2009 Detroit Prospect Rankings, 21-30

Here we go with round #2, players 21-30. It’s a deep, deep crop this year — last year Detroit had only 30 prospects to rank and the bottom five or so were busted projects. This year #30 is a guy who I really have high hopes for, and RWC has in their top 20. He’s just really hard to place right now.

See ranks 31-39 here. I’m just going to keep pumping these out, since everyone’s attention is going to be towards the playoffs tomorrow I’ll post 11-20 tomorrow afternoon and 1-10 Saturday afternoon, so everyone can have some nice weekend reading.

21. Zack Torquato, C
6th round, 178th overall, 2007
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Stats
07/08 .. Erie (OHL) .. 66 GP .. 25-42–67 .. -33 .. 112 PIM
07/08 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 11 GP .. 1-0–1 .. +0 .. 8 PIM
08/09 .. Erie (OHL) .. 66 GP .. 29-34–63 .. +1 .. 78 PIM
08/09 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 1 GP .. 0-0–0 .. +0 .. 0 PIM
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Season: Torquato was one of the biggest draft day slips in 2007, because of questions regarding his ability to score. He had good numbers in his first years in the OHL, but hit a wall when he was traded to Erie. In his third season with Erie, he didn’t eclipse the totals that he had put up last year. However, for the first time in his three seasons there, Erie made the playoffs, and despite being a low seed, Torquato had a good showing against the heavily favored London Knights with six points in five games. He was a team worst -33 last season, but his +1 this season was among team leaders. Torquato was also the captain of the Otters. He signed a tryout with the Griffins following his season, but did not crack the lineup.
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Future: Torquato has matured a lot from his troublesome days in Saginaw. He hasn’t gotten going as a scorer, but he hasn’t been in the best of situations in Erie. He has made strides on both sides of the puck since being drafted, and he’s the character guy that Detroit likes to keep around. This being a contract year for him, it seems likely Detroit will sign him because he hasn’t gotten to show what he can do on a contending team. The only thing playing against him is that he couldn’t crack Grand Rapids’ lineup even without Helm, so he will be one of the lone major junior rookies and will compete with guys who have been playing pro hockey in Sweden for a few seasons now for the last few lineup spots. If Detroit renews their agreement with the ECHL’s Toledo Walleye (formerly the Toledo Storm), it isn’t absurd to suggest Torquato might start his professional career there.
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22. Brian Lashoff, D
Signed as a free agent, September 2008
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Stats
07/08 .. Barrie (OHL) .. 50 GP .. 5-15–20 .. -8 .. 44 PIM
08/09 .. Barrie (OHL) .. 25 GP .. 1-12–13 .. -3 .. 19 PIM
08/09 .. Kingston (OHL) .. 35 GP .. 6-13–19 .. -1 .. 32 PIM
08/09 .. Grand Rapids (OHL) .. 6 GP .. 1-4–5 .. +1 .. 0 PIM
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Season: Detroit is famous for it’s late round steal, but in the current seven-round format, guys like Tomas Holmstrom (10th), Jonathan Ericsson (9th), and Vladimir Konstantinov (11th) may have never even been drafted. It is for this reason that Detroit has taken to signing more free agent prospects, Lashoff being one of them. They had an eye on him throughout the draft but didn’t have enough picks to take him. They invited him to training camp, which, because of a rule I was completely unaware of until Detroit did this, allows them a two week window to sign any free agents that impress. Lashoff was one such free agent. He earned a contract and returned to the OHL with the Barrie Colts. He got off to a slow start, and was traded midseason to the lowly Kingston Frontenacs. Lashoff was actually more productive here as the clear cut #1 defenseman, and was named captain before the end of the year. Kingston didn’t make the playoffs, so Lashoff signed a tryout contract with Grand Rapids. He had an impact almost immediately, scoring close to a point-per-game and securing a roster spot for the postseason.
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Future: Lashoff is immediately showing Detroit why they gave him a contract. As a ‘90-born, he will play one more season in the OHL, where he will need to have a big season to even get Kingston into the playoffs. Lashoff has shown that he has all the tools to be a very good defenseman, and this season has looked more than ever like he could have a decent professional career. Detroit may have invested wisely in Lashoff.
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23. Stephen Johnston, C
6th round, 181st overall, 2008
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Stats
07/08 .. Belleville (OHL) .. 56 GP .. 2-7–9 .. +0 .. 12 PIM
08/09 .. Belleville (OHL) .. 58 GP .. 14-22–36 .. +18 .. 38 PIM
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Season: Johnston was the pick in the 2008 draft that I was most excited for. He played for one of the most stacked teams in the OHL, where his mere presence in such a veteran lineup spoke more to his play than his stat line ever could. It was expected that Johnston would have a big offensive year. He didn’t quite get to the level that Detroit might have expected, but he did triple his point production. Belleville was still a very talented team this season, so Johnston made due with what was mostly 3rd line minutes. He hurt his hand in the playoffs and missed most of Belleville’s run to the Conference Finals, where they were knocked out by Thomas McCollum and the Brampton Battalion.
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Future: Belleville will lose more players this season than they did last season, leaving Johnston as one of the biggest scoring threats on the team. He will need to have a big season to earn a contract with Detroit. Detroit has drafted a lot of players that they hope can fill out the Grind Line when Draper and Maltby move on, so these players will need to score a lot at other levels to show they can contribute as two-way forwards, and not just defensive ones. Johnston has the tools to be a dominant player in the OHL, and will need to show it next season.
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24. Logan Pyett, D
7th round, 212th overall, 2006
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Stats
07/08 .. Regina (WHL) .. 62 GP .. 20-34–54 .. +24 .. 54 PIM
07/08 .. Canada (WJC) .. 6 GP .. 0-1–1 .. +1 .. 2 PIM
08/09 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 61 GP .. 3-11–14 .. -1 .. 12 PIM
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Season: Pyett had a rocky first season as a professional. It wasn’t unexpected, because defenseman of his size are hard to come by in the pros, but his junior career was so impressive that Detroit was forced to sign him. Pyett’s roller coaster started on somewhat of a high note, because he made the Griffins blueline out of camp. However, it took him a long time to get going, and as an offensive defenseman, the fact that he didn’t score until February was troublesome. He saw himself in and out of the lineup until he scored most of his points in the month of February. It was too little too late for Pyett though, as he lost his regular spot in the lineup to Brian Lashoff for the playoffs, and is currently watching from the press box.
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Future: Pyett has two more years on his contract to turn things around. Luckily for him, Ericsson’s moving out and the only defenseman moving in in rookie Sebastien Piche who will certainly compete with Pyett for powerplay minutes. Pyett is an offensive defenseman who will those powerplay minutes to be an effective pro.
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25. Ryan Oulahen, C
5th round, 164th overall, 2003
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Stats
07/08 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 75 GP .. 14-16–30 .. -11 .. 47 PIM
08/09 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 73 GP .. 19-12–31 .. +7 .. 31 PIM
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Season: Oulahen was on the fence to be re-signed after last season, but Detroit gave him one more year. He was Grand Rapids’ assistant captain and a fan favorite all year. It’s hard to tell if he hurt or helped himself with his season. He finished 4th on the team in goals with a career high of 19. He logged big penalty kill minutes and scorered most of his goals not playing on a scoring line. But at 24, he’s running out of time to impress Detroit. He suffered a very nasty hip/leg injury late in the season that will keep him out for the duration of the playoffs.
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Future: Oulahen was given a one-year contract, and seems to be in the same boat as he was last year. He’s pretty close to NHL-ready, but Detroit just has so many more forwards that are jumping over him in the depth chart. He might have better luck cracking another organization.
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26. Jordan Pearce, G
Signed as a free agent, April 2009
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Stats
07/08 .. Notre Dame (CCHA) .. 43 GP .. 23-15-4 .. 2.04 GAA .. 91.4% .. 2 SO
08/09 .. Notre Dame (CCHA) .. 39 GP .. 30-6-3 .. 1.68 GAA .. 93.1% .. 8 SO
08/09 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 1 GP .. 0-1-0 .. 5.11 GAA .. 86.8% .. 0 SO
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Season: I feel like Pearce would be much higher in these rankings if Detroit had drafted him and I’d followed him more closely. He had a tremendous college career. Pearce was part of the recruiting class that really put Notre Dame on the map for hockey. He sat on the bench much of his first two season, but emerged as a dominant college goalie as a junior and senior. His senior year numbers, which earned him the CCHA Goaltender of the Year award, also earned him a contract with Detroit. Notre Dame won the entire CCHA but were bounced in the first round of the NCAA Tournament by the Cinderella-story Bemidji State Beavers. Pearce did not have a good showing in that game. He joined Grand Rapids following the tournament, but was called up to Detroit to practice with the team when it was determined he wouldn’t see any playoff action.
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Future: Pearce will begin the first year of his two-year contract in Grand Rapids next season, probably. He will compete with Thomas McCollum for playing time. Pearce has the advantage of being three years older and more experienced at the position, but McCollum is much more technically-refined. Both will probably get a fair chance in Grand Rapids, but Pearce will likely end up in the ECHL if McCollum even plays somewhat well.
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27. Gennady Stolyarov, RW
8th round, 257th overall, 2004
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Stats
07/08 .. Moscow Dynamo (RSL) .. 37 GP .. 3-2–5 .. -8 .. 22 PIM
08/09 .. Moscow Dynamo (KHL) .. 3 GP .. 0-0–0 .. -4 .. 4 PIM
08/09 .. Astana Barys (KHL) .. 41 GP .. 12-9–21 .. +12 .. 24 PIM
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Season: I can’t mention Stolyarov without the word “enigma” popping into my head. Part of it probably has to do with the fact that he plays in Russia and I can barely find a picture of the guy. I don’t even know if he exists. But Detroit claims he does, and claims they still have an eye on him. After several years of being in that “he’s not scoring, but it’s impressive that he’s playing at that level considering his age” boat, Stolyarov decided it was time for a move. He transferred from Moscow Dynamo, one of the top teams each year in the RSL/KHL to Astana Barys, more of a mid-level type team. Stolyarov started scoring a lot after his move and registered most of his 21 points before January. After this, he slowed down significantly, but it’s nice to know that he’s still on the map.
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Future: Detroit has always maintained that Stolyarov has a very favorable blend of speed and skill. It’s very possible that he’s one of the most NHL-ready players on this list, but he’s so far back on it because there’s just so much uncertainty as to if he will ever sign. He’ll appear on this list for a few more years, as with no transfer agreement there is no hurry to sign him, but it seems possible he will eventually fade into obscurity.
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28. Brent Raedeke, C
Signed as a free agent, September 2008
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Stats
07/08 .. Edmonton (WHL) .. 72 GP .. 15-16–31 .. -14 .. 62 PIM
08/09 .. Edmonton (WHL) .. 71 GP .. 20-36–56 .. -13 .. 80 PIM
08/09 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 2 GP .. 0-0–0 .. -1 .. 0 PIM
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Season: Alongside Lashoff, Raedeke was given a unique opportunity by Detroit with a contract after training camp. Playing on the expansion Edmonton Oil Kings, Raedeke was among his teams leading scorers, but was a long shot to be drafted. His strong work ethic at camp led Detroit to give him a contract, hoping that he would end up another checking line forward. Raedeke had a much more successful year this year, finishing third on his team in scoring with 56 points, including a crucial goal he scored the the head-to-head tiebreaker game to get into the playoffs. Raedeke’s Oil Kings were bounced from the playoffs in the first round, so he signed a tryout with the Griffins to finish the year.
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Future: Raedeke will need one more season in the WHL before he can play in the AHL. As it usually goes in junior hockey, terrible teams don’t stay terrible for too long, so it seems pretty likely that the Oil Kings could end up in a pretty good playoff position next year. Raedeke is probably a strong choice for team captain, and looks like he’s in a good position for a big season.
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29. Bryan Rufenach, D
7th round, 208th overall, 2007
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Stats
07/08 .. Clarkson (ECAC) .. 35 GP .. 3-3–6 .. 12 PIM
08/09 .. Clarkson (ECAC) .. 34 GP .. 9-9–18 .. 32 PIM
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Season: With the graduation of several defensemen, significant ice time opened up on Clarkson and Rufenach jumped all over, effectively becoming the team’s go-to guy. After making the NCAA Tournament last season, Clarkson got a lot younger this season and found themselves near the bottom of the league standings all season. Rufenach finished 5th on the team in scoring and quarterbacked the powerplay all season long. He was one of the bright spots on a lowly Golden Knight team.
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Future: I didn’t expect Rufenach to be the team’s top defenseman until his junior year. The only other two defenseman that got more than two points all season were both seniors, so it’s safe to say that Rufenach’s position as the top offensive defenseman is safe for a while. Overall, his team is very young, so Rufenach could be in a position of leadership even as a junior. He seems to be progressing well ahead of schedule.
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30. Julien Cayer, C
5th round, 151st overall, 2008
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Stats
07/08 .. Northwood (USHS) .. 43 GP .. 24-32–56
08/09 .. Clarkson (ECAC) .. 29 GP .. 4-6–10 .. 30 PIM
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Season: I wasn’t sure what to expect when Detroit drafted Cayer, a Quebec-born player playing prep hockey in New York. He certainly put up big numbers there and seemed to expect that he would be drafted, despite being passed over last season, as he actually attended the draft and sat through a bunch of interviews. He joined Bryan Rufenach at Clarkson, where Cayer’s brother starred for four years and was a fan favorite. So because of his last name, Cayer was instantly expected to do good things. He wasn’t in the lineup every night, but by midseason he was scoring at a fairly productive clip. His 10 points look meager, but only six players scored more goals than his four did.
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Future: Cayer seems to have very good offensive instincts, so it is hopeful that he will have a big offensive year and take some of the icetime that Shea Guthrie and Chris D’Alvise will leave behind, as the second and third leading Clarkson scorers. He’s in the same boat that Rufenach was last year but in a different position, there are a lot of young players on the team right now so he could easily take a bigger role than a sophomore at a bigger school would.
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2009 Detroit Prospect Rankings, 31-39

This is my favorite annual post. Allow me to explain. This time last year I had between 1-3 readers. Now I have 3-5, maybe upwards of 6, so I figure I will fill everyone in on the novel they are about to read.

Basically, my favorite part about following hockey are prospects. I love the draft, I always have even since I was little and had no idea who anyone was. I’d estimate around 2001 I started taking an interest in the players Detroit drafted, because I wanted to know who would be playing for them before they got there. Part of this had to do with a game I started playing around that time called Eastside Hockey Manager, a simulation-based hockey game where you are the GM of a hockey team. You don’t play the games like in the EA Sports series, you just run the team, contracts, drafting, etc. The prospects were all in there and you could sign and develop any of Detroit’s prospects, so I loved doing that. This, and the fact that the Plymouth Whalers played in my backyard, so I could actually see some of the players I was developing virtually, fed my interest in this aspect of hockey.

My interest in the Whalers and the OHL led me to know more and more about the players that got drafted every year. From there I started following other leagues, reading information online and watching games whenever I could, to get a pretty good grasp on most of the players drafted every year. I think my ultimate goal is to have heard of every player Detroit drafts before they take them, a goal in which I was a Julien Cayer and Jesper Samuelsson short of accomplishing last June.

So I follow the Wings’ prospects pretty intensively over the year. Some of what I learn comes from the great RedWingsCentral weekly prospect reports, but I keep bookmarks on team blogs, local papers, and people I know who can see some of these players more frequently than I can. I’d estimate I have seen a lot of them though, I usually go out of my way to see a Wings prospect play whenever I can.

Those who have followed my blog know that I rank the prospects somewhat frequently. I try to do a pre-season ranking, which is pretty condensed (relative to this) which wipes the slate clean and is pretty much based off of potential. From there, in January I do a mid-season version, which I shuffle players up and down based on how much they are exceeding the expectations I set for them in the pre-season. Then at the end of the year, I take bits of my free time for the greater part of a month and assemble this comprehensive end of season ranking. I don’t just rank guys on value here, I assemble a couple lists (I believe nine was the number this year) based on potential, NHL-readiness, how they’ve done this season, my own personal opinion, etc., and average them together to get this ranking. This year I did it a little differently so I assigned players points based on their progress. I feel this ends up being more accurate, for example, because a player like Johan Ryno has one of the best potentials of any of Detroit’s prospects, but he left North America last year and got hurt this year in a lower-division of Sweden, so I don’t feel he should get the same value as a guy with a lot of potential who is doing what the Wings ask of him.

This year it ended up being pretty complicated, and I’m not going to lie, after I averaged everything out I moved a couple guys around who I felt were too high or too low, defeating the entire purpose of creating multiple lists anyway. But I think that shows that I do put time into these rankings and I try to weigh every prospect as fairly as possible. But I don’t about the actual number as much as I care about trying to get the information I’ve absorbed about each prospect out there to people who might be interested in the guys the Wings draft but don’t have as much free time to invest in finding out that answer.

So before we start, here are the links to the other rankings I’ve put together, just for reference. I like to do the rankings backwards, so here is 31-39. Not the most interesting bunch, but still, pay attention, I didn’t follow prospects at the time but nobody had Datsyuk on their radar before he came to North America. I realize the timing for this is also weird because everyone is in playoff mode, but this is the time I get out of school, so my only responsibilities become my part-time job and playoff hockey, so when I’m not working I’m probably thinking about hockey.. and this is a good outlet for that.

January 2008
April 2008 (21-30) (11-20) (1-10)
August 2008
December 2008

Here we go!

31. Jesper Samuelsson, C
7th round, 211th overall, 2008
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Stats
07/08 .. Vita Hasten (SWE-3) .. 40 GP .. 20-42–62 .. +29 .. 73 PIM
08/09 .. Timra IK (SEL) .. 40 GP .. 2-1–3 .. -3 .. 10 PIM
08/09 .. Timra IK (J20) .. 4 GP .. 2-0–2 .. -1 .. 2 PIM
08/09 .. IF Sundsvall (SWE-2) .. 13 GP .. 1-5–6 .. -6 .. 38 PIM
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Season: Jesper Samuelsson was so obscure that it took NHL officials five minutes to find out if he was actually real or if Detroit was making a joke when they selected him with the last pick of the 2008 draft. Jesper is very real, and had himself a fairly eventful season. You can look at his season in one of two ways. On one hand, it’s very impressive that he was able to jump right to the SEL, the highest league in Sweden, after four years in third-tier Sweden, where young players with futures in hockey typically don’t find themselves. On the other hand, his three points leave something to be desired. This especially, considering he played with Magnus Paajarvi-Svensson, considered a lock for the top five in this upcoming draft, and Anton Lander, another potential pick in the top three rounds. Samuelsson was able to stick around for most of the season with Timra, but also found himself with a handful of games in both the Swedish Junior League, and second-tier Sweden, which is considered much better than third-tier.
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Future: Samuelsson is under contract with Timra for another year, but due to the CBA, will need to have a big season to earn a contract with Detroit (provided there is a transfer agreement in place) following the season. He is a creative playmaking center with a lot of similarities in his game to Zetterberg, right down to where he was taken in the draft and the team in Sweden he calls home. After he was drafted, it was revealed that Samuelsson has some kind of glucose allergy, so he is learning a new way to train, as he was never able to put on weight before he was diagnosed.
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32. Sergei Kolosov, D
5th round, 151st overall, 2004
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Stats
07/08 .. Minsk (BHL) .. 47 GP .. 4-6–10 .. +1 .. 73 PIM
08/09 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 70 GP .. 4-7–11 .. -4 .. 36 PIM
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Season: I was pretty shocked when Kolosov signed with Detroit. After they drafted him, they asked him to play major junior hockey, but he waited too long and ended up in the USHL (the United States equivalent to major junior, but not nearly the same talent-level). When his eligibility expired there, they wanted him to sign with a low-level professional team, in the IHL for example, but he decided to go home and play pro hockey in Belarus. However, current Griffins coach Curt Fraser ran into him when he coached the Belarussians in last years World Championships, and when he was hired to coach the Griffins, convinced Detroit that Kolosov was worth signing. He was able to stay in Grand Rapids all season long, and put up fairly decent numbers for a stay-at-home defenseman. He is very physical, but at time lost positioning when he missed a hit.
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Future: Kolosov has one more year with Grand Rapids coming up. He had a good year in that he didn’t see a lot of time as a healthy scratch, and he did crack the playoff roster. He is a little older than most rookie defensemen in the league, so he will need to make up for lost time and mainly work on his skating if he wants to continue his professional career beyond next season.
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33. Nils Backstrom, D
9th round, 290th overall, 2004
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Stats
07/08 .. Alaska-Anchorage (WCHA) .. 16 GP .. 1-2–3 .. 18 PIM
08/09 .. Alaska-Anchorage (WCHA) .. 34 GP .. 4-4–8 .. 38 PIM
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Season: If any prospect on the end section of this list breaks out and randomly gets an NHL contract, it will be Backstrom. Although his numbers don’t look it, Backstrom had a breakout season with Alaska-Anchorage, one of the cellar-dwellers in a very stacked WCHA (Denver, Colorado College, North Dakota, Wisconsin, etc). After injuries slowed his sophomore season, Backstrom put up some solid offensive numbers this season, and played against other team’s top lines every night on the Seawolves top pairing. That’s no small feat, considering the WCHA boasts some of the highest NHL picks still playing college hockey.
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Future: Backstrom wasn’t really on my radar until I read the kind words that a UAA blogger wrote about him last month. He seems to be very high on him and thinks he could play in the AHL this season, but obviously Backstrom will stay at UAA for his senior season. I will definitely be keeping an eye on him, as he was drafted as more of a skilled defenseman, so if he really does have this impressive work ethic, Detroit could give him a contract.
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34. Randy Cameron, C
5th round, 148th overall, 2007
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Stats
07/08 .. Moncton (QMJHL) .. 62 GP .. 12-27–39 .. -14 .. 30 PIM
08/09 .. Moncton (QMJHL) .. 56 GP .. 19-32–51 .. +17 .. 24 PIM
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Season: Cameron was fortunate enough to move from one of the worst teams in the Quebec league to one of the best, almost overnight. Moncton found success through some high draft picks that are among the top names for upcoming NHL Drafts (Brandon Gormley, 2010), and a red hot goalie in Nicola Riopel. Cameron had a solid year, finishing third in team scoring just as he did last season. He was a key faceoff man and a reliable defensive presence on a team that won games more for the goals it didn’t surrender than for the goals that it scored. Moncton made the playoffs and Cameron had 8 points in 10 games before suffering a second round defeat.
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Future: Cameron has to be signed this offseason and is considered a long shot. Detroit has always compared him to Mike Fisher, but Cameron’s modest offensive totals indicate he might have trouble scoring at the next level. Not getting a tryout with Grand Rapids following this season shows that he might not be on Detroit’s radar, but playing into his favor is the fact that he isn’t facing much competition, as Zack Torquato is the only other prospect that needs a contract.
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35. Anton Axelsson, LW
6th round, 192nd overall, 2004
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Stats
07/08 .. Timra IK (SEL) .. 54 GP .. 10-10–20 .. +7 .. 10 PIM
08/09 .. Timra IK (SEL) .. 52 GP .. 6-9–15 .. -3 .. 0 PIM
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Season: Axelsson is now a regular fixture in the SEL, and despite the fact that he would probably do very well in the AHL, it seems less and less likely that he will be signed, so he’s slipping further and further down these rankings. His offensive totals took a pretty big hit this season after his nice 10 goal season last year. He is still a good checking line player and at 22, definitely isn’t too old to come over yet. His zero penalty minutes are particularly impressive.
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Future: No transfer agreement means Axelsson doesn’t need to sign for a while. Detroit was thinking about signing him when they thought there was a deadline for him, but I haven’t heard anything on him this season. He will most likely stay with Timra next season.
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36. Jamie Tardif, LW
Signed as a free agent, April 2008
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Stats
07/08 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 80 GP .. 17-17–34 .. -6 .. 90 PIM
08/09 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 55 GP .. 9-9–18 .. -1 .. 43 PIM
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Season: Tardif earned himself a contract at this time last year with a very impressive rookie season in the AHL. He showed that he could still resemble the dominant player he was in juniors, combining his goal scoring ability with his physical brand of hockey. This season didn’t go as well for Tardif. His numbers took a hit and he saw himself passed on the depth chart by several much younger players. An injury forced him out of most of the second half of the season, but he did return for the playoffs.
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Future: Tardif has one more year on the contract Detroit gave him, and he definitely won’t get a new contract if he has another year like this one. He’s never looked like a scorer at the next level, but production at the AHL level is the first step to a callup from Detroit.
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37. Nick Oslund, LW

7th round, 191st overall, 2006

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Stats
07/08 .. St. Cloud State (WCHA) .. 38 GP .. 4-1–5 .. 27 PIM
08/09 .. St. Cloud State (WCHA) .. 35 GP .. 4-3–7 .. 26 PIM
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Season: Oslund was a beast back in his Minnesota high school hockey days, but hasn’t progressed as Detroit expected him to. A sophomore with St. Cloud State, he hasn’t become anything more than a role player and his numbers are only slightly better than what he achieved last season. He is a great skater and has become a fan favorite for the way he hustles, but he hasn’t been rewarded yet.
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Future: The great thing about Oslund is that Detroit keeps his rights for five years, as he took a year in the USHL before he went to college. So if he’s a late bloomer, Detroit will still be able to hold exclusive rights for him. Unless someone leaves early, St. Cloud is only graduating three forwards, so extra ice time for Oslund will be hard to come by.
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38. Miroslav Blatak, D
4th round, 129th overall, 2001
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Stats
07/08 .. Salavat Ufa (RSL) .. 57 GP .. 2-12–14 .. +9 .. 34 PIM
08/09 .. Salavat Ufa (KHL) .. 54 GP .. 4-10–17 .. +19 .. 41 PIM
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Season: Blatak was drafted eight years ago and one year younger than Niklas Kronwall, so the term “prospect” applies very loosely to him. However, Detroit has always liked his offensive ability so much that they filed for “defected player” status, which gave them two more years of Blatak’s rights instead of them expiring in 2006 like all of their other unsigned Europeans did. He’s produced a lot at a high level of play, but I think at this point Detroit has too many younger projects they’re working on to consider Blatak for a contract.
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Future: He will probably bounce around Europe to finish his career, but I find the chances of Detroit signing him to be extremely slim. Detroit has always wanted him to get stronger, but he never has. His rights will expire this June.
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39. Randall Gelech, RW
Signed as a free agent, August 2007
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Stats
07/08 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 70 GP .. 7-8–15 .. -9 .. 37 PIM
08/09 .. Grand Rapids (AHL) .. 5 GP .. 0-0–0 .. -1 .. 2 PIM
08/09 .. Rochester (AHL) .. 56 GP .. 9-9–18 .. -9 .. 33 PIM
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Season: Last but not least (well, yeah, least too in this case), Randall Gelech earns the distinction of being Detroit’s last ranked prospect. Gelech was given a two-year deal two years ago, but never produced in Grand Rapids like he was expected. He was ruled a spare part in Grand Rapids this year and loaned to Rochester for the year, where his numbers were better than last season, but nothing indicates that he could become a “Travis Moen-type” as Detroit likened him to when they signed him.
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Future: Probably zero chance of re-signing. I don’t say definite things anymore because I considered Sergei Kolosov a lost project and wrote him off last year, but Detroit signed him to spite me. You never know. I would say Gelech is much more of a certainty to be let go because Detroit gave him a chance and sent him away. He will probably be on an AHL-contract next season.
==============================================

Datsyuk’s got Hart

Ansar Khan has the inside scoop and says that Pavel Datsyuk has been nominated for the Hart Trophy. The official announcement was just made ten minutes ago — it’s all Russians. Ovechkin, Malkin, Datsyuk.

It’s definitely a big honor for Datsyuk to even be nominated. Lidstrom has deserved a nomination for years now but never really even got a sniff. I first called Datsyuk for the Hart in January, and he slowed down a little at the end of the year, so it’s nice to see that they still recognized him.

Ovechkin scored 56 goals and even though Malkin had more points than he did, it’s probably going to go to Ovechkin. It’s a shame, because Datsyuk was right up there with the both of them in points and his Selke and Lady Byng nominations speak to how he’s a much more complete player than either of them. The whole “well, Detroit is stacked” argument is going to play against him as well.

So Datsyuk has three nominations, and Lidstrom was nominated for the Norris. All season there’s been talk about how this is the year he’s going to lose, and I think that’s right, but not for a lack of play. Mike Green’s 31 goals are way too enticing and he’s probably going to walk away with it. It’s a shame, because I’ve long suspected — and had this confirmed in the Washington/NY Rangers series — that he is terrible defensively. And I was wrong, he’s beyond terrible. He’s more useful as a fourth forward. He gets beat regularly to the inside and outside and his “defensive reads” usually consist of trying to step up for a big hit on a 2-on-2 so he either breaks up the play there or causes a 2-on-1. It’s honestly upsetting. Third nominee Zdeno Chara isn’t at Lidstrom’s level defensively either, but at least he has a basic sense for positioning.

His name is Jonas

Hiller.

A name obscure to most casual hockey fans, but a name that San Jose fans will soon not forget. Despite the fact that Anaheim still has a 31-year-old Jean-Sebastien Giguere who won a Cup and a Conn Smythe in separate seasons, it was Hiller who posted more impressive numbers all throughout the regular season and got the starting job in the playoffs.

And he won. San Jose heavily outshot Anaheim in every single game. Hiller shut them out, twice. San Jose threw upwards of 45 shots at him a night and Hiller stood strong every game. He stole the series.

Anaheim completely nuked their team at the deadline. In my trade deadline wrap-up, I believe I labeled them sellers, even though I wasn’t sure if they actually got worse by selling. Throughout the course of the season, the Ducks shipped out Chris Kunitz, Brendan Morrison, Steve Montador, Sammy Pahlsson, Travis Moen, Kent Huskins, all at the deadline, and before that, Brian Sutherby, Brad May, and Ken Klee.

It’s a strange period for the team. They have a grand total of seven players who were on the 2007 Cup winning team and one of those players is George Parros. Two of them (Niedermayer and Selanne) were half-retired last season. And one is Giguere, who’s currently opening the door and wearing a hat.

It was no secret that despite the Ducks success, the failure of the Toronto Maple Leafs had more impact on the team this season than it should have. For years now, Brian Burke has been rumored to the GM position and when it became available this season, Burke didn’t wait for when it was convenient for Anaheim to jump ship. In fact, he left them in terrible shape. Anaheim was on the outside of the playoff picture looking in, and almost half of their roster were due to become free agents in the summer. This forced Bob Murray to jump in and do some damage control. He did a great job just getting rid of some of these players for ones that will be on the team next season. He got rid of a lot of fan favorites and was considered a big “seller,” but he didn’t really get any great young assets in return and, in fact, shipped out the team’s top prospect in Eric Tangradi. However, Burke’s impact on the team is still clearly there.

But before I get more into that, I’d like to issue a little commentary on the state of the San Jose Sharks.

All season long, all I have heard is how scary this San Jose team can be. With Todd McLellan at the helm, they play the same style as Detroit. But supposedly, with more size and more speed, they play it better. And they have the goaltending to go all the way. And, at three separate points in the season, I read how Dan Boyle, Rob Blake, and even Marc-Edouard Vlasic would be the defenseman to break Nick Lidstrom’s monopoly on the Norris.

I watched San Jose closely, on NHL Gamecenter. Because of this, I was subject to the Comcastic team of Randy Hahn, who grew a goatee this year to try to look as much like McLellan as possible, and Drew Remenda, who intentionally looks like Mr. Clean and expects people to take him seriously. I do more than my fair share of complaining about Ken “the puck hit the kickplate” Daniels and Mickey “why in god’s name do you wink before every broadcast?” Redmond (alternative title: sometime to do with alcoholism and a strong resistance to any and all rule changes after 1974), but these are the worst to commentators in the league. You’d be hard-pressed to find a game where Remenda doesn’t compare the Sharks’ system to Detroit, and about once a week there’s a commentary on how signing random veterans like Claude Lemieux, Jeremy Roenick, and Rob Blake gives them the “experience” they need to beat Detroit. Whatever — Daniels and Redmond are homers too, but to their credit they usually argue things based on facts and reality.

And then there was the second game against Detroit this season, where I was forced to watch the entire game through the Sharks broadcast. Every time the Sharks did something right, the mighty broadcasting duo went on and on about how it was such a statement. You’d never know that the Sharks didn’t absolutely dominate that game despite the fact that it was a one-goal outcome. And then, in the middle of an on-the-bench interview during that game with someone random, Joe Thornton leaned in with a big grin on his face and said, “we’re the best team in the league.”

Joe Thornton, of all players. Houdini himself. Never has such a dominant regular season player performed so poorly in the playoffs, year after year. It was a harmless comment, something to fire up the fans I suppose, but I found it unprofessional given that it was in the middle of a game and they barely squeaked out with a win. Given the Sharks recent history of bowing out of the playoffs early, you’d think a guy like Thornton would be smart enough to not say something like that because the hockey gods tend to look down on something like that and punish teams accordingly. Thornton showed up for all of one game, and was truly a liability in the first two games of the season.

I honestly think that this loss is the “end” of the Sharks as they currently know it. For the past few seasons, it’s been no secret that Detroit is the best run franchise in the league. Perhaps it was jealousy, perhaps a little fear, but every time I heard about how the Sharks will be the next big Western power, I couldn’t help but wish them ill. They draft extremely well and seem to find a use for every young player they have. They have a great system. But I never felt that their lineup was anything that could beat Detroit in a seven-game series. It’s a shame they didn’t get that Western Conference Finals showdown, but it shows what problems San Jose has.

After Game 5, fans were calling for Joe Thornton and Patrick Marleau to be traded if the team lost. Both of them are guilty of taking crucial games off. Marleau was a warrior last playoffs, but he had taken almost the whole season off. Thornton has disappeared in every playoff he was in, and finally played well in Game 5 after constant media harassment. He fought Ryan Getzlaf tonight, but today, almost seemed to anxious for physical contact to be effective. He is a patient player and great playmaker — but I don’t think he has what it takes to be a great player in a playoff game with intensity. I see big changes in San Jose this offseason. They’re young, there’s no reason to totally nuke the team, but they can afford to move some big names and get some solid assets in return.

And intense is what this series was. My personal vendetta against San Jose and Anaheim’s sweep of the first two games led me to watch the last four games of this series. I felt that it was great hockey. San Jose dominated 90% of the series, but Anaheim was resilient defensively and capitalized on their opportunities to create offense. They are tremendously deep on the blueline and they have some skill scattered throughout their lineup, but not like it was in 2007. They truly are not an 8-seed. I wanted Detroit to play Columbus for a reason. Detroit matched up better that way, and while I did expect San Jose would win this series, I knew it would take a physical toll. So those who got sick of Mike Commodore and Antoine Vermette and their thuggery last round will miss them dearly in about a week.

So how does Detroit avoid going down this same path? Detroit needs to stick to their game. Anaheim won by getting sensational goaltending, but also their defense did as good a job as they could making sure there was no traffic in front of him. Anaheim was also physical and cheap as usual. They did a great job throwing San Jose’s stars off their game, forcing such non-fighters as Joe Thornton and Joe Pavelski off the ice by baiting them into fighting. Dan Boyle was so fed up with Corey Perry’s elbows that he took a run at him late in the 2nd and found himself in the box for four minutes to start the third. There’s just no way that Anaheim can win this series if they take that many penalties and Detroit stays relatively disciplined the way they did against Columbus.

But I think they will tone it back. Randy Carlyle is a great coach. You can tell when he calls for that kind of stuff and when he tells his team to back off. But the team just naturally has enough hotheads where Detroit should see a distinct powerplay advantage.

So, a quick preview:

Jonas Hiller, as I’ve mentioned, is insane. The past two games on CBC they have showed his face during the national anthem. The guy is tranced in a way I’ve never seen before. He’s shouting different things, his mouth is opening and closing, he’s licking his lips, he opens his eyes really wide, he’s practically jumping around. I’m assuming he’s visualizing himself making saves, but it’s very possible he’s on some sort of hallucinogenic drug. He tracks the puck very well through traffic. He’s very quick. You will not beat his glove. If you score early, you might rattle him, but it didn’t work for San Jose this series. The only thing that might help Detroit would be the fatigue factor. If this series starts Thursday as expected, that’s not a lot of rest for a guy who saw as many shots as he did.

In this tirade that is somehow considered blog-worthy, I ranted at the end about how much I hate Anaheim. I mention that Scott Niedermayer is one of the most overrated players in the league. I still believe that — he took most of this season off — but he showed up for the postseason. Not always in a positive way though. He virtually abandoned his defensive position and played as almost a fourth forward, but he is crazy smart with the puck. When he’s on the ice he has the ability to break up a pass and take the puck all the way down the ice to create. If he’s not on the ice, Pronger will be. Pronger is dangerous in that he is really mentally unstable; the guy honestly believes because he’s 6′6″ it’s just natural physics that he will elbow someone in the head when he checks them. He will target Detroit’s stars because nobody will stand up to him. Detroit needs to pick their spots if they choose to go after him.

Francois Beauchemin missed most of the season but has stepped back in the lineup and become a factor. James Wisniewski, one of my favorite ex-Plymouth Whalers, was acquired from Chicago at the deadline and combines toughness with a reliable two-way game. Ryan Whitney is a chronic underachiever but was a force for Pittsburgh last playoff, but he’s still suspect defensively. Rounding out the top 6 is Sheldon Brookbank, who barely plays and is pretty much out to antagonize. He took some bad penalties this series. I wouldn’t be surprised if Bret Hedican, Brendan Mikkelson, or Brett Festerling came in for him.

Up front, size and skill reigns supreme — leftovers from Burke’s regime. Getzlaf, Ryan, and Perry were one of the best lines in the league in the last few months of the season. Getzlaf was a force in this series. His hands are among the best in the league, and I think the release on his wrist shot is the best. Ryan didn’t make the team out of camp but scored 31 goals. Perry is one of my most hated players in the league, and Detroit will get a break because he will probably be suspended. I’ve always ranted about him because he fights with his visor on constantly, and he takes 100+ PIM a year of mostly elbowing penalties. It was a vicious elbow on Jonathan Cheechoo today, that if Donald Brashear’s elbow on Blair Betts yesterday got him five games, Perry’s should be three or four. Perry’s was much, much worse, but that’s the double standard the league usually employs. He is a skilled player, but he would be much better if he weren’t so dirty and lazy.

Secondary scoring is basically one name: Teemu Selanne. He is still one of the most natural scorers in the league, but he just can’t do it every shift like he used to. His linemates this series were Andrew Ebbett, who is quick, but didn’t even score that much in college (played at Michigan) and Erik Christensen, who, honestly, and I know he will score because I say this, is just a terrible player. He has good hands but cannot do anything outside of the shootout. Christensen was replaced by Ryan Carter, who has never scored at ridiculous rates at other levels, but boasts a heavy shot. The only other consistent threat to score is Drew Miller (Ryan’s brother), but he doesn’t have too many games under his belt.

But they do capitalize on chances. And their bottom two lines generate a lot of chances. Todd Marchant centers the checking line and was one of the best players on the ice the first four games of this series. Rob Niedermayer had a good season by his standards, and wasn’t all that impressive this round, but he has won in the past. Mike Brown, I completely misjudged — I’d never seen him take a shift where he didn’t fight, but the guy is fast and probably generated the second most scoring chances on Anaheim tonight behind Getzlaf and Selanne. George Parros is the last regular forward. He’s my favorite goon in the league. He can take a regular shift, and he’s very smart on and off the ice (Princeton grad). I completely underestimated how calculating the guy is just based on his mustache, until I saw an interview with him last year. He made a difference today, by casually running Nabokov a few times, but I don’t see him taking as many shifts against Detroit.

So that’s brief, but that’s my scouting report from what I saw this series. There’s still some uncertainty because they just have so many new players from the team that I got used to in 2007. Detroit can take advantage of second and third line scoring in ways that San Jose couldn’t. Hiller is the absolute difference-maker though. This could be a long series, but I think Detroit is ready for it.

Holy Helm

Well, that was a nice change of pace.

And by nice, I mean, I hated it. Detroit didn’t have all too many nailbiters last playoffs. I definitely didn’t expect any against Columbus, given how the first three went. That would have been an absolutely crippling loss. Teams go up 3-0 all the time, and 3-1 doesn’t really make that much of a difference. Bottom line, and we hear it every year so I don’t need to say it, two teams have come back for that.

But when, in the second period, your goalie is having trouble standing, that changes things some. I wanted Detroit to get out of that with the win and have the seven or eight, or whatever it’ll be, days of rest. He played way too well in the first three games to be as bad as he was today. The defense should have helped him out, but Osgood was making those difficult saves in the first three games. Especially the Russell goal — that was routine. But more important than the goals he was letting up was the people he was letting score — Huselius, Nash, etc. These are not the guys you want to give hope going into an extended series.

But overall, Osgood had a tremendous series. I trust he has what it takes to take Detroit deep into the playoffs. No Conklin, no, no, no. Osgood was clearly hurt in Game 3, I’d guess at his groin. He tweaked it again today. Detroit called up the recently signed Jordan Pearce to take some of his reps in practice. It’s Pearce and not Howard becaue Grand Rapids is still in their playoff run and there is 0 chance that either plays for Detroit in the postseason. It’s clear Detroit wanted to keep him saved up for the game. They don’t need him going down for a week — that’s almost a whole series.

But today was ugly. Columbus showed some jump for the first time all season, and despite a valient effort, Detroit just couldn’t silence the crowd for long enough to run away with it. I think Osgood takes some of the blame, but the defense could have been a little stronger.

I thought in particular, Jonathan Ericsson made up for looking like a veteran for all the games he played late this season with a ridiculous amount or rookie mistakes. Columbus forwards were coming after him, and while he didn’t take any penalties (the one he did take was weak), it seemed to bother him. He gave away a lot of pucks, he had that bad series where he lost a puck in his own feet, and just wasn’t containing forwards with the same ability that he had been. It’ll be interesting to see if he comes out if Lilja is healthy. But I’m not sure if he will be.

On the other hands, Darren Helm was a maniac out there. He returned Columbus’ vigorous forecheck with the same energy and more. That shift where he had three hits and the scoring chance was Detroit’s best of the game. It calmed the team down significantly.

But, as usual, what a clutch goal by Franzen. 19 playoff goals, and 8 are winners? That is just hilariously insane. Detroit will never lose a playoff series for the next 11 years if he keeps that pace up. I thought he had a tremendous game overall, he had become somewhat one-dimensional since he became a big scorer, but today he was making a better effort on the backcheck. He’s a mini-Hossa when he backchecks like that, his speed and strength takes players right off the puck. On that note, Hossa wanted this series worse than anyone. We’d be talking Game 5 it it weren’t for him.

Ugly wins count just the same, though, so I am very happy to get out of this one right now. Detroit took control of the third period for the most part, the experience shines through. Osgood barely saw a difficult shot in the third.

Props to Columbus — not a great draw getting this Detroit team in their first ever playoff appearance. I think this series will do great things for the rivalry, the games definitely got a little heated. Detroit got the best of Steve Mason this series, but he’ll have more than a few chances to get vengence in his young career. He slowed down considerably at the end of the year and into the playoffs, but he accomplished a lot with such a mediocre defense. Especially Mike Commodore.

Anahiem or Vanouver, that’s all that’s left. Bring it on.

Give me something to work with here, Detroit

Nobody liked the way Detroit entered the playoffs. Not even Detroit. It didn’t seem as though they were destined for first round disappointment, but it did seem like they were going to have a hard time. It seemed that way to the fans and the media, anyway, but Detroit took matters into their own hands and handed skeptics a nice tall glass of shut the hell up.

It is probably the first series in recent playoff history that has played out exactly as it looks on paper. It’s David vs. Goliath. It’s the defending Stanley Cup Champions, plus Marian Hossa (and Jonathan Ericsson) against a team who is making it’s first ever playoff appearance. Logic would dictate that it is going to be a slaughter. But that’s not usually how the playoffs work. All it takes is a hot goaltender, which Columbus has, and one player who can take over a series, which Columbus has. All it takes is a title-defending team getting a little too comfortable with how good they are and possibly looking ahead to the second round before getting out of the first. It’s happened before — Detroit’s even done it before.

But Detroit is just too good to not have anticipated this. With the exception of the first seven minutes of Game 1, this series has been all Detroit. And those seven minutes couldn’t have gone any better for Detroit, either. Right away, the hockey world learned something. Chris Osgood does not take kindly to your negative attitude. He said all the right things going into the playoffs, about how everyone makes too big a deal about him, about how he feels like he played well down the stretch, etc., but many, including myself, couldn’t get over those below-average regular season numbers. I felt he played well down the stretch, but I felt he played well through multiple stretches off the season and he came apart after each time. Not this time. Columbus learned early and often that the only chink in Detroit’s armor wasn’t living up to the billing, something that had to be a little demoralizing.

An Antoine Vermette on Datsyuk “pony-ride”, plate full of cheese and whine from Ken Hitchcock about faceoffs, and Osgood 0.67/.974% stat line later, Detroit already has Columbus backed into a corner with a 3-0 series lead. Detroit has looked downright dominant in all three games, the experience of the team is shining through and there’s no question they want another Cup as bad as anyone else. Columbus, and god bless ‘em they do try, have just looked too young for this. They can’t find any set of defenseman to shut any one of Detroit’s lines down, not even Rick Nash is generating regular scoring chances, and even their attempts at cheapshots at the end of the game are brushed off by Detroit. Detroit’s just been through this kind of thing before, there’s just no chance any of that throws them off their game.

The only wildcard is Steve Mason. He’s been solid, but I expected he would be better. He hasn’t at any point been unbeatable, and very few of Detroit’s goals have really been all that impossible for him to stop — most seem to have glanced off a few body parts before they’ve gone in, but Mason just hasn’t had that unbeatability factor that he’s had going for him all season. If Columbus wants to steal a game or two here, it’ll be up to him to come up with those bigger saves. Osgood certainly has. I expected Detroit would win this series, and I expected that Chris Osgood would play well, but I did not expect that he would win the goaltending duel.

So I am left with very little to complain about.

Everyone on Detroit has been nothing short of spectacular. The offense went into the playoffs, frankly, ice cold by its own ridiculous standard, but each line is scoring and each line is generating chances. Based on expectations, the Filppula/Hudler/Samuelsson line has definitely been the most impressive, which is great for Filppula and Hudler because I feel that Samuelsson has still looked a little out of place, especially since Filppula and Hudler have cranked up the creativity. Hudler was excellent defensively tonight. Filppula is playing the best hockey of his career.

But the success starts higher up on the food chain. Datsyuk is in midseason form where he just says “I’m gonna do this now” and does something ridiculous with the puck. Research indicates it’s because of the fine care he receives at the Rahmani Eye Institute. Zetterberg hasn’t looked more perfect all season, the guy is just making the right decisions all the time at both ends of the ice. Hossa hasn’t had a goal yet but not for a lack of trying — he has literally carried defensemen on his back at times while still maintaining control of the puck. It’s quietly understood that he’s going to end up with a monster offensive night eventually. And Nick Lidstrom has just made Rick Nash look silly with those simple little stickchecks and good body positioning.

And yet, I turn the channel and watch Mike Green throw pucks blindly up the middle and randomly step up and miss a big hit and fully expect that he’s going to run away with the Norris. Sigh.

The real unsung heroes to me have been Brad Stuart and Tomas Holmstrom. Brad Stuart wasn’t so unsung today when he re-introduced R.J. Umberger to concussion-ville (I know he came back, but there’s just no way his brain didn’t pop out of place there) in a clean hit that resembled the NHL 09 “rag-doll” physics. After being on the wrong side of mediocrity for most of the season, his defensive play is remarkably improved, and he continues to be a reliable puck-moving defenseman. Holmstrom, on the other hand, has completely occupied every Blue Jacket defenseman to the point where they’re leaving those cross-ice lanes open even in non-powerplay situations and just helping Holmstrom’s case by standing around in front of the net and providing a plethora of different options for the puck to bank in off of.

The young guys don’t look so young anymore. Ericsson isn’t seeing as many minutes as he did in the regular season, but he’s got the hockey world talking about another late round steal. Babcock’s got a tough decision if Lilja gets healthy — the only thing playing against Ericsson is his lack of special teams minutes, Lilja is a penalty-killing fiend. Helm is hitting everything and anything that moves — but moves is a relative term because I imagine everything looks stationary when you’re whipping around the ice as fast as he does.

It has been beautiful hockey to watch. Columbus has a lot of work to do to not get swept, but even if they do come out harder with a last ditch effort and stretch this thing, Detroit needs to keep this style of play going. This is finally the team that we’ve been promised all season. We saw glimpses during the season but it was rare they put it all together for a string of games. But even with the amount of young players in the lineup, Detroit is just way too experienced and talented to not be able to play at this high level when it is really on the line.

Spectacular.

Niklas Kronwall sends Dan Cleary a message; Ville Leino recalled

Since it is playoff time, I’m going to try to be a “good” blog and actually report news as it happens, instead of once every three or four days in short novel form.  Not to say those short novels are going anywhere, because they are my outlet and I feel great after writing one.  Plus, if I type enough miles I get a free keyboard (terrible joke).

Today, as reported by Bruce MacLeod (who made Detroit bloggers rejoice in salvation today, as he had not updated his blog in weeks after The Macomb Daily cut back the amount of coverage he’d need to do on the Wings), Kris Draper is officially out for Game 1 and Game 2, and Niklas Kronwall accidentally ran Cleary into the boards during a drill and he had to leave practice.  Holland calls this a “minor, minor” injury.  He is considered probable for Game 1.

However, this didn’t stop Detroit from recalling Ville Leino.  I think this is hockey-playoff-talk for “Cleary is out for Game 1.”  Personally, as long as Cleary doesn’t have a serious injury, I’m pretty happy with this.  Leino needs to remind everyone what a good player he is, and force his way into the lineup.  I feel like the team’s offense started to nosedive right around the time he was sent down.  He gave Detroit 4 full scoring lines.

Cleary doesn’t.  He used to be that 4th line driving force in his first year with the team, but this year he’s taken more to being a scorer and just isn’t making those “pure hustle” plays.  I think he can and will step up for the playoffs but mainly, I want Leino in to make Babcock re-think Draper and Maltby, maybe even Samuelsson.  Draper and Maltby are useful to have in the playoffs, but if they’re giving anything less than 100%, it’s gotta be Leino.

However, it’s very possible I’m reading too much into it.  Cleary is “supposed” to practice tomorrow and if he’s good, Leino can be sent back down in time for Grand Rapids’ first playoff game against Hamilton. 

How to avoid first round humiliation OR Don’t shoot into Steve Mason OR How to beat a defense that features Mike Commodore

I couldn’t decide on a title, so I went with three.

Please note, this is gonna be a long one.  This is the stuff I’ve wanted to say for about a month now but I’ve held off on because of school and such.  Basically if you haven’t been following I have just had paper after paper and it all culminated with a 39-page public relations campaign (so not actually 39 pages of writing, but there’s words on every page and that’s still too much for me) that saw me sit and type for about 11 solid hours on Sunday.  I could write at least 5 novel length blog posts in that amount of time, but I digress.

Alright, where to start.. Franzen perhaps?

Johan Franzen and Ken Holland’s ongoing dominantion over the NHL Salary Cap.

I never clarified but I’m sure both of my readers figured it out.  Franzen’s deal ended up being an 11-year deal at roughly $45 million dollars, which breaks down to an exact cap hit of $3,954,545 until 2019-2020.  A viking like Franzen can buy an awful lot of mead with coin like that.

So it was a little higher than I originally anticipated, but obviously I have no right to be disappointed.  That’s still a steal for him, that’s still a big discount.  I just did not expect a long deal for Franzen given his history of finding a new way to get injured every couple of months.  But like Niklas Kronwall, it’s not as though he’s “injury prone” but the style of game he plays definitely puts him at risk for a couple of bruises per year.  As long as there’s no recurring injury (like Zetterberg’s back), this contract should look pretty good.

On that note, driving off the fact that Franzen now wears a visor after being clipped dangerously close to the eye against Buffalo two weeks back, can we get every damn Wing to wear a visor already?  I’m not making an argument for visors or something, but every Wing is slowly learning the hard way.  Yzerman, Draper, Lidstrom, Cleary, and now Franzen have all needed pucks to or near the eye to realize that a visor is a good idea.  Derek Meech put a visor on last year after Draper first got clipped, I believe.  This is just some unlucky force looming over the team that is not going to go away.  Guys should just start putting them on.  It just looks bad on a guy like Ericsson who has gone his whole career with a visor (they’re mandatory in most European leagues and in the AHL) to come up to the AHL and take his off while the guy with the 11-year contract is leaking blood about one-quarter inch away from his eye.

Cap-wise, I’ll break it down this way.  According to NHLNumbers, Detroit is now spending $27.254 million on 8 forwards for next season,  $23.483 million on 8 defenseman and $2.133 million on goaltending, for a grand total of $52.87 million, which, under this year’s cap, leaves breathing room of $3.83 million.  Now, that includes everybody who has to be on the team next season.  So it includes Ericsson and Howard, but not Leino or Helm, because they can still play in the AHL next season (most likely, not sure how it will work if Helm plays every playoff game again).

However, and I read this a while ago so I don’t remember it exactly, and I can’t find it right now, but this is a blog and not a research paper so I’m just gonna leave it up to you to decide whether or not to trust me, the NHLPA has the option to bump up the cap roughly $1-$2 million is losses are enough this season to actually curve it’s rapid growth.  So to be on the safe side, Detroit will have roughly $5 million to work with.

That doesn’t leave much in the grand scheme of things.  If Hossa wanted a long deal (5-6 years, nothing in decades), he would need to be willing to defer roughly this amount, and Detroit would likely have to move about $2 million in contract to be able to fill out their final roster spots.  So it’s not completely implausible, you’ve got to believe Kenny pulled the trigger on Franzen with this deal while he could get it because he still thought there was some chance of squeezing Hossa in.  Whether it happens or not, Holland is clearly seeing something from that camp that indicates he is genuinely interested in sacrificing money.  He could just be saying that though, and I wouldn’t hold it against him.

If no Hossa, things look very good.  Hudler might command up to $3 million, but hopefully a little less.  Kopecky could easily be kept, and Leino (who also needs a new deal) and Helm could be kept in the NHL with Detroit comfortably under.  And best of all, there’s not much chance that Detroit could keep Samuelsson and Hudler.  On the open market they’d probably each get $3-$4 million.  I don’t see them each conceding enough where they could fit in a ~$5 million budget with another forward or two and possibly a 3rd goalie.  And Chelios..  I’m 90% sure it’s finally over.  He played forward on Saturday.  Even the FSN guys were laughing at him, and let’s face it, they’re idiots.

Alright, enough cap talk.  It makes me think about the offseason and that should be the furthest thing from my mind right now.

Detroit drunkenly staggers into the playoffs

I don’t really have much to say about this, save for the fact that it makes me very, very nervous.  This was not at all what we needed to see going into the playoffs.  Others have excuses lined up, those games were meaningless, Detroit sat out some of their best players, etc..  Whatever you chalk it up to, it wasn’t good enough.  Detroit lost some big games against some teams that are only looking for a glimmer of hope to rally against Detroit with.  Detroit’s now got to face a Columbus team who not only won an 8-2 game, but actually won the season series.

But the bottom line is Detroit was shorthanded.  Maltby centered Derek Meech and Chris Chelios for crying out loud.  I just didn’t like the effort from the other three lines.  This offense is streaky and did not need to be shutout to start the playoffs.  Any momentum is better than this.  Columbus scratched their way into the playoffs and Detroit knew they were the #2 seed for about a week and proceeded to hand away points to any playoff-hungry team that needed them.  If any team can rebound, this team can, but these are the same mistakes that Detroit made in 2006.  I don’t like to bring that up, ever, but it’s the only thing I thought of.

However, that team was distinctly lacking in Marian Hossa.  I have no doubts this team will play better, but it’s going to take a few games to get into top shape, whatever that is.  This team really hasn’t had too many streaks this season where they’re a well-oiled machine, so it’s going to be hard to just pick that up.

But, Hossa and Lidstrom will be back in.  Draper should be good to go.  Mike Babcock was true to his word when he said Helm would have a spot in the playoffs and wasted no time calling him up as the salary cap expired for the playoffs.  Jonathan Ericsson is in for now, but Babcock has made it clear that he is on a short leash.  Ericsson looked stellar initially, but has since made a few rookie mistakes.  But then again, a lot of veterans were making rookie mistakes in the past two months.  Ericsson’s on a short leash, but when his replacement is Meech or Chelios, well, that’s going to need to be a hell of an error.  The only thing he needs to worry about is Brett Lebda, because when Lilja returns it’ll be between the two of them, because Lilja’s been way too good this season.  And Lebda’s been remarkably solid since his terrible start.  But Lilja may be out a while, bleeding in the brain is never a good thing.

Half the Detroit media is saying Helm will only go if Draper isn’t good to go, the other half says he’s going for Maltby no matter what.  I’d hope the latter is true, Helm/Kopecky have definitely earned the final playoff spots.  Babcock has made it clear he won’t hesitate to take guys out of the lineup if needed, and you’ve got to think that Ville Leino is the next guy in line, even over Maltby, if someone isn’t cutting it on the 4th line.  I’d like to see this to start, on Thursday:

Holmstrom – Datsyuk – Hossa

Hudler – Zetterberg – Franzen

Cleary – Filppula – Samuelsson

Kopecky – Helm – Draper

Short leash on Cleary — useless the past 15 games or so.  Filppula was stellar against Chicago though, he’s even shooting the puck!  If for any reason the team is not scoring, Datsyuk and Zetterberg need to be placed together immediately.  I will be devastated if Detroit gets bounced and Babcock never tries that line combination.

So this brings me to my last point..

The Rick Nash Army

So Columbus has finally made the playoffs, something I’ve picked them to do maybe.. four? five? years in a row.  Fitting that they get Detroit.  Columbus is born playoff ready.  Full of energy, nothing to lose, a goaltender who no one has quite figured out yet, and a captain who is a proven clutch game player, just looking for his chance to do it on hockey’s biggest stage.  Let’s break it down, shall we?  Detroit’s keys to winning:

Eurotwins vs. Nash

One of the Eurotwins needs to be up against Rick Nash.  Always.  Always, always, always.  He is a dangerous player and a proven Wing killer.  Every shot he takes on Osgood goes in.  It’s not Osgood’s fault, Nash is just one of those players.  And I think I might actually prefer Kronwall/Stuart against him instead of Lidstrom/Rafalski.  It’s not about positioning with Nash, because he will bowl you over.  Just get physical on him, and get the puck back up ice.  I don’t know how the mind of a professional athlete works, but mentally, has Brian Rafalski recovered from when Nash brutally skullfucked (sorry, it’s the best word I know to describe it) him into somehow being directly responsible for all of his goals in the 8-2 game?  I don’t know.  Do I want to risk it? ..No.

Every other forward is good

Columbus is not a high scoring team, but they will get offense from every line.  Kristian Huselius is equally guilty of underachieving and being underrated, he seems to like stickhandling through Detroit’s defense.  RJ Umberger scored 10 goals in the playoffs last season and 26 this season, this year he’ll be playing in front of his hometown.  Jason Williams has been on fire since being traded from Atlanta.  Frederik Modin is a week away from returning and is a former 30-goal scorer.  Derrick Brassard was going to run away with the Calder Trophy until a midseason injury, he may be two weeks from returning.  Jakub Voracek took right over for him.  Antoine Vermette is a faceoff expert with a slick, slick set of hands.  Raffi Torres is built for a long playoff run, grit and hands.  Manny Malholtra has probably scored the highest percentage of his 76 career goals against Detroit.  I could go on.  

On the flip side, they’re very fast and very gritty.  Jason Chimera is a top 5 skater in the league.  Jared Boll and Derek Dorsett are youngsters that are only going to feed off a playoff-crazy atmosphere.  Mike Peca is a trademark cheapshot king.  Detroit needs to stay disciplined and score as early as possible in every game.  Cliche and obvious as that might be, it’ll hurt Columbus more than any other team in the playoffs.  Get the early goal, get Boll and Dorsett running at you, get them going to the box.

Scoring goals 101

Let me tell you how I got to know Steve Mason.  During the 2006/07 season I was working at the rink of an OHL team, the Plymouth Whalers (Jared Boll’s former home.  Sidenote: He hits to kill, I’m sure of it).  I had followed the OHL in other years closely but this was the pinnacle, as I saw nearly every home game and did my best to soak in as much information about the players.  I hated the London Knights, Plymouth’s big (really, only) conference rival.  The year before this one, their goalie was their only weak link, his name was Adam Dennis.  I laughed at him, and when I discovered his backup was Steve Mason, I could only assume he sucked, Dennis being as bad as he was.  I felt that Steve Mason was a strange name for an athlete, for whatever reason.  Columbus proceeded to take Mason in the 3rd round of the draft despite the fact that he had played 12 games and was virtually unranked.  I, too, laughed at this fact.

Only to be proven dead wrong in 06/07.  Mason became the starter for London, and, boasting Patrick Kane, Sam Gagner, and Sergei Kostitsyn on their top line and Mason in net.  It was insane.  He won 45 games, but Plymouth still bested London in the playoffs.  The following year, Mason got even better, dominating the regular season and playing virtually flawless in the World Juniors for Canada.  Needless to say, I stopped laughing at his generic name and oddly high draft position.

Five career OHL shutouts in his 2.5 seasons, ten his first season in the NHL.  At twenty.  I turn twenty in two months.  I play Thursday night Aluminum league hockey.  Talk about complete insignificance.  I do dominate Aluminum though, to be fair.

So the trick seems to be shoot the puck.  A lot.  Between 50-60 times, hopefully.  Even Samuelsson can do it.  His 2.26 GAA is vomit-inducing, but his .916 sv% is slightly more human.  That gives me faith.  That, and Columbus defense.

Columbus’ defense, I’d liken it to six very good top-4 defenseman, but no elite tandem.  Jan Hejda might actually be the best of the bunch, simply because he’s the most reliable.  Lidstrom-like.  Fedor Tyutin is underrated, coming over from the Rangers for Zherdev in the offseason.  Mike Commodore makes about as much money as Brad Stuart, which is hilarious, but he’s still steady.  Those three are the big minute munchers, but only about 21-23 minutes a night each.  Kris Russell is an ex-teammate of Darren Helm’s who, despite his two goals, is an incredibly skilled offensive force.  Marc Methot is another former London Knight who has established himself as a useful penalty killer and physical presence, and Rostislav Klesla, the first ever draft pick by Columbus who was hurt for most of the season, and Christian Backman, who was terrible in St. Louis, round out the top six.

Not a lot of depth beyond that either, Aaron Rome and Clay Wilson are the only other defensemen to have suited up, sans Ole-Kristian Tollefsen who appears to be out for the year.  Hejda is my wildcard.  He’s reliable, but is he a shutdown guy?  We shall see.

Thus concludes my series preview.  Columbus has desperately tried to make the playoffs the past few years, and now they have.  Really, they have nothing to lose, the fans will be thrilled with the season either way.  That’s what makes them so dangerous.

In other news.

I don’t predict Detroit’s series because I didn’t last year and it seemed to have work.  But here’s what I like around the league.  There is not one series I don’t think is going to be absolutely awesome.  I can’t wait for Wednesday.

San Jose over Anaheim — I wanted Anaheim to play San Jose as much as I wanted Detroit to play Columbus.  Anaheim is cheap and physical, and they’ve been rather good since quasi-imploding the team’s core at the deadline.  Should not be overlooked, but the Sharks will squeak by with bruises in 7.

Vancouver over St. Louis — St. Louis has been the best team in the league since January outside of I believe only New Jersey.  But, they’re very young, and if it comes down to a goaltender’s duel, Luongo edges out Chris Mason.  Vancouver in 5.

Calgary over Chicago — I would absolutely LOVE to see Chicago win this but Calgary is slowly going to get healthy.  They looked great when they were healthy after the deadline with Jokinen.  Playing with more than 17 players will help immensely.  Calgary in 6.

Boston over Montreal — This was my favorite first round series last year, and this year the seeds are reversed.  I loathe Montreal, Price has looked good lately but Boston is better, bigger, and more pissed.  Boston in 5.

Washington over NY Rangers — Aka who’s going to let in less goals, Theodore or Lundqvist.  Neither one has been spectacular this season, but Lundqvist will have a very playoff hungry Ovechkin peppering him.  Washington in 6.

Carolina over New Jersey — My only upset of the first round, somehow.  Devils struggled of late and Carolina is the hottest thing in the league right now.  Carolina in 5.

Pittsburgh over Philadelphia — I don’t see a long playoff run for Crosby and company, but they tend to bring their game against Philadelphia, and they’re not going to let the Flyers have revenge.  Pittsburgh in 7.

That’s it.  I’m way too pumped for this playoff thing.  In just 48 short hours Detroit will either make my life by showing that they’re actually ready for the playoffs or put me on the brink of suicide by showing the world that Rick Nash can score on Detroit at will.

How to avoid first round humiliation OR Don’t shoot into Steve Mason OR How to beat a defense that features Mike Commodore

I couldn’t decide on a title, so I went with three.

Please note, this is gonna be a long one.  This is the stuff I’ve wanted to say for about a month now but I’ve held off on because of school and such.  Basically if you haven’t been following I have just had paper after paper and it all culminated with a 39-page public relations campaign (so not actually 39 pages of writing, but there’s words on every page and that’s still too much for me) that saw me sit and type for about 11 solid hours on Sunday.  I could write at least 5 novel length blog posts in that amount of time, but I digress.

Alright, where to start.. Franzen perhaps?

Johan Franzen and Ken Holland’s ongoing dominantion over the NHL Salary Cap.

I never clarified but I’m sure both of my readers figured it out.  Franzen’s deal ended up being an 11-year deal at roughly $45 million dollars, which breaks down to an exact cap hit of $3,954,545 until 2019-2020.  A viking like Franzen can buy an awful lot of mead with coin like that.

So it was a little higher than I originally anticipated, but obviously I have no right to be disappointed.  That’s still a steal for him, that’s still a big discount.  I just did not expect a long deal for Franzen given his history of finding a new way to get injured every couple of months.  But like Niklas Kronwall, it’s not as though he’s “injury prone” but the style of game he plays definitely puts him at risk for a couple of bruises per year.  As long as there’s no recurring injury (like Zetterberg’s back), this contract should look pretty good.

On that note, driving off the fact that Franzen now wears a visor after being clipped dangerously close to the eye against Buffalo two weeks back, can we get every damn Wing to wear a visor already?  I’m not making an argument for visors or something, but every Wing is slowly learning the hard way.  Yzerman, Draper, Lidstrom, Cleary, and now Franzen have all needed pucks to or near the eye to realize that a visor is a good idea.  Derek Meech put a visor on last year after Draper first got clipped, I believe.  This is just some unlucky force looming over the team that is not going to go away.  Guys should just start putting them on.  It just looks bad on a guy like Ericsson who has gone his whole career with a visor (they’re mandatory in most European leagues and in the AHL) to come up to the AHL and take his off while the guy with the 11-year contract is leaking blood about one-quarter inch away from his eye.

Cap-wise, I’ll break it down this way.  According to NHLNumbers, Detroit is now spending $27.254 million on 8 forwards for next season,  $23.483 million on 8 defenseman and $2.133 million on goaltending, for a grand total of $52.87 million, which, under this year’s cap, leaves breathing room of $3.83 million.  Now, that includes everybody who has to be on the team next season.  So it includes Ericsson and Howard, but not Leino or Helm, because they can still play in the AHL next season (most likely, not sure how it will work if Helm plays every playoff game again).

However, and I read this a while ago so I don’t remember it exactly, and I can’t find it right now, but this is a blog and not a research paper so I’m just gonna leave it up to you to decide whether or not to trust me, the NHLPA has the option to bump up the cap roughly $1-$2 million is losses are enough this season to actually curve it’s rapid growth.  So to be on the safe side, Detroit will have roughly $5 million to work with.

That doesn’t leave much in the grand scheme of things.  If Hossa wanted a long deal (5-6 years, nothing in decades), he would need to be willing to defer roughly this amount, and Detroit would likely have to move about $2 million in contract to be able to fill out their final roster spots.  So it’s not completely implausible, you’ve got to believe Kenny pulled the trigger on Franzen with this deal while he could get it because he still thought there was some chance of squeezing Hossa in.  Whether it happens or not, Holland is clearly seeing something from that camp that indicates he is genuinely interested in sacrificing money.  He could just be saying that though, and I wouldn’t hold it against him.

If no Hossa, things look very good.  Hudler might command up to $3 million, but hopefully a little less.  Kopecky could easily be kept, and Leino (who also needs a new deal) and Helm could be kept in the NHL with Detroit comfortably under.  And best of all, there’s not much chance that Detroit could keep Samuelsson and Hudler.  On the open market they’d probably each get $3-$4 million.  I don’t see them each conceding enough where they could fit in a ~$5 million budget with another forward or two and possibly a 3rd goalie.  And Chelios..  I’m 90% sure it’s finally over.  He played forward on Saturday.  Even the FSN guys were laughing at him, and let’s face it, they’re idiots.

Alright, enough cap talk.  It makes me think about the offseason and that should be the furthest thing from my mind right now.

Detroit drunkenly staggers into the playoffs

I don’t really have much to say about this, save for the fact that it makes me very, very nervous.  This was not at all what we needed to see going into the playoffs.  Others have excuses lined up, those games were meaningless, Detroit sat out some of their best players, etc..  Whatever you chalk it up to, it wasn’t good enough.  Detroit lost some big games against some teams that are only looking for a glimmer of hope to rally against Detroit with.  Detroit’s now got to face a Columbus team who not only won an 8-2 game, but actually won the season series.

But the bottom line is Detroit was shorthanded.  Maltby centered Derek Meech and Chris Chelios for crying out loud.  I just didn’t like the effort from the other three lines.  This offense is streaky and did not need to be shutout to start the playoffs.  Any momentum is better than this.  Columbus scratched their way into the playoffs and Detroit knew they were the #2 seed for about a week and proceeded to hand away points to any playoff-hungry team that needed them.  If any team can rebound, this team can, but these are the same mistakes that Detroit made in 2006.  I don’t like to bring that up, ever, but it’s the only thing I thought of.

However, that team was distinctly lacking in Marian Hossa.  I have no doubts this team will play better, but it’s going to take a few games to get into top shape, whatever that is.  This team really hasn’t had too many streaks this season where they’re a well-oiled machine, so it’s going to be hard to just pick that up.

But, Hossa and Lidstrom will be back in.  Draper should be good to go.  Mike Babcock was true to his word when he said Helm would have a spot in the playoffs and wasted no time calling him up as the salary cap expired for the playoffs.  Jonathan Ericsson is in for now, but Babcock has made it clear that he is on a short leash.  Ericsson looked stellar initially, but has since made a few rookie mistakes.  But then again, a lot of veterans were making rookie mistakes in the past two months.  Ericsson’s on a short leash, but when his replacement is Meech or Chelios, well, that’s going to need to be a hell of an error.  The only thing he needs to worry about is Brett Lebda, because when Lilja returns it’ll be between the two of them, because Lilja’s been way too good this season.  And Lebda’s been remarkably solid since his terrible start.  But Lilja may be out a while, bleeding in the brain is never a good thing.

Half the Detroit media is saying Helm will only go if Draper isn’t good to go, the other half says he’s going for Maltby no matter what.  I’d hope the latter is true, Helm/Kopecky have definitely earned the final playoff spots.  Babcock has made it clear he won’t hesitate to take guys out of the lineup if needed, and you’ve got to think that Ville Leino is the next guy in line, even over Maltby, if someone isn’t cutting it on the 4th line.  I’d like to see this to start, on Thursday:

Holmstrom – Datsyuk – Hossa

Hudler – Zetterberg – Franzen

Cleary – Filppula – Samuelsson

Kopecky – Helm – Draper

Short leash on Cleary — useless the past 15 games or so.  Filppula was stellar against Chicago though, he’s even shooting the puck!  If for any reason the team is not scoring, Datsyuk and Zetterberg need to be placed together immediately.  I will be devastated if Detroit gets bounced and Babcock never tries that line combination.

So this brings me to my last point..

The Rick Nash Army

So Columbus has finally made the playoffs, something I’ve picked them to do maybe.. four? five? years in a row.  Fitting that they get Detroit.  Columbus is born playoff ready.  Full of energy, nothing to lose, a goaltender who no one has quite figured out yet, and a captain who is a proven clutch game player, just looking for his chance to do it on hockey’s biggest stage.  Let’s break it down, shall we?  Detroit’s keys to winning:

Eurotwins vs. Nash

One of the Eurotwins needs to be up against Rick Nash.  Always.  Always, always, always.  He is a dangerous player and a proven Wing killer.  Every shot he takes on Osgood goes in.  It’s not Osgood’s fault, Nash is just one of those players.  And I think I might actually prefer Kronwall/Stuart against him instead of Lidstrom/Rafalski.  It’s not about positioning with Nash, because he will bowl you over.  Just get physical on him, and get the puck back up ice.  I don’t know how the mind of a professional athlete works, but mentally, has Brian Rafalski recovered from when Nash brutally skullfucked (sorry, it’s the best word I know to describe it) him into somehow being directly responsible for all of his goals in the 8-2 game?  I don’t know.  Do I want to risk it? ..No.

Every other forward is good

Columbus is not a high scoring team, but they will get offense from every line.  Kristian Huselius is equally guilty of underachieving and being underrated, he seems to like stickhandling through Detroit’s defense.  RJ Umberger scored 10 goals in the playoffs last season and 26 this season, this year he’ll be playing in front of his hometown.  Jason Williams has been on fire since being traded from Atlanta.  Frederik Modin is a week away from returning and is a former 30-goal scorer.  Derrick Brassard was going to run away with the Calder Trophy until a midseason injury, he may be two weeks from returning.  Jakub Voracek took right over for him.  Antoine Vermette is a faceoff expert with a slick, slick set of hands.  Raffi Torres is built for a long playoff run, grit and hands.  Manny Malholtra has probably scored the highest percentage of his 76 career goals against Detroit.  I could go on.  

On the flip side, they’re very fast and very gritty.  Jason Chimera is a top 5 skater in the league.  Jared Boll and Derek Dorsett are youngsters that are only going to feed off a playoff-crazy atmosphere.  Mike Peca is a trademark cheapshot king.  Detroit needs to stay disciplined and score as early as possible in every game.  Cliche and obvious as that might be, it’ll hurt Columbus more than any other team in the playoffs.  Get the early goal, get Boll and Dorsett running at you, get them going to the box.

Scoring goals 101

Let me tell you how I got to know Steve Mason.  During the 2006/07 season I was working at the rink of an OHL team, the Plymouth Whalers (Jared Boll’s former home.  Sidenote: He hits to kill, I’m sure of it).  I had followed the OHL in other years closely but this was the pinnacle, as I saw nearly every home game and did my best to soak in as much information about the players.  I hated the London Knights, Plymouth’s big (really, only) conference rival.  The year before this one, their goalie was their only weak link, his name was Adam Dennis.  I laughed at him, and when I discovered his backup was Steve Mason, I could only assume he sucked, Dennis being as bad as he was.  I felt that Steve Mason was a strange name for an athlete, for whatever reason.  Columbus proceeded to take Mason in the 3rd round of the draft despite the fact that he had played 12 games and was virtually unranked.  I, too, laughed at this fact.

Only to be proven dead wrong in 06/07.  Mason became the starter for London, and, boasting Patrick Kane, Sam Gagner, and Sergei Kostitsyn on their top line and Mason in net.  It was insane.  He won 45 games, but Plymouth still bested London in the playoffs.  The following year, Mason got even better, dominating the regular season and playing virtually flawless in the World Juniors for Canada.  Needless to say, I stopped laughing at his generic name and oddly high draft position.

Five career OHL shutouts in his 2.5 seasons, ten his first season in the NHL.  At twenty.  I turn twenty in two months.  I play Thursday night Aluminum league hockey.  Talk about complete insignificance.  I do dominate Aluminum though, to be fair.

So the trick seems to be shoot the puck.  A lot.  Between 50-60 times, hopefully.  Even Samuelsson can do it.  His 2.26 GAA is vomit-inducing, but his .916 sv% is slightly more human.  That gives me faith.  That, and Columbus defense.

Columbus’ defense, I’d liken it to six very good top-4 defenseman, but no elite tandem.  Jan Hejda might actually be the best of the bunch, simply because he’s the most reliable.  Lidstrom-like.  Fedor Tyutin is underrated, coming over from the Rangers for Zherdev in the offseason.  Mike Commodore makes about as much money as Brad Stuart, which is hilarious, but he’s still steady.  Those three are the big minute munchers, but only about 21-23 minutes a night each.  Kris Russell is an ex-teammate of Darren Helm’s who, despite his two goals, is an incredibly skilled offensive force.  Marc Methot is another former London Knight who has established himself as a useful penalty killer and physical presence, and Rostislav Klesla, the first ever draft pick by Columbus who was hurt for most of the season, and Christian Backman, who was terrible in St. Louis, round out the top six.

Not a lot of depth beyond that either, Aaron Rome and Clay Wilson are the only other defensemen to have suited up, sans Ole-Kristian Tollefsen who appears to be out for the year.  Hejda is my wildcard.  He’s reliable, but is he a shutdown guy?  We shall see.

Thus concludes my series preview.  Columbus has desperately tried to make the playoffs the past few years, and now they have.  Really, they have nothing to lose, the fans will be thrilled with the season either way.  That’s what makes them so dangerous.

In other news.

I don’t predict Detroit’s series because I didn’t last year and it seemed to have work.  But here’s what I like around the league.  There is not one series I don’t think is going to be absolutely awesome.  I can’t wait for Wednesday.

San Jose over Anaheim — I wanted Anaheim to play San Jose as much as I wanted Detroit to play Columbus.  Anaheim is cheap and physical, and they’ve been rather good since quasi-imploding the team’s core at the deadline.  Should not be overlooked, but the Sharks will squeak by with bruises in 7.

Vancouver over St. Louis — St. Louis has been the best team in the league since January outside of I believe only New Jersey.  But, they’re very young, and if it comes down to a goaltender’s duel, Luongo edges out Chris Mason.  Vancouver in 5.

Calgary over Chicago — I would absolutely LOVE to see Chicago win this but Calgary is slowly going to get healthy.  They looked great when they were healthy after the deadline with Jokinen.  Playing with more than 17 players will help immensely.  Calgary in 6.

Boston over Montreal — This was my favorite first round series last year, and this year the seeds are reversed.  I loathe Montreal, Price has looked good lately but Boston is better, bigger, and more pissed.  Boston in 5.

Washington over NY Rangers — Aka who’s going to let in less goals, Theodore or Lundqvist.  Neither one has been spectacular this season, but Lundqvist will have a very playoff hungry Ovechkin peppering him.  Washington in 6.

Carolina over New Jersey — My only upset of the first round, somehow.  Devils struggled of late and Carolina is the hottest thing in the league right now.  Carolina in 5.

Pittsburgh over Philadelphia — I don’t see a long playoff run for Crosby and company, but they tend to bring their game against Philadelphia, and they’re not going to let the Flyers have revenge.  Pittsburgh in 7.

That’s it.  I’m way too pumped for this playoff thing.  In just 48 short hours Detroit will either make my life by showing that they’re actually ready for the playoffs or put me on the brink of suicide by showing the world that Rick Nash can score on Detroit at will.

It’s Columbus

St. Louis beats Colorado 1-0 to vault them up to 6th.  They get Vancouver, Columbus slips to Detroit and Anaheim to San Jose.  I would have preferred St. Louis when it was down to the three of them, but I’m very happy with Columbus, and very happy that San Jose has to deal with Anaheim’s thuggery and cheap tricks.

Very appropriate series for Columbus’ first time in the playoffs.  Detroit fans might not all know it, but Columbus hates Detroit.  Detroit’s had nothing but domination in every year (except for this one, given the 8-2 loss) and given the geography of it all, I’m sure Columbus fans put up with a lot of Detroit fans all throughout the state.  The football rivalry is marvelous, hopefully this series will start something substantial with the hockey one.

I’m still swamped with school but I’m getting a lot done today.  I should be able to produce a series preview on Monday or Tuesday.  This is going to be a great playoff — there’s not one matchup that doesn’t interest me.

Here’s a preview teaser:  keep Brian Rafalski away from Rick Nash.