-For those of you who may have thought the proliferation of hockey blogs and analysis outside traditional media might pressure journalists to change their approach or improve their repertoire, you’d be wrong…at least in the case of Don Brennan.  Yesterday he offered yet another confused column making the following baseless assertions:
1. Jakob Silfverberg will play on Ottawa’s top-line
2. The Sens aren’t at the cap floor and this will cause trouble
3. The Sens aren’t tough enough because they let Matt Carkner walk
Two of these points are simply false while the other is purely speculative.  Take Silfverberg, no one is suggesting he is going to play on the top line (he may not play in the top-six).  I’m truly at a loss as to how Brennan came to that conclusion.  Secondly, the cap floor fears are simply wrong (five seconds with Capgeek illustrates the point), although here at least Brennan says that the concern is “outside the Senators’ offices“.  The third point is a chestnut Brennan has been writing for months (the team is not tough enough!), which remains an absurd theory; he dynamites his own argument about Carkner by noting that the “Senators were too worried about the condition of [Carkner‘s] damaged knee.”  That’s a pretty good reason to be concerned!  Carkner is an older player who couldn’t skate has two bad knees–it’s a mercy the Sens didn’t bring him back.  Nichols goes further into the inanity of the column (particularly points #1 and #3), but the facts aren’t going to interfere with Brennan continuing to write this crap.  I don’t derive any joy from unpacking Brennan’s nonsense and I don’t think he’s an idiot, I just think he’s lazy.

–Mika Zibanejad and Mikael Wikstrand are playing for Sweden in their WJC summer camp (for those wondering, Fredrik Claesson is too old to attend).

-Speaking of prospects, Brian-Huddle offers his opinion on the Sens top-10:
1. Mika Zibanejad (comparing him to Ryan Kesler)
2. Cody Ceci (comparing him to Brent Seabrook)
3. Robin Lehner (comparing him to Henrik Lundqvist)
4. Shane Prince (comparing him to Zack Parise-lite)
5. Mark Stone (comparing him to Scott Hartnell)
6. Jakob Silfverberg (comparing him to Patrik Hornqvist)
7. Stefan Noesen (comparing him to Corry Perry-lite)
8. Matt Puempel (comparing him to Alex Semin)
9. Jarrod Maidens (comparing him to David Backes)
10. Stephane Da Costa (comparing him to no one)

He gives Patrick Wiercioch an honourable mention.  With all due respect to Huddle, his comparisons are over the top and in some cases I wonder if he’s seen the players mentioned (for example, Silfverberg is not a Tomas Holmstrom-clone like Hornqvist; Stone is not particularly physical and is more of a playmaker than Hartnell; etc).

-Here’s my updated profile of Peter Regin.

–Lyle Richardson tries to figure out why Tim Thomas came off the rails this year.  He admits that it’s all speculation at this point, but makes some interesting points:

If anyone had told me a year ago Tim Thomas would alienate a portion of the Boston Bruins fan base with far-right political and social opinions, upset his Bruins teammates and front office by refusing to attend a White House ceremony honoring their Stanley Cup championship, then decide to take a year off (effectively ending his tenure with the team), I would’ve told that person to quit abusing solvents. Last summer, Thomas was a hero in Boston, winning playoff MVP honors in the Bruins march to their first Cup championship in nearly forty years, and won his second Vezina Trophy in three years as the league’s best goaltender. At 37, Tim Thomas was the toast of the National Hockey League. Today, at 38, his  views have made him the target of scorn and the butt of jokes, while his reasons for his year-long sabbatical (family, friends and faith) have been questioned by cynical critics. He’s also left a Bruins fan base understandably puzzled over his views, the sudden move of his family from the Boston-area last season to Colorado, and apparent desire to ring down the curtain on his career in Boston. I neither condone or condemn Thomas’ views, but I question his sensitivity toward criticism of his public statements. Just as he has the right to state his views, he should expect his detractors would employ the same right to criticize them. Thomas is currently unwilling to explain why he’s taken to Facebook this year to make his far-right views known, leaving only guesswork on my part (and those of his fans and critics) as to why he’s doing so now. Thomas could’ve voiced his views earlier to a sympathetic right wing media source well before this year. One would assume, given Thomas shares their [the Tea Party’s] beliefs, he might’ve spoken out then [2009]. Or in 2010. Or last summer, when his playoff heroics would’ve made him a hot media commodity.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

August 4, 2012
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: 1 Comment

–Daniel Alfredsson talked about returning to the team:

I’m not saying this is my last year. If I can still play and contribute, I’ll continue. I had issues with my back for a few years, and now that I finally feel healthy again, I want to see how good I can be. You see players at 40 and 40-plus like (Jaromir) Jagr and (Teemu) Selanne, and maybe it’s a new trend that’s starting, that if you look after yourself and take care of yourself, you can play. Who knows what the limit is? That’s an intriguing part for me, how far I can push myself. How good can I still be? I feel like I can get better, especially looking back at the health issues I’ve had, feeling that I’ve corrected that. I should be able to push myself and be better, especially physically, than I was last year. I’m good with the way the contract is. I’ll just play out the last year of the contract and go from there. I think I’ve had the intention of playing (next season) from the beginning, but I had to go through the process to really know for sure. With my back problems … I haven’t really been able to work out as I would have liked for the last, probably, four years. With the surgery last summer, having to do a lot of rehab and I didn’t get the proper training in, I didn’t know where I stood physically and mentally. It took some time, but the training has been going well. I’ve really enjoyed it, so I’m really happy that I feel this way in the process of getting ready for another camp. I could probably have made my mind up a little quicker if I felt the team needed to know for whatever reason, but I also feel this is a good time. The training the last two weeks has gone into another phase, more heavy lifting, and that’s gone well. I probably could have waited for another month, but this feels right. Once that day comes, I’ll look forward to the challenges. But when you feel as healthy as I do … if you retire too early, you’ll kind of look back and say ‘Maybe I should have played another year or two. My kids have (had) me playing the whole time. They’ve been bugging me and I think they would have been really disappointed if I didn’t play. And my wife and I, we feel that our family situation will be easier this season coming up than it was last year, with a newborn baby (William Erik) and sleepless nights. We have more of a routine now. She’s kind of been hoping, too, that physically I would feel fine and play another year and postpone everything that comes with retirement and starting a new chapter in our lives. We’ve got pretty good control of what to do when I’m playing and how to handle me being away and whatnot, so she’s been extremely supportive, too. That’s makes me feel a little less guilty, I guess, about playing another year because I know how much time it takes away from family.

–Stu Hackel offers an outsiders view of Alfredssson deciding to play another season.

–Nichols transcribes Eugene Melnyk’s chat with The Team 1200 yesterday and while I encourage you to read the entire article what interested me was this:

I gave up with this theory [big moves] about going over the top. I really did. We blew our brains out spending to the cap and what we proved last year is that we don’t have to do that. I mean, all that does is cover up our mistakes. Really, at the end of the day, if you invest into scouting, into development of these players, you’re going to get what you’re going to get. And you can’t buy that. You can’t buy heart. You can’t buy the fans. You can’t buy the dressing room. And my attitude, look, we were going to bid on a couple of these (free agents). We were prepared to. We had presentations done. We were all ready to go. We put our July 1st holidays on hold and I called Bryan two days before and I said, ‘Bryan, did you see these contracts and numbers that these people are throwing around?’ and he said ‘Yep. That is what we’re going to have to pay.’ And I said, ‘Do you want to blow your weekend with your grandkids and kids on July 1st and waste our time because we’re not going to spend that kind of money?’ And he says, ‘No, let’s enjoy our barbeques and let somebody else blow their brains out.’ And they did it. I don’t wish them bad luck, but I don’t think that (spending frivolously) is the solution.

Whether you wish Melnyk was willing to bid on big free agents or not I’m happy the team has given up on the futile practice.  The best free agents do not want to come to Ottawa, so rather than overpaying broken down older players like Alexei Kovalev I’m happy to see the organisation focus on developing talent and then paying those players big salaries when the time comes.

–Travis Yost compares how Cory Clouston and Paul MacLean differed in which players they started in the offensive zone (the most amusing for me was Ryan Shannon‘s 61.5% under Clouston).

-Here’s my look at Binghamton‘s roster changes and their potential lineup for the upcoming season.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

August 2, 2012
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: Leave a comment

The Binghamton Senators finished 30th in the AHL with a 29-40-7 record for 65 points, which represents a 27-point (and 13 win) drop over last year’s Calder Cup winning season (when they were 12th in the league).  The team was 23rd in scoring (their 201 goals was 54 less than last year), and 27th in goals against (their 243 goals 22 worse than last year).  The team featured 11 rookies, 7 of whom were regulars in the lineup.  Twelve players from the Calder Cup team remained (thirteen if you count Daugavins’ brief tenure with the team).  Tim Murray admitted the unexpected retirement of Lee Sweatt hurt the team a great deal (comparing him to Andre Benoit), and admitted the other veterans he signed (Parrish and Conboy) weren’t able to replace those lost from the previous season (Ryan Keller and David Hale are the most likely parallels, although Murray also mentioned Ryan Potulny who was acquired by trade mid-season).  It was a disappointing season for the team, although it did feature some was positive development for individual players.  Here’s my full review of the season.  Sixteen players will no longer be with the team when it begins next season, removing 76 goals from the lineup (37% of last season’s total).

Departed Forwards (9): Corey Locke (38-10-31-41) to TPS in the SM-Liiga; Rob Klinkhammer (35-12-23-35) to the Portland Pirates; Mark Parrish (51-15-15-30) UFA; Jack Downing (47-9-8-17) tryout with Binghamton; Jim O’Brien (27-7-7-14) NHL; Nikita Filatov (15-7-5-12) to Salavat Ufa in the KHL; Mike Bartlett (58-3-4-7) to HC Innsbruck in Austria; Kaspars Daugavins (7-2-4-6) NHL; Francis Lessard (43-1-1-2) UFA.  O’Brien and Daugavins were both re-signed to one-way deals with Ottawa.

Departed Blueliners (5): Craig Schira (73-4-9-13) to Frisk Asker in Norway; Tim Conboy (53-2-9-11) to Ingolstadt in the DEL; Dan Henningson (32-2-8-10) UFA; Josh Godfrey (38-2-6-8) Las Vegas (ECHL); Bobby Raymond (38-0-4-4) retained by Florida (ECHL).

Departed Goaltenders (2): Mike McKenna (14-18-5, 2.98, .918) to Peoria; Brian Stewart (no AHL games) to Bakersfield (ECHL).

Departed Coaches (1): Kurt Kleinendorst

Many of the players above were part-time in one way or another.  In essence Binghamton lost a top-four defenseman (Conboy), a bottom-pairing blueliner (Schira), a quality back-up goaltender (McKenna), roughly three top-six forwards (Locke, Parrish, and Klinkhammer/O’Brien), an enforcer (Lessard), and a couple of depth forwards (Bartlett and Downing).  The team also lost its head coach in Kleinendorst who was very popular with his players.

Forward Additions (7): Hugh Jessiman (AHL 67-27-17-44), Mika Zibanejad (SEL 26-5-8-13), Mark Stone (WHL 66-41-82-123), Shane Prince (OHL 57-43-47-90), Jean-Gabriel Pageau (QMJHL 46-32-33-65), Darren Kramer (WHL 71-21-19-40),  Jakub Culek (QMJHL 55-13-27-40).  Pageau and Prince can be returned to their junior teams.

Blueline Additions (5): Andre Benoit (KHL 53-5-12-17), Tyler Eckford (AHL 75-10-15-25), Chris Wideman (NCAA 41-4-20-24), Ben Blood (NCAA 42-3-18-21), Fredrik Claesson (SEL 47-1-6-7).

Goaltending Additions (2): Nathan Lawson (AHL 19-17-4 2.57 .914), , Marc Cheverie (ECHL 10-4-8 2.71 .910)

Coaching Additions (1): Luke Richardson

There are a lot of forwards slated for Binghamton (I am making the assumption Jakob Silfverberg plays in Ottawa) and while some will likely spend time in Elmira (ECHL) I have to imagine that either a CHL-eligible player will be returned to junior or else there will be some player movement.  I’m assuming that Zibanejad will be in Binghamton and if so he’s one of three potential top-six forward additions (along with Jessiman and possibly Stone); Kramer is expected to fill the enforcer role while the other players will slot in the bottom of the lineup.  The blueline has been completely overhauled with Benoit as the #1 defenseman and Eckford filling out a top-four slot; the other blueliners will fight for bottom-pairing slots with time in Elmira not out of the question.  Lawson is a quality back-up.  Luke Richardson has his first head coaching job and it will be an interesting challenge for the former NHLer.

Returning Forwards (10): Mike Hoffman (76-21-28-49), Andre Petersson (60-23-21-44), Pat Cannone (76-19-24-43), Stephane Da Costa (46-13-23-36), David Dziurzynski (72-11-17-28), Derek Grant (60-8-15-23), Corey Cowick (53-5-6-11), Wacey Hamilton (74-5-6-11), Louie Caporusso (ECHL 29-16-16-32), Cole Schneider (NCAA 38-23-22-45)

Returning Blueliners (3): Mark Borowiecki (73-5-17-22), Eric Gryba (73-5-15-20), Patrick Wiercioch (57-4-16-20)

Returning Goaltenders (1):  Robin Lehner (13-21-2, 3.26, .907)

Among the returning forwards three will definitely be in the top-six (Hoffman, Petersson, and Da Costa), while Cannone could slide down.  Dziurzynski and Grant round out the top-nine while the remaining forwards will compete to play on the fourth line.  There’s a good chance Borowiecki will stick with the Sens, while I think there’s no chance of Lehner beating out Bishop and staying in the NHL–not because he’s incapable, but because I don’t think the organisation will risk putting Bishop on waivers.  Either all three of the defensemen can be slotted into top-four roles or if (as expected) Borowiecki is absent than just Gryba and Wiercioch get those slots.  Lehner will be the unquestioned starter.

Training camp will have an impact on positioning, so predicting a lineup is haphazard at best.  Here’s what I think as things stand now (and using my assumptions about Borowiecki being on the NHL roster):
1. Top-six forwards: Mike Hoffman, Andre Petersson, Stephane Da Costa, Hugh Jessiman, Mika Zibanejad, and Pat Cannone
2. Top-four blueliners: Andre Benoit, Eric Gryba, Tyler Eckford, and Patrick Wiercioch
3. Bottom-six forwards: David Dziurzynski, Mark Stone, Derek Grant, Wacey Hamilton, Darren Kramer, Cole Schneider
4. The goaltending situation: Lehner starts, Lawson backs-up

I’m assuming Jean-Gabriel Pageau and Shane Prince will be returned to junior.  This leaves three forwards on the outside looking in (Corey Cowick, Louie Caporusso, and Jakub Culek) and I really wonder if the Sens will want that many prospects playing in Elmira or simply practising with the team.  Given their ages, Cowick and Caporusso are the players most likely to be moved if that’s the direction the Sens want to go.  Mark Stone could crack the top-six, but he may wind up as a top-nine forward to start his pro career.

Ben Blood will play regularly as the 5-6 blueliner, while Chris Wideman and Fredrik Claesson will battle it out for the rest of the ice time.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

August 1, 2012
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: 5 Comments

-The news I’ve expected for months has finally come down the wire with Daniel Alfredsson deciding to play another season in Ottawa.  It’s great for the organisation because there is no one to replace Alfie.  Luke Fox added an interesting tidbit “It’s been four years (or one Olympics ago, for those of you stricken with the fever) since Alfie has been able to train properly in the off-season and have his muscles respond the way he wants them to. A bad back, bouts of rehab and last summer’s surgery left him at a crossroads.”

–Brochenski goes to the Corsi bat in support of Erik Condra (apparently lifting the idea from Travis Yost who compared him to Ville Leino) where he uses stats to show just how good Condra is at the possession game.  This is certainly what I noticed over the season and is what makes him an effective player.  Peter Raaymakers has jumped onto the bandwagon and adds this salient point, “I think advanced statistics like Corsi or CF% or what-have-you are only as useful inasmuch as they can be used to explain or challenge preconceived notions we make while watching a player.”

–Varada provides a puzzling argument for retaining Bobby Butler.  He begins by saying the Sens need him to reach the cap floor (a canard that has been exploded many times), then conflates his numbers from this season and last season, as if they are one and the same thing (limited success on a terrible team versus no success on a competitive team).  Then he suggests they need Butler in case of injury, apparently not thinking much of the parade of forward prospects (Silfverberg, Zibanejad, Stone, and others) Ottawa has waiting in the wings.  He ends by saying this is an indication that Murray is planning a big move…or Melnyk wants to save money.  There’s no basis for the former, while the latter isn’t changed with or without Butler.  Putting aside the confusing arguments, I’m not sure why Varada wants to keep a one-dimensional player who was unable to produce.  He’s essentially Ryan Shannon without the passion, and Shannon is now out of the NHL playing in Switzerland.

–Tim Conboy signed a deal to play with ERC Ingolstadt in the DEL.  A free agent after spending last season with Binghamton, I thought there was a slight chance he would be retained up until the Sens signed Andre Benoit.

–Chet Pickard, the primary piece to Nashville via the Erik Karlsson trade at the 2008 draft, has parted ways with the Predators and signed with Djurgarden in the Allsvenskan.  If there needed to be any more evidence that Bryan Murray won this trade, this is it.

-For those of you buying season tickets for the Phoenix Coyotes, Stu Hackel provides us with the expected problems with the current sale.  Prospective owner Greg Jamison is short 20 million to purchase the franchise, which is why Shane Doan is trying to extort crazy money from other NHL teams.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

July 31, 2012
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: 5 Comments

-As expected the Sens bought out Bobby Butler; he joins a long list of college free agent signings who have crashed and burned in the NHL.  He produced enough as a pro that he’ll sign somewhere else, but it seems likely it will be a two-way deal.

-Capgeek confirms Stephane Da Costa‘s contract numbers (800k)

–Marc Methot talks about becoming a Senator:

I’m still really excited. The whole overwhelming feeling, because I had never been traded, has kind of faded. Now, I’ve got the Sens’ gear, I’m wearing it in practice and I’m getting used to it. It really feels like I’m becoming part of the team now. I’m around (some of the guys) and I’m getting comfortable. I believe it has sunk in, but until I don’t think it really will until I start skating with the team and have to go to Scotiabank Place to practise with the team. You can absolutely call it a fresh start. I’m going to get a chance to play in front of my family and friends. I don’t think the situation could be any better. I’ve been taking the situation pretty serious this summer with regards with my training and preparing so I don’t let people down. I better play good hockey, right? When I’m focused I’m not concerned with that stuff. When you’re playing in a market like this, you’re going to get criticized. It’s part of the game. Do I ignore it? Yes. I try not to listen to it. Does it bother me? I’d be lying if I said I just shrugged it off. Sometimes it will piss you off. You’ve got to deal with it. My parents, family and friends, understand it’s not always going to be peaches and cream. I’m not going to sugarcoat it: I have the utmost respect for the fans there. It’s just sometimes during the week we wouldn’t get a packed house and we’d be playing a team like Chicago or Detroit and it sounded like half the building were from those markets or were fans of the other team. We were losing a lot of games, people weren’t happy and it wasn’t a great atmosphere. I do know I’m playing in a bigger hockey market here and that’s something I’m really looking forward to being a part of. I’m starting to come into my prime as a player. I’m at the age where I feel like I can actually be a factor on a team and play some big minutes. It was just icing on the cake that it was my hometown that I got traded to. I’m ready to be a factor here. My only focus is playing in the playoffs. I’d watch all the games on CBC and all I’d say to myself is how badly I want to be a part of that. All the attention guys get for playing in the playoffs and the buzz around the city. I saw it for myself when I was around the city. That’s something I’m really looking forward to being a part of.

-Here’s my assessment of Bryan Murray‘s tenure as the Senators GM

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

July 28, 2012
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: 1 Comment

-Ottawa signed their last RFA today as they gave Stephane Da Costa and one-year, two-way deal (reportedly for 800k).  Tim Murray said “We just feel if he can get stronger, get used to playing with higher competition and become a more consistent player away from the puck, that he’s got a chance to play in the National Hockey League.”  It’s a good deal for both sides as Da Costa has talent and deserves another season to see where he can take it.

–Mike Hoffman talked about how he sees himself in the organisation:

I think I’m right there. Once training camp comes around (in September), time will just tell. If you don’t have confidence playing hockey, you’re not going to play up to your potential. Confidence is a huge part of the game and if you have it, that helps you out that much more. You always want to get better, you always want to work on things. You’re never going to be perfect so if you can do that, you help yourself out a lot … I thought last year’s training camp was pretty good. I thought I played pretty well. Then I got a game (against Carolina) and I thought I fit in pretty good. I’ve just got to work hard (this summer) and just get bigger and stronger.

Randy Lee added:

What’s attractive about him is that he can score, he’s got a great shot, he sees the ice pretty well and he’s got really, really good speed. And he’s not afraid — he played with an edge. In his exit meeting after playing with the Black Aces, I think he made an impression on both Bryan and Paul with his real seriousness, that he’s committed to being a pro and wants to play for the Senators sooner rather than later. It was a change in his work ethic (that made the difference). Rather than thinking he was entitled to play, he realized that he had to work toward it and I think he did that. He’s shown that he’s willing to work hard and he showed with conviction that ‘I want to be a pro player and I want to help this team win.’ That made a real impression on those guys. He is willing to stick his nose in there and that’s what he’s got to do. Sometimes, you have guys with good speed who become perimeter players just because they’re able to (do that) with their speed. He’s got to learn that’s one of his threats, to go wide with speed, but other times he’s got to drive and get in the dirty areas. He can finish in tight and he’s got a great release. He’s got that flexibility to play the point on the power play, which he does on a big-time basis down (in Binghamton). He’s got a great one-timer, he moves the puck really well and he can move laterally pretty well. And he’s not a real detriment defending if he gets caught out there. He can skate well enough to defend.

Those are high words of praise.  I think the challenge for Hoffman is making a niche for himself as a third-line player, as it doesn’t look like his offensive talents are enough to make him a top-six forward.

–Jean-Gabriel Pageau talked about his chances of playing in Binghamton:

That’s my goal. I want to be in Bingo and help the team win. For me, it’s my personal goal. I’m going to work hard this summer to make sure that goal is going to be achieved. Mentally, I’m ready (to make the move), but I can improve more physically. I’m going to train hard this summer, come here with Chris and make sure I’m 100 per cent ready to go. Getting more strength is going to help my shot and my explosion on the ice, so for sure gaining more strength (is a goal) and it’s what I’ll work on this summer. I’m confident in myself and who I am. I know what I can do to help the team win. There is a great example in the NHL in Danny Briere and that’s what I try to follow. He’s a great example for me … We play hockey together in a league for fun (during the summer). He gives me good tips and I try to apply them when I can. He just tells me never to give up. People will say ‘you’re too small, you’re not going to make it.’ But he said if you just keep believing in your dream and keep working hard, it’s going to happen for you one day.

Randy Lee added:

He’s just got to prove that he can make the jump. It’s a huge jump — we always say they’ve got to respect that jump to the American league — and he’s got to prove he can make that jump and sort through the competition. Other guys ahead of him on the depth chart have got that one year (of pro) experience. We’ve taught him to look at guys like Wacey Hamilton, who went from being a 20-year-old (captain of the Medicine Hat Tigers) in the Western Hockey League to being in Binghamton, where he had to pay his dues and got stuck on the fourth line quite a bit. He had to deal with that frustration and we looked at how he handled that, and it was a good reflection on Wacey‘s character. We’ve talked to Jean-Gabriel about that, that it’s a harder transition than people think. You don’t just go on the top two lines (right away) and he’s a skilled, top-two line guy. So it’s going to be an adjustment for him. He’s worked hard. He’s made the commitment to come in with Chris Schwarz every day, and to be around Mark Borowiecki and Chris Neil and all those guys who are real workhorses in the gym. So that’s going to pay huge dividends for him. You overcome the size differential with compete, and he does that. In the Quebec league, he takes a beating. What we want to see is once teams start playing tough on you and targeting you, does your game change? And if your game doesn’t change, you’ve got what we like to make that transition to the pros. I think Jean-Gabriel can compete when the going gets tough.

These are cautionary words and do nothing to persuade me that Pageau won’t be sent back to the QMJHL for another season in junior (especially with all the forwards the Sens have signed).  There’s no need to rush and turn him pro.

–Bruce Garrioch engages in a lot of speculation but excluding the absurdities (like Dallas moving Brendan Morrow) he confirms the Sens have tried to trade Bobby Butler.

–Varada and Scott assess the Rick Nash speculation and I’m on board with Scott’s feelings that the rumoured package Ottawa was giving up for the Blue Jacket star was ridiculous.  It’s all moot regardless, since Nash was never interested in coming north.

–Stu Hackel doesn’t see the  Nash trade as completely disastrous for Columbus, but while I agree with him that the hyperbole over the deal is a little ridiculous his reasoning ultimately doesn’t change the fact that the Rangers did not give up much to get a certifiable top-line player.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

July 25, 2012
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: Leave a comment

-The Sens avoided arbitration with Kaspars Daugavins and signed him to a one-year, one-way deal (635k).  Tim Murray said:

Both sides got a number they thought was fair. We don’t have to go through the process of criticizing a player that you want in your organization and he doesn’t have to hear that or not understand the process completely. It’s good to get it done at a number that we liked and they obviously liked the one-way contract. Let’s hope he comes into camp ready to go. He has to come in like last year when he got called up. He has to be a responsible player. He has to play hard and he has to be effective on the penalty kill. If those things happen, maybe his role can grow from that situation. I think the coaches respect his game and aren’t afraid to put him on the ice certainly. Hopefully, he can grow his game from being a defensive player and a penalty killer to showing some of the skill that he has shown at every league except the NHL.

With the crowded forward group Bruce Garrioch echoes my speculation that Bobby Butler will be moved (bought out in Garrioch’s case, as Ottawa has a 48-hour window to do so).  James see’s the signing as an indication that the organisation doesn’t want the team to be full of rookies and agrees with my prediction back in May that only Jakob Silfverberg is likely to suit up with any regularity.

-We can finally say goodbye to all those absurd Rick Nash to Ottawa rumours as he was traded to the Rangers yesterday.  Howson is getting ripped for the deal, but he was never going to “win” the trade and I think he acquired more tangible assets (Anisimov, Dubinsky, Erixon, and a first-rounder) than Ottawa did in the Dany Heatley trade.  Senschirp wastes his time explaining his version of the process and why he kept bringing up the possibility of an Ottawa move, which seems pretty pointless.  Nash was never going to come to Ottawa, so whatever management did was completely irrelevant.  I’ll give Senschirp credit for admitting no one really knows what Ottawa offered–all the individuals named in the speculation seem to have come from Ottawa Sun reporters.

-Hockey stats geeks have much to comb through in The Legion of Blog‘s analysis of a Mike Gillis radio appearance.  Gillis was talking about hockey analytics and had a lot to say:

It’s different for different positions. For forwards it’s a combination of shots on net, quality of shots on net, location of shots on net versus time on ice. You know, there’s a number of stats that go into it, but one of the reasons that Moneyball was intriguing to me, was that—I taught about it at law school and talked about it a lot—was what happens when a team is forced to look at something differently. And forced to go against the grain and forced to change the rules to their benefit so they can be competitive. And the biggest thing that I got from Moneyball was not statistical analysis but it was that ability to think differently when you’re not forced to, when you want to. And when you want to create a different culture and a different environment. And the fact that they were successful that leads me to believe that you can be successful doing it without being forced to do it.
We do use advanced analytics to some measure. It’s more difficult in hockey than in baseball because baseball is a defined event. You’ve got 100 different things that go into player success. Who they play for, match ups they constantly play against. Their age. Injury history. So you’ve got lots of things that are determinant factors in hockey that can’t be properly analyzed just through analytics.In baseball you can. What we’ve done is look at things and try to design success, particularly for younger players, based on where they’re starting. And who they’re playing with and what situations they’re playing with and the number of minutes they play. And I’ve become convinced that you can really begin to enhance a young player’s ability by putting them in situations where they’re going to be able to succeed almost all the time and the only way you can do that is if you have the luxury of having a good team. If you don’t have, if you’re in a rebuilding stage or something that might not have the luxury to design those ice times the way you’d want, but here we’re fortunate, we have a good team, we can do what we want.
Well oddly enough we have looked at [passing efficiency] in soccer. And we put that in a very different context, we’ve looked at it relative to fatigue and conditioning and how you’re percentage of passing success is relative to your conditioning and the time in the game when you do it and how many minutes you’ve played. There are studies that we’ve looked at that indicate that passing percentage in soccer goes dramatically down depending on the time in the game or depending on the conditioning of the player. That’s through practice, that’s through defined, you know, not in the spontaneity of the game and so there are things from other sports that we’ve been trying to utilize as much as we can. The problem in our sport is that when you combine hitting and you combine puck battles, that takes it away from every other sport. We’re trying to define fatigue levels in those circumstances and as you know, a player usually gets hit twice when he gets hit once. He gets hit by the player and then hits the boards. How you can attribute that to success and how you attribute that to fatigue levels is instrumental in finding out when a player in the third period makes a mistake. And something happens and I think that as we’ve found, in a dynamic, competitive contact sport that fatigue levels are really a lot of the determining factor in success or failure.
You need defencemen who can handle big minutes because they’re constantly in today’s NHL being challenged, hit, challenged speed-wise in their own zone and then they have to make really good passes, outlet passes, and that’s what differentiates those great defencemen from the ones that are really good.

The blog points out that Gillis has experimented with boosting the stats of young players through offensive zone deployment. The Canucks have an unprecedented zone-start discrepancy.  It also talks about Pythagorean Expectation, a win-loss estimator based on goals for and against (which I’d never heard of), which Vancouver dominates in third periods.  It’s worth reading in full, although like the Corsi system it’s worth keeping in mind (as the blogger points out) that hockey analytics is in its infancy.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

July 24, 2012
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: 1 Comment