Drake_Marcus

66 is winning points with the fans around here

I assure you, all three are floaters of the highest degree.

f***. My. Life.

Sarah Palin?

Damn! You're right My bad.

Not if Helm has anything to say about it!

Yeah, if you're a hottie go for it. I'm sure some of the players would appreciate it!

No, but I'm willing to change that stance for the low low price of 6.7 million dollars a year. Act now, this is a limited offer.* *Offer not valid in Quebec. Void where prohibited. Offer may be canceled at any time at discretion of offerer.

Simple. Drive around until you see a hotel with Redbird 1 parked in the lot. You're welcome.

I know man- I wish I knew who actually wrote that. It's been floating around on the internet for so long and I have to think that guy hasn't gotten enough free beers out of it. I'd buy him one

Shhhhh.... don't tell. It's more fun to hypothesize about minutia on the internet when you can single people out!

Ovechkin's racking up more awards than Malkin and Crosby combined. It's hard to assume he'll suddenly start to blow hard. the dude's averaged 60 goals a season over the last two years. And like Crosby, he's only going to get better before he gets any worse. Complete player? Malkin, Crosby, Ovechkin... --> None provide a significant PK force- they won't be assigned to shut anyone down out there. None of them are even above average defensively on their own team (don't go saying Malkin's 94 take aways are big s*** when he had 81 give aways, easily the worse take-away to give-away ratio among the leaders in take-aways, Datsyuk had 39 more takes than gives, for example). --> Only one of them is a feared checker. Alex is known to deliver heavy, heavy hits and do it often. So what elements do we have in hockey, at the most basic level: --> Offense (Obviously all three are highly, highly elite offensively... like stupidly good at putting up points) --> Defense (All three are average at best, you can't say you're complete when your defensive game is so comparatively low) --> Physical Play (Ovi wins this hands down. Malkin hits, yeah, but he's not terribly physical overall) --> Competitive edge (Crosby's competitive drive can't be questioned after the Pens-Caps series, Ovi's is right up there too, but I have to give the edge to the guy who won head to head against the other. Malkin's not beating Crosby out in a spirit competition) --> And much less importantly for this discussion: Fighting (None of the three win this, but Malkin's sweet drum solo fighting style wins it if only for the entertainment value) So, in summary, none of the three are complete. I'd give the edge to Ovechkin because he's so good physically and has such a strong competitive drive. If Crosby could lay people out like Ovi his competitive edge could've knocked Ovi out. One other note is that I'm impressed how Crosby improved his face-off ability over the summer. He's gotten much better in the circle over the last year. It's interesting that so many people throw the label "complete" around. I know a guy that swears Iginla is the most complete player in the game because he's an elite scorer and fights on occasion. To me there are two main components of hockey: scoring and not getting scored on. That's offense and defense. How can you use the word "complete" without fulfilling both aspects of hockey? A guy like Datsyuk is "complete". Nominated for the Selke, Hart, Pearson and Lady Byng. You just can't get more complete than that. To be considered one the top defensive forward AND one of the top 3 or 4 offensive forwards in the game? Simply amazing. Strong defensive play really does take an amazing level of concentration, exersion and committment. There's zero doubt that a guy like Datsyuk could stop skating and pressuring people across the rink on the backcheck, stopped logging so many critical pk minutes (as in not the last 15 seconds of each PK ), he could put that effort into scoring more. What else would he focus on? Doing sweet origami on the bench?

Haha. Good point! Scot Stevens was pretty sweet at making people die inside.

Interesting letter. But nothing tops the best letter ever written. I speak of course of the one below:

Haha thanks If I were a Wing I'd totally do s*** like that at signings at the Hockeytown Cafe. Then I'd walk over and get them a new shirt or whatever from the shelf for me to sign properly. For a millionaire, it'd definitely shell out that cash just to see how people would react.

It's actually interesting how many people believe Kronwall leaves his feet when he checks players. I definitely understand why they do- he's not on his feet when the two players appear to be colliding. The thing that Babs pointed out is that he explodes through the guy while he's checking him but the initial contact occurs while Kronwall's skates are on the ice. Slowing the footage down clearly shows that to be correct. So how come none of the commentators out there point that out? Do they just not notice, or do they not believe their eyes would deceive them on the live play?

I think you'll gain some valuable insight if you read my post above.

Tell us the truth- did Holmstrom try to sleep with your girlfriend or mother or something? I just can't help but feel that your hatred towards him is personal I've got it! You saw him at a signing and he thoughtfully marked your brand new Wings jersey "I'm hammered right now, Tommy H" in bright pink sharpie.

It's not fair because I keep asking God to make Kronwall obliterate Campbell in the middle of one of his spin-a-rama moves.

And isn't that the worst part? It just sickens me that you can lobby refs for calls when they're supposed to be fairly interpreting a set of written rules! I'm looking at you Micheal Therrien.

Well I suppose he's kind of lost that energizer man, unflappable quality he usually has.

So true. And it's even worse when some jerk parks his big ass truck too close to the intersection on the side you're turning into!

This is regarding the highlighted part-- Really? Lidstrom is the best d-man in the playoffs right now. He's the only one who comes close in terms of points, PK, PP or any other measure aside from grit. Is Lidstrom looking like the Conn vintage Lids? Not really, he looks a few years older. He doesn't look 7 years older than that guy, though. Lids has dropped off from has prime, but it's pretty remarkable that his drop off version is still better than the prime version of the rest of the NHL's defensemen. EDIT: I agree with you, at least in part, about the rest of your post. I'd say Datsyuk's injury happened before the play-offs, though. He went silent just before the season ended and hasn't really woken up since. Based on his history of remarkable consistency I'd say a injury is the obvious culprit.

Oh? When did Ovechkin join the Pens? Lidstrom? Datsyuk? Because I only see one Penguin in the list of award candidates this year.

Especially considering that dozens of curlers have died in that time.