Hockey

High On The Hog: Drive For Five

By Jon Fromi 1198 0

The Rockford IceHogs have a chance to run the table on the current home stand Friday night. The Blackhawks AHL affiliate play Manitoba for the first time this season. The piglets have won four straight home games heading into the game with the Moose, most recently a 3-1 win over Toronto Wednesday morning.

Rockford trailed briefly in the second period after Matt Read goal eight seconds in. However, Reese Johnson tied the score 24 seconds later, assisted by Nick Moutrey and MacKenzie Entwistle. Phillipp Kurashev drew cord on the power play at the 8:06 mark for a 2-1 Hogs advantage.

That was all Kevin Lankinen needed, making 19 saves to post the win over the Marlies. Brandon Hagel got an empty-netter in the final minute of action to seal the deal for Rockford, who improved to 6-5 this season. The IceHogs are now in fifth place in the Central Division with a .545 points percentage.

 

Friday vs Manitoba

Manitoba is at the bottom of the division standings heading into Friday’s action. The Moose are led by Griffin Shaw, who has a team-high six goals on the season. Griffin and Jansen Harkins (3 G, 9 A) pace Manitoba with 12 points each.

Former IceHogs defenseman Cameron Schilling (4 G, 3 A) is coming off two strong seasons for the Moose. Sami Niku (3 G, 3 A) is an offensive spark plug from the blueline. In net, expect Rockford to be staring down Mikail Berdin, who has started nine of Manitoba’s eleven games. After a strong rookie year, Berdin (3.62 GAA, .885 save percentage) has struggled out of the gate for the Moose.

 

Sunday at Chicago

Rockford is 3-0 against the Wolves this season. Chicago, who just beat Iowa 3-0 Thursday morning, is in fourth place in the Central Division. Back on Sunday, the Hogs rallied from three goals down to beat the Wolves 7-4 at the BMO Harris Bank Center.

Rookie Lucas Elvenes (5 G, 14 A) has two goals and three helpers against Rockford this season. He is currently tied with Grand Rapids Chris Terry for the AHL scoring lead. Gage Quinney (6 G, 6 A) is also a potent scorer for Chicago. Veterans Tye McGinn (4 G, 5 A) and Curtis McKenzie (3 G, 5 A) are also chipping into the Wolves offensive effort.

Garret Sparks (1.55, .954) shut out the Wild Thursday. The IceHogs lit up Oscar Dansk (4.08, .847) Sunday, including five third-period goals.

 

Roster News

The Blackhawks re-assigned D Dennis Gilbert to Rockford Wednesday. To keep the roster at seven defensemen, the IceHogs sent D Jack Ramsey to the Indy Fuel Thursday.

Rockford is still awaiting the return of captain Kris Versteeg, John Quenneville and Mikael Hakkarainen to the lineup.

 

Random Thoughts

  • Reese Johnson has goals in his last two games. Philip Holm is on a four-game point streak.
  • The offense has picked it up during the win streak. Rockford is now averaging 2.82 goals a game, tied with Manitoba for 21st in the AHL.
  • The IceHogs lead the league in shorthanded goals with three. The power play is still at an anemic 8.8 percent for the season, but Rockford has four goals in their last 20 man advantages.

Follow me @JonFromi for intermission updates on Friday night and thoughts on the IceHogs throughout the season.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hockey

Game #15 – Canucks 2, Hawks 5: I Don’t Know What I Believe

By Adam Hess 1920 0

Box Score

Natural Stat Trick

Just one night after I commiserated with Sam, McClure, and Feather over just wanting to see the Hawks play competitive hockey, they delivered in spades. It wasn’t a straight up dominant performance, but that wasn’t what we were looking for. The Hawks finally looked like a team playing confidently and playing fast, and the end result was an impressive win over a Vancouver team came into this game with the third most points in the West. Let’s do it:

DA BULLETS MY FRENT

– Patrick Kane said this a little tongue-in-cheek in his post-game first star interview, but a huge factor in this game for the Hawks was that they were able to play with a lead. Not having to play catch-up for the first time in a while (yes I know they were leading in Anaheim but even that was different) allowed them to play faster and a bit more loose, and that resulted in better overall hockey. It also helped that they had started edging toward outplaying the Canucks before that first goal, so they could probably smell a little blood in the water.

– Speaking of the first goal, I think Alex DeBrincat is not eligible to be named a saint by the Catholic church (not that he’d want to) because that goal had to be a miracle. I have probably watched it 25 times now and it never looks less impossible. My guy was getting hooked and tripped at the same time, the puck was rolling, and he kinda lost control of it as he started to fall, and yet he still picked his spot top corner and got more velocity on the puck than I could ever muster even if I was roided up and on cocaine. It has to be one of the goals of the year NHL.

– Overall, the 12-17-88 line being together led to big results, and gee if only a very handsome 25-year old hockey writer who lives in central Indiana had suggested that could be possible before the season. Ho hum. Alas, Kane and Dylan Strome provided three points each and Top Cat scored his miracle goal. The possession numbers for them are confusing, though, as Kane and Strome both got domed and finished with ~40% CF and ~10% below team rate while DeBrincat ended up at 55% and 6% above team. But I am not asking too many questions.

– Speaking of guys getting their brain pounded in possession wise, I was kinda blown away to see that Adam Boqvist finished a 35.29 CF%, which was damn near 18% below team. Obviously we do not expect hugely dominant results from him this early in the career, but you’d like to see that number be better. Another perplexing pairing result because he played with Olli Maatta a lot (by observation) and Maatta ended up at 48%. WHAT IS GOING ON?

But I say I was surprised by it, and that’s because I thought he played quite well tonight. I noted it on Twitter, but he had at least 3 incredible poke checks that were expertly timed and completely put the kibosh on Canucks rushes. He also is smart in terms of defensive zone positioning, so the results will come. For now I will take the consistent flashes of those special skills game-in and game-out.

– Big night from Crow, who deserved it. He was great all night, not that it’s any surprise.

– Now, not to ruin the mood here, because they did skull fuck the Canucks in the first period and close them out well, but what does it say about this team that the best game they’ve played in two weeks still saw them get completely owned in the second period, play even hockey in the third, and end the game losing the SOG count 38-37 and the 5v5 CF count 42-40? Like, sure the Canucks are third in the west, but is playing teams even really the best the Hawks are going to be able to do? Is that going to work when they’re not playing with a lead?

– Next up is Pittsburgh on Saturday. Until then.

Baseball

Stop Acquiescing To These Capitalist Pigs

By Sam Fels 3329 0

I’m gonna take a break from the Cubs offseason wishlist to address something I’ve seen far too much of the last week.

Every day I open Twitter or Facebook, which I recognize is the start of the problem right there but it’s pretty much unavoidable given what I do, and I see someone–and frequently people I know personally–say something like, “I’ve come to the conclusion/place/idea that I’m ok with the Cubs trading Kris Bryant if…”

What comes after the “if” doesn’t matter, because absolutely no one should ever be ok with the Cubs trading Kris Bryant. It should be the kind of thing that makes you consider trading in your fandom, although I guess if we’re all still here after the Addison Russell mishegas and Fredo Ricketts’s Trump fundraisers, we’re never going to go away.  Which is exactly why they bought the team and exactly what they’re counting on, so I realize I’m pissing into the wind here. Save your breath.

Still, it’s the kind of thing that should have a fanbase in complete revolt. The fact that you have basically been conditioned to shut up and take it a symptom of what’s wrong with baseball right now, and really the country as a whole (but we’ll leave the latter out of it for this).

Here’s a list of players that would be an acceptable return for Bryant:

Cody Bellinger

Walker Buehler

Mookie Betts

Juan Soto

Christian Yelich (and that’s not a gimme)

Ronald Acuna

Mike Trout

Maybe Alex Bregman

We’ll throw Jacob deGrom on there to be nice. And that’s it. And none of those names are coming back for Bryant.

And yet there’s a growing faction of Cubs fans that are somehow convinced that trading Bryant is some version of four-dimensional chess that only Theo can see but they don’t want to admit they can’t see it because that would just mean they’re merely a peon. It’s not. It’s not even close. The idea of trading Bryant is merely an acceptance that the uber-wealthy Ricketts family don’t want to pay a player what he’s earned in two years’ time.

This isn’t about some “schism” between Bryant or Scott Boras and the Cubs. There’s no such thing. Pay him the most money, and he’ll be a Cub for life. This isn’t hard, and yet everyone wants to code this into some sort of larger puzzle. Again, it’s simple greed. The Ricketts want to keep more and more of your money and they certainly don’t want to have to give it to “labor.” They’re the stars after all, not Bryant and Rizzo and Baez. After all, they’re the only owners to bring a World Series to the Northside. And don’t you forget it.

The idea of some “grand plan” or “advanced thinking” is merely what they use to poison your water. If they can convince you that moving Bryant is actually the “smart” thing to do, because they’ll never be able to afford everyone, then you might not notice what an utter travesty this would be. This isn’t the NHL or the NFL where there’s a hard cap and you do get punished for producing a bevy of good players. You can pay whatever you want.

And if you somehow believe that the luxury tax would cost the Cubs or the Red Sox or Yankees or Dodgers living in the black, and you’d have to be the most gullible doofus on the planet to believe that or the Ricketts kids would have to be the stupidest people on the planet and the worst business people in history (and they might be!), remember the luxury tax is just another instrument of greed imposed by other owners who simply want money for free. It’s the Bob Nuttings and Derek Jeters and descendants of Bud Selig of the world not wanting to have to put a good product on the field consistently, which they easily could, to turn massive profits. It’s about bleeding their cities and fellow owners dry for money they’ll never have to earn. And yet all the owners go along with it because they’re raking in the cash too, and as long as it’s not going to the players, they’re just fine with that.

There is simply no way the Cubs can trade Kris Bryan and be better next year. And it should be about next year. You already went through the rebuild. And you go through those things to get a player like Kris Bryant, because they come around once a generation. You hoard those prospects in trades and spins at the international pool and make all those draft picks in the hopes you find a Kris Bryant. You don’t find one and then just decide to cash in and find another one. That’s not how this works.

The idea that the Cubs have to look forward to the future in any way is wool being pulled over your eyes to justify the Ricketts not having to spend to keep this team together. I’m sure if you got Theo in a private conversation at a bar and pumped him full of two or three beers he’d tell you he’d hand Bryant $37M a year tomorrow and wouldn’t look back. He’s not being allowed to. Because the Ricketts, one of the more born on third broods in the world, think they know better because they’re in the Lucky Sperm Club. Or they just want to keep more money for themselves.

They’re obviously not alone. The Red Sox, a team that has had their own channel for a long time now and one of the biggest brands in North American sports and the most expensive ticket in baseball, don’t want to pay Mookie Betts what he’s earned even more than Bryant. It’s not because they can’t, they’ve just decided they don’t want to., And they’ll tell you whenever they hire their new GM that he’ll lead the way in modern baseball thinking and trading Betts will be a part of that. That a team can run more efficiently than just ponying up $30M or more to players, who again, have more than earned it. They’ll tell you they need to get under the luxury tax threshold. They won’t tell you why, and no one will ask. Because the Red Sox and every team like them would absolutely turn a profit with a $300M payroll. They just don’t want to.

(I should admit that if the Red Sox payroll trimming allows the transfer budget for Liverpool to sign Kylian Mbappe next summer, then I’m all for it).

The Cubs are built to win now, and easily could win again in 2020 with as simple as one or two moves. And that’s with Kris Bryant, who is comfortably a top five player in baseball. If you somehow believe he’s perma-crocked at age 27, then again I can’t help you. Maybe hiring a new medical team that doesn’t send him out there every day with a knee that sounds like a Crunch bar would be a start to making all the non-believers see again.

As baseball is intertwined with America, this is just another symptom of the sickness. A group of barely qualified, probably barely literate rich kids tell you they can run a business more “efficiently,” which only means they can do it more cheaply and skimp on the actual workforce. That’s all trading Kris Bryant would be. And I don’t give a flying fuck what prospects he could bring back. We did that in 2011 and 2012 and 2013. That was then. I don’t care about 2022 or 2023 or 2024. The Cubs are here and now and anything they tell you about restocking the system or looking toward the future is utter horseshit. It’s a smokescreen. It’s meant to blind you to what’s really going on, which is unadulterated greed.

Imagine the Cubs trading Ryne Sandberg in 1986. If you’ve been around here a while, remember when the Hawks struggled in 2012 and some floated the idea of trading Patrick Kane for Ryan Goddamn Miller? Remember how we laughed everyone out of existence on that one? Two Cups, one Conn Smythe (undeserved, but still), one Hart Trophy later and looks even dumber now, doesn’t it (if we ignore all the off-ice being a monster stuff for a second)?

Trading Bryant would be no less galactically stupid or destructive.

Don’t fall for it. Don’t talk yourself into it. Don’t convince yourself you can see the logic. None of it is there. They’re only pretending it’s there so you won’t see what’s actually there. Don’t let them think you’re that stupid. That’s what they’re literally banking on.

Baseball

Burden In My Hand – White Sox Offseason Wish List: Nick Castellanos

By Wes French 1685 0

Right field has been a black hole of SUCK on the Southside going on, oh, a decade? Magglio Ordonez and Jermaine Dye are the last great players to man the position for the White Sox, and the ineptitude of management to fill the O-E-O/WS MVP sized hole is a bit jarring. Yes, dead last in the entire MLB in 2019 in OPS jarring. The likes of Carlos Quentin, Avi Garcia, and Adam Eaton were passable if unspectacular in stints over the years, but the Sox have also trotted out the likes of Jason Coats, Willy Garcia, Andruw Jones (the ol’ KW past his prime special!), Brent Lillibridge, Rymer Liriano, Alex Rios, Moises Sierra, Michael Taylor, Blake Tekotte, Trayce Thompson and Dayan Viciedo since Dye hung em up in 2009. Folks,,,,, that’s not great!

John Jay was brought in as part of the “recruitment” of Manny Machado last offseason and thought to be the everyday right fielder, but injury kept him out a majority of the year. The cast of characters used to fill in were all way, way under-qualified for every day MLB duty – Ryan Cordell, Charlie Tilson and Daniel Palka all saw far more at bats than any competent team would dare give them and they responded with that league worst performance at the position at the dish. The defense was also meh at best, but with a suspect free agent class the Sox don’t really have the current lineup to hide a defensive wizard they get no offensive production from (otherwise they’d just stick Robert in RF and let Adam Engel patrol CF, but alas).

So who out there is available, plays RF (even barely), can get on base, park a few baseballs into the Rate bullpens and would actually be willing to take Rick Hahn’s checks? Dear reader, you already know him, or got a small taste of him after last year’s deadline.

Nicholas Castellanos, come one down!

Why Him? Castellanos can hit a bit, as the Sox know all too well from being the victim of his bat for almost six years as he came along in Detroit. His 2019 is a little misleading as his high average (.321) helped him to 16 homers and 36 RBI in just 51 games after a trade to the Cubs. That comes out to a scorching 154 wRC+. Prior to the trade, though, he carried just 11 homers and 37 RBI on a .273/.328/.462 line for a wRC+ of 105 in 100 games.

This does help to give him two straight years over 121 wRC+ and that makes him exponentially better than any Sox RF in 2019. He’s also gone .337 and .354 the last two seasons in OBP while averaging 25 homers and 81 XBH, and if he can continue that trend the White Sox probably wouldn’t care if he just hung out in the Goose Island section or had a beer with the #108 guys every half inning.

He’s also only 28, making him pretty young to be a free agent. He won’t come with a QO compensation penalty. Since JD Martinez isn’t available, Castellanos also represents a chance to sign an impact bat this offseason, deal with the defense for a year or two, and plan to use him at DH/LF with Eloy down the road and develop or sign your next RF later. Maybe that plan sees them sign Edwin Encarnacion on a Nelson Cruz-like one year pact (OR SIGN GRANDAL ALREADY LIKE AJ SAID) and just like that you’ve got some instant impact offensive upgrades to a team that sorely needs it.

One other plus – signing him would mean he can’t kill the Sox anymore (or maybe he’d find fun ways to ruin them from within…). This is some recency bias, but since 2018 Castellanos carries 7 HR/22 RBI/.413 OBP/1.065 OPS(!) in 28 games against the Sox, good for a wRC+ of about 185, or otherworldly. Small sample size and all that, but fuckin’ a does he MURDER White Sox pitching of late.

Why Not Him? Oh, that “defense”. Castellanos debuted as a third baseman and Detroit was all too generous to let him try and be that for four seasons while they lost a million games. He made the move to right field in 2018 and is the worst defensive RF in that time, posting -28 DRS (defensive runs saved) and a -17.6 UZR. I don’t know if that all actually makes him the worst RF since 2018, but being responsible for 28 runs scored against seems really bad.

If you want some kind of silver lining, Castellanos did actually improve by 10 full runs in DRS over 2018, and by 8+ points on his UZR, giving him a more palatable -9 DRS/-4.4 UZR in 2019. Still not good by any metric, but not comically bad. He might even be improving, and maybe he gets to a point where he’s league average and look at that I just talked us into Nick Castellanos, league average RF for the Chicago White Sox by 2021.

Honestly, if you sign Castellanos and you already have Eloy Jimenez being the ungraceful elk that he is in LF, you probably need to be ready to take him out of the field within a year or two. So the knock is, will he hit well enough to cover occasionally killing you in the field. And if you’re already looking at re-signing Jose Abreu and you’ve got Gavin Sheets and Andrew Vaughn on deck…is this really the best way to allocate funds/roster space?

How Much Is This Free Resort Weekend? MLBTR comes in with an estimate of 4/$58M and Fangraphs is in agreement with a 4/$56M estimate of their own. Unless some wild market creates itself out of nothing for lil Nicky here I can’t really see him getting more than 4/50, possibly even having to settle for something like 2/25 or 3/35 and a few option years. The bat has enough juice to get him a multi-year pact, sure, but that defense is brutally awful and the game is no longer kind to players of his abilities. Damned kids and their analytics. Without 30+ annual HR potential or a near .400 OBP, there just isn’t any one tool that really carries the weight to justify giving Castellanos that much term, so you’re really banking on his being younger than the rest of the FA OFs and hoping that defense is really improving and the 2018/Cubs version of the bat is the one you’re buying. Whole lotta optimism in there.

The Sox have already been reported to have interest, which probably doesn’t need to be read much into as they should have interest in any OF available via trade or free agency this winter. They’d probably be wise to explore other options and make Castellanos a plan B, waiting out the diminishing market for his type of player to mitigate the commitment for such a walking red flag.

Now that I’ve thoroughly fleshed out that I’m not really on board with a run at him, I have to admit that if the Sox do end up with Castellanos it will be a massive upgrade over the trash heap of career minor leaguers and Machado friends and family that Hahn tried to float by the masses last year. It could absolutely be worse, but I’d hope they explore a few more avenues or wait to see how many other teams are really falling over each other to add what might just be a slightly over league average DH to play everyday RF.

Hockey

Game #15 – Canucks vs. Hawks Preview: It’s Only Nostalgia Week For Us

By Sam Fels 1517 0

vs.

RECORDS: Canucks 9-3-3   Hawks 4-7-3

PUCK DROP: 7:30

TV: NBCSN Chicago

THEY FILMED DEADPOOL THERE: Canucks Army

We’ve had to do this the past couple years now. Whenever the Hawks meet up with the Kings or Canucks, we have to do something of a “Remember when these mattered?” comment. This used to be the the fiercest rivalry in the league. That stopped some seven years ago. With the Kings and Hawks, there just isn’t much more to discuss because both teams are lying face down in the muck. Sadly, that might not be the case for the Canucks anymore.

The Canucks find themselves one point out of the lead for the Pacific Division, behind the Oilers and one ahead of the Coyotes, just to let you know how backwards everything is and how many different teams seem to have better ideas than the Hawks right now.

Is it real? The numbers suggest it might be. The schedule does not. The Canucks have seven regulation wins, and they’re over the Sharks at home (some teams can do that, in fact a lot of them have), the Kings twice (some teams do that), the Red Wings twice, the Rangers, and over the Panthers at home. Only the last one is a team that’s probably good and playing well at the moment. But hey, you can only play whom the schedule says you do, and the Canucks have made hay against that.

And they haven’t just squeaked by, as their metrics are pretty glowing. They’re one of the best teams in the league in terms of Corsi and expected-goals, and they’re doing some explosive work in the offensive end. Most of that comes from the top line of WHO WANTS TO WALK WITH ELIAS?-JT Miller-Brock Boeser. They’ve combined for 52 points in 15 games, with Elias Pettersson on track for a 109-point season. That’ll play.

Coach Travis Green has taken the training wheels off this line, starting them in any zone against any opponent, and pretty much doing the same with his second line centered by Bo Horvat. This has freed him up to put his plugs in more advantageous spots, which is maybe why you’ve seen scoring spikes from the likes of Brandon Sutter and Tim Schaller. What a time to be alive…to cut yourself.

That doesn’t mean Lady Luck isn’t waving her ass a bit at the Canucks, too. Again, the soft schedule helps, and they’ve ground up the chuck they’ve been served (is that how that works? Let’s just go with it). But this is a team with a 102 PDO that’s getting a .918 from Jacob Markstrom and a .938 from Thatcher Demko. The latter has been the hope for the future for what feels like 17 years now, but he’s not a .938 goalie. The Nucks are also shooting at a team-rate of 9.4% at evens, and while Pettersson and Boeser are most certainly top-level scorers, the rest of this outfit most certainly is not.

That said, they’re a top-10 specials teams outfit on both sides, with an excellent penalty kill, and with the possession they’ve gotten at evens and what they’ve done with it, you can’t really ask for any more.

And they have hope on the blue line. Somehow, and this for sure won’t last, Tyler Myers has been a possession-driving monster, with a Corsi of 56.5% while just shading most of his zone starts in the defensive zone. Should you expect that to continue? Cue Russell Westbrook:

Still, nice to have for now. That has freed up Quinn Hughes, who is going to be a thing, to take easier assignments, and he’s dinging opponents upside the head to the tune of a 57 xG% while getting third-pairing minutes and 67% of his shifts in the offensive zone. Must be nice to be able to bed in a young, dynamic d-man like that so easily. We’re looking longingly at Vancouver, folks. Eat Arby’s, puke it up, and then eat that.

Right, the to Hawks. Corey Crawford will rotate back in to the starter’s net after Lehner once again did enough to keep the Hawks from getting utterly embarrassed. This is starting to be like the end of “Little Miss Sunshine,” where Paul Dano is trying to convince Toni Collette that she has to keep Abigail Breslin from getting embarrassed by the actual pageant girls. I think Lehner is Collette in this metaphor, but I’m not entirely sure as the Hawks have basically broken my brain.

Coach Kelvin Gemstone, in his infinite wisdom, has decided to scratch one of the Hawks’ best two-way and fastest forwards tonight in Dominik Kubalik to give us more Zack Smith. Because all the kids out here with their skateboards and backwards hats have been demanding more Zack Smith. The world needs more Zack Smith. Zack Smith is the key to salvation…

…

…

…I’ve just had a brain bubble.

Everything is fucked.

Anyway, the Canucks can do pretty much whatever they want here. They can try and out-skate the Hawks, which they can. They probably have the defensive structure to use the “advanced trap,” that the Sharks used to strangle the Hawks into paste, which is just a trap but ahead of the red line. Or anything in between. And the Hawks will probably still try and dump the puck in and get it back with their not-fast-enough and not-strong-enough forwards.

I’m going to go look for a strong tree branch. You folks enjoy the game.

 

 

Hockey

Game #15 – Canucks vs. Hawks Spotlight: Come On Without…Come On Within…

By Sam Fels 1410 0

Imagine a world where a team could bring up a very promising rookie, one that was worth a top-ten pick, and play him on the third pairing, shelter him as far as zone-starts and the competition he sees, and let him hang loose on the power play where his generational skill can really shine. Imagine getting 11 points out of him in his first fourteen games, as his mistakes don’t kill you because they come against third and fourth lines.

That world exists, people. It’s just in Vancouver and not in Chicago.

Whereas Adam Boqvist essentially was tossed into the deep end full of ornery badgers (and they tend to get that way when you toss them into a pool where they don’t belong) due to his organization’s incompetence, the Canucks have allowed Quinn Hughes to land softly in the NHL and already showcase what the Canucks think will be a franchise-turning skill-set on the blue line. Oh for a different way.

Hughes has started his NHL career skating with steady-as-a-rock vet Chris Tanev in a third-pairing role. Tanev is still capable of much more, but is also the perfect centerfielder for the freelancing Hughes. As the Canucks didn’t have too many aspirations when the season started (that could be changing), they can keep Tanev in a more reserved role to develop a future star. It also helps having Edler, Myers, Benn, and Stetcher who are, at worst, representative NHL d-men. Tanev and Hughes have started 63% of their shifts in the offensive zone, keeping Hughes where he is best and letting him learn the defensive side of the game at a slower pace.

And it’s actually Tanev who has been lost without Hughes, as he has sported a sub-40% Corsi in the 40 or so minutes on the season he’s played with someone else. So clearly, Hughes is special.

And he’s shown that on the power play, where he already has eight points and one of his two goals. The top unit is being QB’d by Hughes with Pettersson, Boeser, Miller, and Horvat as the four forwards, which can be a scary one for a long time. You can see where this thing would become self-aware like the Sharks one did a couple years ago, with talented players playing together on it for season upon season until they just knew where each other was.

If you want hope for Boqvist through Hughes, keep in mind they’re just about the same size. Hughes is listed at 5-10 and 170, which is generous to the hilt. And as the years roll on, the Canucks will expect him to displace Alex Edler on the top pairing. But they don’t need him to now, as things are going well and expectations within the organization–except for ownership which is kind of a problem–are tempered.

The future looks bright in Vancouver, if they can keep owner Aquilini out of hockey side of the business too much. Something they’ve failed to do for a while now. Acquilini has never given in on doing a full rebuild, trying to do half of one while also trying to compete for playoff spots, which has handcuffed the Canucks for half a decade now. It’s why they have some unconscionable contracts on their books to the likes of Eriksson, Sutter, Roussel, and now Myers while actually producing a promising young core of Pettersson, Boeser, and Hughes. It feels like it could keep them from going in any direction.

Still, within the next two seasons they could probably free themselves up from Tanev, Edler, Eriksson, Pearson, and Sutter’s revival might make him marketable as well. Then the Canucks would really have room to boost their future. A future in which Hughes looks like he’ll be driving.

Hockey

Game #15 – Canucks vs. Hawks: Hedley Lamarr’s Muggers, Buggerers, Bushwhackers

By Sam Fels 1301 0

Alex Edler – We’re really stretching here (not Troy Stetcher-ing…we’ll show ourselves out), but the Canucks just aren’t the grouping of fuckwits you used to know and…well, know. So we’ll go with Captain Elbows here, who never met a hit he couldn’t leap into like Quinn the Eskimo just got here. Edler has been getting away with this crap for years, and perhaps one day he’ll miss and turn into shards on the boards and we’ll finally be vindicated. Probably not, though.

Tyler Myers – At least the Canucks have kept up tradition in having a big, doofus defenseman on their roster whom they will massively overpay for years. Sure, Myers is playing well now. It started well in Buffalo and Winnipeg, too. Then he gets bored with his defensive responsibilities, convinces himself he’s the big blond dork version of Paul Coffey and goes cowboy-ing his way all over the ice while the opponents gleefully and perhaps disbelievingly gallop into the spaces he’s supposed to be in but is ignoring. You’ll see, garbage-throwers and shit-ass rioters. You’ll see.

Jordie Benn – If he ever shaves, he’ll be out of the league within seven minutes.

Hockey

Game #15 – Canucks vs. Hawks: Lineups & How They Were Built

By Sam Fels 1212 0

Canucks

Notes: Pettersson started nearly 70% of his shifts in the o-zone last year but that has dipped of late, despite what that number says. Still, they’ve been one of the most dominant lines in hockey…Horvat’s production has mostly been on the power play but expect him to do damage at evens before too long…Adam Gaudette is good enough for their second line but his main running buddy in college isn’t good enough to beat out Zack Smith or Andrew Shaw right now and is in Rockford. Life is grand…Sutter is having a revival season now that they’re no longer using him as some kind of Jordan Staal/checking type and just support scoring…

Notes: Yep, Kubalik is scratched for Zack Smith. Just let that marinate…we’ve got nothing else to say….