Sens at Land's End

With my second pick in the NHL Re-Draft, I decided to try and give the Sens some long-needed stability in goal in the form of Cam Ward. Why Cam Ward? Well,

• He hasn’t had a lot of trouble with injuries in his career. No offense, Pascal Leclaire, but the fake Sens wanted someone who could probably be counted on to play about 60 games per season. (And now that I’ve said that, he’ll probably get hurt this year. Sorry Canes fans.)
• Playoff experience. As you can see, he’s won the Cup. He was also pretty much a machine for the Canes in the 2009 playoffs. He gives me confidence.
• Salary. I looked at the list of goalies still available, and my decision came down to Ward or Ryan Miller. (I just don’t trust Marc-Andre Fleury.) When I realized Ward’s cap hit is a very reasonable $2.667 million, compared to Miller’s $6.25 million, I felt the choice was obvious. Also, this is the last year of Ward’s contract so he’s bound to play well.
• Age. Have you ever wondered why Ward looks so young? In fact it’s because he’s technically still a child: having been born on February 29, 1984, he’s only celebrated his birthday six times. If he can play this well at such a young age, imagine him when he actually becomes draft eligible.

At some point I’m going to follow Double Edged Sabres’ lead and make a depth chart of the fake Sens. For now, our team consists of only Ward and Rick Nash. Good building blocks, I hope. It’ll be a while before I pick again, so where do I go next? What would your strategy be?

I check my email when I got to work this morning and discovered it was my turn to pick in the Cycle Like the Sedins NHL Re-Draft. Naturally, I postponed all work so I could devote some time to coming up with the best possible choice for my Sens team.

There were several factors to take into account: this is a 30-team fantasy draft, and while the draft order snakes so I do get to pick again in the #36 slot, it’s going to be a long time between my second and third picks. I therefore wanted to pick a player I felt could carry a significant load for my team, just in case I’m not able to draft ideal players to complement him later on. We are also working within the constraints of the NHL salary cap, so that’s an important factor.

In the end I was torn between using my first pick to take a great forward or a great goalie. While it’s obviously very important to have reliable talent in goal (ask the real Sens about that one), I believe it’s also very risky to depend on any goalie to be reliable (again, ask the real Sens). With Henrik Lundqvist, Roberto Luongo, and Martin Brodeur already gone, there weren’t any goalies I felt strongly enough about taking with my first pick left.

So, I settled on a forward. That forward is … drumroll please …

Read more

Happy Jason Spezza Wedding Day, now with 100% less Heatley!

Alas, the Senators still have the same amount of Heatley. Will anyone ever take this guy off our hands? I’m starting to think the answer is no. Let’s all give a big thanks to Heatley for being such a ginormous douchebag that no one will now touch him.

There’s nothing I can do about this in the real world, unless I somehow brainwash an NHL GM, or take over one’s life. I actually have done this to Bryan Murray in the virtual world, where I am playing the role of GM for your Ottawa Senators in the Re-Draft the League project over at Cycle Like the Sedins. My task is to build a new Sens team using current NHL players, within the constraints of the NHL salary cap. I have been given the 24th overall pick to work with, which unfortunately means that a lot of the really super high class talent in the league will be gone by the time I get up to the (metaphorical) podium with my jersey and hat for my pick to proudly put on before he poses for a photo op with me and my staff.

Here’s how the picking has gone so far:

1. Calgary Flames – Alexander Ovechkin
2. Vancouver Canucks – Sidney Crosby
3. Tampa Bay Lightning – Henrik Lundqvist
4. Dallas Stars – Evgeni Malkin
5. Chicago Blackhawks – Jonathan Toews
6. New York Islanders – Nicklas Lidstrom
7. Philadelphia Flyers – Pavel Datsyuk
8. Edmonton Oilers – Zach Parise
9. Nashville Predators – Ryan Getzlaf
10. Atlanta Thrashers – Vincent Lecavalier
11. St. Louis Blues – Roberto Luongo
12. Phoenix Coyotes – Mike Green
13. Pittsburgh Penguins – Ilya Kovalchuk

Still to pick before me: the Caps, Blue Jackets, Red Wings, Kings, Wild, Hurricanes, Rangers, Devils, Leafs and Sharks.

So what do you think, Sens fans? What direction should I take in re-building our team? Build from the goal crease out? Pick a franchise forward? A superstar defenceman? It’s a lot to consider.

Much will depend, of course, on who’s left by the time I pick. The only thing I can confirm at this point is that the Ottawa Senators will not be taking Dany Heatley with their first round pick.

So let’s see. First Dany Heatley demanded a trade out of Ottawa because he didn’t like his boss. Then he refused to leave when he didn’t like the destination offered to him. Through all this, he hasn’t spoken a word to the media. And now it appears he’s dodging Daniel Alfredsson’s calls. (To be fair, I guess if I were as much of a sucky baby as Heatley is, I’m not sure I could face talking to Alfie either.)

In the spirit of maturity and respectful communication Heatley has fostered throughout this whole situation, here is an open letter, to which he will never respond.

Dear Douchebag,

Grow a pair.

Sincerely,

Sens at Land’s End

Apologies for the lack of posting lately. I find myself having a much busier summer than I’d like.

Although the biggest move that will (hopefully) take place this offseason has yet to occur and the Sens are still in possession of one stupid grumpy sniper, they have made a couple of moves lately. Most notably, they’ve signed Alex Kovalev, recently of the Montreal Canadiens, to a two-year, $10 million deal ($5 million cap hit). I’m not wild about this signing for a few reasons.

1. That’s a lot of money.
2. Kovalev is 36 years old, which makes it seem like an especially high amount of money.
3. Kovalev has a reputation as an inconsistent player who takes frequent nights off. Not to beat a dead horse, but again: that’s a lot of money to pay someone who might spend a third of his time floating.

I also just plain don’t like Kovalev. Granted, my dislike may be less related to Kovalev himself than to the fact that I find almost anything in a Montreal jersey completely obnoxious. When I see him in Sens colours I might well become his biggest fan. I hope so.

This is a signing that, in theory, helps the Sens by adding some offense. That’s always a good thing. It’s not that elusive secondary scoring we’ve been hearing about for years — recent events should soon rob us of a third of our primary scoring — but it’s still good. It’s also great to have that top six forward we needed — except that, due to recent events, we actually needed two. But I guess we can’t have everything.

The other recent player move is the trade of Alex Auld to the Dallas Stars for a sixth round draft pick. This is something I’m not on board with. Auld was one of the few bright spots in the 2007-2008 season and I liked him. I also liked the team’s goaltending depth with Pascal Leclaire and Auld on the big team, and Brian Elliott starting another season in Binghamton. Now it looks as though we have Leclaire starting, Elliott backing up, and the recently-signed Mike Brodeur next in line for a spot on the NHL roster in the unlikely event *cough* that something should happen to one of them. Greeeeeaaaaaat. I know, in the big picture this isn’t something that’s going to have a gigantic impact on the team next season. Still, I don’t really see the point.

In other news, the Sens have announced their 2009-2010 preseason schedule. It features games in Halifax (against the Panthers) and Regina (against the Lightning). My mother lives in Regina and she tells me that game has already sold out. Here is the full schedule:

Sept. 15: Ottawa vs. Florida, 6 p.m. (Halifax)
Sept. 16: Ottawa vs. Florida, 7 p.m.
Sept. 18: Ottawa at Montreal, 7:30 p.m.
Sept. 19: Ottawa vs. Montreal, 7 p.m.
Sept. 21: Ottawa  vs. Tampa Bay, 9 p.m. (Regina)
Sept. 25: Ottawa vs. Boston, 7 p.m.

According to various sources, the NHL is likely to announce its full schedul for 2009-2010 on Wednesday afternoon. I hope to make a post about that once I’ve finished adding all the games to my Google Calendar. Woo hoo!