Huh!?

Kings made two moves.  They are equally good and bad.  First, the bad.  Kings signed JS Aubin to a one-year deal.  From the TSN story, "Aubin, 30, played in 20 games last season with the Toronto Maple Leafs and had a 3-5-2 record, a 3.34 goals-against-average and a .876 save percentage."  Is the idea to have someone in the locker room that can relate to Cloutier?  Or do they need to make Labarbera look that much better, by having him outplay two guys?  They said that teams would start copying the Ducks, but getting your own marble mouth is not the way to do it.  There was already one too many Jean-Sebastian goalies in the greater Los Angeles area, don't need more.  (I think one sign of the Apocalypse is supposedly three JS goales in SoCal.)  But, the Kings also signed Dave Lewis as assistant coach.  Good move.  There aren't many assistant coaches better than him.  Just don't expect him to take over for Crawford; as good as Lewis is an assistant coach, he's proven to be a bad/ineffective head coach.  I have no doubts that Lewis will speed the learning curve for all the kids on the Kings, he's a great teacher.

Ugly

Here is the new Senators logo and jerseys.  First, the good points.  I like the colors and the fact that the stripes and banding around the sleeves and bottom of the jersey are gone.  The shoulder patches feature an old skool Senators logo which is simple and clean.  The bad?  I never liked this logo when it was on the third jersey.  They cleaned it up, but it only shows that the base design is bad to begin with.  The new numbers are generic.  I liked that the old jerseys featured numbers that looked oversized and had a unique font.  The new numbers look anorexic by comparison.  In fact, the only redeeming quality about the Sens jersey was the numbering, now that is gone.  At least I'm not rushing out to by a new Senators jersey or hat with this new logo.  Better luck next logo change...

Foppa

I've heard rumors in the last week about the Senators being interested in Forsberg for next season.   I was pretty doubtful at first, since the Sens don't really have the cap room for Forsberg, unless he is willing to take less money to be on a Cup Finals team. But the rumor was more or less confirmed by a story on TSN today.  I have very mixed feelings about Forsberg joining the team.  Didn't they learn from the Hasek experiment?  Old, injury prone players will let you down come crunch time.  But speaking of Hasek, he rebounded to play a full season and playoffs for a surprising Wings team last year.  Maybe the Sens are counting on being the "rebound team" after Nashville had their own failed Forsberg Experiment last season.  I guess I'm just too much of a fan.  I was burned by JR coming to the Kings; while he did plenty of PR work and got on plenty of local TV shows, he was never really in hockey shape.  And I have always liked Forsberg, too.  So the last thing I want to see is Forsberg injured for 45 games, then half of his former self upon returing, and injured come Playoff time.  But the guy is still pretty good at only 75%, so I can see why teams are still interested in rolling the dice with him.  Murray mentioned friendship with Alfredsson and a contending team as reasons for coming to Ottawa.  And that is an interesting concept.  Both Swedes are about the same age, Alfredsson would put up big numbers playing 80 games with Forsberg.  Not only do they possess incredible skill, but the Heatley/Spezza line would have to be respected as well; so basically Forsberg gets second line duty, avoiding the opponent's top defensive pairing.  The other teams courting Forsberg are in the West.  I think the smart move is to go to the East and not get as banged-up all season.  The West sports some big, physical teams that are a receipe for re-injury.  So, unless he really wants to head back to Colorado to finish off his career, it might not be a bad move to pick Ottawa.  The only downside is that some cap room has to be made.  And as much as I am talking myself into thinking that this is a good idea, the sacrifice of any young player on the roster is not worth Forsberg's health gamble.  So unless Murray can do some salary cap magic, I probably won't be happy to see Forsberg on the Senators.

Sens Signings

Sens have signed a few more players.  Luke Richardson and Jim O'Brien.  Richardson is older than dirt and clearly at the end of his career.  I think this is the "Rob Blake" signing; which is having a veteran mentor your young defensemen and he gets to play near home.  At least the Sens aren't really paying Richardson anything and aren't counting on him to actually play big minutes in games.  O'Brien was this year's late first round pick.  I was surprised that they signed him so soon.  But I guess he was a very young 18 year old playing 4th line duty in college.  At least this way he can play minutes at a pro level, probably ECHL.

New Uni's

I went to the Sharks website the other night for a reason I have long since forgotten, but noticed that the Shark logo looks better than ever.  After a little research, I've found out that several teams are changing or 'refreshing' their logos.  Its a good time to do it, since next season is the start of the form fitting Reebok jerseys.  Which brings me to the Senators.  They have applied for logo patents in Canada, to revise their logo.  I really do not care for the Senators jerseys or logo.  And the new changes are pretty minor, better, but still minor.  I don't like the 3/4 profile senator face that was on the 3rd jerseys; and I understand that it will be the main logo.  Too bad.  At least I don't have to rush out and buy a new jersey.

Kings

I guess Mike Cammalleri went through with his arbitration hearing.  I have to believe that there will be lingering hard feelings.  On the one hand, he was the leading scorer and has steadily increased his production each year without much of a team around him.  I would think that warrants a raise.  But I think it is hard for most teams to give big money to small sized players unless they are Kariya or St. Louis.  I'm wondering just where he fits in the rebuilding process, in Lombardi's eyes.  I also see him as a player that eventually gets away, and has success elsewhere.  (That sounds like the Dave Taylor era Kings....)

 

Was talking to a definite Kings fan on 4th of July.  He liked the signings that Lombardi made.  I do too, but don't put a whole lot of hope on them either.  I  mostly liked the short length of the deals.  If they all come together, he will look like a genius.  But if nothing happens, these guys' tryout is over and time to move on; without a lasting salary cap problem.  Kinda win-win.  Calder-Handzus-Nagy will help take the stress off Frolov and Kopitar.  And that seems to be the main point, getting some "mature" players that are still under 30, to add stability to the team without making it "old".  All of these forwards have question marks in their games, whether injury or consistency, so let's roll the dice and see what we get.  On defense, Preissing is highly under-rated in my mind and surprisingly versatile (on a very good Senators team).  Stuart is a little over-rated, but having two mobile defensemen is a big addition.  One of the better moves was the subtraction of Mathieu "Off Angle" Garon.  I wish him well, but don't mind seeing him leave LA.

 

I'm excited to see how the rookie players develop most of all.  It will be great to see Jason LaBarbera in net again.  He will be a definite wild card for next season; but he absolutlely tore-up the AHL last year, which will be great for his confidence.  I am still waiting for Dustin Brown to take the next step as a power forward, but I said that this time last year; and he seemed to take a step backward last season.  Jack Johnson will most likely get a year of mentoring from Rob Blake.  I've been waiting to see if the huge, Brian Boyle makes the team this year.  O'Sullivan will probably get his shot at full time NHL duty.  Tukonen will hopefully "pull a Kopitar" and impress right out of the gate, continuing the successful draft of relatively unknown euros.

 

Lots of unknowns.  Which is fun now.  But I didn't make it through December last year; before I was not watching the Kings games regularly.  PLEASE give me a reason to watch for the whole season. 

Ready?

Well, the Sens managed to avoid arbitration with Emery, Schubert and Kelly.  That's probably a good thing.  There tend to be hard feelings after an arbitration hearing; as it's hard for players to hear team management and coaching staff tear down their ability.  Which brings me to Sean Avery.  I guess he was 'shocked' that the Rangers called him out as a selfish player.  What did he think an arbitration hearing was about?  At least they didn't say "media hog" or "cancer to the team".

 

Anyway, the Sens roster appears to be set.  There's some room for a rookie to make the team, but no clear intention of bringing anyone up like with Kaigorodov last year.  I wish him well with the Coyotes, but he seemed far from ready to play North American style hockey.  Giving away Comrie and trading Schaefer will open up some premium ice time.  I'm hoping that Eaves, Kelly and Vermette are given a chance for quality ice time.  Eaves has a ton of heart and plays a nice power forward game in high traffic areas.  Kelly has solid game, and put up points when playing with Heater and Spezza for a limited time last year.  Vermette has a ton of skill, i think he lead the team in shorthanded goals, but can be more than a PK specialist. Time to see what these guys can do. I think at least two of them will be on the 1st or 2nd line by mid-season.  Donovan and Dimitrakos are new additions.  I think Donovan is a good checker, which is what the team needs.  Dimitrakos is probably more of an experiment?

 

Now it will be pretty slow until training camp.  Most of the free agents have been signed.  August is a slow month.