This was posted at NHLHotstove yesterday, and was also written before reading that Rawhide asked the same question over at his AJC blog. Great minds think alike. 

 

A few days ago on Puck Daddy, the guys looked at “mid-season goats” for all thirty NHL teams. The Atlanta Thrashers’ goat was Niclas Bergfors. The former All-Rookie Team member, who finished fourth in rookie scoring last year with 44 points (23 goals and 21 assists), has been an enigma so far this season. Coach Craig Ramsay had scratched him multiple times in December, finally playing him at the end of the month and during January thanks to injury depletion. As such, he’s only played 34 out of the 45 games so far this season.

He ranks 8th on the Thrashers in scoring (23 pts), and 7th in goals with nine. He’s been frustrated in the past with the scratching, there have been trade rumors brewing, and fingers are pointing at him for someone who is under-performing.

But, if you really look at it, he’s only 20 points off of his output for last season, and he’s going to play significantly fewer games this year. There’s no reason to expect him to not make up the deficit, especially with him scoring four points in the last four games. Perhaps being a scratch lit a fire under his butt, but if he wasn’t scratched, those eleven games that he’s been out could have added significantly to his point totals. He’s under-producing because he’s not being used for whatever reason.

Statistically, if you look at the Thrashers, there isn’t anyone who has been performing significantly underwhelmingly point wise. The issues have been in the defense, as is per usual with the team. Rich Peverley is a -11, Freddy Modin and Nik Antropov are a -9, and the defensive pairing of Zach Bogosian and Johnny Oduya are a -9 and -10 respectively. Peverley and Antropov are almost balancing it out with their offensive output, and Oduya’s having a solid offensive season, scoring two goals and twelve assists so far. Modin and Bogosian, however, are struggling. Modin has scored seven goals but has just added two assists for only nine points on the year. Age and injuries, as well as being a scratch, are starting to catch up to him. Does this excuse it? Not really.

Bogosian, after having a great rookie campaign (9-10-19, +11 in only 47 games), saw his numbers taper off (10-13-23, -18 in 81 games in 2009-10) after being exposed to John Anderson’s coaching style, and being played with a wrist injury when he should have been a scratch. This season, Bogosian has been banged up and has only played 37 games so far, netting three goals and five assists, and is a -9 on the year so far. His projected stats are a line of 5-9-14 with an overall -16 rating. He’s been looking lost at times out there in Ramsay’s system, and is having to adjust to his second coach in three years of a professional career. Not an easy to-do.

I’m not pointing the finger at Bogosian as the Thrashers’ goat, partially because I think it’s irresponsible to name players as the cause of the team’s ills, and because he’s got more than enough time to work things out and turn this situation around.

Players are having issues because of injury, age, and God knows what else, and without being a fly on the team’s wall, I don’t think that I’m qualified to comment on who isn’t “pulling their weight” or not. But, I do think that pinning the label of “goat” on Bergfors isn’t necessarily correct. He’s more than able to equal his output from last season in fewer games, and could have surpassed it had he not been a healthy scratch.

When some people are noticeably slipping at the same time a player is holding his career “status quo,” it’s tough to name the person maintaining his play the “goat.” Perhaps a victim of expectations is more accurate of a description.

Few people have had to endure fat jokes like Keith Tkachuk. Show up to one training camp with a few too many cheeseburgers and tacos from Jack in the Box in your stomach, and deal with years of fat jokes. Retire and put on some weight, and it gets no better. Big Walt is a St. Louis fixture, though, and is a beloved Blues alumni who brings his kids to games to point out how there's no one who can get in front of the goal and deflect shots like he could.



Well, I guess until now. If Walter had a few fat jokes made at his expense, then Kyle Wellwood's had about a billion. No one else has a hashtag on Twitter dedicated to their propensity to not show up to camps and games within a healthy playing weight. Well, get ready for some fun, St. Louis. If he clears waivers by noon tomorrow according to TSN, Kyle Wellwood is the next recipient of your best "how many toasted ravioli did he eat last night?" jokes. Blues GM Doug Armstrong is chalking this up to a bunch of TSN rumormongering, but seriously - who makes up a rumor like this? It's just not even nice. The Blues, who have an odd inability to score and maintain leads, have signed someone waived by his KHL team... who was before that not signed by the Phoenix Coyotes after a pro tryout, who was waived by the Vancouver Canucks, and who before that was waived by the Toronto Maple Leafs? I'm not sure if this is someone that St. Louis needs to go after right now. Yes, it's hard not having Oshie and McDonald and Perron around, and yes Wellwood's ok on the face-off, but does he add anything that one of the AHL callups doesn't? I'll believe it when I hear it, but until then, I'm researching gooey butter cake jokes. Does anyone have any good ones?

It's come down from the Morality Chair, Colin Campbell, that Ben Eager will be gone for four games. You know what? After the way he's been playing recently (not just last night), and his ignorance in last night's game, I'm ok with that. It really won't be noticeable one way or the other. What was noticeable is that a member of the Thrashers decided to make an already bad game worse by pre-meditatingly doing something stupid that cost his team four goals in five minutes of gameplay. It's not Eager's fault that the Thrashers lost last night, but I get infuriated when someone on one of my favorite teams does something ignorant that puts that team in the spotlight in a very negative way. I don't want my players getting suspended for things that they should know better for. I called Colby Armstrong out on this last season when he nailed Mathieu Perrault in the head with an elbow on purpose. I was especially pissed off about that because Atlanta was fighting to get into the playoffs; I guess at least Eager took himself out of the game against Toronto, which is so not the same thing.

Eager's four game suspension is warranted. In a quote given to Chris Vivlamore of the AJC, Eager tries to compare himself to Milan Lucic:

“I’m surprised in one way, but there is no parity in these suspensions that are handed out,” Eager said Saturday. “The last two incidents I’ve seen, they knocked a guy out with no glove on and get no fine. The Lucic incident, he suckers a guy who’s not even looking, with no glove on, and he gets fined $2,500. Then Jody Shelley does the same thing to a guy who is watching and he gets two games. I get four [games] somehow for hitting a guy with my glove on, that is looking right in my face. We are looking eye to eye.  I guess [NHL disciplinarian Colin Campbell] wanted a quiet weekend. He didn’t want the Toronto media calling him all weekend. He did what he had to do.

“It is what it is. It’s four games. I will deal with it and move on.”


Ok, Ben, no. Lucic's hit on Meyer wasn't premeditated - it was a reaction to something Meyer had just done to him. The suckerpunch to Armstrong's face was clearly pre-meditated retribution for Armstrong being obnoxious all night - probably most specifically the hits on Little and Peverley. If you watch the clip of Lucic, and then watch the clip of Eager, it's obvious that Eager took a run at Army and tried to cream him into the boards about thirty seconds before he hit him.

Also, and something that Eager leaves out (but mentions later in the interview with CViv), is that he's already been suspended by the league once for three games in 2009 for a hit on Edmonton's Liam Reddox. Earlier in 2008, he was suspended for three games for swinging his stick at Sean Avery as Avery skated by. Eager was seated on the bench at the time. Prior suspensions figure into league punishment according to the rules, and if Eager wants to dispute that, well fine. But it still does.

Ben Eager lacks judgement, he's not an enforcer, and he's not even a legit pest. At least Avery, Matt Cooke, and Steve Downie can score and be effective hockey players. Again, I'm not blaming Eager for the loss last night, but what he did is embarrassing to the Thrashers organization, and I don't appreciate that.  

I need to write this before I write my SB Nation recap - if that gets written, considering my headache.

It's amazing how fast a hockey game can change. What goes from a few missed chances in the first period can go to hell promptly in the second period, and that's what happened tonight. It was a complete and total breakdown. No defense, no goaltending, not really sure what was going on with the Pavelec-Mason-Pavelec-Mason goaltending switch... momentum shifts, frustration, multiple missed calls, and players responding inappropriately to stupid plays by the opposition designed to get under the Thrashers' skin.

No one played worth a damn tonight other than Byfuglien and Enstrom, who finished +1 on the night were the best defensive pairing. Chris Thorburn and Patrice Cormier both finished +2. Ladd and Little were also +1. Ben Eager was +1, but I don't care.

I don't call out individual players for things unless they do something outlandishly stupid. I called out Colby Armstrong multiple times last season for questionable hits, cowardly actions on the ice, and his lack of production. Things don't change just because you're in a new city, and what I've said about Army  when he was in a Thrashers uniform is no different than what I'll say about him tonight. His goal and assist happened because the momentum of the game was so far away from the Thrashers it might as well have been on vacation in Boca. His cheap hit on Peverley towards the end of the 1st period with incidental knee on knee was inappropriate, and he was skating around doing what he does best - pissing teams off - all night long. Armstrong's a pest, and his job is to goad the other team into focusing on him more than the task at hand, which is winning.

This little exchange courtesy of John Manasso sums up both Colby Armstrong and Ben Eager perfectly:

 #Leafs Colby Armstrong: Ben Eager is a "meat head." #Thrashers' Eager, Armstrong is "one of the phoniest players in the league."

It's funny, because they're opposite ends of the same pole. They both thrive on irritation. Eager did it constantly with Chicago, which is why I was less than thrilled when the Thrashers acquired him. I found him useless and always stirring up problems that someone else on the Blackhawks had to fix, or else he'd just piss off Cam Janssen who would promptly beat him into the ice. Eager's been a scratch here recently, and he hasn't been missed. His first game back, and he helps shift the momentum in favor of the Leafs with stupid penalties, and once the oomph is as far gone as it was tonight, you can't get it back. 

Eager's double minor at 13 minutes or so into the 1st period was ill-advised. Roughing AND a cross check on Dion Phaneuf? No. Granted, Phaneuf shoved Eager back, but he didn't start it. Eager did. That penalty led to a power play goal for Toronto and it also shifted the momentum to the Leafs. The Thrashers were distracted and scrambling, and let a bad penalty kill dictate the emotion for the rest of the period and game.

The second period flood? The first three goals were inexcusable, but when you're down 5-1, do you really want someone doing something so ignorant that it costs your team four more goals? Ben Eager ran Colby Armstrong clearly with an intent to injure:



I don't care how annoying Army is - and he is pretty damn annoying - you do not do that. You take yourself out of the game totally, you give your team five minutes on the penalty kill, and you probably get suspended and fined. Why? Because someone's annoying you. Brilliant. That hit was just one more distraction on a night where the Thrashers didn't need any more, and there was no way that the PK could get their act together enough to stop the FOUR powerplay goals that Toronto scored.

Eager never, ever should have touched Armstrong. He needs to be at the least fined, at the most suspended a game or two. And when that suspension's over, a benching'd be in order. Hell, I'd be ok with sending him to Chicago and keeping Cormier up. Cormier finished +2 and got his first NHL goal tonight, and was one of the best players on the team.

Tonight was a bad night for everyone on the team, probably the coaches included. That still doesn't hide or excuse Eager's ignorant hit or actions. The Thrashers should bounce back from this fine, because at the end of the night, Atlanta's still in a playoff spot and Toronto's still looking up. But if you want to win games, you can't let other teams get in your head, and you absolutely cannot react to them the way that Eager did tonight. There's not one person that I blame tonight's loss on, but out of all of the guys on the ice, Eager absolutely and inexcusably acted like an idiot.

I am not trying to rub this in Canada's face. I love Canada - swell country, lots of Canadian friends, gave us hockey. The hubris shown during the World Junior Championships though had to tick off the hockey gods. I'm convinced that people who think that they're entitled to win fail harder than folks who don't feel that way - that (along with the fact that they played like crap) contributed to the US's 4-1 loss to Canada on Monday night. Canadians annexed Buffalo for the tournament and the stands at the HSBC Arena were red and white for that game, and they were red and white for the gold medal game between Canada and Russia.

Blues prospect Vladimir Tarasenko decided he wanted those stands to be red, white, and blue - and not for the Russian flag. Apparently Canadian tears are his favorite tears of all.

Tarasenko capped the Russian's rally in the 3rd period by scoring the game tying goal. The goal itsef is special, but it's more so considering that the Baby Blue could have been the next member of the Concussion Country Club that the team's setting up. He got hit in the head with a Canadian skate, left the game, and then came back shortly before doing this (full game highlights follow - scroll to the goal):

Not being satisfied with making the arena quieter than a tomb, he decided to assist on Artemi Panarin's game winning goal.

Moral of the story? Next time you want to crow about being the bestest in the world at something, check behind you. Tank could be waiting to take you down.

I'm usually not one to wear t-shirts with screen prints of people, animals, or other things on them. Unles it's simple and the team's logo, it'll get tossed into the sleepwear drawer.

If anyone bought me this thing I'd probably use it as a rag to clean the bathroom with:

Seriously - that was designed by a fan? They're letting 8 year olds design stuff now? I'm flabbergasted that not only a grown man designed this, but that his girlfriend claims a bit of the credit. I would love to see the original mock-up. Does it look something like this?

Honestly, if the person (people) who designed this shirt see this, I'm not making fun of you as people, but really. That shirt shouldn't happen.

Here's hoping that 2010 closes with a Thrashers and a Blues win - hockey double header day today, with the Thrashers game underway right now (started at 5:00) in New Jersey, and the Blues taking on the Coyotes tonight on Versus at 8:00. Everyone be careful, enjoy popping your champagne safely (especially if the Thrashers and Blues win on the same day - I'll chug a bottle) For now, your Moment of Zen, courtesy of Thrash:

2010 was a good year for both teams - 2011 shouldn't be any different.

And this, purchased by fellow Game Timer I_AM_SPARTACUS at the True Blues store at the game tonight should make everyone else live in fear. Frankly, it's haunting my dreams tonight:

For some reason, it strikes me as looking like one of the lost Staal brothers or something. Nevertheless, bobbleheads scare the bejesus out of me, and this is no exception. The only one that doesn't terrify me is the Thrash bobblehead that I own. He's cool, but that's because he's a giant bird.

Of course, there's always the Chris Pronger bobblehead if The Osh isn't scary enough:

... for the link and the lengthy quote over on their GDT. Also, epic photoshop. Usually I am pretty cool with the Penguins, their fans, Malkin, and even Crosby. 

But for tonight, darn you all. And that's all I'll say about the Thrashers' 6-3 asswhooping. The rest is over at SBNation Atlanta. Four game losing streak by Atlanta. Four game winning streak by St. Louis. Law of Hildy in full effect. Here's hoping that the law is bullshit and both teams win every night that they both play in 2011.

I have long whined and complained that my two teams, the St. Louis Blues and Atlanta Thrashers, are completely incapable of winning hockey games on the same night. Maybe it just seemed an unhappy coincidence, maybe it is just my natural cynical nature. Who knows. But with the Thrashers on this four game sliiiide that started last Tuesday with the Blues winning their head-to-head matchup, I find it more than timing that the Blues are now on a four game winning streak. Both teams sit at 7th in their conferences, and as long as they both make the playoffs I really almost don't care - but I had to take a look at this and see.

Let's look at the nights that the two teams have played on the same night:

1. October 9th: Thrashers lose, 5-2; Blues win, 2-1
2. October 16th: Thrashers win, 4-2; Blues lose, 3-2 (OTL)
3. October 22nd: Thrashers lose, 5-2; Blues win, 4-2
4. October 23rd: Thrashers lose, 4-3 (OTL); Blues win. 1-0
5. October 30th: Blues beat Thrashers, 4-3, in shootout
6. November 4th: Thrashers lose, 3-0; Blues win, 2-0
7. November 6th: Thrashers lose, 5-4 (OTL); Blues win, 2-1
8. November 11th: Thrashers win, 5-1; Blues lose, 3-2 (OTL)
9. November 13th: Thrashers lose, 4-2; Blues lose, 5-3
10. November 17th: Thrashers lose, 2-1; Blues lose, 7-3
11. November 19th: Thrashers win, 5-0; Blues win, 3-2
12. November 24th: Thrashers win, 5-1; Blues win, 2-1
13. November 26th: Thrashers win, 3-0; Blues lose, 2-1
14. November 30th: Thrashers win, 3-2; Blues lose, 7-5
15. December 4th: Thrashers win, 3-1; Blues lose, 2-1 (OTL)
16. December 11th: Thrashers win, 5-4; Blues lose, 2-1 (OTL)
17. December 15th: Thrashers lose, 2-1 (OTL); Blues lose, 5-2
18. December 16th: Thrashers lose, 3-2 (OTL); Blues win, 6-4
19. December 18th: Thrashers win, 7-1; Blues lose, 4-1
20. December 19th: Thrashers win, 6-3; Blues lose, 3-1
21. December 21st: Blues beat Thrashers, 4-2
22. December 23rd: Thrashers lose, 4-1; Blues win, 4-3
23. December 26th: Thrashers lose, 3-2 (OTL); Blues win, 2-0
24. December 28th: Thrashers lose, 6-3; Blues win, 3-1

So, as you can see, out of the 24 times the two teams play on the same night, only five times did they both either win or lose on the same night. The other 17 times (not counting the times that they played each other), one or the other won.

For those of you playfully accusing me of being favoritist towards St. Louis, during games played on the same night that follow the Law of Hildy, Atlanta is 8-5-4. The Blues are 8-5-4. And the teams have a record when not playing each other of 10-7-5 for ATL and 10-8-4, so the Thrashers wind up with one more point. Obviously, the Blues lead total with a 12-8-4 to a 10-8-6 record to the Thrashers, but both seem pretty evenly paired up when they play on the same night.

Which, of course, means that I'm neither too happy or too upset on any given night when both of my teams are playing. Wooo, here's to hockey and the Law of Hildy - keeping up the trend of "meh" through 2011!