![]() Ken Campbell says the most successful NHL teams at the trade deadline make tweaks over overhauls with under-the-radar physical players. This season has available players who fit the bill.
It’s no secret that Calgary Flames defenceman Noah Hanifin has rocketed to the top of all the trade boards leading up to the NHL’s 8 March trade deadline. And whether the team that acquires him does so as a rental or with a contract extension in place, the price will be high.
Someone who thinks Hanifin will add what they need to their defence corps will probably do it. And history tells us that team probably won’t win the Stanley Cup. You know why? Because teams that are true Stanley Cup contenders generally are what they are by the time the trade deadline comes around. And they realise that, basically, they need a few tweaks to get them over the top, not an overhaul. If you need someone of that ilk this late in the season, you’re probably not good enough in the first place. That’s why the Vegas Golden Knights went out and got Ivan Barbashev last season. That’s why the Colorado Avalanche got Andrew Cogliano and Artturi Lehkonen in 2022, why the Tampa Bay Lightning acquired Blake Coleman and Barclay Goodrow in 2020. These are guys who generally go a little under the radar and often are the ones who provide the grit and physical play that translates well to the complete change in style that the post-season brings. So you can have Noah Hanifin. I’ll take the likes of Scott Laughton, Nic Dowd, Brandon Duhaime or Jordan Greenway. Perhaps even a Pavel Buchnevich or Adam Henrique if you want to go a little higher. And we’ll see who is lifting the Cup over his head in a couple of months.
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![]() After the Jets' chairman raised attendance concerns on Friday, Adam Pro Toe says there are too many great things about Winnipeg as an NHL city to expect to lose its team.
Talks of attendance issues for the Winnipeg Jets must be deeply concerning to the team’s fan base, but there's still a lot to be hopeful about.
Team co-owner Mark Chipman told The Athletic this week that the team’s season ticket-holder base has shrunk by 27 percent over the past three years to just 9,500. “I wouldn’t be honest with you if I didn’t say, ‘We’ve got to get back to 13,000,’ ” Chipman said. “This place we find ourselves in right now, it’s not going to work over the long haul. It just isn’t.” Despite the worrisome tone of Chipman’s comments, we’re not anywhere close to convinced the Jets are in imminent danger of leaving. Say what you will about Winnipeg’s icy weather or small-town identity – at least, compared to NHL metropolises like New York City and Toronto. But there’s a reason why stars Mark Scheifele and Connor Hellebuyck chose to sign lucrative and lengthy contract extensions in the fall when they had the chance to become UFAs and leave the Jets as soon as they were contractually able to. Playing for the Jets gives you access to, and the support of, some of the friendliest, most passionate fans in the game. The Jets’ "Whiteout" in the stands and their chants of “true north” make the Winnipeg market one of the most ferocious in all of hockey. And while there are attendance issues right now, there’s no good reason why the city can’t re-embrace the team in their hour of need. Nobody would want to be around for the team leaving town for a second time, and Chipman’s comments should give the team and fan base all the motivation they need to turn things around. Not to mention, the Jets’ success this season – when many (this writer included) thought they might take a competitive step backward or sideways – should be more than enough for fans to want to continue their support of the team. We’re not questioning Chipman’s intent in speaking out. As the man who brought the Jets back to the NHL, he’s earned a positive place in Manitoba hockey history. But we’re not nearly convinced the Jets are in danger of relocating. Indeed, if you look at the league’s stance against relocation, you’ll see it bends over backward to try and keep any one team where they are. Of course, the most recent example of that is the Arizona Coyotes. That franchise has had infamous struggles to (a) be a prosperous team on the ice and (b) be a financial success off it, yet here they are, still operating for their fans. Many big cities are currently angling to bring in an NHL team – including Salt Lake City, Houston, Quebec City and Atlanta – who wouldn’t think twice about plucking the Jets away from Winnipeg if things were to ever get to that point. But can you imagine the optics that would materialise if the NHL allowed Winnipeg to lose their second team (Why not? Atlanta did it)? Sales of pitchforks and torches would skyrocket in mid-Canada. The route ahead could be bumpy for the Jets, but the organisation is not headed off a cliff just yet. If the Jets’ attendance hasn’t improved by this time next season, we’d be more apt to think they’re trending toward being in jeopardy. But that’s something that isn’t happening this year. Winnipeggers have every opportunity to reinvest their entertainment dollars in the team in the weeks and months to come, and the Jets have every chance to work with the fans to provide the best and most flexible options for ticket packages. Hearing the Jets’ troubles this week raises a red flag in many respects, but there are too many good things about Winnipeg as an NHL city to expect a relocation anytime soon. Arizona Coyotes move to terminate Adam Ruzicka’s contract after social media video surfaces24/2/2024
Associated Press Stephen Whyno
The Arizona Coyotes have put forward Adam Ruzicka on unconditional waivers to terminate his contract.
The move comes after Ruzicka posted to social media a video of a himself with a white powder appearing to be cocaine and a credit card on a counter. The team announced Friday that Ruzicka was going on waivers for termination purposes and said it would have no further comment at this time. Ruzicka is in the second season of a two-year contract worth $1.525 million. He has only been with the Coyotes for about a month since they claimed him off waivers from the Calgary Flames on Jan. 25. The 24-year-old from Slovakia has no points in three games with Arizona after nine in 39 with Calgary. He has played in 117 NHL games since making his debut in April 2021.
Ruzicka is the second player in the league this season to have his contract terminated, following Corey Perry with Chicago Blackhawks after they said the veteran winger violated team workplace policy. The NHL Players’ Association asked for and was granted an extension of the window for Perry to file a grievance, and he’s back playing with Edmonton. There is precedent for the NHL to punish players for off-ice conduct such as Ruzicka’s. Washington’s Evgeny Kuznetsov was suspended three games in 2019 for “inappropriate conduct,” less than a month after he was banned from playing for Russia for four years because of a positive test for cocaine. (Then there was Salming's FULL FUCKING SEASON suspension, reduced to eight games, eejit) Kuznetsov faced allegations of drug use at the world championships that year after a video posted on social media showed him near a table with lines of white powder and American dollar bills. ![]() Dodgy two-stroke technology and a nauseatingly callous racing establishment were the causes of Monza 1973 – a fiery multiple pile-up that claimed the lives of two of the sport’s biggest stars and changed the course of racing AUTHOR Mat Oxley MOTORSPORT MAGAZINE Motorcycle racing changed forever at 3.17pm on May 20, 1973. The Italian 250cc grand prix had just got underway at Monza and the pack was accelerating flat-out towards the first turn: the daunting, Armco-lined 140mph Curve Grande; no chicane in those days. German Dieter Braun led the way on his Yamaha TZ250, chased hard by Renzo Pasolini on his Harley-Davidson and Yamaha’s Jarno Saarinen, who had narrowly beaten Pasolini to the previous year’s 250 world title. At that moment Saarinen was the greatest rider in the world and firm favourite for the 1973 500 title after he had dominated the opening two rounds on Yamaha’s first 500 GP bike, the 0W19 inline-four. As the pack charged through the Curva Grande, Pasolini’s Harley two-stroke seized a piston at about 130mph, locked its rear wheel and hurled him to the ground, where Saarinen was unable to avoid him. The 27-year-old Finn crashed, cannoned into the trackside guardrail and rebounded into the track where he too was run over by the pursuing pack. ![]() Fuel tanks were ruptured, sparks flew and a ball of flame engulfed the circuit, setting alight the hay bales uselessly lining the Armco. Riders rode through the blinding inferno at high speed, trying but mostly failing to avoid the fallen. In all, 14 riders crashed. Only one or two walked away; several were seriously injured. Saarinen and Pasolini were dead. And yet in spite of this scene of horror no warning flags were shown and the race wasn’t stopped. For several minutes many of the survivors kept racing, threading their way through the chaos each lap, until they pulled into the pits of their own volition and the race ended. Two months later bikes raced again at Monza. Before this national meeting, Dr Claudio Costa – later in charge of MotoGP’s Clinica Mobile – asked the organisers to place an ambulance at Curve Grande. His request was refused. Once again there was a pile-up at the corner. It took 20 minutes for an ambulance to get to the scene – too late for the three riders who perished. Health and safety are usually dirty words these days, but it wasn’t so long ago that race organisers happily got away with jaw-dropping callousness. Monza was by no means the only circuit guilty of such sins. The people who survived the Saarinen/Pasolini tragedy are still scarred by the events. Briton Chas Mortimer was a top privateer of the time and suffered serious leg injuries in the accident. He still finds it difficult to talk about what happened. “I was the third person that crashed,” says Mortimer, the only rider to have been victorious in 125, 250, 350 and 500 GPs and F750 races. “I killed Pasolini, actually. There’s a picture of me coming out of the flames with Pasolini lying right across the road and I ran straight into him. “It was like what happened when Marco Simoncelli was killed (during the 2011 Malaysian GP), except there was no fire at Sepang. That accident really brought Monza back to me – I feel so sorry for Colin Edwards and Valentino Rossi [who were unable to avoid the fallen Simoncelli]. “It was Pasolini and Saarinen and their bikes hitting the barriers and coming back onto the circuit that started it all, then the hay bales caught alight and it was just bloody carnage. I was about the only person that was able to walk away from it. Everyone else was stretchered away. I remember running over to see Jarno – all his head had gone virtually – it was bloody horrendous … It was a bloody enormous accident, the biggest there’s ever been in Grand Prix racing." After the crash Yamaha withdrew its factory team for the rest of the year. An investigation was then established to examine the causes of the accident. Most people blamed Walter Villa, whose Benelli four-stroke had sprung an oil leak during the preceding 350 race. Several riders had pleaded with the organisers to clean the track before the 250s went out. The organisers refused and then called the police to eject the protesting riders from their office. Neither Villa – who was one of the 250 fallers and remained in shock and mute for several days after the accident – nor Benelli management proclaimed their innocence, so they were presumed guilty. Thus Villa went to his grave in 2002 without being forgiven by some of Saarinen’s loved ones. But the investigation found that the accident wasn’t Villa’s fault at all. When Saarinen’s and Pasolini’s machines were stripped the investigators discovered that the Harley’s right-side piston had seized. They concluded that the bike’s rudimentary water-cooling system was to blame. However, Villa was never publicly exonerated because the results of the investigation were never fully published and remained largely unknown until Italian magazine Tuttomoto published them in 1993. Monza 1973 changed many things, some for the good – it’s been a sad constant in racing that safety improvements are only made after riders pay the highest price for doing what they love. The accident was one of many during the 1960s and 1970s that made riders realise they were being taken for a ride. Something had to be done to improve safety. “As long as tracks like Monza are used, the rider’s life isn’t worth more than that of a mouse in a mousetrap – nothing,” said Braun after that fateful day. Blame it on the ‘death rails’ Although a flaky two-stroke caused the Monza pile-up the accident might not have proved fatal if the circuit hadn’t been ringed by Armco. Both Saarinen and Pasolini died after they hit the guardrail and bounced back into the oncoming traffic. Thus two big lessons were learned: the bike builders needed to improve lubrication, metallurgy and cooling, while the track builders needed to get rid of the Armco. “The riders called the barriers ‘death rails and at that time they were rising like mushrooms out of the ground at every circuit,” recalls famed Yamaha mechanic Ferry Brouwer. Armco (the name derives from the American Rolling Mill Company) became a serious problem in the early 1970s after Formula 1 drivers demanded crash barriers to prevent out-of-control cars launching off the track with potentially fatal results for them and for spectators. For bike racers, however, the cold steel rails were every bit as dangerous as a dry-stone wall on the Isle of Man. One step forward for car racers was one giant leap backwards for bike racers. “At one of my first GPs I remember a British rider called Rob Fitton hitting the Armco at the Nürburgring,” says Chas Mortimer. “It nearly took his leg off and he bled to death because there was no one around to stop it.” Although bike riders lobbied circuits and organisers they had little chance of being heard. “We were second-class citizens because the cars pulled in more punters,” adds Mortimer. “The other problem was that the organisers were a law unto themselves. They were a lot of terrible men who just weren’t interested. They’d say, on your bike, mate. There were worse places than Monza – Salzburgring was the worst because the track was completely ringed by barriers.” In 1977 the Salzburgring was still encircled by Armco when a massive Monza-style pile-up left one rider dead and several seriously injured, including 1982 500 World Champion Franco Uncini, who is now MotoGP’s safety officer. Although safety didn’t improve overnight, perhaps Monza was the start of the long road towards today’s much safer circuits. But while some venues did start removing the Armco and installing runoff areas, it was a slow process. ![]() “For many years I pushed very hard to get organisers to take out the f**king barriers,” says 15-times world champion Giacomo Agostini. “I think the Monza crash did make everyone realise the barriers were bad, but the real reason they were removed was that Formula 1 also realised the barriers were dangerous because they could break fuel tanks and cause fires. Finally people understood they must take out the barriers, but it happened very slowly.” By 1982 the riders were so fed up with lack of progress that they hired former racer Mike Trimby – now general secretary of MotoGP teams’ association IRTA – to fight for their rights. “By the time I arrived there was more run-off, but this was before gravel beds, so they had catch fencing, which the car guys wanted to slow the cars down,” says Trimby. “The problem was that the fencing was held up by wooden posts – 500 rider Michel Frutschi was killed by one of the posts at Le Mans in 1983. It was like planting trees around racetracks! “We had loads of arguments with circuits. We ended up removing a lot of catch fencing ourselves. What we wanted was something that would gradually collapse to slow riders after they’d crashed, which meant good old hay bales. I remember at Mugello in ’83, the circuit took out the fencing, then told us, ‘Right, your hay bales are here, they’re on that tractor over there, so go and put them out’, which we did – us and the riders.’ Bit by bit the riders began to have more of a dialogue with the organisers. “Once IRTA was launched in 1986 we had a formal voice. The other turning point was 1992 when Dorna came in. The deal with them was that we didn’t have to race anywhere we didn’t want to race. Now, when someone like Hermann Tilke [creator of Sepang, Shanghai, Austin and other tracks] designs a new circuit, they incorporate what we want for bikes. The situation can never be perfect but it’s about as close as it can get.” A few weeks after Saarinen’s death, Yamaha published its own (rather hurried and lightweight) investigation into the Monza accident. The report concluded with a statement that reveals how differently danger was perceived in those days – you won’t find Valentino Rossi’s team boss discussing the necessity of danger in bike racing. “Motorcycle racing will always involve an element of danger,” said the report. “It may be said that danger is necessary to bring out the qualities of a champion when man and machine are striving for the ultimate performance. But unnecessary and senseless danger can, and should be, eliminated as a duty to the competitors.” The genius of Jarno
Jarno Saarinen was a genius, a game-changer and all set to become an all-time great. He had learned to slide bikes as a champion ice racer, so he brought a whole new way of riding to GP racing. His skills inspired Kenny Roberts to do what he did: drag his knees and ride sideways. “I started hanging off at Ontario Motor Speedway in 1972,” recalls Roberts. “The track had this horseshoe where I felt so uncomfortable, like I was going to crash. So I watched Jarno – he leaned off the bike with his knee out, so I leaned off and all of a sudden I didn’t have that bad feeling.” Finnish ice racers like Saarinen made an earlier impact in GPs than American dirt trackers like Roberts and Freddie Spencer. During Saarinen’s era there were plenty more Finns in the GP paddock, including GP winners Tepi Lansivouri and Pentti Korhonen. Saarinen studied mechanical engineering at university and was known for his meticulous machine preparation. He thought very hard about how to go faster, using both riding technique and machine technology. He was famous for positioning his handlebars at an unusually steep angle, which he claimed helped him to control slides. In little more than one season – between September 1971 and May 1973 – he won 17 GPs across the 250, 350 and 500 classes. And what if Saarinen had lived? Bike racing might have had a very different look for the next half decade if Saarinen hadn’t perished at Monza. The brilliant Finn was running away with the 1973 500cc world championship when fate intervened, so he was already set to make history by winning the first two-stroke 500 crown. His death prompted Yamaha to withdraw from racing, so history was deferred and the two-stroke had to wait another two years before it conquered the premier class. His passing poses several other questions. If he had lived, would Phil Read have won the 1973 and 1974 500 world titles on the MV Agusta? Possibly not, because the MV four-stroke was being rapidly overtaken by Yamaha’s considerably faster two-stroke. And if Saarinen’s star had still been in the ascendance would Barry Sheene have won his two world titles in 1976 and 1977? And if Yamaha had had all the riding talent they needed, would Agostini have signed for the factory in 1974 and won his final world title the following year? And would Kenny Roberts have come to Europe in 1978? It’s all ifs and buts, but there’s no doubt that losing a genius rider at a relatively young age had multiple ramifications for GP racing. ![]() Jesse "Big Head" Puljujarvi has not hurt the Pittsburgh Penguins since joining the team, but Adam Pro Toe says needing to sign him in the first place was grasping at straws.
The Pittsburgh Penguins have been one of the NHL’s biggest disappointments this season.
That’s in spite of another excellent season from captain Sidney Crosby and solid contributions from veterans Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang and first-year Penguin Erik Karlsson. But even small achievements – such as the signing of veteran winger Jesse Puljujarvi – are ultimately condemnations of their bleak over all picture. Puljujarvi hasn’t necessarily hurt the Pens since signing a two-year, $1.6-million contract with the organisation, but he hasn’t blown the doors off anyone, either. After looking good in the AHL, the 25-year-old Finn has played six NHL games for Pittsburgh ahead of Tuesday night and has yet to produce a single point. Part of the reason for that is averaging just 11:00 of ice time per game, but it’s clear now why there wasn’t a bidding war for Puljujarvi’s services. Instead, the Puljujarvi signing has made it clear – the Penguins haven't surrounded their core with secondary players who can move the needle consistently. The team’s drafting and development group has not produced enough talent to augment what they have in their marquee players. Even with the contributions they’re getting from Crosby, Malkin, Letang and Karlsson, it’s not nearly enough to keep them in the thick of the Metropolitan Division playoff race. Indeed, it's easy to draft at the top and take generational talents such as Crosby and Malkin. But to avoid the pain of the salary cap's constraints, you need sustained asset generation from within the organisation. And for too long now, the Pens haven't been able to do that. They’ve got veterans who are slowing down, such as Jeff Carter (six goals, eight points in 46 games), underachieving forwards, including Rickard Rakell (five goals, 20 points in 40 games) and average younger players, including Drew O’Connor (six goals, 17 points in 52 games) and Valtteri Puustinen (one goal, eight points in 22 games). This is one of the reasons why GM Kyle Dubas went out and claimed forward Matthew Phillips off waivers from the Washington Capitals. The team is grasping at straws, and while the Pens have had some injuries to deal with, virtually every NHL team has had the same issue – and none of them look as flat as the Penguins do at the moment. Puljujarvi may soon settle in and start putting up decent numbers from Pittsburgh’s bottom-six group of forwards, but they need much more than that if they’re going to leapfrog up the Eastern Conference wild-card race. Their struggles up to this point mean that not only do they have to drastically improve the rest of the way this year, but they need more than one of the teams currently above them in the standings to collapse. In other words, the Penguins’ fate is no longer solely in their own hands. And that should frighten Pens fans tremendously. Puljujarvi is no saviour, and neither is anyone available to the Pens on the trade market. Dubas now faces the pressure, and if he trades star winger Jake Guntzel and doesn’t come away with pieces to help Pittsburgh win this season, the pressure will increase exponentially. It sure feels like there are going to be more bad days than good days imminently ahead for Pittsburgh, and it all can be traced back to the draft and development not producing top talent to augment their line up. Until that changes, players like Puljujarvi are going to be a band-aid solution to a blood-gushing problem. ![]() Auston Matthews could score 70 goals and not be a finalist for the NHL's Hart Trophy, let alone a winner. Ken Campbell says that would be ridiculous as he revisits Situational Scoring.
If Auston Matthews continues on his current torrid pace, he’ll score 75 goals this season, possibly more. It’s also possible that it won’t mean squat in the Hart Trophy race. Not only might Matthews not win the NHL’s MVP award this season, he might not even be a finalist.
History tells us that is not unprecedented. Logic tells us that would be ridiculous. Because not only has Matthews scored goals at a prodigious pace this season, he’s scored more big goals than anyone else in the NHL. And it’s not close. How do we know this? Well, because of my Situational Scoring statistic that charts goals by importance. You know how they say that it doesn’t matter how, but how many? Well, with Situational Scoring, it doesn’t matter how many. What really matters is how many of them were meaningful. We last visited Situational Scoring during the all-star break, but it's time for an update. As the name suggests, it measures situational scoring, specifically which players produce offence at the most crucial times in the game. As always, there are a couple of things to note, the most important being that goals are weighted more heavily than assists, with goals worth one point and assists worth half a point. In this system, goals can be worth more than one point and assists worth more than a half a point. For example, the first goal of a game is automatically worth two points, one for being the first goal of the game and one for putting that player’s team ahead in a game. An overtime goal is worth three, one for putting the team ahead, one for being the game-winner and one for the overtime goal. If that is the only goal in a 1-0 game, it’s worth four. It can all be a little confusing, so here’s a glossary: FIRST: When a player scores the first goal of the game. AHEAD: Any goal that puts a team ahead at any point in the game, including overtime. TIED: Any goal that pulls a team into a tie at any point in the game. COMEBACK: A goal that is scored when a team is trailing by two goals or more and is part of a series of goals that eventually ties the game, regardless of the ultimate outcome of the game. WINNER: A game-winning goal, but not by the NHL’s definition. The game-winner in this category is the goal that puts a team ahead in a game to stay. So in other words, you could have a 7-6 game and maybe the first goal of the game was the game-winner. OT: Overtime goal. SO: Only shootout game-winning goals are counted in this category. NHL: Where the player stands in the actual NHL scoring race. ![]() The Dallas Stars briefly recalled Logan Stankoven from AHL Texas, but his NHL debut will have to wait. Jacob Stoller says the AHL's top scorer is worth the hype, and his stats and fearlessness suggest the same. Who let the stank out?
Update: The Dallas Stars loaned Logan Stankoven back to the AHL's Texas Stars on the same day they recalled him, as Matt Duchene was available to play for Tuesday's game against the New York Rangers. The original column follows, because when Stankoven does make his NHL debut, it will be worth the wait: If you think the Dallas Stars couldn’t get any better — think again. The Stars recalled Logan Stankoven from the AHL on Tuesday in a move that signifies much more than just an injury replacement for Matt Duchene. Stankoven, 20, isn’t just the top forward prospect in the AHL — he’s arguably the best forward in the league, period. It’s not a stretch to suggest that if Stankoven weren’t stuck behind one of the NHL's deepest teams up front in Dallas, he’d probably be an NHL regular for most organisations. At the very least, he would've received a call-up much sooner than now. Logan Stankoven is the real deal, folks. For starters, the 5-foot-8 forward is leading the AHL in scoring — as a rookie, no less — with 57 points in 46 games. His resume only gets shinier when you peel back the onion layers, as Stankoven has the highest game score statistic per 60 minutes of any AHL forward (1.42), according to data via InStat. (Game score, a model developed by Dom Luszczyszyn, takes into account a variety of statistics to measure productivity in any given game.) Here’s Stankoven's player card with the percentile in which he ranks in the AHL: To put Stankoven's production into perspective, his 0.54 primary points per game at 5-on-5 rank second among all U-21 AHL forwards from the past decade who played a minimum of 20 games in a season, according to AHLTracker.com.
Draughted 47th over all by the Stars in 2021, Stankoven fell out of the first round due to concerns about his size. His rookie production has silenced those who discounted him. In an interview with The Hockey News for a story on Stankoven in the latest Rookie Issue magazine, Stars GM Jim Nill explained how giddy the Stars were to land Stankoven in the second round. After the first round ended, Nill said Stankoven was their target. They even tried trading up to grab him, as they feared he’d be snatched up before their pick. Stankoven doesn’t fit into the mould of your typical undersized junior. His raw skills — highlighted by his smooth edgework and puck skills — are unquestionably tantalising, but there’s also an element of fearlessness to his game that’s palpable. He’s a workhorse competitor, one that not only isn’t afraid of 1-on-1 battles, but he actually excels at them and creates a high volume of chances from the slot. The Stars tend to overripen their prospects — a prime example of which is paying dividends this year in Thomas Harley. In many ways, having Stankoven be the guy in Texas is a blessing in disguise. But as you’ll see soon — there’s no doubt he’s an NHL-calibre player. His future is tremendously bright; no Stars puns intended. ![]() That got me thinking, and I found this on hockeybuzz: Sheng Peng Vegas Golden Knights Blogger "Sure, it's nice to win it," began Alex Delvecchio, after winning the award for a third time in 1969. "But the name takes a lot away from it and what it's meant to be." (Berry, Jack. "Delvecchio 'Happy, but Unhappy.'" Detroit Free Press, April 29, 1969.) NHL.com historian Dave Stubbs told this tale about the 1972 winner, "When Jean Ratelle was traded to the Bruins in 1975, the first thing that he did when he arrived was apologise to Don Cherry (a massive cocksucker and closet lady). He said, 'I'm sorry I won the Lady Byng.'" "Back in our day, it was a different game," Gerard Gallant noted of the '80s and '90s, before admitting, "You heard a lot of guys say, 'I don't want to win the Lady Byng Trophy.'" 2003 winner Alexander Mogilny called it a consolation prize. He skipped the Awards Show in Toronto -- Pat Quinn accepted the trophy in his stead -- despite playing for the Maple Leafs at the time. Team mates Martin St. Louis and Brad Richards were both nominated in 2004. The problem was, neither wanted to take the trophy home. Richards acknowledged, "Me and Marty were fighting over who didn't want to win it. Rammer [associate coach Craig Ramsay] kind of put us in our shoes. He told us, 'Don't say you don't want to win an NHL award, you play in the NHL and you should be honoured.'" (Erlendsson, Erik. "Richards Believes Award Is Special." The Tampa Tribune, June 11, 2004.) "Consolation prize." "It sounds like a sissy award." "Left-handed compliment." "Which NHL club wants a gentlemanly hockey player?" That's what people have written about one of the league's oldest, most underrated awards for too long. Times may have finally changed. "It's a different game than it was 20 years ago," said George McPhee, echoing Gallant. "The regular season is really, really hard now. I think it's harder now to make the playoffs than it's ever been -- might be easier once you get in to the playoffs to go deep -- but it's harder to get in. "You have to be smart all year long. Have a team that doesn't take penalties. Be really disciplined. "We need more players playing like that than in the past." The numbers support McPhee's talking points. Only 16 of 31(32) teams qualify for the post-season. Parity -- as evidenced by the once-unheard of Stanley Cup Final runs by the eighth-seeded 2012 Los Angeles Kings and 2017 Nashville Predators -- is at its peak. And as a whole, skaters are trying to avoid the penalty box. The average NHL team enjoyed 437 power play opportunities in 1987-88, 380 in 1997-98, 351 in 2007-08, and 250 this year. In fact, you can argue, because of its rarity, a "gentlemanly" player "combined with a high standard of playing ability" was more valuable 30 years ago than now. But anyway, these days, with so few power plays doled out, it's more important than ever to remain on the right side of that ledger. It's not as simple as they get one, you'll get one back now. For 2018 Lady Byng Memorial Trophy nominee William Karlsson, a four-time winner helped glamorise a trophy that otherwise wasn't much celebrated in his native Sweden. "Growing up, I remember [Pavel] Datysuk was winning it a lot. He was a pretty good player. That's the memory I have of the trophy. "Stuff like takeaways, he could knock the puck off people. Just a complete player." "A lot of guys in the league take pride in being a good sport," remarked 2016 winner Anze Kopitar. 2014 winner and 2018 nominee Ryan O'Reilly is certainly among them. "I take a lot of pride in being effective and staying out of the penalty box. "It means a lot to my family too. They respect it a lot, being seen as a sportsman. They always [believed in] integrity in the game." Okay, so generally, players nowadays may actually want to take home the Lady Byng. A sport which once asked, "Why aren't you in the penalty box?" -- see the 1982 Paul Mulvey incident, for example -- seems to finally be asking, "Why are you in the penalty box?" *** Regardless, lingering mysteries endure about the Lady Byng, such as why it became almost solely an award for forwards. Between 1954 winner Red Kelly and 2012 winner Brian Campbell, only forwards have taken home the trophy. That's longer than the Rangers' Stanley Cup curse! Stubbs couldn't put his finger on why, "No one's ever said as of now, it's going to be a forward award." There's no reason that I can think of for the Byng to be forward-exclusive. Imagine Connor McDavid zipping by you in tight quarters -- defencemen are probably challenged more than anybody to balance "sportsmanship and gentlemanly conduct" with a "high standard of playing ability." Stubbs pointed out that awards voting does evolve, "When the Selke came out, it was purely a defensive forward award. "Patrice Bergeron and Bruce Cassidy, they both said the criteria has changed. Cassidy said, 'The guy nominated for that trophy has to put numbers on the board.' "It's two-way forward now; it's not just a defensive forward." With that in mind, hopefully more defencemen avenge Nicklas Lidstrom -- five-time Byng runner-up -- in the coming years. Another question -- or criticism -- volleyed at voters is the apparent simplicity of their vote. One part, points scored. Two parts, PIMs. Shaken, not stirred. That's fair, for sure, and historically, there hasn't been a tremendous deviation from this formula. From 1949-50 -- when the NHL expanded to a 70-game schedule -- to now, the average Lady Byng winner has accounted for just 14.1 PIMs in a season. Funny enough, Wayne Gretzky has the most PIMs for a post-WWII Byng winner with 34 in 1991-92. From 1959-60, a near-point per game or better forward -- except for Campbell -- has won every year. To differentiate this award from others, I wonder if there should be a stronger emphasis on the "sportsmanship and gentlemanly conduct" aspect. Perhaps referees should be involved in the vote? Kopitar did stress that the Byng belongs to players who are "humble and respectful to each other and the referees and everything." *** I thought of the Lady Byng as "Gretzky's Other Trophy" when I was a kid. Gretzky took it home five times, second-most in league history. However, four were awarded after he stopped winning Harts. I was wrong. Brilliant and disciplined play should be prized, perhaps above all else. Lady Byng of Vimy certainly believed it. Wife of Canada's then Governor-General and Ottawa Senators fan, she donated the trophy to the NHL in 1925, wishing to encourage gentlemanly play and sportsmanship. In that time, Frank Boucher would set a mark even Gretzky couldn't pass, winning the trophy seven times in eight seasons. After Boucher's seventh and final victory in 1935, Ottawa Journal columnist Walter Gilhooly published an open letter to Byng, suggesting she let Boucher take permanent possession of the actual trophy. Byng agreed, giving Boucher the original Lady Byng, while donating another trophy for future winners. This is Gilhooly's letter, from April 16, 1935: If these fucking idiots that slag the trophy (AND LADY BYNG!) knew who her husband was, they would shut their filthy fucking commie mouths.
The Right Honourable Sir Julian Byng 1st Viscount Byng of Vimy would not have ordered them taken out and shot, he would have done it himself. He was/is a bit of an almost life-long hero of mine. And by the way, the "VIMY" in his name is for "VIMY RIDGE". SO WHEN HIS WIFE GIVES YOU A FUCKING TROPHY, YOU FUCKING TAKE IT AND LIKE IT! ![]() Mark Spector SPORTSNET DICKHEAD TEMPE, Ariz. — It was one of those periods. The kind you’ll probably only remember if you don’t win it.
The Edmonton Oilers were in Tempe, playing in front of a home crowd of travelling Oiler fans against an Arizona Coyotes team that was winless in nine games — and had lost less than 24 hours earlier in Colorado. But somehow, Edmonton found itself trailing 3-2 after 40 minutes, with another brutal second period in its resume. Now, the 6-3 Oilers win that ensued is something we’ll all assume was supposed to happen. Good team versus not-as-good team, right? But in reality, with a host of players not producing, a Vegas win at San Jose, and the fact the Oilers hadn’t won two straight since before the All-Star break, the third period that Edmonton delivered was as comforting as it was clutch. “When things aren't going our way, or we don't have our best game going, it’s just about staying composed and not panicking,” said Evander Kane, who scored his 20th and 21st goals in the final frame. “Knowing that if we hang around long enough and get our game in order, we can pull it out.” An Arizona team that took the game away from Edmonton in the middle frame — a disturbing trend for the Oilers, who have lost their last four middle periods — got steamrolled in the final 20 as Edmonton emerged from its dressing room with new line combinations and an entirely upgraded pace of play. Head coach Kris Knoblauch went back to his old Top 6 — Connor McDavid between Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Zach Hyman, and Leon Draisaitl with Ryan McLeod and Kane — and those units created three goals plus an empty-netter in a 4-0 third period for Edmonton. The final: 6-3 Oilers, and a 2-1 road trip heading home for five straight at Rogers Place. “You can tell that you're playing a young, fragile team that’s been on a losing streak and feeling very tight. Our group, we just took advantage of it,” said Knoblauch, who has become the master at pressing the right buttons when it comes to in-game line manipulations. “Usually you're thinking about what's worked in the past, and who's playing well at that moment,” he said. “It's good for the coach to be prepared, but also, it's not a good sign for coaches to be too prepared and have a backup line up. You don't want to get in the habit of changing things up (every game). “But after the second period — we got outplayed, we were slow to pucks and they really carried the play in the second — we just needed a little something to change things up.” What resulted was a wake-up call for a couple of moribund Oilers, after Mattias Janmark had already notched his first goal since Nov. 28 in Period 1. After the lines emerged from the blender, Ryan McLeod found his first point in 10 games, while Warren Foegele scored his first goal/point in nine games. With ice-cold Connor Brown spending his first game in the press box as a healthy scratch, it was high time the Edmonton depth forwards started pitching in again. And so they did. “We went back to playing simple and playing faster, instead of sitting around watching the play all night,” McLeod said. “In the third we played on our toes a little more, and it paid off.” With two more goals Kane is quietly on pace for 30 goals and 50 points; pretty good production for a player earning $5.125 million. He’s found comfort on the left side of either McDavid or Draisaitl, and gets his tucks with very little power-play time (five PP points all season). Plus, he leads the team in hits, and is tied for ninth in the NHL with Brady Tkachuk. “Both units have played together for long stretches during the season,” Kane said after the win. “So it was nothing really new for us. But it gave us a bit of a spark and paid off.” Edmonton has now won six straight meetings against the Coyotes since their last loss on Feb. 4, 2020, and this season Edmonton hasn’t lost a one-goal game (9-0) since Nov. 9 in San Jose, the penultimate game of Jay Woodcroft’s coaching tenure. “We talked about that,” Knoblauch said. “We didn't have back-to-back wins for about three weeks. Now, one of those weeks was the All-Star break, but good teams are able to put together long streaks. Good teams don't put long losing streaks together.” Good teams win third periods. Especially when they have to. ![]() Last week, Toronto Maple Leafs centre Auston Matthews said he felt his "bed was already made" before his hearing with the NHL Department of Player Safety in 2022. As the result of Morgan Rielly's suspension appeal awaits, Adam Pro Toe reacts to Matthews's comments.
The relationship NHL players have with the league’s Department of Player Safety is a complicated one.
On one hand, the DOPS is tasked with making the game as safe as possible for players. On the other hand, it is there to take a hard line on players who cross the boundary between legal and illegal play. Sometimes, even the league’s best players run afoul of the DOPS. When that happens, there’s an opportunity for those players to defend themselves, whether it's in a hearing or an appeal as we’ve just seen recently in the wake of the five-game suspension handed to Leafs defenseman Morgan Rielly. Last week, Toronto Maple Leafs star centre Auston Matthews suggested that nothing he planned to say in his hearing with DOPS officials in 2022 would sway them from their initial instincts. The Hockey News' Maple Leafs site covered his comments at the time. Matthews referenced a brouhaha in which he cross-checked Buffalo defenceman Rasmus Dahlin during a game, an act that ultimately got him suspended for two games. "It’s definitely very eye-opening," Matthews told reporters on Feb. 12 of the process. "I felt like my bed was already made when I hopped on that phone (for the meeting).” When a run-of-the-mill NHLer speaks out on a suspension, it doesn’t make many waves at the league level. But when it’s an icon of Matthews’s stature, a critical word or thought resonates to the top levels of the sport. One of Matthews’s bosses in Toronto, team president Brendan Shanahan, made waves as a retired star when he worked to make the game more enjoyable and entertaining in what was at the time called the “Shanahan Summit.” He used his experiences as a star player, as well as his cachet on and off the ice, to effect notable change. And while Matthews hasn’t taken that route yet in his playing career, his willingness to give his side of the story in this case could lead to him using his voice for change in the game later on. This is not to argue that Matthews or any player should be free of supplemental discipline. If someone breaks a rule egregiously, the suspension they receive will be justified, as Matthews's was back in 2022. However, speaking up at the hearing at least gives the individual a chance to offer their opinion of what took place, and that could affect the length of games they’re suspended for. Most times, even when filing an appeal to the NHL commissioner over a suspension, the commissioner will support the DOPS’s decision. But the only way players can mitigate the number of games they’re suspended for is to defend themselves behind the scenes and publicly. This is why Matthews, Rielly and other NHLers deserve the right to speak up if they see fit. The subjective essence of player safety measures isn’t always fair to all involved, but if the league is going to create a better work environment, it needs to take into account all perspectives before handing down a ruling on someone. Matthews was probably right – his bed was more than likely made the moment he cross-checked Dahlin. The same goes for Rielly after he cross-checked Ottawa’s Ridly Greig. The long arm of the law is supposed to be impartial, but taking a few minutes to defend yourself, both in the public eye and in the league’s perspective, is what more players, stars and otherwise, should be doing. |
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