Ribeiro deal
I am taking a wait and see attitude on Mike Ribeiro acquisition. I've seen him at times when he was very, very good with Montreal. I've seen him be dismal at other times.
If the Stars like Eric Lindros on the wing, I think they needed a center with some playmaking ability and Ribeiro has that. Of course, he has some flaws in his game as well.
Again, I'll just wait and see how the guy plays in Dallas.
For now it means Antti Miettinen will be moving down the lineup. It's not a surprise. That's been the case recently in practice. He showed some strong flashes in the pre-season, but maybe not as much the Stars were hoping.
I think Janne Niinimaa had a pretty good pre-season. His ankle was doing a lot better and it showed at times. I thought he got a bum rap from a lot of people because of his struggles last season. Sure he struggled, but people just seemed to wait for his next mistake and tended to ignore the times he played well. I hope he does well in Montreal.
That said, I think he was the guy who was going to bring the most value among the defensemen the Stars were likely to trade.
30 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Captain Morrow
When Brenden Morrow signed his contract extension it was pretty much a given that he was going to eventually be the captain of the Dallas Stars. That it happened now - less than a week before the regular season - is quite the surprise. I found the timing odd. Then, when I thought about it some more, the change didn't really surprise me.
Leadership was a big issue in the Stars' off-season moves. That's why they brought back Darryl Sydor and signed Jeff Halpern. Matthew Barnaby was added, in part, to bring another strong presence in the locker room. Making the change to Morrow was just another part of the process it appears.
The Stars probably won't admit it, but the move may be another sign that there will be little comfort level around the team this season. You have this move with Morrow replacing Modano as captain. You have this talk about Mike Smith coming in as a young goaltender who is not content to be a backup and possibly pushing Marty Turco. You have the trade issue hanging around because of the eight defensemen. Just a thought on that one.
I feel bad for Mike Modano. He said he was disappointed with the move, but wasn't caught off guard. Management had talked to him about a possible change a few times over the summer. When Morrow signed that recent six-year contract extension the process to make the change shifted into high gear.
I always thought Modano got a bum rap from a lot of people when it came to his role as captain. The team tanked during his reign so he naturally took more blame than others, except for Marty Turco. But I am not sure you could fault Modano's leadership. I think too many people have images of the captain putting on some war paint, riding into the locker room on a horse and giving some inspirational speech to the troops. Might make for a great movie moment, but I think probably some of the better captains just lead by example.
I assume that will be Morrow's primary strength. I am sure he'll say something if he needs to, but he'll lead with his play and his work ethic. I don't see him going William Wallace on his mates too often.
The recently retired Steve Yzerman made an interesting point this past summer during an interview with XM Satellite Radio. When it came to be captain in Detroit he said: "Ironically, for me, when we started winning Cups is when I started taking the role a lot less seriously. I just went out and played."
29 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Odds & Ends
I said I wouldn't read too much into Wednesday's pre-season game against Colorado and I really didn't. It was a pre-season game and they have a week to get their stuff together.
Dave Tippett obviously wasn't happy with the performance. You could tell that from his post-game comments and today's practice session, which was pretty long, intense and detail oriented.
It was an interesting practice to watch. Nothing spectacular, but there was a lot of stuff going on. Very few lulls in the action. The only one was the Zamboni resurfacing the ice between hour one of practice and hour two. I guess Tippett wanted to send a message.
Is this a sign of a tougher Tippett? I think so. There may not be much room for error or prolonged funks in what should be a very competitive Western Conference. Tippett realizes that.
Fifteen of this team's first 25 games are on the road. A lot of those road games come against divisional teams and/or teams that are likely playoff contenders at this point. The Stars better have their act together. That's almost a third of the season right there and you can dig yourself a treacherous little hole if you are not careful. Look what San Jose had to do to make the playoffs after their horrid start last season and look whom they had to acquire to pull it off.
28 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Roster cuts
No surprises with the roster decisions the Stars are making. This team looks pretty much like I expected coming into camp. I would have liked to have seen a Loui Eriksson, Junior Lessard or Joel Lundqvist crack the lineup, but there was simply no room for them. Their time will come at some point this season. I think Mike Smith earned the backup job. No question there. He had a good camp and pre-season.
So, it appears the roster is set. Now it is time to see how things take shape heading into next week's opener. Tonight will be the first glimpse, but I won't read too much into it. To me it's just the first step as Dave Tippett tries to get the team's game in order before they fly off to Denver next Tuesday.
There are a lot of things to like about this team. Depth is one of them. They've got it at both forward and defense. Tippett has said from top to bottom the team may have more offensive punch than last season. But as I said back in the summer a lot of things are going to have to go right for this team.
That's what happened last season. There were no key injuries. They had those 12 wins when trailing after two periods, some of which were due to the shootout. Some key players had career years or close to career years. All that added up to a very good regular season. All of that may be hard to repeat again this season.
This year's team may have to really claw and scratch their way through the season. Maybe that is a good thing. Maybe it will make them a tougher team heading into the playoffs.
27 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Odds & Ends
Dave Tippett said after last night's game that the next round of roster cuts will come Wednesday. I still have no idea what they are going to do except for the goaltending. Mike Smith seems to be the guy who will get the backup role. What they are going to do with the eight defensemen is still up in the air and how the forwards will shake out is up in the air too?
I think Loui Eriksson has come on strong and would add some offensive skill, but where would he fit in the set of forwards? He might not fit if you look at lines in the traditional way.
But Razor made a good point last night about not labeling lines as the first line, second line, third line and fourth line. The Stars may be deep enough up front that those labels become irrelevant. You just have four lines that you roll as much as you can over the course of a 60 minute game. You find combinations that are working and roll them. I have a sense that is what the Stars want to do. Carolina used that model last season. So did Buffalo. Of course they were able to get a lot scoring from different guys, which is what the Stars are banking on here.
It's going to be interesting to see how things shake out here over the next week.
Is it just me or are some people rethinking their stance on Janne Niinimaa? He's played well the past couple of games.
25 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Morrow extension
I like the Brenden Morrow extension. I think you pay guys for more than just statistics. There are a lot of intangibles that Morrow provides that just don't show up in the boxscore. And I think that $4.1 million per year price tag is going to look like a bargain in years three or four through six.
Stars fans seem extremely happy with the move. It generated a much more mixed set of reviews when I posted the news over at HockeyBuzz.com this morning. You can read the reaction here.
21 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Phoenix Game
Just a couple of thoughts on the Phoenix game. I thought Eric Lindros looked good. That's the best he has looked since camp opened last week.
I was impressed with Mike Smith as well. He looked sharp and I'd say that's the best he has looked since camp started.
Not sure I could handle Razor and Darren Pang together on a regular basis. It's probably just me.
21 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Odds & Ends
Two pre-season games in the can and I am not sure there is much to say about it. I don't read much into the results of the games.
I don't think you can give an advantage to any of the backup goalie candidates yet. Mike Smith and Dan Ellis will both play again tonight in Phoenix. It's a draw so far if you ask me.
Marty Turco's performance Tuesday night in Colorado? It's one game. I am not going to read too much into that. He got better as the game moved on.
I thought Antti Miettinen was probably the Stars' best player Tuesday night. He had some good chances, skated well and looked sharp overall.
Eric Lindros has been quiet. I don't consider that a negative. I see him simply adjusting to a new team and teammates. I expect to see more frrom him as the season draws nearer.
As far as the prospects, I think some guys have separated themselves from the pack.
Joel Lundqvist was a guy who stood out Monday night againt Atlanta. We'll get another look at him tonight in Phoenix.
Junior Lessard had a good game Monday. I think Loui Eriksson has shown some flashes of why he is so highly regarded as well. I still like Yared Hagos' game.
On the flip side, Vadim Khomitski is still a work in progress. He is still adjusting to several things. Time will tell.
NHL.com has a Stars preview posted. You can read it here. Nothing earth-shattering, but it's a decent read.
20 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Camp Stuff
Well, three days of training camp are in the books and I don't think you can read too much into what has gone on so far. At least I don't. We'll have some pre-season games and they'll start cutting the roster. By the end of the week they'll be down to about 30 players. It will be the Stars roster players, those who might be in the hunt for a roster spot and some of the players who might get called up this season. Then stuff will start to take shape.
Some players have stood out over the first three days.
Among the roster players I'd throw in Brenden Morrow, Matthew Barnaby, Niklas Hagman, Stu Barnes, Antti Miettinen and Trevor Daley. Dave Tippett mentioned Patrik Stefan, but I haven't noticed it. Then again, I haven't been looking for him much.
Among the prospects I'd say Yared Hagos, Joel Lundqvist, Chris Conner, Marty Sertich, James Neal and Mario Scalzo have caught my attention at times.
Among the three forwards pushing for a roster spot, I think Junior Lessard has had a couple of good moments.
Russian defensemen Vadim Khomitski started slow, but seems to be getting more comfortable with each day.
The backup goaltending battle? Mike Smith, Dan Ellis and Tobias Stephan have all had their good moments. Stephan has played well in his first training camp, but it's still between Smith and Ellis. It will be interesting to see them in pre-season action.
17 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
CP Western Conference Preview
Pierre Lebrun of the Canadian Press offers up a look at the Western Conference as teams head off to training camp. Here's his take on the Stars:
No. 2 centre Jason Arnott and top-four blue-liner Willie Mitchell were tough losses in free agency but GM Doug Armstrong didn't stand around and mope, busily working the phones and adding centres Eric Lindros, Jeff Halpern and Patrik Stefan, rugged winger Matthew Barnaby and top-four defencemen Darryl Sydor and Jaroslav Modry. Keep an eye on rookie Loui Eriksson, the 21-year-old Swedish winger is ready for the NHL after a solid AHL campaign last year which saw him collect 31 goals and 60 points in 78 games. Two key issues for the Stars this season: Is there enough offence with the departure of Arnott and the increasing pressure on the aging Mike Modano? And how will star goalie Marty Turco bounce back after a disastrous first-round playoff loss last spring, allowing 18 goals in five games - the exact number of goals in the exact number of games from another disappointing playoff in 2004. This is a huge year for the likeable native of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., who has to prove he's a money goalie in the playoffs. A playoff team for sure, but a contender? Time will tell.
Lebrun's contenders in the West at this point are Anaheim, Calgary, Nashville and San Jose.
No surprises there. Those four teams are the current favorite flavors among most prognosticators.
Modano is stick with aging label now, eh? By the end of the season reporters can stop saying that he is 36 and note that he is closing in on 37.
14 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Kessler offer sheet
The picture to the left sums up the Vancouver Sun's take on yesterday's two big hockey events. There was Islanders owner Charles Wang signing Rick DiPietro to a 15-year, $67.5 million dollar deal. Then there was Flyers GM Bob Clarke signing Cancucks restricted free agent Ryan Kessler to a $1.9 million offer sheet.
Everyone was waiting for someone to make an offer sheet to an RFA and Clarke did it with a $1.9 million offer to a 22-year-old who has 12 goals in 110 NHL games. Kessler's qualifying offer was $564,000. According to The Province he was close to signing a two-year deal with the Canucks worth $1.9 million. Enter Bob Clarke.
Here's an excerpt from a TSN article on reaction to both the DiPietro and Kessler situations. This part has to do with Kessler:
'This is a great day,'' one player agent told TSN. ''It's about time (an offer sheet was tendered). Hopefully, it's the first of many. Maybe the old boys' club is breaking up.''
If the agents were celebrating the possibility of GMs like Philadelphia's Bob Clarke playing cut-throat managing, and opening the door to more offers sheets, many other GMs were furious.
''I thought the DiPietro deal was the height of stupidity but this Kesler deal tops it,'' said one NHL GM. ''Does Clarkie actually think Vancouver isn't going to match? Every team will match. You have to. You have to protect your assets no matter what. All this is going to do is drive up the cost to do business. This is going to be ridiculously inflationary, even in the cap system we have. It's crazy.''
I am not sure this move by Clarke is going to open the floodgates on general managers extending offer sheets to restricted free agents. I think most GMs will look at whether making the offer is worth it and in many cases it isn't. You end up overpaying a guy and, in some cases, you end up sacrificing a lot of assets. But will have to see how this all plays out. I doubt if too many other general managers around the league think Kessler is worth $1.9 million. Time will tell if Canucks GM Dave Nonis thinks he is and matches Clarke's offer.
13 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
A new venture
Well, Andrew's will be extending its reach a little bit this season. Not much will change with this site, but I will be providing some content for another site. That will be hockeybuzz.com, the Eklund site. Eklund sent me an e-mail over the weekend asking me if I would be interested in doing a Dallas Stars blog for his site. I thought about it a few minutes and e-mailed him back to say I would be interested. We talked briefly on Sunday, at length on Monday and worked out the details.
The bottom line is I'll be posting stuff over there on a regular basis starting this week. It will news and other stuff. Some of it may look similar to what shows up on this blog. Some of it may be tidbits from articles on the main site. I'll just see how it goes and what works.
Eklund has an impressive collection of people blogging over there. Some people whose work I admire. Tim Panaccio from Philly, Rick Sadowski from Denver and Kevin Gibson and Howard Berger from Toronto are four regular contributors that stand out to me. There are others as well. Jeremy Roenick has blogged a couple of times, including good little debate with Panaccio about national TV coverage.
The site's traffic is impressive. The content is good. And there are a lot of top notch people over there.
Of course the fact that it is Eklund will turn some off. That's because nobody who is familiar with him is neutral on the subject. People either like him or they don't. After having a long talk with him, I like him. All that stuff from the lockout? It's in the past. He was even willing to talk to me about it, but I said I really didn't care. I don't. The rumor stuff? Everybody gripes about rumors; right after they scramble to read it. They are like car wrecks; everybody looks.
Anyway, I am looking forward to it. Nothing changes around here. I head out to training camp on Friday. I am hoping to expand over what I did on camp coverage last year. This year I will have access to players for some quotes after their workouts. Not sure what my approach will be on that yet. I am not sure if I'll do those right off the bat or concentrate more on what is happening on the ice the first few days. Time will tell.
12 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
The Sporting News on Turco
I am not sure how many different takes on Marty Turco's playoff woes I have read this summer, but people keep cranking them out.
Ray Slover of The Sporting News offers this tidbit today on Turco:
So what's up, Marty? Do you have it in you? The starting job is yours, no question, because prospects are all the team has for now for backup. Play lights out in the 82? Great. Prove what you can do in a best-of-7 or two . . . or three . . . or four.
Turco is good, folks. Hey, he's so good he designed part of the video game NHL 2K6. Trouble is, the regular season isn't the playoffs.
Let's not blame Turco alone for the team's first-round failure last season, when as a second seed the Stars became green-and-gold dwarfs before the Avalanche.
By the way, Slover doesn't sound overly optimistic about the Stars this season. You can read his blog here.
The Islanders are apparently going to sign goalie Rick DiPietro to a long-term deal that will be worth $4.5 million per year. No problem with that. That's a good deal money-wise. $4.5 million may look very good in a couple of years. But a 15-year term? Yikes!
I guess there's a chance this could be looked at one day as genius
Here's an excerpt from Newsday's article on the deal:
According to an NHL executive, Islanders owner Charles Wang and DiPietro are on the verge of announcing they have reached agreement on a 15-year contract worth $67.5 million. The deal is believed to be the longest in NHL history and second in the history of major North American professional sports behind the 25-year deal worth $25 million that Magic Johnson signed with the NBA's Los Angeles Lakers in 1981.
DiPietro, who turns 25 a week from today, is scheduled to receive $4.5 million in each season of the contract. Although the total financial package represents a major investment by the Islanders, DiPietro's salary ranks eighth among NHL goaltenders for the coming season, leaves them $2 million under the current salary cap and should look like more of a bargain as the cap rises in the future.
And there is this excerpt, which deals with another big contract handed out by owner Charles Wang
Wang gambled big previously on center Alexei Yashin, who signed a 10-year deal worth $87.5 million in 2001, and lost when Yashin failed to emerge as a team leader and managed to reach the 30-goal mark only once in his first four seasons with the Isles. The size of Yashin's contract is regarded as a mistake because it makes him virtually untradeable. He's scheduled to make $7.2 million this season.
The length of DiPietro's deal could have the same effect, but the annual salary number leaves the Islanders with some flexibility in relation to the salary cap. They still have room to add a backup goaltender, such as Mike Dunham or Brian Boucher from the remaining free agents in time for the first training-camp practice Friday in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia.
12 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Vokounc contract, Players to get money back
Tomas Vokoun gets $22.8 million over four years from the Predators. That's the same money and term as Marty Turco. Take the Roberto Luongo contract from earlier this summer and you've got some goalies who haven't done much in the playoffs - nothing in Luongo's case - getting some big money. Something wrong there? Not really, if you ask me.
I think the way you look at goaltenders may have to change under the new CBA. There's something to be said about regular season value under the salary cap system. That top notch goalie who can get you the few extra regular season wins could be the difference between making the playoff and hitting the links right after the final regular season game in a parity driven league. The days of spending your way into the playoffs every season may be over, but shelling out money to lock up a quality goaltender may be among the better options to keep yourself an advantage.
Doug Armstrong has a point when he says you have to make the playoffs first.
TSN reports that players will get money back from the owners based on what teams spent on player costs versus what teams earned in revenues. Based on everything that had been reported about the league's revenues, this is not a big surprise. The cap was set artificially low based on low revenue expectations. That helped keep player costs down. Revenues were higher than expected. Therefore player costs didn't hit 54 percent of league revenues and, as called for in the CBA, players get money to bring their share up to the 54 percent level. That's the way the system is supposed to work.
This season everything will work be based on actual numbers instead of doom and gloom projections. It will be interesting to see how the numbers add up next summer. Does it matter to me? Not really. All I know is the players are going to get a set percentage of league revenues. If league revenues hit $2.2 billion next season the players' share will go to 55 percent. If they stay below $2.2 billion then it will still be 54 percent.
Training camp gets underway this week. It will be interesting to see how this team's roster takes shape, especially with the glut of defensemen. I think it's going to be wait and see. There are too many potential variables here to speculate as to how things may shake out and what things may look like when this team takes the ice for the season opener in Denver. I think there are a lot of things to like about this team and there are some question marks. More on that as the week moves along.
11 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
End of an era
Got an e-mail this afternoon from Ty Wubker, who many of you will know as "Ty the Music Guy." Well, it appears the Stars are going in a different direction as far as the personnel who present the music at Stars games and Ty will no longer be part of it. Ty is pretty beaten down by it. He's been involved with that side of things for a dozen years.
I'm kind of beaten down by it too. Ty's been a friend of Andrew's for a long time. I think we may have started with an e-mail feature on the site back in the late 1990's before eventually going to a section on the message board. Ty was always great about taking requests. Ty is the one who came up with the idea of playing the so-called "Darkness Music" after opposition goals. There was an article about it on the Stars official site a few years back.
When the Stars won the Stanley Cup in 1999 Ty made his own audio highlight CD that included calls of games from Ralph and Razor along with some music. He sent me a copy. I still have it. Actually, I think my daughter had it the last time I checked. It was far superior to the one the league sold.
Ty was always great about taking requests or answering questions about stuff that was played. When people griped about music (as they always do) Ty handled it with style.
I, for one, will miss the Ty touch.
05 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
Odds & Ends
With Trevor Daley under contract it looks like the Stars will head into camp with all eight of their defensemen still in the mix. I don't see them being in any rush to make a move and there is no real need to make a move. A lot can happen between the opening of camp and the opening of the regular season. They might as well keep their options open. I think they want to get a look at Vadim Khomitski and what he might be able to bring to the table.
I am hoping to talk to Doug Armstrong next week. He'll be in Traverse City for the prospects tournament, which starts Friday. I'm sure the defensemen issue will come up. Might talk about the cap too, but mostly stuff about the team heading into camp.
I see Razor is going to be doing some work for OLN/Versus this season. He should be a good addition to OLN.
OLN officially becomes Versus on September 25. The network has gained 7 million subscribers and is now up to 70 million. That's great, but Versus is still way down the food chain among the cable networks. Discovery is tops with 91.2 million and ESPN is next with 91.1 million. ESPN2 is eighth with 90.6 million. Rounding out the top 20 are Toon Disney and VH1 with 89.7 million. Still, the network's growth is a positive.
02 September '06 - - default| - § ¶
