The Bruins are officially loading up for their Cup run.

They added Chris Kelly from Ottawa for a second round pick in this year’s draft. A great trade for the Bruins as they add a great checking line player who has some offensive upside. In other news, it seems rather imminent that Tomas Kaberle will be shipping up to Boston (:P) before February 28.

Once again, a player who would have positively impacted the Sabres has gone to a rival. Now, I don’t think the Sabres need to trade their entire team away, or grab every guy who becomes available. Most of the time there is simply too steep of a price to pay for a player – Kris Versteeg going for a first and third-round picks and Colby Armstrong signing for over $3M are good examples.

However, for a team with pretty good depth in the prospect cupboard, the Sabres continue to guard their draft picks like gold. Now, when Darcy Regier steps to the podium to say the Sabres used a second or third round pick to acquire a great player, I will eat crow. For now, I will lament that Buffalo couldn’t find the right package to land Kelly, Mike Fisher or Joffery Lupul.

Keep your eyes peeled for who I could see as potential trade targets for the Sabres in the coming days.

Alex Auld finally figured it out. After a few too many years of wearing terribly ugly masks, he had Dave Gunnarsson make a Montreal tribute mask featuring the three greatest goalies in Canadiens history. Take a look:

So sick. The coolest part is the Dryden tribute on the left side while Patty Roy and Jacques Plante adorn the right. A++ in my book on all counts.

The Montreal – Boston game turned into an absolute Gonger tonight. The final was 8-5, in favor of the B’s, and there were three line brawls, a goalie “fight” for a grand total of 182 PIMs.

The goalies did nothing more than grab each others jerseys and spin around. But enjoy watching Benoit Pouliot land a bomb on David Krecji (video 2) and watch Gregory Campbell and Johnny Boychuk beat on Tommy Pyatt and Jaro Spacek, respectively.

It is now officially trade season in the NHL. Forget the 20 trades that happened prior to February, or the fact that ten of those trades involved players that were immediately inserted into their new team’s lineup. We are 18 days from the deadline and the fire sales can now officially begin.

As I mentioned there have been ten trades that involved players going to a new team and immediately being inserted into the lineup. What I mean is that there were ten meaningful trades before tonight. Dwayne Roloson to the Lightning for Ty Wishart crops up right away as does Jamie Langenbrunner’s move back to Dallas or the Avs, Caps and Habs all adding needed talent to their blue line.

I am making this point to show that trades don’t need to happen at the last moment, or two weeks before the last moment. Brian Burke said he likes to get out in front of the deadline, he did today (sorta). I just wonder if GM’s will wise up and start dealing in January in the future. Continue reading →

Apparently Rick DiPietro’s chin is just as durable as the rest of his body.

What DiPietro was thinking on that one is beyond me, he is giving up four inches on Johnson. Although, it is good to see two American boys going at it. Ask yourself this; who doesn’t love a goalie fight?

In other NHL news:

– Johan Franzen just about went Sittler on the Senators tonight. He lit up the Sens for five goals as the Red Wings won a barn burner, 7-5. The Wings also benefited from a reaaaaallllllly bad call. C’mon War Room, you can’t say the puck was under the goalie when it is obviously in the net. Add to that, the “intent to blow the whistle” ruling is totally bogus and shouldn’t even exist.

– Also the Sabres got some help from the Habs as they managed to beat the Panthers in regulation. Keep the hope tank filled boys and girls.

Tampa Bay unveiled a new set of unis, today, that dropped the iconic sliver and black that had graced their threads since their inception. Beginning next year, they will be taking the ice in these unis:

Not a bad set right? I am on board with the changes, even if the logo looks a wee bit like the Incredibles/The Flash. The uniforms have a distinct Red Wings feel to them with the basic stripe pattern. However, the change is good and I like the baseball feel to the road unis by including Tampa Bay above the bolt. They also have an awesome shoulder patch for these bad boys. For more pictures and info check out Icethetics.

I give a thumbs up to the Lightning for a job well done on the redesign. I understand that the new ownership group wanted to put their own stamp on the franchise. Lightning fans should be glad they didn’t take this route.

I will yearn for them to put the bolt back on the pants as they have had for years, just as I hope the Rangers bring back the Lady Liberty third jerseys.

The NHL All Star weekend concluded with a fairly-ish entertaining game that saw Team Lidstrom spoil all of the racing hockey fan’s weekend in Raleigh.

Prior to that however, were some creative and relatively successful changes that Brendan Shanahan is either completely or partially responsible for.

Continue reading →

The NHL All-Star fantasy draft kicks off at 7:30 tonight. Kudos to the NHL for thinking of something to make the ASG semi-relevant. Sunday’s game will still be brutally boring.

Eric Staal and Nick Lidstrom will each choose a team of players (with the help of a few assistant captains) from a pool created by the NHL.Goalies must be chosen by round 10 and defensemen by the 16th round.

Six players were voted in by the fans which usually means they aren’t worthy of playing in the game but their fans cared enough to vote. The case this year is a bit more forgiving with Sidney Crosby and Carey Price among those six. But Evgeni Malkin is not having an All Star year and Kris Letang is simply not worthy of such an event. Sorry Pens fans. Continue reading →

Happy birthday to the Great One. Wayne Gretzky turns 50 today.

I understand that nobody goes to Islanders games. I get that. I think it is also safe to assume that not too many people watch the games either. But still, YouTube is a very real tool and James Wisniewksi just found out how useful it is.

Here is some visual evidence of James likely talking to Sean Avery about something very civilized.

Continue reading →