Personally, I expected a more dominating performance out of the Oil. The 4-0 final is a bit deceiving, I don't feel that it is indicative of the play.
Few observations:
- We beat a bad team, and we beat their backup goalie. Sad thing is, this is something we have struggled with in the past.
- Hemsky logged 20 minutes tonight, looks like MacT is rewarding his performers. Can't say much more about this kid, he gets better every game.
- Smid (22:15) and Staios (24:45) logged the most minutes on the blue line tonight. If Stevie signs for 2.6-2.9 Million over the next 4 years, I will be one happy camper. That man is worth every penny.
- Maybe it's too early to judge, but it seems like Lupul isn't a great fit for Hemmer-Sykora.
- Fourth line looked good, made the most of their minutes.
I'll have more later when I put together the clips package.
Sunday, October 29, 2006
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Lose This One and You're Dead To Me
After watching them play Vancouver last night I have come to the conclusion that only 3 things could possibly make Washington win: Ovechkin, Kolzig, and the Hockey Gods sense of humour.
Losing in Anaheim was frustrating. Losing in Phoenix was embarassing. Losing to the Caps, at home, would be unacceptable.
Losing in Anaheim was frustrating. Losing in Phoenix was embarassing. Losing to the Caps, at home, would be unacceptable.
MyTake: Oil @ Ducks 25th Oct 2006: Thoughts and Video.
- After watching the game a second time, I came to an obvious conclusion: the goaltending needed to be better. That 4th goal killed us, up to that point we were competing hard.
- We had some real fire during the PP that Stoll scored on. You could tell the boys wanted this game, it's too bad it didn't work out.
- Anaheim's D is not nearly as impressive as I expected it to be. They were easily exposed by good down low cycling.
- Matt Greene must be on some sort of referee shit list. Did he sleep with Kerry Fraser's Daughter or something.
- The BS "holding penalty" (The Oilers penalty to #2 Matt Greene, 2 minutes... for being Matt Greene, the time, 18:37) that Greene took led to an Anaheim goal.
- Getzlaf is one ugly kid.
- Selanne and Co. were invisible.
- First line was useless, they seem to be getting worse game by game. If I had to pick one, I'd say Horc's play was teh stinkiest. He didn't play his game at all, forced way too many pucks, and didn't convert on a couple golden chances.
- Pronger was matched up against Hemmer, Sykora and Thoreson, who were virtually held off the scoresheet (Hemmer, PPA). Clearly, Pronger has not lost a step.
- Good chemistry on the 3rd line, too bad Stoll hurt his back in practice.
- 4th line was damn good.
One more thing, I don't intend to discuss the Phoenix game; infact, there never was a game in Phoenix, it was all just a figment of my fevered imagination.
Thursday, October 26, 2006
Tonights Game on TVU
According to the Viidoo forum, tonights Oilers game will be broadcast on TVU. For those of you who missed my earlier blog on the subject, TVU is a peer to peer internet TV network.
Intestinal Parasites and Visits to the ER
You'll have to excuse my lack of updates, I have been under the weather for the last few days. I would talk about the Phoenix game, but I watched it while my brain was dying. So instead of the usual post game blurb, I will leave you with one important piece of advice:
If you are running a 39 degree fever, and have a history of getting REAL delirious when gettin' good an' fever'd, do not choose hockey as your medium of entertainment. It will fucking haunt you for hours, I spent at least 3 hours talking to myself about offsides and icings and Horcoff comes up the ice and Smytty just put it in and oh god why can't I stop thinking about hockey (this moment occurs once every 8-10 minutes, when your cognitive brain tries to assert itself on your consciousness only to be foiled seconds later by Hemmer dangles and Stoll blasts a shot from and...)
Fevers are not cool.
Once I finish appropriating the Anaheim game, I intend to watch it a second time and provide some sort of blog entry. Even though my early instinct says "Roli had an off night, end of story", I am still willing to waste two hours of my life in the name of objective analysis.
If you are running a 39 degree fever, and have a history of getting REAL delirious when gettin' good an' fever'd, do not choose hockey as your medium of entertainment. It will fucking haunt you for hours, I spent at least 3 hours talking to myself about offsides and icings and Horcoff comes up the ice and Smytty just put it in and oh god why can't I stop thinking about hockey (this moment occurs once every 8-10 minutes, when your cognitive brain tries to assert itself on your consciousness only to be foiled seconds later by Hemmer dangles and Stoll blasts a shot from and...)
Fevers are not cool.
Once I finish appropriating the Anaheim game, I intend to watch it a second time and provide some sort of blog entry. Even though my early instinct says "Roli had an off night, end of story", I am still willing to waste two hours of my life in the name of objective analysis.
Monday, October 23, 2006
TVU Player
Living outside of Alberta and don't have access to Centre Ice?
You need to get TVU; this great little program connects you to a peer to peer internet TV network. Just install and click on the NHL channel. Unfortunately they don't always broadcast Oiler games, but it's better than nothing. You can check out the pre-game broadcast schedule on this forum.
The Yotes-Oil game will be shown this evening; see you there!
You need to get TVU; this great little program connects you to a peer to peer internet TV network. Just install and click on the NHL channel. Unfortunately they don't always broadcast Oiler games, but it's better than nothing. You can check out the pre-game broadcast schedule on this forum.
The Yotes-Oil game will be shown this evening; see you there!
What the Hell is Going on in Phoenix?
Phoenix is a weird team. I like to think I'm a pretty smart guy, and most teams in the NHL make sense to me. I can see what the management is going for, even if I think what they are going for is absolutely insane. But Phoenix doesn't make any damn sense. I have no idea what Barnett and Gretzky are trying to accomplish most of the time. Lets leave aside Gretzky's coaching strategies for today and just focus on the player acquisition end. There's something seriously schizophrenic about Barnett's trade history. Watching him build that team is like being Homer Simpson trying to decide if frogurt is a good idea.
Briere for Gratton - That's bad.
Gratton and Vaananen for Ballard and Morris - That's Good!
Langkow for Gauthier and Saprykin - That's bad.
Westrum for Michalek - That's Good!
The weird turnover on defense last offseason is playing the role of potassium benzoate. You may not know its bad immediately, but it is. Mara for Boynton looks to make sense. There was lots of offensive talent on the blueline, and Mara was redundant so they traded him for a roughly equivalent defenseman who plays a different style. But then they gave Jovo 6.5 million dollars. If your old offensive defenseman was redudant, why did you spend all your cap space on Jovonoski? Did you feel that your team wasn't taking enough stupid penalties?
Still, you may say that he was an FA, no big deal. Except that spending that money on Jovo means that the Coyotes big offseason forward additions were Roenick and Nolan. Add to this relying on a goalie whose best before date was apparently December 05 and anyone who cared to think about it should have known this team was going down.
Does anyone really think the Coyotes wouldn't be better with Manny Legace in goal, someone like Tjarnqvist as the primary defensive addition and the savings of 5.3 million dollars spent turning Roenick and Nolan into forwards who would have been actually been useful?
They've got young talent there. Ballard and Michalek are legit NHLers and Yandle looks like a steal, but if you're going to suck, suck cheaply.
Honestly, I'm going to be disappointed in anything less than a blowout tonight. Phoenix is exactly the sort of team the Oilers should be able to shred. Hopefully the PP can get rolling tonight, it's starting to concern me. Historically, the Oilers play down to their competition. Beating up on Phoenix would be a small step towards fixing that problem.
Sunday, October 22, 2006
Wings @ Oilers: Oct 21st, 2006 - Post Game Thoughts Plus Video.
- First game with any real flow, thought we looked good 5vs5.
- Spent less time running around in our zone even strength. Our breakouts were much better.
- The powerplay was absolutely terrible. We spent more than half our PP time trying to gain the zone.
- The PK was great, the Wings had very few chances.
- Not sure why people are ragging on Lupul. He's done everything that should be expected of the kid. He comes back defensively, wins battles on the boards, and scores timely goals. Also, has anyone else noticed how chippy he is? He really seems to get under peoples skin.
- The Wings are great at diving.
- Tjarnqvist has looked great in his 25+ minutes a game. His 1.6 million dollar contract is turning out to be money VERY well spent.
- Horc won some key faceoffs; it's about time.
- When I was watching the game live, I thought Chopper had broken his arm (4-6 weeks) on Markov's helmet. I was very relieved when I found out he only had a separated shoulder (day to day).
- Showed a lot of character coming back after the Datsyuk goal. That whole series of unfortunate events could have been a massive momentum swing.
- Bergy had a mistake free game, and made 4 great plays (featured in the video).
- First game with any real flow, thought we looked good 5vs5.
- Spent less time running around in our zone even strength. Our breakouts were much better.
- The powerplay was absolutely terrible. We spent more than half our PP time trying to gain the zone.
- The PK was great, the Wings had very few chances.
- Not sure why people are ragging on Lupul. He's done everything that should be expected of the kid. He comes back defensively, wins battles on the boards, and scores timely goals. Also, has anyone else noticed how chippy he is? He really seems to get under peoples skin.
- The Wings are great at diving.
- Tjarnqvist has looked great in his 25+ minutes a game. His 1.6 million dollar contract is turning out to be money VERY well spent.
- Horc won some key faceoffs; it's about time.
- When I was watching the game live, I thought Chopper had broken his arm (4-6 weeks) on Markov's helmet. I was very relieved when I found out he only had a separated shoulder (day to day).
- Showed a lot of character coming back after the Datsyuk goal. That whole series of unfortunate events could have been a massive momentum swing.
- Bergy had a mistake free game, and made 4 great plays (featured in the video).
Thursday, October 19, 2006
Defending MAB
My MAB video seems to have caused quite a stir in the Oiler fan forum world:
http://edmontonoilers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=21210
http://hfboards.com/showthread.php?t=302473
What started primarily as an experimental foray into the art of internet video making turned into quite the shit storm. Part of the blame falls squarely on my shoulders; I had just created the accounts that I used to make the posts, and the the threads were started in a rather nonchalant manner. I think a lot of fans pegged me for a troll, bashing their players and team; I was the enemy. If these fans had actually taken the time to think about what I had created, and what tools I must have had at my disposal (in particular, EVERY oiler game on my computer) they would realize the folly in their assumption.
As I adamantly claimed in many of my replies in the aforementioned threads, I did not create this video with malicious intent. I was disappointed with Marc's performance thus far in the 06-07 campaign; however, I was not trying turn people against him. I decided to make a video and MAB's poor play was something fresh on my mind, so I went for it. I had a lot of fun making it, and would certainly do it again.
With no further adieu I present you with:
Marc-Andre Bergeron's First 6 Games of 2006-2007
http://edmontonoilers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=21210
http://hfboards.com/showthread.php?t=302473
What started primarily as an experimental foray into the art of internet video making turned into quite the shit storm. Part of the blame falls squarely on my shoulders; I had just created the accounts that I used to make the posts, and the the threads were started in a rather nonchalant manner. I think a lot of fans pegged me for a troll, bashing their players and team; I was the enemy. If these fans had actually taken the time to think about what I had created, and what tools I must have had at my disposal (in particular, EVERY oiler game on my computer) they would realize the folly in their assumption.
As I adamantly claimed in many of my replies in the aforementioned threads, I did not create this video with malicious intent. I was disappointed with Marc's performance thus far in the 06-07 campaign; however, I was not trying turn people against him. I decided to make a video and MAB's poor play was something fresh on my mind, so I went for it. I had a lot of fun making it, and would certainly do it again.
With no further adieu I present you with:
Marc-Andre Bergeron's First 6 Games of 2006-2007
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