Thursday Caps Clips: Sen't Home Happy

I hate that prick, but at least he did say that he doesn’t see Ovi as that kind of [dirty] player. Though obviously his opinion differs with the a large cross-section of our northern neighbors.

One wonders what color is the sky in Mike Green’s world.

I get the ode to 69 Boyz, but “break the pickle”?

I went bonkers, too. I think the fact that he had come so close but not scored yet, that made me so loud.

In the end, that top line was playing well all night. Im surprised they didnt get more goals.

Gads… we have to be careful. We had a reference to “Chicago” in the recap comments, and now this from “Oklahoma”… folks will think this is a Broadway Show Tunes blog….

Odd that a “second” line of Brouwer/Johansson/Halpern should all get fewer than 15 minutes of ice time, while the “third” line of Chimera/Laich/Ward should average 17 minutes per player. A lot of that is Brooks Laich’s special teams minutes (and he played a whopping 5:04 in PK time; only Alzner played more), but it still seems odd.

As it’s an optional, just wait until tomorrow night.

The goalie usually goes back in due to the face-off being at center ice combined with the fact that there isn’t much time left.

OTF with Duff and Weekes showed video, showed interviews with Anderson, Neil, and McLean. Showed nothing from the Caps’ side and presumed guilt. There was not question of whether it was part of Ovi’s natural stride.

The Canadian media went just a little bit er, nuts about this incident. Blame it on a slow hockey night.

Somewhat related, I thought Neil’s quotes on the incident were surprisingly non-inflammatory and appropriate.

Hey, no agenda here…

nope…none at all

I don’t think there’s any doubt that the NHL in general is by, for and of the Canadian good old boy network, and that network generally values Canadian players and products of the Canadian junior system more highly than players who don’t fit that mold.

The TSN studios are a more rarefied version of the above.

Not surprised a bit that they jumped immediately to “How long is the suspension going to be.”

Should’ve been a penalty on Ovi in-game, but not something the League needs to look at further, IMO (though it’d be nice if they apologized to Neil for tagging him with the unsportsmanlike).

I find it amazing that a ref could call a dive when he likely didn’t see what precipitated it. Clearly all he saw was Neil on the ice. Guy should get the benefit of the doubt in that case. Why would he flop on the ice behind the play when he can assume the ref isn’t looking? Thats a risky move on his part.

I agree. I originally came down on the unintentional contact side, but the OTF angle makes it look like it was deliberate. Not sure how hard he got him, though, and he definitely seems to get it in the midsection rather than the giblets.

A little stickwork behind the play is worthy of a minor if they catch it. Can’t see Shanny getting involved. I have been completely wrong on predictions like this before, though.

I do think Neil totally oversold it and deserved his embellishment minor.

I look at it like the play in the pre-season where Semin may or may not have been hit in the head. It was a play that shouldn’t happen, the CHI player attempted to do something illegal, but Semin’s blatant flop made it impossible to see how much contact there was and (IMO) made the league just ignore it. We didn’t even hear about a call. AO maybe gets a call, but this kind of thing happens all the time and it shouldn’t be a suspension.

it’s one of those dirty things experienced players could get away with.

Look at it this way: if neil hadn’t fallen no one would have known ovie did anything, it was such a natural movement.

Also encouraging to me was the fake slapper which drew the dman and goalie down. Tired of seeing guys take 180 degree windups only to have the puck end up hitting the dman’s shin pads. Now, Ovi was embarrasingly open thanks to the Karlsson fly-by (no relation), but it was a nice move that I would like to see others take advantage of. Keep the dman guessing.

I also think Ovi was able to make those strong moves behind the goal due to dmen expecting the move to the middle and cheating a bit that way. Perhaps that will keep them honest so that the move to the middle might work again.

Would that not depend on which groin is hurt? I’m not a skater, but would think that stopping on the good groin wouldn’t necessarily irritate the other — though a stop as hard as the one last night might activate both groins pretty hard.

That was a phenomenal display of skating.

I guess it depends which side the injury is on. He could be nursing a groin, but it would only take away the hard stops on one side, I would think.

It’s been far too long since we’ve seen Ovie make a sharp, crisp pivot like that. Never mind the beauty of a fake and even more beautiful goal that immediately followed.

Welcome back, Ovie.

I’m with you, check that snow shower and you can see how hard he hit the breaks there. Definitely would have been excruciating pain on a pulled groin.

Clearly, he juiced before last nights game.

Or maybe he had a testosterone patch on his scrotum, and he knew that Chris Neil had the same. . . so his “spear” was just an attempt to dislodge Chris Neil’s testosterone patch from his scrotum?

As a fellow Schultz supporter, you may want to talk to him – seems that he’ll need to do something to endear himself to the new boss.

The Caps have not lost a game all season when I have my awesome Ducks jersey sitting on a coathanger with the rest of my sports equipment. When I moved it to the closet, the Caps began to lose. I moved it back after remembering they hadn’t lost with it out.

if it means getting the old Ovi back then I’m all in. He hasn’t seemed to enjoy himself on the ice very much lately and if this indicates he’s out there having fun that’s a good sign for the Caps.

It’s cute until someone runs him hard because he’s focused on the puck and not where he’s going or whos nearby.

Given that (as I recall) it was an attempted poke check by the D that popped the puck into the air, I don’t really have a problem with him juggling it a couple times and throwing it around the D. If he’d have picked it up himself while crossing the blue line just for shits and giggles, then we could have this debate (though I’m still not sure I’d end up against it). All in all, not that huge a deal in my eyes.

He's just trying to be more Crosby-like like Milbury wants.

Put me in the camp of unnecessary showmanship. When you’re putting up 100 points a year, I can let it slide. 60 point pace? Time to cool it.

Pointless elaboration. Get the puck on the ice and settle it down. Easier to maintain possession with a good pass.

Crap like that gives statistical analysis a bad name.

No love for Nick? Sell. And sell. Who is this guy?

Sell.

You know the list is suspect when MA Bergeron is #11. Wow.

Buy (but not in the good way) and sell.

Well, I suppose “difference maker” can apply both positively and negatively, so I’ll buy on that. But MVP? Ehhhh… I think I gotta give that to Backstrom or Chimmy so far.

I tweeted last night asking for clarification on if I was reading it right and Wideman was 19th most valuable.

So one assist over 26 TOI in a 5-3 win was enough to make Wideman jump up seven spots in the MVP ranking?

The actual content in there isn’t actually bad. I’ve got no idea as to his formula, but what he wrote seems pretty spot-on.

When the Caps were going “well” at the beginning of the season, Wideman was playing very, very well. He’s struggled since. No doubt his “formula” takes this into account.

is that in both sections it completely disregards my Maple Leafs.

Apparently not a member of the Eastern Conference, and no mention of Kessel or Lupul in any MVP discussion. Amazing.

Yup, that’s a trustworthy source for sure.

If anyone is interested, Power Scout Hockey is defending the selection via a Twitter convo with me.

I would have liked him to apologize. I know a lot of you will disagree, but I would have preferred Ovi saying something like “I’m not the type of person who spears someone. I’ve been speared, I get it. If I hit him, and I’m still not sure I did, then I’m sorry, and I hope he’s ok.”

Must be the roid-detox

OK, so what are your expectations over the course of a season, tangible numbers-wise?

Speaking of OV, did Dimagus ever get around to posting the play that broke Karlson’s (sp?) ankles and selling the slapper to Anderson before sniping the net with a wrister?

"Too many mutha uckas … Uckin’ with my shi- … The shi- fight’s gonna get vicious and malicious. Cut the cra- …I need my red delicious!

"

priceless! sig worthy!

BTW, nice subtle move by Wides sneaking down and creating a passive pick and knocking Karlssons stick away from Ovi.

That moment’s hestitation with the faked shot gives Jared Cowan just enough time to completely bail out on the play after he sort of went down to block the shot the didn’t come. But the time Ovechkin let fly, Cowan had glided out of the line of sight.

Mojo or just using a new move. I just hope he keeps it up. How many times have we seen him hold the puck and go behind the net?

You don’t anticipate (or even expect) the slightest bit of regression as he gets older? Wow, go you then. And those expectations aren’t shared by “everyone” here.

Gretzky, the all time leader in goals scored, averaged 47 between the ages of 26 and 30 (inclusive). Gordie Howe (second all time) averaged 35. Brett Hull (third) averaged 59, but he had 86 and 70 goal seasons at the start of that period. Marcel Dionne (fourth) averaged 51 smack dab in the middle of the go-go era.

There is a reason you don’t find players who played the bulk of their prime years past the 1995 lockout on the top of the all-time goals list. It’s a different game. If Ovechkin was to average 40 over his 26-30 years, it would be like averaging 50-plus in the 1980’s. It’s not likely to happen. Schemes are too sophisticated, scouting is too dedicated to finding tendencies, and goaltenders (not to mention their equipment) are better.