OTF Classic

Special t hanks to Joe Pelletier's prompting, which arrived in my inbox as follows: "We are heading into Hall of Fame weekend, a weekend where we honour past greats. Greatest Hockey Legends.com is challenging hockey bloggers everywhere to honour your own past great. What I want to do is get as many hockey bloggers as possible to post an article, a memory, interactive content of some sort, something or anything that honours a favorite retired hockey player." Thus challenged, I'd like to take this opportunity to reflect on one of my favorite retired players, one who was forced into retirement just as his career was reaching a peak; Vladimir Konstantinov . For most hockey fans, their impression of Konstantinov was shaped by the tragic accident that left him and team masseur Sergei Mnatsakanov disabled. During the Detroit Red Wings' championship run in 1997, Konstantinov gained the notoriety that comes with being a prominent member of a Cup-winning team, but the wi...

Here's your smorgasbord of Monday updates, rather than a single, thought-out post: 1) The Penalties Drawn numbers have been updated at the Google spreadsheet . Sidney Crosby still holds the lead with 14 draws, with Scott Gomez, Anze Kopitar, and Dion Phaneuf tied for second with 12. Interestingly, Phaneuf is the only defenseman in the Top 35 in this category. For now, I've removed the Games Played and Time on Ice columns until I can provide those in a more automated way (for the first week I copy & pasted from NHL.com stats, yuk). 2) Kudos to Jessica Hopp over at the Tennessean , who followed the team on its recent Western Canada swing and has provided some fine articles of late. Over the last few months the Tennessean at least has improved its coverage of the team. 3) And how about this road trip? After the opening loss at Calgary, the Nashville Predators have nabbed convincing wins in Vancouver, Edmonton, and Chicago, thus guaranteei...

It's a battle of unstoppable forces tonight at GM Place, where the utter inability of the Nashville Predators to win on the road (0-5) matches up with the blundering incompetence of the Vancouver Canucks in front of their home fans (1-5). Right up front I'm going to pat myself on the back for sitting through this one. Staying up for a late-night game between two basement-dwelling teams is what being a dedicated hockey fan is all about, right? Anybody can tune in for Crosby vs. Ovechkin in prime time, but this one starts at 10:00 p.m. Central and I've got a meeting at work tomorrow bright & early at 7:30. So let's get on with it... Period The First Dan Ellis gets the start in net for Nashville, against Roberto Luongo for Vancouver. For a team that's scored 3 goals in 5 road games, facing Luongo has to be a daunting prospect. The Preds open up with a line of Ortmeyer-Bonk-Smithson, but almost immediately switch them off for a new line of Tootoo-Legwand-Radul...

Check back tomorrow morning, as I'll probably do another live-blog summary of tonight's Predators-Canucks game, which starts especially late this evening. For some previews, check out Canucks Hockey Blog and Waiting for Stanley . This is a battle of the NHL's worst road team visiting the NHL's worst home team; just imagine the possibilities! In other news, mega-congratulations go out to hockey blogger supreme Eric McErlain, who will lend his talents to the Sporting News twice a week. When I work out at the local Y, the Sporting News is the only sports rag available, and they could certainly use a boost in their NHL coverage. Well done, Eric! UPDATE: Thanks to Mirtle for informing us of Spector's good news; he'll be writing for the Hockey News website weekly as well. Spector's been churning out great hockey writing and rumor vetting since Ye Olden Days of Ye Internet, i.e. the 20th century, and should be a great credit to the Hockey News. Also, a r...

The chilling tale of the Predators sale approaches the Witching Hour , and we have a host of spirits seeking to terrify and delight the hockey fans of Middle Tennessee:     A Holiday-themed insight into the current state of mind for most Preds fans, especially after last night's debacle in Calgary .   1)  The Globe & Mail's Allan Maki broke the news that Doug Bergeron (originally from Windsor, Ontario) has joined the Freeman group.  Does this mean additional capital and stability, or another force looking to relocate the team?  Nobody can say at this point.   2)  With today being the end of the exclusive negotiating period with Craig Leipold, word comes that  the deadline may be extended somewhat if the local investors can hammer out a deal with Nashville Mayor Karl Dean today on adjustments to the Sommet Center lease.   3)  As always, the most thorough analysis of this developing situat...

Heading into Tuesday night's tilt at Calgary the Nashville Predators have seemingly righted their ship, having won twice at home over Atlanta and Florida before heading out for an extended five-game road trip. The Flames (5-3-3) have been playing mostly competitive hockey of late, balancing an amazing comeback win over Minnesota last week against a 4-1 loss to San Jose two nights before. In their previous meeting this season, the Flames toasted the Predators 7-4 in Nashville, breaking open a 4-4 tie with a dominating third period. For those of you out celebrating Devil's Night , here's the detailed recap.... Goaltenders: Chris Mason for Nashville vs. the newly-signed Miikka Kiprusoff for Calgary Period The First: Continuing a trend seen against Florida, Martin Erat starts on left wing next to Jason Arnott & J.P. Dumont. Whatever it takes to get him rolling... At the 18:12 mark David Legwand chases down a sloppily-played puck by Calgary that leads to a brea...

If you're wondering who's drawing the most penalties in the NHL , I've performed the weekly update over at the publicly available Google spreadsheet. Currently Sidney Crosby leads the way with 12, and then we have a five-way tie between Alexander Ovechkin, Joe Thornton, Scott Gomez, Mike Cammelleri, and Anze Kopitar, who have each drawn 11 penalties this season. I've added a few columns to the spreadsheet, including Games Played, Average Time on Ice, and Position, for those of you who were wondering about such things. NOTE - There's currently a formatting issue with any player averaging over 24 minutes per game, and I'm hoping to fix that by next week. Dion Phaneuf, for example, shows as having an average ice time of 3:31, rather than 27:31. WEEKEND NOTES I missed Saturday night's thriller between the Predators and Panthers, as I took my wife to the Grand Ole Opry, something she'd wanted to do since we moved to Nashville two yea...