Rick’s Picks 2019/2020
This is always a disappointing time of the year for me. I know the rest of you are excited about the start of the hockey season and all the trivial minutiae that entails with the HHL draft and impending cold nights made warm by 40 “ plasmas, but for me it is a gloomy melancholy clouding the excitement of baseball’s final and greatest and frostiest month. In every Vancouver bar, baseball games are sequestered to a muted grainy CRT that somehow still exists above the entrance way while forty other vibrant screens trumpet the blaring, frantic, staccato monotone handed down by Foster Hewitt to every subsequent hockey play by play announcer. Imagine my joy now in getting to spend my time analysing not the sport of hockey, but the projections of fake teams constructed and managed by grown men. Well, my excitement grows.
Rick’s Picks began unsolicited by Mr. Rick Ramsbottom, and his mild ribbing and haphazardly crafted observations were embraced by the HHL members, adding a slight gravitas and prestige to the exuberance of the early hockey season. After a few years, as Rick’s Picks became more and more delayed and it was found they were becoming more stale and repetitive like later AC/DC albums, it was passed off to others, who promised fresh originality but instead came across like AC/DC cover bands which played the same stale and repetitive songs, though not younger nor any better. Now it is my turn to continue in that tradition of being no younger and no less stale than that box of swiss cheese crackers in the back of Rick’s pantry, or a song sung by Axel Rose which you swore was Thunderstruck but has a completely different name. I do not admit quality and I’ve completely ignored brevity, and hope that my haste to get them to you makes up for all the deficiencies. In fact, if brevity is your thing, close the browser now and don’t waste your time. This is a great vomiting purple mess of smelly analogies, sticky metaphors, and confusing conclusions which is only enjoyable to those sincerely trying hard to avoid more pressing responsibilities. If reading this helps you take stock of your life and commit yourself to more important things, as you know that you will never get this time back, then I have succeeded.
No, I haven’t followed hockey in a good while, but when looking over the teams I was excited to see some familiar names among the GMs and managers. Stevie Y is a still a golden god. Rick Tochett has somehow been forgiven for whatever strange goings-on occurred with Mrs. Gretzky. And who can but admire three-time Rockland elementary school male outstanding athlete, ’81-’83, Rod Brind’Amour? Always a legend. These players I understand, whereas before this exercise I couldn’t have told you what teams Kucherov, Draisaitl and Scheifele were on, or even if they were NHL hockey players. This in part explains my predictions, which I will present from last to first, which might be the tradition, or might not.
Last Place: Kurgen’s Killer Krew
Imagine yourself walking some massive brown dog through a wooded area on a beautiful sunny autumn day, and the pooch begins to slow, and suddenly shivers and contorts into a weird stuttering awkward squat, and boom, there it goes, what could possible appear but an enormous shit by the trail side. Now, if it was down in the subdivision with all the lovely houses all in a row and clean sidewalks and suspicious middle class people looking out the window and everyone doing their part of the social contract, then one dutifully takes a little green baggie out of one’s pocket and with a flourish developed from daily practice neatly package up that doo-doo and have it safely contained in a trash receptacle by the end of the next block. Now sometimes you aren’t on a sidewalk but a on more secluded woodland trail between cul-de-sacs hidden by forest from judgemental eyes where one has to give serious consideration whether to pick up the steamer, but it is ultimately conceded that one hikes the trail almost daily, and if you didn’t pick up every chog deposited by the chocolatey beast, then others might not either, and then the trail would become like a minefield and since the dog you are walking is an inveterate shit-eater, you would end up suffering the most as you aren’t strong enough to hold back that gigantic brown dog from eating every stinky turd it comes across. So out comes the baggie, which is again, sequestered in some bear safe container before it even cools.
But what about when deep out in the woods, on a narrow, rooty, trail rarely visited by mountain bikers, two miles from the nearest house, even farther from the nearest trash receptacle, what then? Some of you must be thinking, why I would grab a stick and just kind of flick that pooh off the trail and beneath some fern, just far enough that some bicycle tire doesn’t pick it up and spray shit everywhere, and so some lowly slug or skunk might find a quick nourishing meal to bide them through the autumn afternoon. But a man of stronger character will take that bag out of his pocket, and duly accept his social obligations of packing the shit, even though it is a bigger shit than normal, even though that pile of shit has other morsels of greenish gelatinous shit in it because that dog is an inveterate shit eater, and because that dog is an inveterate shit eater, the shit has the texture of a six week old cucumber leaky and forgotten in the back of the fridge and just collapses with a sucking sound as you grasp it and you dry heave a little at the uncanny unnatural sensation, and the huge goopy shit doesn’t quite get in the bag but a little somehow gets on the outside and you’re gingerly walking with this bulging oozing shit-smelling shit-bag and its not quite cold so its attracting bugs and the shit-flies are flying around you and your shit-smell and somehow a little gets on your arm because it is one of those biodegradable bags and its eco-utopian purity can’t quite hold itself together at the seams, but you’ve got another mile to go, and finally you get the bulging oozing shit-smelling shit-fly infested, seam-splitting, ecologically sustainable shit-bag back to a bear-secure shit-can and you throw it in there and somehow a little more gets on you and you try to wipe some of it off with a soggy ragged shit-leaf and the inveterate shit-eater is looking at you with its incredulous doggie eyes like, ‘ why’d you do throw that away for? That was good shit.’, but you are secure in your knowledge that you did the right thing, and that a lesser man would have abandoned it.
Well that pile of shit is Kurgen’s team, and its prospects for future success are as weak as that shitty analogy.
Now maybe they aren’t that bad, maybe I’m just a little wound up after dog sitting Rick’s dog last weekend. But this a team which has only made playoffs once since 2010/2011, and frankly, I expect more. Kurgen has won the David Livingstone Memorial trophy, in 2009/2010, and unlike NCAA football, once an HHL champion, always an HHL champion, but I worry that Kurgen has forgotten that. He does have some solid young centers. Ryan Johansen is serviceable, but Matthews leads the English bookie odds of getting wrapped up in something complicated with Bianca Andreescu by Christmas, while Couture is now only useful as trade bait. He’s 30 in people years, which is 4 in shit-dog years which is 50 in hockey player years. He has developed some defensive depth but his winger pool is shallow to the point of being untradeable. The only saving grace is he has two Carolina players who are under the guidance and leadership of hockey great Rod Brind’amour. Will they develop? Maybe so. I hope so, as this team remains a project and one could just abandon the shit pile, but you can’t; you gotta carry that shit bag, tend to that shit bag, and hopefully, one day it will cease to be a shit bag.
14th place: Wallis Jets
There has been some talk by the HHL Player’s Union to file grievance against the Jets for discriminating against players by employer alone. The number of teams represented by players not on the Jets has fallen from ten in 2015/2016 to three in 2019/2020, which would have been two if Trouba had not been traded to the Rangers.
This year 15 of 18 players are Winnipeg Jets, and in what is effectively a two-line league, having five centres or five d-men from one team is not conducive to optimum performance. The success of the younger players will depend upon cannibalizing the ice-time of the veteran players. The team’s struggle to win will be as great as the Canadian government’s struggle to replace the cold war era CF-18. A mixed blessing for the Jets, as they won’t have to update their logo anytime soon.
But that may not be the point. Mr. Walli has found a game within the game, and though his game is different than the rest of HHL members, he is, in his own special way, winning. While the rest of you are divided into winners and losers, Mr. Walli is only winning. And he can visit the website once a year, look at his standings, look at his players, lean back, nodding, smiling, secure in the knowledge that he has accomplished exactly what he set out to do. The Winnipeg Jets have the highest representation in the HHL with 15 players. The Vegas Knights are second with 12. But the enjoyment of those twelve is diluted over seven competitors, watery and skunky like Jose’s old wedding merlot, while the monopoly for the enjoyment of the Winnipeg Jets is held by only Mark Walli, who drinks deeply to the dregs of fine Flin-Flon Bordeaux.
The Jets have made playoffs before, but I don’t see it this year. And of course he won’t finish in 14th, because two or three teams will dump below him, while Mark will never trade his Jets. He will hoard them tightly as Kevin Leeson hoards a handful of loonies as a swarm of waitresses attempt to shame him for a better tip. If he makes playoffs, then his enjoyment is completely aligned with the success of his favourite team; and if not, then he gets to share fully in their anguish, his entire soul in sympathy, holistically in union to their fate. There is something devout and medieval about all this, something almost holy, and I’m sure when the Dali Lama is in hogtown he feels compelled to seek out Mr. Walli for a blessing, identify his actions as a uniquely Canadian tantra, before heading out for the ‘Ford Family Special’ at Etobicoke ‘Holistic Therapy’.
Part of me hopes for an alternative outcome for this team. Perhaps in the movie version the Winnipeg Jets hear that someone in Toronto has drafted nothing but Winnipeg players, but they assume it’s a nine year old boy, and it motivates them enough that Walli’s Jets do make playoffs, and the Winnipeg Jets and the Walli’s Jets soar to be champion winners of their respective cups, and they invite the ‘nine year old boy’ to Winnipeg to celebrate and out of the plane comes a grown-ass man, and the team just goes ‘fuck, that’s just the way she goes, eh’ and Mark and the Jets all drink from both the cups, and they don’t invite Johnson and Reilly cause fuck the Leafs and Mark Walli goes down into Winnipeg lore along with Randy Bachman and pooh-bear.
13th Place: Team Chaos
Now Team Chaos is not going to come in 13th; they traded away too many assets last year going for the trophy, and opportunities for success this year will be as skinny as pre-grunge Stewart Wilson and his diet of du Mauriers.
After the trades, Cole managed to keep Giordano, Fleury, Marchand, Ovechkin, O’Reilly, while retaining Bergeron as an RFA. Only Marchand makes me throw up a little. Nine of the players he traded away eventually got protected outright by their respective teams, with another three being RFAs. Teddy kept Seth Jones, PK Subban, and Vrana; Rick retained Dumba and Hischier; Crutches protected N-H; Greeks ended up with McKinnon and Landeskog; Barney RFA’d Radulov, and the Disco shuffled off with Aho, Backstrom and RFA Gustaffson. Disco and Greeks really set their teams up well for this year. It will be seen if Teddy can utilize his players effectively. Rick’s future with his players is more volatile, and Windows 365 doesn’t come equipped with a crystal ball to allow me to see that future. Most likely Rick will attempt to do something overly complicated, fuck it up and blame Stew to gaslight everyone.
So Cole has consolation in that he has some trade pieces so long that Boston and St. Louis players don’t suffer a playoff hangover. Valentin Zykov made the team in Vegas, so he gets to see what he can do. Should he have kept Phil Kessel? Letang? Who knows. He went for it, came up a little short, and will have to rebuild. One can’t fault a person for going for it; we will see how his rebuilding progresses over the next couple of years before we excoriate him.
Some might argue that Cole should have sat on his players and waited for the future. Others will gloat that if they had had his roster, that they could have made better trades and won the championship. Again, these are hypotheticals. We can only deal with reality. $185 big ones, treating the family to a night out at the Old Spaghetti Factory, and a story to tell the grandkids about how he almost won it all. Just don’t tell them you were willing to take Marchand.
12th Place: He Will Play on Crutches
We saw some bold moves last year from HWPoC, the world’s most ungainly acronym.
He has succeeded in making his team very lean, but perhaps a bit too lean to have a very successful run. Being an associate of Mr. Wilson, we might presume that Mr. Wilson told him that one had to dump to have future success, and HWPoC is ensuring that he gets dumping out of the way so that he is poised for success. If one is at the bottom, we can’t report any further losses to the stakeholders, right? Gold for the annual report.
His flurry of trading last year resulted in Stamkos, Nugent-Hopkins, Skinner and Vorachek. He gave away Eichel, Tchakuk, and Toews. A little sexier, but It is unclear if his team is improved by the trade. Stamkos may be tired from having carried the Lightning for so long, and anyone can talk to JP about the disappointments of Skinner.
Of his pickups, Petry is expected to decline. Gardiner is already hurt, and everyone hates Dustin Brown just because. Tatar does get some consideration for the all name team, and so is not a wasted pick.
In looking at the trade history, I find it a little sad that Stew’s limited programming ability has resulted in Josh’s team name being globally renamed ‘Crutches’ in the HHL historic trades list. I feel also a little sad that I don’t remember the name of Josh’s team, have forgotten quite what he looked like, would struggle to recognize him in the street, and perhaps next year will struggle to remember if Josh actually existed or was instead a rat/cyborg character from Buzz’s old comic book. Oh, such sadness. I don’t expect this though with HWPoC, he will always be that guy happily spending an afternoon humping a leaking flamingo amidst a tepid pool of oxybenzone, spermicide and false eyelashes.
11th Place: Korean Assassins
I do respect the passion, if not the direction. Much like a gigantic brown inveterate shit-eating dog, you never know where the Korean Assassins are going to drag you. This year we were all a little disappointed in his absence as he had the Liberal’s pick for him, and luckily for the Liberals, this was aligned with its core values of sabotaging his competitors while disingenuously pretending to be their allies. Teddy may have well been an indigenous female MP with all the bad faith he received from the Liberals. But Teddy knew what he was getting into; he could have had the Commish draft for him and then he at least would have received a couple of the Dynasty’s top prospects, instead of the one’s Rick marked on the page with a bright red x, like Loui Eriksson, or James Neal.
Centers seem strong. I don’t know who Barkov is, but he did great last year. Evgeny Kuznetsov did well despite a four-year suspension from international play by the IIHF after testing positive for cocaine. So if any of your favourite wholesome players choose not to play for their national team, now you know why.
On D, one hopes for a bounce-back season for PK Subban in a new environment. The rest of the defensive core are expected to have strong seasons.
The weakness is the wing department, where the Koreans are about as sexy as 1301 W. 41st on D&D night. Yeah, you can pretend all you want you have a 6’2” buxom female warrior-cleric with judgement after drinking of ‑3, but its still just Joe Pavelski.
I want to say more mean things about Teddy’s team, but the more I look at them, the more I kind of like them. I hope the young guys show progress. All the best in your travels TKO. Remember not to gobble any shit, no matter how enticing it might seem.
10th Place: Comox Crunch
It was a little unnerving seeing Barney and the Crunch on the big screen in KT’s basement. I hadn’t seen Caley in years and I realized that he has aged into an extra for ‘the Expendables, Part V’ hired to make Danny Trejo seem more attractive, but alas, haven’t we all? The only thing that made Caley seem a little younger was seeing Barney on the same screen with him, though I’m not sure if it made Caley seem young, or it made Barney look like his Grandpa. After the draft it was elected by all present to avoid using the big screen video conference option in the future, or to apply the Instagram filter that is used to magically smooth out Kardashian’s gladbag-of-jello ass.
The Crunch are struggling to find the star players that seemed to fall into his lap back when he first developed his HHL reputation. He has Eichel to solidify a strong center core, is hoping that Matt Murray develops into a consistent premier goaltender, while Hedman has turned into a solid producer on D. Rakell and Keller are expected to show some improvement on wing, but he is expecting rookies Byram and Fox to produce, when they might be a couple of years away.
We can blame the players for the team’s projection, but the real reason is the Crunch have stopped being nasty. Nobody is afraid of these guys anymore. Let’s get some nastiness going. Its better to be feared than loved said Machiavelli, if you cannot be both. And Crunch has a nasty face, so he should put it to work. I hope he has a job where you have to be mean, because then he doesn’t have to force it, he can just sit back, relax, and let the mean face do all the work. The interior monolog can be mildly humming ‘get happy’ while those around you are mincing around on Buzz’s broken eggshells and shitting themselves.
Now maybe I’m being hard on the Crunch as he represents Comox, land of retirees and semi-respectable restaurants, while I’m from Campbell River, where cocaine induced parking lot rage and BC’s most successful Moxie’s have become synonymous. The true reason is that we have never properly bonded and I secretly blame him for running Stevie Francis out of town. But I am willing to find common ground, and do some buddy stuff like get man-bun extensions together and meet for some mindfulness and donuts in Cumberland.
9th Place: Dynasty
With an almost gloating self-assurance, Dynasty thinks he has a plan. Now that plan isn’t to win this year, but the Commish did his part by boldly and unpredictably choosing Jack Hughes in the first round of the draft. An assertive move which just might be the future of this franchise.
We’ll see if Rick’s plan goes forward. He always has a penchant for wanting to seem clever rather than follow common sense. He is of the “buy low, sell high” mantra, and he certainly has bought low. But sometimes, low is just low; Peter Klima low. He takes great pride in the pick ups of Gusev and Hintze, where the Commish dutifully followed the scribbles from Rick’s crayon, though they have yet to produce in the league. Mantha might be his best winger, though Granland, Nylander and Bratt are all expected to improve.
Rick has already attempted to cut Lui Eriksson but he refuses to leave, and sticks around the locker room like a particularly sticky piece of dog shit embedded deep within the tread of your favourite hiking boots, which can only be worked out using some sort of implement found in Rick’s kitchen, but what implement that might be he may never know. Eriksson has now been suspended by the league indefinitely under Gross Misconduct code GRM23: Travesty of the Game.
Erik Karlsson is getting a little old to expect a return to heroic form. Expectedly, he has a no trade clause vetoing trades to Rarr’s Rage, a team which negligently, does not have a spousal cyberbully policy.
In all, this team has a lot of pieces that have never proven themselves, but this team isn’t about this year. The Dynasty senses the weather has shifted, and the shit winds will be blowing in his favour. But he shouldn’t get too cocky. He seems the type you’d find walking around Port Moody with him and his kids all dressed in customized Dynasty branded clothing that he thinks is classy but somehow comes across like mismatched pajama sets stolen from a Target discount bin. Let us hope his hubris remains in check at least until this Hughes character shows he is legit.
8th Place: Rarr’s Rage
Unlikely, I know, because if Rarr is coming in 8th, then he will be coming in last. If we know anything from Stew, there is no middle ground. Either trade up or dump down.
Now he does have Conner McDavid, but his wingers are disreputable, the Kopitar bidding was part panic and part nostalgia, and the sign of Stew carrying two goalies is a sign of him hoping to flip one to a contender. Pickups like Kessel and Toews may seem solid but are the type of guys one hopes to flip to contenders for younger players who still have their knees.
Speaking of Phil Kessel, to me he is always the most unlikely of hockey players, as if he is shocked that he is playing pro hockey and would be better befitted in the back of pioneer hardware sharpening mower blades or something because he makes the customers too nervous when he works the counter.
The other week I went to see Quinten Tarantino’s latest movie ‘Once Upon a Time in Hollywood’, without expecting much except that before the end credits I would see Sharon Tate stuck like a pig by members of the Manson Family. Anyway, Mr. Tarantino decided to cast Leonardo DiCaprio in the movie as a thirty something aging tv western star who is at a crossroads of his career. Now this annoyed me, because DiCaprio is the complete antithesis of the western tv character of the 1950s and 60s.
Burt Reynolds, Clint Eastwood, James Gregory, Steve McQueen, James Garner, Michael Landon, James Arness. These are the guys who starred in the tv Westerns. They were all baritones, they were all manly. These shows were watched by men who worked for a living, who wanted to solve problems by fistfights, who needed only sniff a beer to threaten to knock your block off, and parking lots were populated by troubled teens having to cool down with a smoke.
DiCaprio is the pudgy, waterfaced, man-boy. His roles are generally born out of his character’s inadequacy because he himself never seems quite adequate as a Hollywood actor archetype. In this film, they have to corset in his muffin top so it doesn’t waffle over his belt hoops while awkwardly sauntering in tight jeans and cowboy boots. His attempts at lowering his voice to a more manly gravity is less Clint Eastwood, and more 18 year old freshman Buzz attempting to order beer at Red Robin’s. The only way they could make DiCaprio look menacing in the movie is to have him play opposite an eight year old girl, and he is the only Hollywood actor for whom Jim Pringle could respectably cover as nude body double. You might think of him being comparable maybe to Michael Landon, but DiCaprio can’t hold his lasso. Landon sacrificed his youth working the family ranch for fifteen seasons, willed his family to survive the cruel prairie winters for a further eight, and when they did kill him off, he managed to return as an angel for another five before finally riding off into that great Marlboro billboard in the sky. Despite being born Eugene Horowitz of Queen’s New York, you readily accepted him as a born in the saddle, take him at his word, man of the dirt. My god, I would have bought grizzly jampacks from this man.
But for all his failings, Mr. DiCaprio is somehow able to make it work in the movie due to his one consistent quality, his impeccable timing. And in that same manner, despite coming across as unremarkable, Phil Kessel has that sense of timing to take advantage of that bouncy puck and make opportunities happen, and so has become an HHL staple, though a NHL marketer’s burden.
Now I know this comparison is more shoehorned than Mr. Tyfting having to squeeze into one of my mighty sized 6 ½ Blundstones, but the casting really bugged me. Short story: McDavid good, Rarr’s team sucks, Kessel and goalie probable trade bait. DiCaprio not a cowboy. Landon dead of cancer. I have small feet.
Landon Cowboy Body vs. Pringle Homer Body
7th Place: Kevlar
Those three or four people who actually showed up for the draft and tasted of the blessed jumbo grilled steak sandwich of Saint Marilyn may have noticed a billiards table has taken residence in the recreation/war room. Back during the NBA finals I would force myself onto the hospitality of the Tyftings, and he and I would play different games on it while drinking freely of all the previous summer abandoned Palm Bay Strawberry Pineapple Spritzers and Fuggles and Warlock Espresso Plum Sours I could find from the back of the beer fridge.
Now the Tyfting rec room has some interesting characteristics which challenge the traditional play around a billiards table and which are rarely seen on the pro circuit. The west wall can be a little snug, the cabinetry along the north wall can present some interesting angles, and the load bearing pillar discretely clad in particle board is a death zone at the southeast corner and provides an opportunity to truly stymie your opponent. To compensate for these peculiarities, the Tyfting basement has a greater variety of cues to accommodate the shot than Wilson has excuses for the stats not being up. A dignified 58” cue can be used along the south rail, from the west when opening the basement door, and sometimes from the north when playing out of the one of the upper cupboards. From other angles, particularly the southwest corner or the north east, to make one’s shot one will have to a adapt to the 52”, the 48”, the 42”, or even the 36”. This demands a level of expertise absent from most of the pro ranks. But the true challenge comes from being stymied by the pillar and tight to the rail, where one has to rely on the 24” cue which is nothing more than a novelty chopstick nicked by Kevin from Benihana Las Vegas. A very intimidating shot from across the full length of the table, and one which often changes the momentum of the match.
When we first began we’d play 8 ball, and sometimes I would win but mostly Kevin would win because I’m not very good, but regardless most games were ended by someone scratching on the 8 ball, never a satisfying way to end the match. You can brag that you ran the table, but you can’t brag that you made David suck so bad that he accidently sunk the 8 ball on his first shot out of the break. Later on we began to play nine ball because, one, it required fewer balls and the games were quicker, and two, it allows a player the creativity of sinking the black for the win when the opportunity arises.
One time we were playing and I couldn’t find any Palm Bay in the fridge but I found a Hey Y’all Apricot nectar. It wasn’t very good. Another time I found an Angry Orchard Cider and was walking back to the table when I smell something and notice that Kevin’s dog had left on the carpet in front of the tv an enormous pile of sh… Oh, where is this story going you ask? Absolutely nowhere, just like Kevlar and the HHL careers of Crosby and Malkin.
This team is like the kid who gets this awesome RC car for Christmas, won’t let you play with it, but can’t play with it himself because he can never figure out how to put the batteries in it properly. Now this may be a poor analogy and it makes the kid seem greedy, entitled and a little stupid. And Tyfting isn’t those qualities, and he doesn’t have an RC car, but he does have an electric car. He has never let me drive the Tesla but no matter, it drives itself! Both he and I can sit back on the freeway and watch the novelty of the car drive itself as the obstacles it senses and identifies are shown on the LED screen. Lamentably, an HHL team doesn’t drive itself, but needs precise leadership to steer it out of the 4th to 12th place lanes, and for Kevlar, it is only the lane barriers keeping the team on the HHL highway as it bounces from side to side. A quick scan of Kevlar’s Crosby years shows that the team’s most common placement is 7th. And this is why I’m not shitting on Team Chaos. He had an opportunity, just missed, and will find another opportunity over the next thirty years. Sid the ’not such a kid anymore’ has now spent 14 years on KT’s team, and could barely scrounge up a 3rd place finish.
Now I know this secretly kills him, as no one puts more time into his team than Kevin, I mean no one. It upsets him so much that almost daily he speaks to counsellors, especially while at work. But it remains in a permanent state of disfunction. Frankly I’m wondering if he should remain in the pool if he is this stinky but Tyfting is adamant it will come around and that he gets so much out of hosting the draft. To substantiate his unwavering dogged persistence to one day win the pool, he pledged a ten year hosting commitment for the draft, to which I acquiesced to gratify him.
Wingers are as sparse as true pints at Vancouver bars, as traditional on Kevlar, though Panarin is bona fide and one might expect some improvement from Arvidson and Debrusk. Will Tolvanen see some playing time? Maybe. On defense Ristolainen, had 43 points while accumulating a - 41 in plus/minus. Considering his career total is -142, his coach must consider that whenever he is on the ice, he is virtually playing for the other team.
Now, I’m not saying the Tyfting battery is running out of juice, but Crosby is in that dopey eggshell time of his career and one elbow away from becoming a Walmart door greeter, and Malkin is firmly in the camp of Team Putin, so a mattress full of money can buy him a cozy late career transition back to Russia without the fear of tripping and accidently falling thirty stories.
This team isn’t done; after all, the Flood won and they sucked for a generation, but like a Tesla traveling to Kelowna from Vancouver, it can’t do it without a little help. And that boost of power will be difficult coming from someone who is sleeping at the wheel.
6th Place: Barney HardCore
Mr. Hardcore, the Engineer, has a system, and though this Frankenstein team has a few parts in the wrong place, perhaps a couple too many thumbs, a wonky shoulder, and a leg missing a knee, it has the potential into developing into a winner with a little tweaking and a little time.
Some think Mr. Hodgson might have time on his hands, but while the rest of you urbanites have tidily shrunk your worlds into a walnut containing a television set, a coffee shop, a craft brewery and a subscription to Amazon prime, he has developed a mastery of the wide expanse of American suburbia.
From Virginia to Oregon, he can: manicure the perfect lawn in five different climate zones; organize and maintain the warranties of hundreds of appliances, knowing each of their strengths and frailties; get around liquor laws in nine different states for day drinking at kid’s sporting events; determine the suitability of his children’s friends from the spelling of their names; deftly pawn off picking up his kids onto other parents during times of heavy traffic; sniff out interstate gas stations washrooms without shit on the walls before anyone even pleads they have to go, and has discovered the answer to many of life’s great mysteries that the tyranny of choice has given America: Papa John’s vs. Papa Murphy’s, Popeye’s vs. Bojangles, Chicken Express vs. Chick Fil’a, Texas Roadhouse vs. Outback Steakhouse, Blimpie’s vs. Jimmy Johns, PF Chang’s vs. Panda Express, Cracker Barrell vs. Applebees, Steak n Shake vs Whataburger, Moe’s Southwest Grill vs. Chili’s, ad infinitum.
The team has lots of depth at wing. Big stuff is expected from Mikko Rantanen. Timo Meier might be expected to see more playing time in San Jose, and his Knight players are still expected to do well. If Vasilevskiy stays healthy he should be another integral player, but Barney will have to do something during the year to bolster that defense, as he has Teddy level optimism in Bouchard, Boqvist and Brannstrom.
For centers, Strome and Reinhart are expected to show improvement, but what do I know, I’m just reading this out a magazine I found discarded in the office john.
We will see if the Engineer puts in the effort to tweak this imperfect team, or like a pitiful theoretical physicist, is content to have it work in simulation, and dismiss the real world effects as ‘merely details’. If he doesn’t, we can always hope that he is instead using his time wisely, hunkered in some dingy establishment on a dusty interstate, digging into the spongy soggy bottom of a caramelized, corn-syrup soaked, chocolate chip waffle, to arrive at a conclusive answer to an overwhelming question: Huddle House vs. Waffle House?
5th Place: Spanish Bitches
This team owner is not who I thought he was. Not a gritty lift-kitted Land Cruiser that can fearlessly tear through de-commissioned logging roads, but more a Subaru Forrester standard with rollback assist because of hill start anxiety. The vintage sound from the cassette player is a little less the Doors, and a little more REO Speedwagon. How else to explain his lack of aggression at last year’s trade deadline?
He has some depth at wing, but I don’t expect a return performance by Kucherov, and his other wingers won’t pick up the slack. His defense is strong. Carlson is expected to repeat. Tyson Barrie is a good pickup, but has required Leaf administration to lecture players not only on the perils of selfies with loose women and late nights at the Roxie, but also on “investment opportunities” solicited by Barrie’s dad.
Expect a bounce back from Trocheck, but Krejci is already hurt. Couturier is what the teenagers refer to as “meh” and is over valued by Jose because he is a Flyer.
My advice to the Las Perras is get rid of the Forester, find something with an old fashioned clutch; dare the car behind you to get too close, roll back a little then hit the gas, peel out, live dangerous. You may have feared slipping backward. But you’ve slipped back anyway, and will be out of the money, even if you get lucky with good performances from your players, as it is unlikely you’ll take a chance for the title even if a big fat wet sloppy opportunity comes begging to kiss you on the lips. That would take initiative. That would take decisiveness. That takes uncompromising courage. Those are some mighty adventurous places, and those are places that a Forrester doesn’t have the clearance to take anyone.
4th Place: Disco Godfathers
Last year’s Hamber Cup champion is so confident that he found the perfect system for developing a team, that he allowed the Commish to pick his team for him with two hours notice. The only reason he is picked at 4th and not in the money is because the Commish doesn’t want to pump his own tires about how he built this amazing team. He will save that for the post-season when his name is put on the trophy as co-winner along with the G-Daddy’s.
In honesty, it is lucky that Disco had a solid protectable six and the Commish had the green light to spend all the money to keep the RFA’s, because the other free agent signings are mostly brutal. Paul Stastny was picked because the Commish felt nostalgic of the old o-pee-chee hockey cards when the Nordiques first came in the league. Pekka Rinne was signed on name recognition alone. He may have well picked Curtis Joseph. The draft picks are the most mediocre of the mediocre, the type of players that if the Commish watched hockey, even ignorant of the game as he is, he would instantly recognize that they lacked some essential talent, either speed, or puck sense or physicality, which will prevent them from ever finding a consistent role with any regular playing time, the type of liability players coaches and managers know have to be replaced for any team to have real success. Nelson Emerson comes to mind.
Now his good players like Aho, Gustafsson, Yandle, Seguin, and Backstrom have to produce, but with Barrington sporting an Elon Musk-like flair for unconventional thinking, it should be easy to find opportunities to develop the team and give himself a chance if it arises. He does have credentials, having won both trophies in the past. The prize is not so great as sending a rocket to Mars, but turning Chiasson, Peron and Spurgeon into counting players may prove no less a challenge.
3rd Place: Liberals
Buzz mentioned to me once that people tell him that he is looking young, but in actuality everyone else is just looking old, because he has not changed a bit since university. Now this is truth, very little has changed about Mr. Leeson, but if there is one face that deserved to mellow somewhat, to let age, the master painter, soothe by little dabs with some gentle distinguishing marks, it is that face that Wylie and Suzanne brought into the world and then sagely decided, no more. Even noted philanthropist Jeffrey Epstein grew into his looks as he aged, perhaps with a little help of HGH, a gentle scent of l’eau de l‘argent, and so became the object of desire of many a fawning young woman. But Mr. Leeson has stolidly maintained the same face which brought him into adolescence. A man of dependable character, Mr. Leeson has passed up dignity for consistency.
And consistent as always, Kevin showed up early not just in anticipation of the draft but to be first fill his face with whatever could be found in the Tyfting kitchen. Mr. Leeson has never met a draft he didn’t like, and with magazine and paperwork in hand, he sported the fresh hairdo and leering optimism of a seasoned church youth pastor working the room of a purity convention, knowingly adept at finding opportunities in those neglected ugly ducklings dismissed by the discriminating. He has a good core of protected players and apparently has no shame in cheering for Maple Leafs. It is his hope that Tkachuk, Kapanen and Galchenyuk develop, and he takes great pride in the plus/minus of his defensive core. Kadri might be an interesting draft pick, where a change of scenery may make him less of a loathsome rat. At goal he is putting some of his eggs in Carter Hart’s basket, but confident that another goalie can be found by trade or draft who I guess will come with eggs of their own.
But danger looms on the horizon. Netflix may have Buzz carry a heavy load this winter, and when torn between having to provide blowjobs to disgruntled D-level actors or dedicate himself to draft research, Buzz is the type who will do his duty, rationalize that the belt he won in his office hockey pool is far cooler than the DLM or Hamber Cup, and sacrifice his chance at the HHL title. With success comes complacency, and as he sits snugly on his steatopygic buttocks, thumbing through his photo album of past hockey pool trophies while soliloquizing to Nina of his fantasy league exploits while she laments having ever learnt English, that may be enough to satisfy Mr. Leeson.
2nd Place: The Greeks
Back in 1979, a young Jim Pringle sat in front of the large wood panelled RCA in the recreation room watching Jack Sikma and Dennis Johnson lead the Sonics to the NBA championship, and young Jim Pringle thought, wow, I like it when my team wins the championship, I bet it will happen every year! Well, forty years later, the Canucks, the Seattle Mariners and Detroit Lions have failed to win championships, while the Sonics have simply failed to be. It was as if some spell has cast, some impermeable shield which defies all luck and smothers all talent and confounds all strategy to a singular state of not winning. Now, no one I know would ever say that Jim is unlucky, but Mr. Tyfting has heard a rumor among high school counsellors that young Jim Pringle is the only student whose career assessment, somewhat contrary to his honour as class president, came back as a cooler in a black jack hall. And weren’t we all surprised when Mr. Pringle flew into Vegas last spring, that the showgirls had to put on their wool merkins and even icicles formed on the nipply breast plate of Sid Caesar outside of Bobby Flay’s southwest house of deep-fried avocado goodness?
Though Jim is not a city dweller he is in the same state of Canuck induced frustration as his despairing 300 level compatriots who attend the games, and in fellowship has sat all tense and sullen in front of the home tv until the game is over. But that wintery screen is glowing a little less blue, a little more cheery, because this team is fun. His HHL team now has a bit of hopeful aura about it, and Jim actually enjoys watching the Canucks play rather than treating it as a duty and burden he was born with and destined to pass onto his kids along with their surprising sprinting ability.
Hall, Landeskog, Guentsel and Boeser make a solid wing core. Defense is a little weak but Cale Makar is expected to get some playing time. Nathan McKinnon is a great young pickup, and seems even younger because of his lack of playoff games. I see a lot of players that are hungry. I like that.
So we can’t say the Greeks are going to win, because they never do. But it is possible they will enjoy themselves all the same. What might impede them from winning is that the HHL has not a more overzealous Canucks fan who will overpay in a trade for Boeser, Petterson or Horvat.
1st Place: Tri-City Flood
I’m not much of a conceptual thinker, and the Flood winning last year is a good enough reason for me to pick them the winner this year. This guy went from never winning ever, a perennial loser, to he may never lose again. That’s how fickle the pool gods operate. All I ask is that as a double winner, he apportion some of his winnings for a wreath in memory of the trophy’s eponym, to be laid on a cenotaph at Remembrance Day, bless his soul.
We can try to manufacture drama. Will Kane avoid dirties in sleazy bars? Will Brent Burns have his position redefined because he never actually plays defense? Are Debrincat and Draisaitl actual NHL players, or the work of a nine year old gamer button mashing when playing EA NHL franchise mode? Will the Flood have its champion nullified as it is no longer in the Tri-Cities?
I can’t answer any of these questions. Really, they are beyond me and the future will have to prove them credible or simply as the whims of fancy, shitbags abandoned on the trail of life. Maybe all of them have happened, maybe none of them have happened, but they happened in another dimension. I mean, if a butterfly can beat its wings, only once, and make an atomic bomb go off, then just imagine what a million migrating monarch butterflies could do to the NHL scoring race. I mean, if we’re all controlled by the butterflies, why are we even keeping score, it just seems so incredible that even as I type this a butterfly in Mexico made me type something completely different. What was I really going to say, can you really know? or are the butterflies really in control of everything? Hey, remember when Tool came out with that album, wasn’t that cool? Remember when Maynard did that thing on stage when we went to that show? What if Maynard was a butterfly emperor? I bet he would still practice jiu-jitsu and have impulse control problems…
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