Bulin Clears

well, nobody wanted him for 6.75 mil. not too big of a surprise. lets' see who wants him for half of that.
supposing he does report to rockford. i'm willing to be that somewhere out there dale has a partner for a trade (or multiple partners) it seems that waiving him doesn't really solve the issue except financially. the locker-room is going to be a mess if we don't add someone before the season. sure, this leaves us an opening to sign some kids and maybe someone around the deadline, but we need to add a center now. we can package some of our prospects and pull down someone who will be a decent stopgap for not a lot of money, i'm sure.
i'll keep updating as this plays out.

Khabibulin on waivers

how they got the balls to do this, i'll never know.
interesting to see how this works out.

Turco is a Jerk-O

there's a lot to talk about i guess. got to go to my first hawks game of the year with mikey yesterday and it was great.
it felt incredible just to be in the building and see the ice. all the characters were back in the building and i forgot how much i missed just talking to people about the hawks. the boys came out of the gates real real strong and ended up on the powerplay right away. capt. serious had us up by one before i even realized what had happened. banked it off of their goalie (who looked kinda tepid the whole night) and Bam! Hawks up by one. let me just say that Brian Campbell is going to be worth every cent if he continues skating the way he is right now. our entrances into the zone last night were incredible (everyone remembers last year, and this was a serious problem) thanks in a large part to Campbell.
I'll admit Campbell has got some work to do learning how to play with his new teammates, and positionally, looked a little lost on the powerplay sometimes. it is preseason so i'm trying to cut the boys some slack on the positional shit, since they're not true linemates yet, but it was sloppy at times.
regardless, soupy had four assists and it seemed that he was ALWAYS on the ice. he was wearing an 'a' as well which i think may be a little premature.
skille looked amazing, and was skating his ass off. easily one of the best conditioned of the kids, he got a great goal off a backhander after a great pass from soupy.
it was great to see kyle beach play as well. as a draft pick this year there's a whole bunch of expectations on him because of the people we've drafted in the past three or four years. he has a ton of grit and is a big big boy. by far the most impressive trait is a simple one. every time the whistle blew for a stoppage the first thing beacher did was take his mouth guard out of his mouth so sean avery could hear exactly what he was saying. beach agitated the avery/ott line for the entire first period, finally getting ott to take a stupid penalty which got him thrown out of the game and the hawks a four minute powerplay (which we scored on).
remind me please of a game where the hawks had scored three powerplay goals?
i know it's early to start the 'all hail dale' chants but it sure looks real nice right now.
niemi also looked incredible in net. at times there were some punk moments, but for the most part, there were two goals that he certainly couldn't take all the blame for (i'm looking at you doug janik or whatever the fuck your name is) and he was so quick with his pads from side to side in the crease that even savvy was getting pumped at points.
the big question is...where's khabby?

khabibulin was listed as the starter for the game all week and when we showed up and saw crawfs and niemi it was a little confusing.
khabby wasn't even dressed.
this is interesting because if you read the post just below you can how i've done a wonderful job of jinxing.
there is talk of nik and "blue chip d-prospect" heading out to the east.
now, if he goes to the eastern conference the only team that makes sense is ottawa. there is talk of gerber coming back, but i really don't think that trading one underachieving/overpaid goaltender for another is in dale's plans for success. gerber weighs in at almost four million to khabby's 6.75, whereas if we were to take on vermette (who fills a much needed hole at center) we'd be much better off. ottawa has little need/use for vermette and has a huge need for a goalie and would love to bring barker up in a system where he has the potential to play behind the best forward line in the NHL. After losing Mezaros this off-season, Barks makes perfect sense. Sure, i would be a little hesitant of just throwing Barker in on a trade for the sake of getting rid of Khabby, but if it means that we'll be able to sign our prospects and get them into the NHL this year, i'm ready to take the chance. Not to mention, if we can land Vermette it will open up the lines positionally and prevent either of the Patricks from having to play center.

We'll see, should be a busy day and i'll keep updating as i see it

Great Khabibulin quote:

good to hear him get behind the motto from last year.
Habby "committing to the indian" could solve a lot of problems.

http://www.thefourthperiod.com/news/chi080920.html

The Chicago Blackhawks as a potential girlfriend...

see, i've thought about it.
the parallels are kinda scary.
you know right before a girl breaks up with you something flips.
she starts dressing nicer, being way cooler about how fucked up you got last night, and generally giving you the space you've wanted all along...then, you find out it's because she's trying to pick up dudes at rainbo or something and everything starts to fall in place. the things that were making you feel the relationship were going better end up being the message that self-destructs before you can read it.

i have a sneaking suspicion that this analogy might apply to our Hawks this year.

with all of the hullaballoo about how much better the hawks are, how much better their tickets are selling, and how much we have to look forward to, a simple assessment of our roster leads us in another direction.
Yes, on paper our defense is better.
But, will someone please take a quick peek at our first two lines?:
SHARP TOEWS KANE
??????? KONTIOLA/BOLLAND HAVLAT

havlat hasn't played sixty games since '03.
kontiola and bolland are unproven like a motherfucker.
there is no left wing.
before his season last year, the idea putting patrick sharp on the first line with your youngest studs would've made nostradamus blush.

yeah, we beat the blue jackets last night in the preseason.
why does this make media outlets jump on the idea that the hawks should be booking flights to disneyworld?

things are going good, but why is chicago unable to balance their excitement?

ticket sales are going up too, which is due in a large part to the fact that season ticket holders get a shot to buy winter classic seats before anyone else. likely, a package of season tickets for some people pays for itself the second the seats to the classic get put up on stubhub. not to mention the crowd of douche nozzles that are going to be at every game needing an explanation of offsides. now, i don't mind the hawks getting attention, and i truly believe that hockey should be a more appreciated chicago sport. but i don't want that to happen overnight and have to deal with the same frustrations i've known being a cubs fan for so long. (thanks, john mcdonough. no, seriously.)

shit.

i need to pour out the rest of this haterade.

7th inning stretch tonight

Tazer and P. Kane are doing the seventh inning stretch tonight at Wrigley. Big game for the cubbies too, magic number is down to four and they're gonna find out what kinda shape Harden's arm is in.

Regardless, definitley worth checking out to catch the kids doing the anthem.

Campbell did it a few weeks ago and although he did quite a good job with the song, he sounded like the biggest stoner in the world when they were trying to interview him. Is this guy really that dumb? He's got the kinda cro-magnon man drawl and is rather monosyllabic. Actually, who gives a shit. Just play defense.

game starts at 1:20 and is being aired on CSN locally.
go cubs.

A Good Place to Start

So, it had to happen sometime. I've tried to do the blog thing before for Mannequin Men (see 'Mannequin Man in a Van') but that didn't really work. It's rather hard to update a blog from the road and talk about something that you are doing all day anyway. When i actually thought about it, i realized i would much rather write about something that i really really love. Cue the Chicago Blackhawks. I'll do my best to update this regularly throughout the season and especially in the upcoming weeks with training camp about to start. There's going to some serious action on the Hawks front coming up real soon with a lot of young kids pecking at each other for a spot with the big club.
First things first, the Robert Lang deal this weekend was probably one of the silliest things that i've seen tallon do in a while (Samsonov being the other most recent thing that comes to mind). Of course, people are going to run their mouths about the cap and the reasons this needed to happen. I understand how the cap works, dude. However, why lose sixty points, get nothing in return, and leave us virtually bald in a position we have virtually no depth in?
The way it stands now the Hawks could roll one of two ways on center. Toews, Bolland, Kontiola, K Adams, and Burish would likely be roster centers with a chance at seeing a Nathan Davis or a Evan Brophey if there's flops in camp. That looks pretty shitty. Kontiola was bred a center and is a playmaker, and from what i saw in his short stay with the Hawks last year, he can play defense. He just looked gassed the entire time he was on the ice. Now i'm not expecting Duncan Keith minutes from a center, but this season will drag on and on for a guy who looked exhausted after twelve games with the team last year. Bolland is the guy i'm most confident with, but he would sit much better on a third line with Byf and Andrew Ladd. They'd be gritty and work opposing teams to death, you could try putting Kontiola on the 2nd line with Kaner and an undisclosed left wing (that's quite another big hole, dale) but dropping a rookie into a top 6 forward position on a club with big expectations is a recipe for disaster.
Unless there's a trade coming that we don't know about (please, say there's a trade Dale) we're going to have one center over the age of 24. eek. not to mention the winger problem. so tell me: why trade Lang?

A: because Lang was a hack. sure, he put up a lot of points and brought experience to a line that at times had none, but what kind of experience did he bring? was he teaching the young un's that once you prove yourself at least competent, you don't really have to work that hard? Lang was never in the corners and was definitely not a new Hawks style player. Basically, he was too soft. Remember last year when Denis went on the "commit to the indian" rant? tell me that wasn't directed at mr. robert lang. he loafed the whole season and was truly the definition of adequate. i'm not saying that Denis didn't like him, because i believe Savvy saw the value of Lang, i just don't believe he was he kind of player that Savard wanted around the kids. Oh yeah, and he cost us four million a year. People like Kevyn Adams and Martin Lapointe (please bring him back even though he didn't EVER score) are the kind of leaders this team needs.
Take a look at that photo up there. If you never saw Robert Lang play as a Blackhawk, it kinda looked like that.
See you later, Sloth.