Last night the Pittsburgh Penguins showed everyone that they are one of the teams that really has a chance this year to take the Cup. Still playing without their captain Sidney Crosby and now also without leading defenseman Kris Letang, they easily beat Colorado Avalanche, a team desperately clinging for their chance to make it to the playoffs. And this all on a night where some of the other big teams (Vancouver, Boston, San Jose) stumbled with losses. What made Penguin's feat even more impressing was that the guys scoring the goals came throughout the lineup. NHL scoring leader Evgeni Malkin contributed one goal, which was expected. Other four came from rare scorers; Arron Asham (3rd), Deryk Engelland (4th), Richard Park (6th) and Steve Sulliven (13th). This team really has the winning spirit and will be hard to contain.
On the West, Los Angeles is showing signs of finally waking up with their impressive lineup. The whole season they're been solid defensively, but haven't been able to score. Now, after the acquisition of troubled star forward Jeff Carter from lowly Blue Jackets, they seem to have found some confidence. With San Jose Sharks in free fall and other bubble teams struggling to find another gear, the city of angels might well find themselves in the top eight when the regular season ends.
Showing posts with label Malkin. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Malkin. Show all posts
2012/02/22
Top dogs
Let's walk away from the trade speculation for a short while and review the biggest point producers of late. The top of overall scoring list has very few surprises, both in and out. But lately there's been a few guys that have shown a reignited passion to break through to the scoring race.
Leading the pack is maybe the number one candidate for Art Ross trophy, Pittsburgh's Evgeni Malkin. He has a steady team to back him up and seems to love the spotlight while Sidney Crosby is out. Malkin is a monster in every aspect on the ice. Big, strong, shoots a lot and makes plays like the best of them. With confidence up, this guy is practically unstoppable. He seems also to possess somewhat unique ability to explode for 5 points every now and then (three times this season!). A feat not many have pulled out ever despite having tremendously successfull careers. Malkin is on a continuous hot streak with 6+8 in last ten games. A minus one rating is maybe a small dent in February.
Chasing Malkin is Tampa Bay's and the whole league's number one sniper, Steven Stamkos. This boy is on fire and is really aiming for the scoring title to go with his somewhat sure Rocket Richard trophy for most goals. Stamkos' shot is just phenomenal and it's going to be fun to watch this kid score for years to come. He might end up with a number in career goals column that only few can dream of. Last ten games he's gone through the roof with 9+7 and positive plus minus rating on a team that's going to fail to make it to the playoffs. Tough to beat.
The third kid on the top three is Philly's Claude Giroux. He's also only 24 and starts to fill all expectations set for him and more. He's been really consistent while the team has gone up and down throughout the season. January saw Giroux fall from the scoring lead but now he's back, making a statement that it won't be easy to walk over him on this one. Giroux has sort of sneaked into superstardom this season and it's really interesting to see if he really is this good. Malkin and Stamkos already have some silverware for memories. Giroux is 5+10 in the last ten games, but also falling to -3 to raise some questions.
Chasing these three kids we can see some slightly more experienced guys with rising productivity. Ottawa's Jason Spezza is really on fire with 8+9 in last ten and has brought the surprising Senators to almost sure playoff spot with his heroics. Some praise must be thrown to amazing young blueliner Erik Karlsson for coming up with massive offensive numbers to complement Spezza's feats.
Another late season blast comes from New Jersey in form of always so thrilling Ilya Kovalchuk. He's got the most points in the last ten in the league if you don't count Edmonton's Sam Gagner and his 8 point night. 6+12 and counting for Ilya, and he's stepped it up on even strength too to rack up +5 during the stretch. Spending 100M on this guy may feel just a little bit less painful for the ownership when Kovalchuk is on this mode. The dude is one of the fastest out there and sized like a bull. Throw in his shot that pales to no one and this is what you should expect. Hopefully Devils can keep Parise and Elias to set Kovy up also in the future.
Some of the all season top ten guys seem to have run out of steam a bit.. well if you can call point per game that. There's Toronto's wonder pair Kessel-Lupul and Vancouver's identically scoring Sedin twins. Steadily following also Mr. Selke, Pavel Datsuyk and Buffalo's brightest star, Jason Pominville. All of these are still within a striking distance, should the big guns relax a little.
It'll be extremely tight this year and the big prize seems to fall for one of the young bucks. Hurray for modern NHL and skill hockey.
Leading the pack is maybe the number one candidate for Art Ross trophy, Pittsburgh's Evgeni Malkin. He has a steady team to back him up and seems to love the spotlight while Sidney Crosby is out. Malkin is a monster in every aspect on the ice. Big, strong, shoots a lot and makes plays like the best of them. With confidence up, this guy is practically unstoppable. He seems also to possess somewhat unique ability to explode for 5 points every now and then (three times this season!). A feat not many have pulled out ever despite having tremendously successfull careers. Malkin is on a continuous hot streak with 6+8 in last ten games. A minus one rating is maybe a small dent in February.
Chasing Malkin is Tampa Bay's and the whole league's number one sniper, Steven Stamkos. This boy is on fire and is really aiming for the scoring title to go with his somewhat sure Rocket Richard trophy for most goals. Stamkos' shot is just phenomenal and it's going to be fun to watch this kid score for years to come. He might end up with a number in career goals column that only few can dream of. Last ten games he's gone through the roof with 9+7 and positive plus minus rating on a team that's going to fail to make it to the playoffs. Tough to beat.
The third kid on the top three is Philly's Claude Giroux. He's also only 24 and starts to fill all expectations set for him and more. He's been really consistent while the team has gone up and down throughout the season. January saw Giroux fall from the scoring lead but now he's back, making a statement that it won't be easy to walk over him on this one. Giroux has sort of sneaked into superstardom this season and it's really interesting to see if he really is this good. Malkin and Stamkos already have some silverware for memories. Giroux is 5+10 in the last ten games, but also falling to -3 to raise some questions.
Chasing these three kids we can see some slightly more experienced guys with rising productivity. Ottawa's Jason Spezza is really on fire with 8+9 in last ten and has brought the surprising Senators to almost sure playoff spot with his heroics. Some praise must be thrown to amazing young blueliner Erik Karlsson for coming up with massive offensive numbers to complement Spezza's feats.
Another late season blast comes from New Jersey in form of always so thrilling Ilya Kovalchuk. He's got the most points in the last ten in the league if you don't count Edmonton's Sam Gagner and his 8 point night. 6+12 and counting for Ilya, and he's stepped it up on even strength too to rack up +5 during the stretch. Spending 100M on this guy may feel just a little bit less painful for the ownership when Kovalchuk is on this mode. The dude is one of the fastest out there and sized like a bull. Throw in his shot that pales to no one and this is what you should expect. Hopefully Devils can keep Parise and Elias to set Kovy up also in the future.
Some of the all season top ten guys seem to have run out of steam a bit.. well if you can call point per game that. There's Toronto's wonder pair Kessel-Lupul and Vancouver's identically scoring Sedin twins. Steadily following also Mr. Selke, Pavel Datsuyk and Buffalo's brightest star, Jason Pominville. All of these are still within a striking distance, should the big guns relax a little.
It'll be extremely tight this year and the big prize seems to fall for one of the young bucks. Hurray for modern NHL and skill hockey.
2011/10/12
From Russia with love
I happened to browse some news, posts and comments on Matt Bradley's alleged radio criticism towards former Washington Capitals teammate Alexander Semin. This study led to more comments on Semin's inconsistent performances, lack of commitment and so forth. This rung a bell in similarity on articles about so many other Russian players. Alexei Kovalev comes to my mind first. Is it really a national characteristic of Russians to pull this kind of spotlight for themselves or is this just some last remains of the good old cold war in the minds of US-centric media?
In regards of Bradley's comments after leaving the team, I believe that's part of being rather young and inexperienced and getting lured into this kind of talk by the interviewer. Stupid, against the players' code of honor and outright bad for karma and career for sure. But somewhat innocent in the end. He'll be hearing about this for a while and will learn to keep his mouth shut on topics like this. Players in general stand for each others like in any team sport, only highlighting the most outrageous behavior of certain individuals. Rest of the yapping remains in the rink and locker rooms.
What comes to Russian star players in the NHL. It seems like forever since the first guys jumped over to play in the States. Since that the Soviet Union has collapsed and borders have opened. KHL has come in to offer an local language alternative. The world has changed a lot. Still, some of the writers, many of the league elderly statesmen, owners, GMs etc. are old school and don't realize that nationality isn't very important these days. It's just a job and a business. Where wouldn't we be outsourcing tasks these days?
So, I'm leaning on the side of prejudice. Guys like Semin and Kovalev have proven to be world class players. You don't score almost a point per game in NHL without extreme talent. Of course these individuals are mostly offensive weapons and save themselves for those tasks instead of grinding out the pucks in the corners or finding lanes to deliver massive checks. They have the softest hands in the league and those skills will go out in a puff of smoke after few broken wrists or separated shoulders. Not to mention the flying speed that can't really take that many torn knee tendons before the career is over. There's different shaped guys for the hard work in all teams and it's hard to put these two types of players in comparison.
Stats tell that regular season favors the guys with offensive skill and speed, but playoffs turn the scales towards hard work and never-die attitude. That shouldn't really be much of a surprise to anyone in the business. It's a long season and everything is on the line in the end. It would be hard to not get the jitters on the final push towards the ultimate reward. Guys are also banged up and tired after 82 games of regular season. There might not be enough left in the tank to pull off some of the fastest spurts or finest moves in the postseason.
If you compare Semin and Kovalev to fellow countrymen Ovechkin and Malkin, what makes a difference in the public attitude? Ovechkin loves the spotlight, he's at home as a hockey celebrity. And he has a nasty edge, some Canadian blood perhaps? Malkin is a shy and silent guy too, but has won the public over with simple talent and undeniable productivity on the rink. Another bad season for him and he'll be in the same doghouse with Semin. Be it injuries or anything else, it's just going to be unfair.
The teams are paying millions to the coaching teams that seem to fail in getting everything out of these star players at times. I wonder how their professionalism is evaluated in those spots. They should be gutsy enough to tell who's going to jump in the box at what times and not whine about it later if they've played 25 minutes some guys who don't seem to have the energy. If it's grind time, don't throw in the artists.
I see another massively productive season for Semin, even playing on the second line behind Ovie and Backström. And Washington will make a big mistake if they let this guy leave instead of talking things through along the season. Get a freakin' interpreter if the kid doesn't speak English.
Kovalev already left when he had enough. He has nothing more to prove in his age and he'll be happy playing out his career in Russia.
I'd like to end this post with an opinion that the NHL would be way less entertaining as a league without the Russian (and other Eastern block) players. The media should realize that and embrace the differences in the playing style instead of judging without looking any deeper.
In regards of Bradley's comments after leaving the team, I believe that's part of being rather young and inexperienced and getting lured into this kind of talk by the interviewer. Stupid, against the players' code of honor and outright bad for karma and career for sure. But somewhat innocent in the end. He'll be hearing about this for a while and will learn to keep his mouth shut on topics like this. Players in general stand for each others like in any team sport, only highlighting the most outrageous behavior of certain individuals. Rest of the yapping remains in the rink and locker rooms.
What comes to Russian star players in the NHL. It seems like forever since the first guys jumped over to play in the States. Since that the Soviet Union has collapsed and borders have opened. KHL has come in to offer an local language alternative. The world has changed a lot. Still, some of the writers, many of the league elderly statesmen, owners, GMs etc. are old school and don't realize that nationality isn't very important these days. It's just a job and a business. Where wouldn't we be outsourcing tasks these days?
So, I'm leaning on the side of prejudice. Guys like Semin and Kovalev have proven to be world class players. You don't score almost a point per game in NHL without extreme talent. Of course these individuals are mostly offensive weapons and save themselves for those tasks instead of grinding out the pucks in the corners or finding lanes to deliver massive checks. They have the softest hands in the league and those skills will go out in a puff of smoke after few broken wrists or separated shoulders. Not to mention the flying speed that can't really take that many torn knee tendons before the career is over. There's different shaped guys for the hard work in all teams and it's hard to put these two types of players in comparison.
Stats tell that regular season favors the guys with offensive skill and speed, but playoffs turn the scales towards hard work and never-die attitude. That shouldn't really be much of a surprise to anyone in the business. It's a long season and everything is on the line in the end. It would be hard to not get the jitters on the final push towards the ultimate reward. Guys are also banged up and tired after 82 games of regular season. There might not be enough left in the tank to pull off some of the fastest spurts or finest moves in the postseason.
If you compare Semin and Kovalev to fellow countrymen Ovechkin and Malkin, what makes a difference in the public attitude? Ovechkin loves the spotlight, he's at home as a hockey celebrity. And he has a nasty edge, some Canadian blood perhaps? Malkin is a shy and silent guy too, but has won the public over with simple talent and undeniable productivity on the rink. Another bad season for him and he'll be in the same doghouse with Semin. Be it injuries or anything else, it's just going to be unfair.
The teams are paying millions to the coaching teams that seem to fail in getting everything out of these star players at times. I wonder how their professionalism is evaluated in those spots. They should be gutsy enough to tell who's going to jump in the box at what times and not whine about it later if they've played 25 minutes some guys who don't seem to have the energy. If it's grind time, don't throw in the artists.
I see another massively productive season for Semin, even playing on the second line behind Ovie and Backström. And Washington will make a big mistake if they let this guy leave instead of talking things through along the season. Get a freakin' interpreter if the kid doesn't speak English.
Kovalev already left when he had enough. He has nothing more to prove in his age and he'll be happy playing out his career in Russia.
I'd like to end this post with an opinion that the NHL would be way less entertaining as a league without the Russian (and other Eastern block) players. The media should realize that and embrace the differences in the playing style instead of judging without looking any deeper.
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