Heroes of Hockeytown

Attaboy Meech. Nice play.

Not to mention going from playing excellent defense to running the gamut of defensive lapses this season... Standing around at his blue line flat footed, leaving his man to go stare down the puck carrier; tonight he did virtually nothing to defend the two on one (though Lilja gets the lion's share of the blame for his ill fated play at center ice) and then goofing around with the puck behind his own goal and giving it away... I guess I'm preaching to the choir with regards to poor defensive play, but there it is.

This game is killin' me.

Either Franz or Hud's pass went passed him and off a Bruin's skate.

Must... get to... rebounds...

I don't know if my paycheck is enough to buy a goal from a team in the bigs, but if it is, it's yours.

The defense is just playing really, really bad. I don't know where it comes from. It's all the same guys that were playing lights out hockey six months ago. But they gotta figure something out. This won't cut it forever.

I don't know what Kronwall was thinking. He had three or four options and he just wouldn't let it go.

Terrible.

I am prepared for some stupid floating wrister from the point to find its way through fifty pairs of skates and behind Conklin.

For f***'s sake.

Oh, please.

I mustn't be the only one that finds voting for the player of the game during the first intermission to be incredibly inane.

I guess I need to see that second goal again. Was Conklin screened or what? It seemed like there were a lot of guys in front of the net and he didn't react til late.

Needless to say... a maddeningly frustrating period.

I was busy being angry and did not see the replay, but initially it looked like there was about 3 people in front of Conklin making the screen.

So, this is goin' well.

Lilja played the role of pylon on that one.

Aww goddamnit.

Probably because we haven't let go of the puck since the opening face off.

Great energy and jump early, gotta capitalize.

I can't quantify it without looking at all of his plays and the plays of his contemporaries, so on a lack of hard evidence I'd have to concede the argument. But I knew that from the start, so as I've said, it's merely the perception that I've got that he's not really measuring up to his totals -- yes, as opposed to Pavel or Hank or Hudler who look like they're making more genuine plays.

I think you can appreciate the difference between a shot from 20 feet that surprises a goalie and a shot from 90 feet that marginally changes direction.

Sure, I agree. All good players that get lots of PP time end up with a good number of routine assists that inflate totals, but to be honest I've been watching Sammy's totals closely (because I've noticed just as the OP has his career year scoring pace) and it looks like an inordinate number of his points are coming in this way.

This year it seems to me Sammy has been getting a lot of fairly meaningless secondary assists on the PP that are inflating his totals above what I perceive his true ability to be, but I'm pretty good with Mikael anyways. Decent offensive instincts, good shot, very responsible defensively, bargain salary; I'm not complaining.