortunately gets sat. Next season he should be a regular though.

If you guys have a complaint about rules or officiating, you have no complaint with Bettman. That stuff is the domain of Colin Campbell, not Bettman. His job is the business side of things, not the hockey side of things.

Osgood is known for soft goals..like those he gave up en route to being second in Conn Smythe voting and winning a Cup, or like one he gave up in his rookie year in the playoffs (when he became only the second Wings goalie ever to get a shutout in his playoff debut) Sorry, Ozzie doesn't give up any more soft goals than Roy, Brodeur, etc. That argument is invalid.

You think that line is tougher than the McRae/Probert/Kocur trio that saw ice in 1986?

Like dump Williams and add two physical, scoring forwards?

Datsyuk looked pretty good with the kids last night...and If Z has Homer and one of the kids I don't think he'd lose terribly much. That lineup gives us three good scoring lines...very hard to stop that.

Something worth noting: Only once in his Wings career has Osgood had a losing record in the postseason. That, as has been discussed on here, was largely a result of Yzerman and Shanahan being injured. As far as career stats are concerned, Osgood's stats improve more than Hasek's do going into the postseason. Just for those who say Osgood will choke it away i nthe playoffs.

Here is the biggest factor in the 'was Bertuzzi suspended enough' discussion: Bertuzzi's assault has been compared to McSorley on Brasher more than any other. What was McSorley's suspension? McSorley was suspended for life for his hit on Brashear.

I was thinking this last night. Calder/Lang/Franzen seems to be working really well. Filppula and Hudler both showed chemistry with Dats. So my thought goes like this as something I would like to see Babcock try: Filppula/Zetterberg/Holmstrom Hudler/Datsyuk/Bertuzzi Calder/Lang/Franzen Maltby/Draper/Cleary

Chris Gratton...is officially the worst 9 million dollar player the NHL has ever seen.

Lang was playing with Williams and Cleary most of this season, and played with Williams most of last year too. Both of those guys had career years playing with Lang. As far as Lang scoring 70-80 points consistently...I see exacly zero second line centers on pace to score 80 points this season. In fact, I see a few first line centers who aren't, also. Combine that with the fact that Lang has had third line wingers all season, and you can't seriously expect Lang to score 80 points. As far as last season, Lang played the majority of his time on a third line with Williams and Yzerman. Find me another third line center that scored as well as Lang did last season (62 points!), or any season. If you think he should score 80 points on the third line, you are crazy.

Yes, McCarty sucker punched Lemieux to star tthe whole thing. The difference is this: Bertuzzi had been doggin Moore about fighting and Moore declined, and was rejoining the play when Bertuzzi punched him in the back of the head and drove him face-first into the ice. McCarty clocked Lemieux in the face, and if you watch the video you posted, Lemieux saw it coming and tried to dodge and block it. Moore didn't know Bertuzzi was going to hit him until he woke up with a broken neck. Also, McCarty went after Lemieux because Lemieux had viciously cross checked two Wings into the boards from behind the previous year, one resulting in a career-threatening injury. Moore laid a clean, open ice hit on Markus Naslund. yes, Naslund was injured, but guess what? Naslund played the next game between the two teams, which was about two weeks later. Moore had also already went toe to toe with Matt Cooke, while Lemieux had squared off with nobody.

The fact that what Bertuzzi did has to be compared to those incidents to show that it's not THE worst thing to ever happen in the NHL shows just how bad it was. Although I think Eddie Shore might be a better example...a ridiculous, unexpected, and unwarranted assault by a star player that caused career-ending injury.

And ultimately, possession is the discretion of the on ice official, who ruled Hull maintained possession.

The crease rule, as amended early 1999, would disagree. Due to a high number of breakaway goals being disallowed due to crease infractions, an amendment was made to the crease rule that stated something to the effect of if a player enters the crease legally and gains control of the puck, a goal scored while that player is in the crease shall stand even if the puck leaves the crease before entering the net, so long as that player maintains possession the entire time the puck is outside the crease. The puck entered the crease. Hull followed, gained possession, and scored. Good goal. Had it been scored in November, it would have been disallowed.

There's the shootout specialist at work.