betterREDthandead

In related news, how soon until the rest of Canada starts encouraging Quebec to re-think that whole secession thing? For non-francophones, the link says not only will commissioner Corteau of the QMJHL not oppose the legislation, but he has previously mentioned on CKAC that he and the league committee already had plans to announce some kind of anti-fighting rules for the league, and that the league will be publicly supporting the government legislation.

To answer the original question, I imagine they'd only do it if a diving penalty was called. They'll issue a fine or suspension on a play where no penalty was called, but that's probably reserved for instances where players get hurt. Anyway, his diving may be graceful but he doesn't have much imagination. I have yet to see him pull off a one-and-a-half in the pike position. His degree of difficulty is woefully lacking. Until he starts attempting some of the harder dives he'll be nothing but a hack.

I'll take the 0 of 30. See, as I've mentioned, it takes 2-3 extra seconds off the clock when the defenseman strolls down the ice to chase the puck just for a ceremonial touch-up. That might not seem like much but it adds up at the end of the game. If you have 20 such icings in a game (as in your 10 of 30 scenario) you then get 40-60 extra seconds at the end. If you have a close game, a tied one or a one-goal lead, that can make all the difference. I'd much rather see the whistle blown straight away, and get to the faceoff straight away.

By the way, Packer, clearly I'm slow as hell at putting two and two together because I just now figured it out, but how are we supposed to read your blog if you don't pimp it any?

It does not. What part of the game is flowing when a defenseman takes his obligatory lazy skate back to touch the puck just to get the icing call? That accounts for most potential icings.

My rooting interests for games in the next round: UNC over WSU (I like Wazzu but gotta stick with the ACC and my championship pick.) Louisville over Tennessee (hate UT.) Kansas over Villanova Memphis over MSU (when it comes to basketball, many MSU fans have become exactly what they hate about U-M fans.) Texas over Stanford

What natural game flow? Guys waste energy racing after a puck that 99 times out of 100, they're not going to get to. Then the game is stopped anyway. I don't buy that no-touch icing will reduce injuries, because it rarely happens. But....I don't think any European leagues have the rule that the defensive team can't change after an icing. That should take care of any issues of teams icing the puck just to get a stoppage - what good is a stoppage if the other team can get fresh legs out there and you can't? I want to see the no-touch icing specifically because I think it will improve the game flow and stop wasting seconds off the clock. Those seconds add up at the end and if the game is close, we get thirty extra seconds of desperation hockey instead of ten stupid wild-goose chases. As I said earlier, if we need the race to an iced puck to keep the game exciting, then hockey is finished and we may as well go watch tiddlywinks. The NHL actually has icing down almost pat. Giving the refs discretion, and allowing no change for the offending team, these have been wildly successful, IMO. They should add no-touch to the list.

Aussie's on vacation and has asked me to post these. Sorry, no standings yet. Aussie will have these when he returns....probably Monday, maybe Tuesday. Results will be tabulated at that time as well, since I won't be around on Sunday. Friday: NY Islanders @ New Jersey NY Rangers @ Philadelphia Toronto @ Buffalo Washington @ Atlanta Minnesota @ Vancouver Anaheim @ San Jose Saturday: Colorado @ Edmonton Chicago @ Nashville Los Angeles @ Dallas Boston @ Montreal Toronto @ Ottawa Tampa Bay @ Florida Detroit @ Columbus New Jersey @ Pittsburgh Anaheim @ Phoenix Minnesota @ Calgary Sunday: St Louis @ Chicago NY Islanders @ Philadelphia

Icing - as GS&T pointed out, rarely are icing calls negated by the icing team racing down to touch the puck first. (I always thought that was funny before the two-line pass rule was abolished. Doesn't touching the puck down there make it a three-line pass and therefore illegal? But I digress.) Anyway, if we have to look to icing races for excitement in hockey, the war is already lost and we might as well fold the league. I'm all in favor of no-touch icing, because it would speed up the game. I think the rule is brilliant that allows referee discretion as to whether the icing was intentional or simply a missed pass - it does wonders for the flow of the game. Allow the refs to blow the whistle the moment the puck is officially iced and you probably save three seconds of playing time. About ten icings a game, that adds up to what might end up being a very crucial thirty seconds at the end, depending on the score. I'm not really as worried about people getting hurt - it "might" have happened a lot but in actuality it hasn't happened much at all - I just think no-touch icing would improve the flow of the game and besides, make the rules simpler for a newbie to understand. Oh, and icing on the power play? If the PK team couldn't do that, I think PP scoring would double. I don't really want to see 8-6 games because of one rule change. Especially not when there's already some controversy as to what's a penalty and what's not. Don't want the refs afraid to call a penalty because of how much more likely it is to score on the power play, and I don't want some stupid rinky-dink hooking penalty to decide the game at the end either. We see power play scores on average between 15-20% of the time, that's quite enough. If you want to mess with the power play, allow two goals instead of one before the penalized player returns.

:crybaby: Zumaya, Rodney, and now Granderson. There's such promise for this season - I hope it's not derailed by injuries! I think the offense could suffer the loss of guys like Sheffield or Cabrera or Maggs (only one of them though) but Granderson is the lead-off hitter and the table-setter. Most versatile hitter on the team in that he sprays the ball all over the field and is good for any type of hit at any time. And a future Gold Glover to boot. Hope he heals quickly.

CCHA champs is nice. The tourney draw is nicer. Pillow-soft opposition for the first two rounds. Plus a potential matchup against New Hampshire (not even Hockey East champs) instead of UND, in the Frozen Four, should U-M get that far. Meanwhile, Sparty is stuck in Colorado, playing Colorado College. And apparently that's an Olympic-size rink? I did not know that interesting little factoid. Hopefully the championship will stay in the state of Michigan this year!

Facty fact fact. It's been well and truly shown that going into the playoffs on cruise control is a bad mentality and leads to first round difficulties, if not an outright ouster. If the Blues earn no points in the games against us, they're officially eliminated from the playoffs, so let's step on their throats, give those jealous Blues fans one more straw in their haystack of reasons to hate us, and go into the playoffs in high gear rather than having to try and flip the intensity switch. And yes, having home ice in a potential series with the Sharks is huge. Wings have clinched home ice in a potential series with any team but San Jose and Pittsburgh, and Pittsburgh's practically a done deal, but the team has gotta keep the focus high.

Asking Parros to shave the 'stache would be like asking Zetterberg to stop scoring. It's what they do.

Nobody in particular. If I had to pick one team only it'd be UNC - always liked the Heels, and gotta pull for the ACC. Also always liked Kansas. If Purdue were to somehow make a run as a 6 seed, that'd be pretty sweet, but I'm not counting on it. I'm mainly just happy that of the top 12 teams, there's only one that I really don't like. (Tennessee. Don't much care for Wisconsin, either, but I'm not averse to pulling for them for the Big Ten's sake.) Long and short of it is, whoever wins, I'll probably be happy about it. Not like last year when Florida and OSU were #1 seeds and met for the title. Of course, UVA was in last year's tournament too, so that was, y'know, nice.

I hope that's exactly what happens, as long as it's not within the division. Everything Matt Millen touches turns to pure grade A s***.

Can anyone think of a good playoff slogan?

Friday: NY Islanders @ New Jersey NY Rangers @ Philadelphia Toronto @ Buffalo Washington @ Atlanta Minnesota @ Vancouver Anaheim @ San Jose Saturday: Colorado @ Edmonton Chicago @ Nashville Los Angeles @ Dallas Boston @ Montreal Toronto @ Ottawa Tampa Bay @ Florida Detroit @ Columbus New Jersey @ Pittsburgh Anaheim @ Phoenix Minnesota @ Calgary Sunday: St Louis @ Chicago NY Islanders @ Philadelphia

Fun: When you see another driver in traffic and you see their mouth move singing along to the same radio song you are.

Let's not forget there were more than a few posts on this very board predicting the exact same thing.

That would be a fun schedule if the division race were tight. It's kind of boring now, but kind of has a little side benefit in that it puts the team in a playoff, same-team-every-night mode of thinking.

<--- I'm not. I think a lot of people are more anxious that we might lose him.

As it would likely be a bad team that would most want to sign Flip to an offer sheet like that, yes. I would not trade a very good, known commodity like Filppula for three low-end picks (like, 20 and below).

You've been waiting to make that post for a while, haven't you Am I the only one who feels like this year has been kind of a parade of prospects? I don't recall seeing so many different guys from the prospect pool get their chance in one year. We've seen a little bit of Quincey, Meech, and Howard before, but much more so this year, and toss in Ericsson, Stafford, Helm, and now Ritola.

Couple of these, I think I got some responses.... Robby Gordon - you're absolutely right. Stupid penalty, and yes, it no doubt cost Gordon some money to appeal, and it actually ended up costing even more, because the result of the appeal was the points were restored but the crew chief's fine was increased. Kind of a head-scratcher.....guess they wanted to feel like they were generously allowing a trade-off while still punishing for the offense. California - again, absolutely right, I turned off that race and didn't look back. Lame as hell. NASCAR's got a few off weekends in the schedule. Reschedule the race for later in the year, how hard is that? If baseball can handle that, as they do all the time while competing for stadium space with football teams and concerts, surely NASCAR can figure it out for a racetrack that's only got one purpose. Atlanta - Tony Stewart needs to STFU. It's like a football team complaining the ground was too muddy. Guess what, bucko, everyone had to race on the same tires. Oh, I'm so ******* sorry you felt uncomfortable. Your comfort zone got thrown off and you couldn't race like you wanted to. Everyone else had the same tire. And you know what I didn't see very much of (if any) during that race? Tires flying apart. the Busch/Nationwide/whatever series (you still calling it the Winston Cup? ) - NASCAR really kind of has a very fine line to walk here. Nobody's gonna watch the minor league race if it's nothing but minor league drivers. My solution would be to allow the Sprint drivers to race, earn the money, and walk victory lane if they win, but rack up no points. Any racer in the Nationwide race who then races the Sprint race forfeits all their Nationwide points for that week. Simple. You'll still get all kinds of Sprint racers in the Nationwide races, thus keeping people interested. But the Nationwide racers will be able to stack up against one another in the points column instead of having a guy like Carl Edwards clinching him a Nationwide championship with like two races left. It's in a way beneficial for the Nationwide drivers because they get the chance to race the big boys, but if the big boys aren't scoring points it'll let the minor leaguers stand out on paper.

Was gonna be my answer too. I, uh, I don't see it happening though.