Week Nine of NHL 2006-07

I will keep my NHL diatribe short this week since this is late and the Vegas edition was too long, even for me.

Fortunately, the Flyers only went on to lose one more time while I was in Sin City but I intentionally chose not to bet on them, it was them against the Devils. This season it’s a sucker bet. It ended up being closer than expected yet the smart money was still with the Devils, my pick for the Atlantic Division. Now they’ve had six days off before they get a rematch tonight. Meanwhile, former GM Clarke has been moved to some position with Operations and Scouting. Great move. He can still saddle the Flyers with slow defensemen and washed-up forwards through influence instead of hiring them outright. They should’ve just given him a figurehead position like Flyers Ambassador as Brett Hull has with the Stars.

Turned out I wasn’t the only person demanding the Flyers take back John LeClair. I think Ed Moran of the Philly paper agreed. It would be more than a publicity stunt because LeClair has had more goals (2) in his few appearances (21) with the Redshirts, I mean Penguins, than the disappointing and overpaid Kyle Calder (0).

Phoenix is an enigma right now because I was out of the loop on them even more while on vacation. I’ll be catching up on them some too. Right now I see they’re within two points of the wounded Kings and have played three fewer games which could give the ‘Yotes six more potential points. Sure, this would only put them in fourth in the Pacific Division. It’s a start and a bit closer to the main goal of returning to the playoffs.

Finally, a big congratulations to Marty Brodeur. He is now tied with Ed Belfour at 461 wins for second place on the all-time list of goalies. Broduer is within reach of beating Patrick Roy’s record. I think he’ll do it too because he’s a talented goalie despite that he may succeed out of attrition; he’s only in his 13th season and all the big-time goalies played for over 18 seasons.

Okay, one last thing. Gary Bettman will be revealing the new uniforms for next season. The guy just can’t leave well-enough alone. I think raising NHL/Hockey awareness is more important and new threads aren’t going to solve it. We’ll see though. Everyone ridiculed the new Buffalo uniforms, including me, and allegedly they’re the best selling jerseys this season. I think it has to do with the novelty and how they’re still the dominate team to beat.

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