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Game #37 – Hawks vs. Stars Douchebag Du Jour: Jamie Goes South

By Sam Fels December 20, 2018 1605 0

We ran this last year, but it’s one of our faves. So as a Christmas present, we give it to you again, just like Jamie wouldn’t.

Last time these two met, we went down on what makes Jamie Benn so angry. We got to the bottom of what might be irking him, to see if we could lap up what make Benn tick. Maybe, if we played our cards right–took it down, if you will–we could bring his problems to their knees. Sometimes, you just have to put your face in there, y’know? You can’t just expect things to come to you. Put your love out there, and you’ll get it back. Give if you want to receive, as it were.

But we couldn’t quite bring it through. Benn is leading the Stars in penalty minutes, speaking to his inner frustration, which he just can’t seem to open up. The bile is rising, but he can’t taste it. If Benn could just sink down into it, and see what he can’t get to. Maybe if he just took a look, and tried to solve his problems, things would just open up for him. And then he could be a player no one ever dreamed of.

That’s the thing with sports, in order to achieve all you can you have to realize there are things under the surface that you have to face. That you have to conquer. You have to do things that at first seem distasteful, maybe even gross. You have to push yourself through, no matter what might get stuck in your teeth. Maybe you’ll feel surrounded, maybe it’ll be dark and hot and you won’t know exactly what you’re doing. But then you just close your eyes and guess, and sometimes it works. Maybe this is why Jamie Benn has never seen a conference Final. He’s never gotten “halfway,” if you will.

But until Benn is willing to go where he hasn’t before, he’s never going to taste victory.

Game #37 Preview Suite

Everything Else

Game #37 – Hawks vs. Stars: I Make A Lot Of Graphs

By Sam Fels December 20, 2018 1329 0

Game #37 Preview Suite

Everything Else

Game #37 – Hawks vs. Stars: Lineups & How Teams Were Built

By Sam Fels December 20, 2018 1337 0

Game #37 Preview Suite

Everything Else

Unity

By Sam Fels December 19, 2018 2372 0

You may be wondering what would be the point of watching the Hawks the rest of the season. We go through that as well. So it’s probably part of our job to point out stuff for you. It should be things that portend to a brighter future, no matter how incremental. So here’s one: since returning from injury, Connor Murphy has been the Hawks best d-man, and it’s not even particularly close. Yes, that’s not much of a claim given the state of the crew, but you asked for anything.

What’s been startling about Murphy in just six games is that he’s immediately been tossed into the dungeon as far as zone starts and competition. Overall, Murphy has started just 40% of his shifts in the offensive zone, and over the past four games that’s just 29.5%. For references sake, the lowest Off. Zone start % in the league among d-men is around 33%, so if Murphy keeps this up he’ll lead the league in it by some distance.

And that hasn’t really meant Murphy is getting his head kicked in. There was the ugly game on Sunday against the Sharks, but the Sharks will do that, especially when the Hawks pretty much were in mourning over Crawford and Cam Ward didn’t know how his legs worked. Murphy was equally buried against the Jets the game before, starting just 20% of his shifts in the o-zone and over half in the defensive zone. He and Dahlstrom were faced with Scheifele and Blake Wheeler all night and still managed a 45% Corsi, which considering the circumstances isn’t ridiculous. Last night saw him pitted against Johansen and Fiala, which isn’t a full-strength top line for Nashville to be fair, and though they did get the Preds’ one goal the Hawks ran over that line most of the night to the tune of a 55% share and 64% scoring-chance share.

It is just six games, so he’ll have to keep it up, but Murphy’s relative scoring-chance percentage, high-danger scoring chance percentage, and expected-goals percentage are all top-1o in the league at the moment. He’ll probably be hard-pressed to keep these going if he’s getting just 25% of his shifts in the offensive zone and starting so much in the defensive zone, as well as facing the hardest competition in the league in terms of Corsi % as he is now. But it is highly encouraging. Especially as we thought he wouldn’t be able to bend over after back surgery.

Funny enough, another d-man with some truly torturous zone-starts is one Niklas Hjalmarsson. And all of Murphy’s numbers are the same or better than Hammer’s, so if everyone could shut up about this trade for like five minutes that would be truly helpful to everyone else involved.

The reason is clear. While Jeremy Colliton may be getting a ton of things wrong (though the past few games have been better), him simply not being Joel Quenneville is doing wonders for Murphy. Last year, Murphy knew that any hint of a mistake would see him tumble down the lineup, benched, or scratched before Q retreated to his office to apologize to the alter of Hjalmarsson for failing him, followed by Q would covering himself in ox blood. Now Murphy knows he has a prominent spot and he’s not going to lose it at a whim.

The knock before on Murphy was that he couldn’t take on the top lines and competition, and only four games of doing so is not proof that he can, of course. And even if Murphy were to end up being a high-end second-pairing guy, that’s a nice piece to have around and really the absolute maximum Hammer could have offered you going forward, and for not as long.

Because while the Hawks have a logjam now on the blue line, mostly of crap, it gets worse next year. We know that Keith, Seabrook, Murphy, Jokiharju are locks to be here, for varying reasons. If I were to guess, two of Boqvist, Beaudin, and Mitchell will be as well. That’s six, and none of them have yet proven to be top-pairing players, or have proven they are very much not. Which means if the Hawks plan to turn it around quickly, and they probably need to, they’re going to have to also find a way to bring in a genuine, top-pairing player, If Carl Dahlstrom continues his superb play, he’s also in the discussion.

The Hawks could alleviate some of it by playing seven d-men a night, which more teams should do anyway. But that won’t solve it all. If Murphy can continue to play well with the toughest assignments, it makes the picture next year at least not as daunting.

Everything Else

Game #36 – Predators 1, Hawks 2 – I Will Walk Before They Make Me Run

By Rose Rankin December 18, 2018 2062 0

The Hawks played well tonight…I’m struggling to believe I typed those words…they played better than a team that is demonstrably more talented and a legitimate Cup contender or at least conference finalist…and so I will try to make sense of this. To the bullets:

Box Score

Corsica

Natural Stat Trick

– Right out of the gate, the Hawks had a step on the Predators. Maybe this is a consequence of the Preds being on the second night of a back-to-back. You wouldn’t think that would necessarily be the case, given that Nashville is just plain better but whatever. I don’t know and I don’t care. In particular the top line had a number of quality chances and good puck movement early on, and the second line was right there with them. By the end of the second period the Hawks led in shots 28-18, and they had a 57 and 58 CF% respectively in the first two periods. They were faster to the puck, defensively competent, and they even scored a power play goal. A power play goal, guys! I don’t even know what to say!

– Related to the whole top-line-playing-well-thing is Brandon Saad, who once again had an excellent night. He ended the night with 4 shots and 56.7 CF%. In fact he had three shots on goal barely more than 5 minutes into the game. No, he didn’t score so there was a lack of finish, let’s just get that out of the way, but he played an effective two-way game all night. He was robbed via a desperation play on a short-handed breakaway that happened because he just wanted the puck more, Rinne made an outstanding save on his point-blank chance mid-way through the third, and defensively he was spot on. Saad may not have scored but his play directly impacted the Hawks’ possession and chances. If he can keep this up I won’t even bitch about him not scoring.

– Speaking of defense, that which usually scorches your face and melts your eyeballs like the opening of the Ark of the Covenant did not do that tonight. Connor Murphy and Carl Dahlstrom are just a random pairing that’s making it work somehow. They had a 57 CF% and looked, well, competent, including the final two-minute scrum when Rinne was pulled. I even saw Duncan Keith make a couple good plays to clear the puck out of the zone. Oh, and our defensemen did the scoring. I don’t know if you’ve heard, but there is this thing called the Fels Motherfuck, and it’s real and it’s a force to be reckoned with. Tonight Gustav Forsling was the embodiment, and after sucking out loud he potted one past Rinne who had been unflappable to that point. And then Cowboy Gustafsson had the aforementioned unicorn, a power play goal. Up is down, black is white.

– Cam Ward isn’t better than Pekka Rinne, and that’s evidenced by the shots Rinne stopped tonight, including some excellent chances by Saad in particular but also Kane and a bunch of the other schlubs. Ward also gave up a fairly weak goal in the last minute of the first period after the Hawks had played really well, and I was honestly convinced that would be the end and the Hawks would shit the bed as soon as the second started. But tonight Ward WAS better. He is not objectively a better goalie but at least in this one instance, where it was clear Rinne was going to fuck us over, he was. Of course this means Collin Delia and his superfluous L will not get the chance he deserves (at least not for now), but fuck it, it’s a win.

– The second line of Strome-Anisimov-Kane was not as bad as I expected it to be. Before I go any further, do NOT take this as an endorsement of this being a line! I’m just saying that I expected a dumpster fire and instead for some reason Patrick Kane‘s give-a-shit meter was higher than usual tonight. He and Strome had multiple good sequences with shots and puck movement in the slot, from the circles, near the crease, everywhere you want them to be. Kane bulldozed over Anisimov in the first when his slow ass couldn’t get out of the way, and Anisimov was perennially a step behind his two linemates, but he wasn’t as much of a liability as he could have been. I still think that DeBrincat-Strome-Kane is as clear to see as the bulbous nose on Barry Smith‘s face, but at least tonight this worked.

– I won’t dwell here but Ryan Hartman should have gotten an elbowing penalty for embedding Marcus Kruger‘s mask into his face. No he didn’t jut his elbow into Kruger, but when he saw Kruger coming, Hartman definitely positioned it in such a way that Kruger would have to run into it. It’s kind of like an older sibling asking why you won’t stop punching yourself. Hopefully Kruger is OK soon enough.

The Hawks beat a better team in their division and did so in regulation, by holding onto a one-goal lead. I said it before but I have to reiterate—I can’t believe I just wrote that sentence. Does this mean the season is saved? Absolutely not. But it does mean that maybe they’re not an irredeemable mess EVERY night. We’ll take whatever breaks we can get, wherever we can get them. Onward and upward.

Everything Else

Tonight I’m Gonna Rock You Tonight – December 18th

By Sam Fels December 18, 2018 1143 0

First Screen Viewing

Flames vs. Stars – 7:30

Let’s give it to this one. The Flames are atop the Western Conference, and have the second most points in the entire league. And Mike Smith is now hurt, so they might get even better! Let’s hope they feel like they have a real shot at a Cup and want to shore up their third-pairing at the deadline with a Keith or Seabrook. If that’s what has to be. The Stars can be anything on a given night, which basically means they’ll be good when their first line scores and bad when they don’t. But hey, both these teams can score so it’ll make for better viewing than the Hawks.

Second Screen Viewing

Sharks vs. Wild – 7pm

Fresh from braining the Hawks but good, the Wild head up I-90 to St. Paul to take on the fading Wild. Fading because they weren’t really any good in the first place. They’re three points out of a playoff spot and are behind the Oilers for god’s sake. Bruce Boudreau’s speeches between periods must be utterly hilarious at this point, because he’s got the same amount of answers for the Wild I do. And I don’t care about the Wild!

Other Games

Panthers vs. Sabres – 6pm

Maple Leafs vs. Devils – 6pm

Ducks vs. Rangers – 6pm

Red Wings vs. Flyers – 6pm

Blues vs. Oilers – 8pm

Islanders vs. Coyotes – 8pm

Lightning vs. Canucks – 9pm

Jets vs. Kings – 9:30

Everything Else

Game #36 – Predators vs. Hawks Preview/Sadomasochism: What Are We Even Doing?

By Sam Fels December 18, 2018 1569 0

vs.

RECORDS: Predators 22-10-2 Hawks WHO GIVES A FLYING FUCK?

PUCK DROP: 7:30

TV: NBCSN Chicago

PEOPLE WHO WRITE ABOUT A TEAM THAT KNOWS WHAT ITS DOING: On The Forecheck

This probably should get its own rant in its own post, but this is where we are today so we’ll just put it here. The Hawks have no idea what they’re doing, in the front office or behind the bench, and if everyone isn’t fired by the end of the season you have no reason to watch. There, I said it.

I don’t even know where to start, so I’m just going to throw a dart at the wall and start with the decision to loan Henri Jokiharju to the Finnish World Junior team. Let me remind you, in case you forgot, that the Hawks are not a NCAA or CHL team. They’re not an AHL team, though they do a fine impression of one. They’re a NHL TEAM that decided it was better for a player who is supposed to be a cornerstone of whatever comes next to play in a tournament full of children that he’s already played in and succeeded in. This isn’t sending a kid to Triple-A to get more ABs and work on going the opposite way. This is sending a kid back to High-A so he can beat up on confused kids trying to light their own farts fire who can’t throw a curveball. We know Jokiharju can hit a fastball! He needs to work on breaking stuff!

So what’s the rationale? Development? Nope, because he’s already dominated this level. He needs NHL time, and he needs it with a partner who A) cares and B) can play the NHL game. So the first one rules out Duncan Keith. The second basically rules out everyone else save Connor Murphy. So stick Jokiharju with Our Big Irish Son the rest of the year and find out what he can do. And let Keith continue his season-long pout with whoever can stand to do it.

Is it about saving this season? Because you can’t. And Jokiharju would help you do that more than anyone else if that really was the aim.

No, this is about the Hawks clogging their blue line with a bunch of useless stiffs they were somehow under the impression can play. This is so they can cram Gustav Forsling onto the ice more when it’s obvious he sucks. Gustav Forsling will never contribute to a team that means anything. Accept that now. It’s so they don’t have to simply waive Brandon Manning, because signing him to stick it to a coach you hate doesn’t really work anymore after you fire that coach and no team is dumb enough to take him off your hands because, y’know, they actually have pro scouts that don’t have vertigo and can clearly see he’s an abortion. It’s because they don’t really want to send Carl Dahlstrom down because lo and behold, he’s actually been good which they couldn’t scout or anticipate because they’re stupid. So sending HarJu away pushes off their problems for two-three weeks while they fist-fuck themselves even more and have the same problems in January.

So now that’s out of the way, let’s get to tonight’s lineup, which will only infuriate more. While the Hawks did get mullered on Sunday, they had show signs of life in the previous two games. And they had a third line that looked pretty spicy with David Kampf centering Dylan Sikura and Brendan Perlini. And while defensively they were an adventure, Dylan Strome between Alex DeBrincat and Patrick Kane was producing goals if nothing else. And the fourth line seemed to function. So why not blow all that up to appease Artem Fucking Anisimov! And let’s move Dylan Strome to a wing! Because hey, that’s where his future lies, right?! No? WELL FUCK YOU THEN!

Stick Arty’s overpaid useless ass on a fourth-line wing until it’s time to trade him for the second and third round pick at the deadline you were always going to get anyway. Strome needs reps at center in this league. He’s not going to get better at it playing a wing, where his lack of footspeed is probably even worse for him. We know what Arty is at center, and it’s overrated garbage. The season is lost, and you better find out what you have on the younger portion of the roster.

Oh but we’re not done. I got it, let’s pair Duncan Keith and his refusal to reign in his game combined with his inability to play the one he wants that’s sprinkled with a complete lack of give-a-shit, and pair him with a d-man completely incapable of covering for him in Erik Gustafsson. That sounds good! On his offside no less! Fucking genius if I understand it correctly! Swiss fucking watch! I’ll have that and then a dessert of strychnine please! And we’ll continue to toss Murphy and Carl Dahlstrom at the top lines because there’s simply no one else even though both have been with the Hawks for about seven minutes this season.

Oh, and I’m sure Cam Ward will start because it’s not like we don’t need to find out what Collin Delia is in case Corey Crawford never returns from the land of wind and ghosts.

Jeremy Colliton, at best, is in way over his head with a roster no one can save, especially if you can’t tell any of the veterans to go screw. Or he’s a complete blithering idiot. Guess we’ll find out!

Anyway, they’re playing the Predators. They’re really good and are going to kick the shit out of this outfit while barely breaking a sweat. Even if they did play last night. Pekka Rinne will probably start after getting pulled last night in Ottawa, which is a sentence. So he’ll actually be trying because of that. Which is good when he’s been the league’s best goalie this year against a team that can’t manage a piss-up in a brewery. They’ve lost a bunch of road games of late. It won’t matter.

Fuck this.

Game #36 Preview Suite

Everything Else

Game #36 – Predators vs. Hawks Spotlight: Time And Tide Wait For No Man…Except This Guy

By Sam Fels December 18, 2018 1340 0

It was only two or three years ago that you’d be forgiven for thinking that Pekka Rinne was finished. It feels like eons, but in reality it was only a few grains of sand in the hourglass of life (whoa, trippy).

Just over three years ago, Rinne was borderline terrible against the Hawks in a first-round series and really was the difference between the Preds pulling their upset then instead of waiting for two years. The following season he was mediocre at best throughout the entire campaign, posting a .908, and leading to the first calls for Juuse Saros to start to take over in the Nashville net. Preds fans were actually anxious to see the crease filled by someone else for the first time in a decade. Rinne wasn’t much better in the playoffs, posting a .906 that was good enough to see off another Ducks choke in a Game 7 at home but was pretty much railroaded by the Sharks.

Even the following regular season was only league average at .918. But something clicked in the spring of 2017, as Rinne put up a .923 in March. You’ll then recall the .980 (yes, .980) he threw at the Hawks in that authoritative and comedic sweep. Rinne would go on to produce a .930 throughout the Preds playoff run, though it came apart in the Final against the Penguins.

And it hasn’t stopped.

Rinne deservedly won his first Vezina last year, though his Game 7 full-body dry heave against the Jets perhaps colors things in some people’s eyes. And this season he’s the clubhouse leader for the award again, with the league’s best SV% at .926 and league’s best GAA at 1. 96. He has the league’s best even-strength save-percentage, and the best difference between his even-strength save-percentage and his expected one. The only thing he isn’t leading in is penalty-kill save-percentage, but he’s in the top-20 in that just in case you thought he sucked there.

Rinne’s renaissance (alliteration noted) in his mid-30s is nothing short of astonishing. In fact, he’s having one of the best seasons by a goaltender over 35 in history at the moment. No goalie has bested his current .929 at 35 or older except for Tim Thomas‘s .938 in 2010-2011 which saw him win a Vezina, Conn Smythe, and Stanley Cup. And as we’ve mentioned before, Thomas didn’t even crack an NHL lineup until after he was 30, so he didn’t have the miles. Roberto Luongo matched Rinne’s .929 last year at 38, and is really his only comparable. Ryan Miller was just a tick below at .928, but he was a backup. Rinne’s .927 is the third-best mark by any starter 35 or over.

Which makes Rinne’s next two years at $5M something beyond a bargain. Luongo is the cautionary tale of course, as he got hurt at 39 (this year) and has been pretty terrible since. He’s also three years older, exactly when Rinne’s contract would be up. Tim Thomas lost it at 39 as well. Martin Brodeur went off the diving board at 38, though he kept playing because no one could seem to tell him no. The Preds and Rinne might have this one clocked perfectly.

There are goalies who have won the Vezina Trophy at older than 36, a feat Rinne looks odds-on for. But the only one in the modern era is Thomas and Dominik Hasek in 2000-2001. And only Hasek for a second time, and no one for a second-straight year. Brodeur won at 34 and 35. Hasek won at 34 and 36. This is just not something we see very often.

Maybe there’s an injury right around the corner. Or a dip in form if Juuse Saros can’t spell him more consistently. Maybe it all hinges on what he does in the playoffs and if he can get the Preds where they’ve never been before. But we might not see this again, or at least for a while.

Game #36 Preview Suite

Everything Else

Game #36 – Predators vs. Hawks Q&A: JR

By Sam Fels December 18, 2018 1305 0

This one’s on us. We didn’t give our Nashville friends enough time for this, so we’ll just rerun what we did with JR Lind a couple weeks ago when the Hawks were in Nashville. We’ll make it up to you.

Most points in the West, second-best goal difference, the Vezina leader…is there anything to complain about in Predators Land?

As Blackhawks fans know, there’s always something to complain about, no matter how sterling the season is. Obviously, the Preds are very, very good and were able to sustain success from last season with a minimum of moves (David Poile’s biggest free agency acquisition was bringing back Dan Hamhuis on the traditional This Guy Used To Play Here Contract).

The acute complaint is that the Preds are on a two-game losing streak, just the second time this season they’ve gone consecutive games without a point; largely this is a result of a bizarre inability to solve the Arizona Coyotes.

The more chronic issue is the power play (currently 30th ahead of only…uh hi!). It’d be easy to blame that on the recent spate of injuries with Viktor Arvidsson, Kyle Turris and Pernell Karl Subban all out, though it was worse when everyone was reasonably healthy.

Kevin Fiala has been in a season-long slump (he finally scored five-on-five Tuesday) in what many expected to be a big year for him after a breakout season last year. And while he was sparkling when he was playing everyday when Pekka Rinne was injured, Juuse Saros has been mediocre in a lot of his spot starts lately.

There’s always something to complain about.

Seriously, how has Pekka Rinne been able to come up with a career renaissance at 35?

After his surgery and then missing so much time because of the post-surgical infection, it really looked like he was on the downhill. Then goalie Yoda Mitch Korn left with Barry Trotz and the overwhelming feeling really was that it was time for Poile to go franchise goalie hunting in the ninth round again. And then we all realized there wasn’t a ninth round anymore. Fortunately, Rinne had a career year and finally won the Vezina, signed a very team friendly extension for two more years counting $5 million against the cap (somehow David Poile got the guy to take a pay cut after winning a Vezina).

So I don’t know what kind of magic he’s working. The only complaint (and this is a weird one, I recognize) is that he might be playing too well, because as a Preds fan, you’d like his regular season workload to be a little lighter so he’s tanned, rested and ready for the playoffs. Last season, he played a lot more down the stretch as the Preds pushed for the President’s Trophy and as he secured the Vezina. Ideally, he’d get a lot more rest in March and April.

If there’s one quibble, the Preds have gotten 14 goals from Filip Forsberg but no more than eight from anyone else. Is scoring something of a worry down the line? Or is the socialist method of scoring going to see them through?

Part of that is the injuries. Arvidsson, who hasn’t played since Nov. 10 and is out for a few more weeks, is the guy with eight. Then it’s a jumble of dudes – nine with between four and seven goals, led by Old Friend Ryan Hartman (who I contend should just be signed to a series of one-year deals from now until the end of time).

Arvidsson’s absence has meant a rotation on Ryan Johansen‘s wing opposite Forsberg, which has included such strange experiments as Rocco Grimaldi. The STF line of Smith-Turris-Fiala has been ho-hum outside of Turris, who is hurt. Smith is inconsistent and Fiala can’t score. But, there are worse things that having one guy who scores 40, another who scores 25 in an injury-plagued year and nine or 10 who go for 15 to 20.

How is the power play this bad with all the weaponry on it? (please don’t turn this question around on us)

Who knows? Nothing seems to work. Subban is hurt and Ryan Ellis has had trouble scoring (at evens and on the power play), which takes away two of the big outside weapons. With Arvidsson out, the coaches haven’t really found a consistent net-front threat (having tried Nick Bonino, among others, down low). Eventually, it’ll click, we’re told, but it’s getting close to 30 games in now and it’s still 14 some-odd percent so.

Game #36 Preview Suite