haroldsnepsts

Honestly this whole Campbell situation just illuminates why the league struggles to become a major sport, when one of its top executives conducts himself in this manner. It makes the NHL look like it's still basically a Canadian family business, where biases and personal relationships rule the league, not a legit major sport.

Oh well, it was nice to pretend the league might have some integrity regarding Campbell and what a joke he is. http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/news/story?id=5809513 Right. so what about the part where he calls Savard a faker? Seems like the Director of Hockey Operations basically calling a current player something like that to the head of officials might influence how that player is treated. Very professional. Just like the director of operations "venting" to the head of officials about calls against his son is also totally normal and appropriate conduct.

it's made it onto yahoo sports. Let's hope the snowball keeps rollin! http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/blog/puck_daddy/post/Have-Savard-emails-exposed-NHL-s-Colin-Campbell-?urn=nhl-285531

It's from a court case, so I'm assuming they subpoenaed them. As for the grammar, that doesn't bother me so much. But the language. He's the Senior VP and Director of Hockey Operations, communicating via email with the head of officiating about a league related matter. So the emails are in an official capacity, yet he sounds like a 4th line player yapping from the bench. And honestly, the more I think about it, he's not just a jackass but an unprofessional idiot. These are communications about an employee he's trying to fire. Anyone who's ever been in or around a situation like that knows you have to document everything in case of a potential lawsuit when the employee is dismissed. Performance reviews, communications about the employee, everything. Someone in Campbell's position should damn well know that. Over on hfboards, were I first saw this, they gave it a better subject line. "Campbell emails raise questions of impartiality." I need to work on my headline writing.

Agreed. If you someone ever had a conspiracy theory about personal grudges in Campbell's decisions, this certainly supports it. Here's a snippet of one of Colin's emails: It's a little hard to follow because the legal documents have removed players names and references to cities and games. But he's basically calling a player a whiner and joking (hopefully?) about assigning s***ty refs to that players games to really give him something to complain about.

I didn't have the dislike for Kopecky that many did while he was here, but seriously, what did this guy do to get so much favor from the hockey gods??? It's like every damn game I watch of his, he ends up stumbling into a breakaway or a wide open net. Like tonight when he took a late penalty but comes out of the box just in time to end up with a breakaway. It's ridiculous.

Lebda is making $1.45 million to play for Toronto (when he's not watching from the press box). Meanwhile Lilja is making $600k and has had a significant role in settling down the Ducks blueline. crazy world.

Not a pic of the stache, but this one's for you Edi. Great hipcheck by Lilja. I dont' know that I ever saw him throw and open ice one like that in Detroit. As much as I hate the Ducks, he seems to be playing well there.

Cleary, because this season if it's Huds out there, there's a good chance you'll end up down two goals. Neither? Cleary was "well below the expected level defensively" because he had two anchors around his neck as he skated. At the end of games, Babcock has been putting Cleary out there with Zetterberg and Datsyuk. Why do you think that is?

Great. so he's outscored one D man just back from injury who's played one-third the number of games and one bottom pairing dman who's played half the games he has. Not very impressive. He's played 12 games, has 4 assists, and is a -6. His role on the team is pretty much to put up points, as he doesn't have a lot else to offer. No one needs to grab stats to force them into anything regarding Hudler. Any way you slice it, he has been craptacular so far this season.

Exactly. It's not like he was saying "you suck." It's more like he knows Hudler is very talented, just calling out his questionable compete level.

Less posting and more thinking please

I recently saw a commercial where hamsters were driving a car and rapping and dancing to the Black Sheep song "you can get with this." Yeah. that was awesome.

They're the first ones that came to mind. Awful. Just awful.

Agreed. Seems like Ilitch is smart enough to know what he doesn't know. So he surrounds himself with people who do and can overlook his ego to trust their opinions. As for Bourque, that would've been crazy. Then maybe they could've settled once and for all who's higher on the all-time list.

Agreed. It's hard to be patient with Hudler and hope he comes around when it requires sitting players who actually contribute something to the team. Hudler's best games so far this season have been the ones where he's invisible. Because when you do notice him, it hasn't been for the right reasons.

didn't see the game, but checked out the highlights. Luongo whines about something every time he's scored on. I guess I'd be bent out of shape too if I continued to put up mediocre numbers the last couple seasons on a very talented Canucks team.

He was born and raised in Pennsylvania.

Clearly hasn't been playing poorly, he just had two crappy linemates. Now Modano seems to be getting it going, and they got the dead weight off that line. Even when the Hudler-Modano-Cleary line was still together, Babcock was using Danny with Pav and Z at the end of games. That's a pretty big vote of confidence. It's early in the season, but Hudler needs to get it going because right now this team is better with Abby, Eaves, or Miller in the lineup than him. And Datsyuk is playing like a Hart trophy candidate again. He looked a step off for the first half of last season, but has come out blazing this year. Z too. I think with them on the same line and their puck dominance, they give the opposing line fits. And another solid game from Jimmy!

Agreed. but he had 7 SOG last night. If he keeps getting that many opportunities on net, they're gonna start going in.

For $2.875 mill I guess I was just hoping it wouldn't be him. And honestly I wouldn't have guessed that a year in the KHL would have stunted his game as much as it seemed to. I was hoping he would be the sniper the Wings have been needing. The season is young, but man he needs to get it together. 8 games, 0 goals, 3 assists, and a -6.

you're right. that 5 minute youtube clip accurately represents decades of hockey. well played sir.

For those who didn't see the Toronto-Florida game last night, I thought you might appreciate this clip given some of the goals Homer has had called back over the last few seasons. I've always thought the refs have no consistency on what exactly constitutes goaltender interference, but this one is laughably bad. Note the ref standing about 10 feet away with a great look at what happened. The same one who signals goal.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1069302/2/index.htm Some other highlights. I couldn't find all his incidents because most online sources don't go back that far. http://www.hockeydraftcentral.com/1981/81040.html Add to that refusing to shake hands twice in playoff lineups, and a career full of dirty, or at the very least borderline plays, and Chelios equals or surpasses Pronger in that department.

pretty clearly boarding. Like someone else mentioned, he got a game misconduct for this less than 41 games ago so it gets an automatic game suspension by league rules. Hockey is a fast game and it may have been unintentional, but two boarding misconducts in that amount of time, and it's probably good to send a message he needs to pick his spots better.