Around the League

Well, as we all get ready for the really big show of the summer--The NHL Awards Show--it almost seems like nothing is going on in the NHL. And that is true--except that Speculation Time is afoot and we all know how fun, important, and time-consuming speculation can be. But, you know, what else are we going to do?

The Entry Draft is coming up and so far, from what I have seen around the web, the Islanders are planning on taking everyone but Steven Stamkos with the #5 pick. A lot of people seem to want (are begging?) the Isles to draft the dynamic Russian Nikita Filatov on the 20th. He starred for the Russian entry in the WJC this past December and is the #1 ranked European player on the final CSS ranking. Will he be there at #5 a week from Friday? He may be. After Tampa picks Stamkos, many believe that there will be a run on puck-moving defensemen, assuming that no team, trades up to snag Filatov.

I'm still not sold that Filatov is going to be The Guy. I think the Entry Draft has got to be more about picking the best athlete and getting him into the system than anything else. You can't exactly go with need (scoring, in this case) if you aren't picking first overall and Stamkos is sitting there in his tuxedo waiting to go to the prom. This isn’t the NFL where you're all of a sudden committing all sorts of cap dollars to a player who is 22 or 23. The Entry Draft is all about choosing kids who are still, for the most part, still growing into the players and adults they'll become.

Plus, let's not forget the fact that there is no transfer deal between the NHL and the Russians that makes any contract in North America binding throughout the hockey world. Also, with the new Russian KHL starting up, the oil barons who own the teams in the "super league" are not going to think twice about trying to keep and/or lure Russian players home with all sorts of crazy money contracts. It's the Wild West for them.

In other news, Toronto has hired Ron Wilson to coach the Bad News Leafs today. Wilson was fired by San Jose last month. So, let's see. The Leafs--who are completely too screwed up to be called dysfunctional, have hired a so-called name coach who is a known task master and yet, they have not hired a new general manager yet. Hmm. Brian Burke has been refused a chance by the owners of the Ducks to talk to the Leafs brass but in the surprise of all surprises, is very good friends with said Ron Wilson. Burke has one more year on his deal as GM of Anaheim and Toronto has a guy as old as the hills named Cliff Fletcher working as a placeholder until the Leafs GM Search Committee can agree on giving someone the job. I mean, Fletcher couldn't be more of a Caretaker if he was making prison wine in his toilet.

Is it sad to root for another team to lose? I say, no. Been doing that with the Rangers for a long time now. I also get a strange satisfaction with seeing the Leafs constantly mess up because the media in Toronto really enjoyed sticking it to the Islanders during the lean years. Plus, it is going to be fun to watch the Burke Charade as it continues and Wilson is ripping his players in the press. Ron Wilson can talk all he wants about having a Canadian passport (as he did in the Star) and having played for the Leafs but Toronto is not Anaheim or DC or San Jose. It is a totally different animal and that animal is going to hang on his every word and his every lineup change.

I love all of this Brooks-Orpik-to-the-Rangers-talk. Um, does anyone remember when he was playing the wing in December because he wasn't being aware enough defensively? Does anyone really think that the continued employment of Mike Therien as Pittsburgh's head coach is going to drive Brooks Orpik away from the Penguins? The guy is a free agent and man, someone is seriously going to over-pay him. He's sort of like in the seat Adrian Aucoin was in with the Isles. Everybody (including myself) were falling over themselves to pat the guy on the back and after getting a 4 year/16m dollar deal with the Blackhawks, we all know that Kenny Jonsson was doing the real heavy lifting for the tandem back in the day. I'm not dissing Aucoin or saying anything bad about him at all. I am just pointing out that at no time in his career did he enjoy the kind of league-wide success that he had when he was an Islander...and that he partnered with Jonsson the overwhelming majority of the time.

Orpik is going to strike it big all because of that one shift where he flattened half of Detroit (the city, not the team) in spectacular fashion. Good for him. I just hope it isn't with our boys. We need puck movers. Let the Rangers overpay for another guy who gets skated around more often than he makes the play.

I guess that's it for today. We'll try to have something live for the NHL Awards show and some updates as we feel the need. Thanks to everyone who wrote in about the RLB of the WHA vs. USSR game. It was a fun one to do.

Here are all of the Islanders' draft picks for the 2008 NHL Entry Draft:
1st Round: #5
2nd Round: #36, #53 (Ana to Edm to NYI)
3rd Round: #66, #73 (Edm to NYI to Edm to Ana to NYI)
4th Round: #96
5th Round: #126, #148 (Phi to NYI)
6th Round: #156, #175 (Min to NYI)
7th Round: None

And last, you're probably wondering why Ken Stabler's mug shot is included in this post. Well, it is simply because he has one of the most hilarious quotes of all-time. I lifted this straight from the AP story that is everywhere: ...Stabler has long been a notorious drinker. Once when asked about his divorces he reasoned, "All I wanna do is drive around in my truck and drink Jack Daniels... and they just don't understand." Now that, my friends, should be the real Raiders motto. But doesn't he look like a well-meaning-but-hammered Mall Santa in that picture?

The Mess in Toronto

While we all wonder what the heck is going on in Toronto, it is important to note that some good can come out of the circus for the New York Islanders.

In case you haven't heard, last week the Anaheim Ducks denied a request by the Leafs to interview Ducks' GM Brian Burke for the same position in Toronto. Burke's all-but-coronation had been all the talk in Canada for weeks and many considered it to be a foregone conclusion that Burke was going to land there.

Of course, no one had officially asked the owners of the Ducks. Now Burke is allegedly trying to hammer out a longer-term deal with Anaheim and is going to work through the last year of his contract.

What does this mean for the Islanders? Well, speculation was that Burke had already made noise about buying out the remainder of defenseman Bryan McCabe's contract; just as the Isles did with Alexei Yashin last summer.

McCabe as a free-agent would lead to more "he's returning to Long Island" talk since his wife is from the area and her family is all on the island. Every time the TO media needed to move McCabe and his suffocating contract, they always speculated that Bryan would be good with returning to the Islanders because he got his start there.

Would this be a good move for the Islanders? Well, I suppose it would.

McCabe has developed into a dangerous power-play defenseman with a hell of a shot and a bit of a nasty streak. He had one great season where he was scoring goals like a bigger Paul Coffey and the Leafs decided to drop a bank safe full of teachers' pensions onto his lap. So he signed a long-term deal for like $5m a year like anyone should. This money--and the stranglehold the fans thought it put on the Leafs' salary cap--made him a bit of a whipping boy in Toronto. Hey, remember, these are the fans that booed Larry Murphy out of town and to Detroit where he won a Stanley Cup!

If I am Garth Snow--and I am not--if McCabe is bought out and expresses a desire to come back to the Islanders, I think he can expect a bit of home-town discount. He may have been making over five million bucks a year to get his pride stepped on up north but on the Islanders, I think a three-year deal is ok to make. There is no way that Bryan McCabe should make more money than a warrior like Brendan Witt so for 3 years I am thinking between eight- and 9.5 million is about right. He is younger than Witt and is tough player but Witt means more to the leadership core you're developing with the young guys.

My wife asked me if there were any other former Islanders that I hoped would find their way back to the Islander. I guess it is worth noting is that Calgary defensemen Adrian Aucoin will be unrestricted pretty soon (after next season) as well and he may want to return to where his career took off. Of course, Chicago signed him to a four-year, $16m deal as a free agent when he left NY but I doubt that he is going to see that kind of scratch again. Aucoin has been hassled by injury since leaving the Isles and worse, he was exposed as being a much better player when paired with Kenny Jonsson on the Isles. Jonsson had a way of making the heavy-lifting look easy, didn't he?

Mike Milbury didn't think Aucoin was worth what the Blackhawks gave him and even though I was a fan of Aucoin's, I didn't either. If he wants to play for the Islanders again, I'd give him just over $2m a year. Someone else might give him more but as much as I like Aucoin's game--it's similar to McCabe's but perhaps less nasty--we already have younger guys who are ready for bigger roles on the Islander blueline. Another year of development for the guys next season and the Isles will know what kind of players they have for the future. We see guys like Bruno and Campoli who are regulars when healthy. Andy Sutton is still a young guy and so is Radek Martinek. Aaron Johnson is young and proved himself capable at times last season as well.

Mike Peca will be unrestricted this summer, too, you know. Don't think he should come back.

Tonight at 8:00PM on the NHL Network is a show I have been waiting to get for a while: Classic Series 1993--Penguins vs Islanders. Two words: David effing Volek. Make sure you check it out. They're also playing the 1984 playoff game vs. the Rangers where Ken Morrow won it in OT on a little snap shot toward the net. Just like Pierre McGuire says, you don't always have to drill it.

Also worth nothing is that beginning May 16 the NHL Network will be broadcasting games for this year's Memorial Cup. Having never really seen too many Junior games aside from stuff online, I am really looking forward to this.