It's Time for Another Hockey Season!!!

So this is it! The NHL season gets underway tonight with 3 games, Toronto at Montreal, Winnipeg at Edmonton, and Washington at Chicago, where the Hawks will be raising their Stanley Cup banner. I’m planning on watching at least parts of each, which seems like an appropriate way to celebrate the start of the season. So get stoked, it’s time for another hockey season! And it's not delayed because of another lockout. Here’s some things that have happened since the last time I updated this.

-The NHLPA has approved hybrid icing to take effect this season. I’ve already written by opinion on icing rules on here before, and I’m in full support of the change. I’m surprised it happened, but I guess enough players felt that a positive change for player safety was more important than keeping the traditional rule. Joni Pitkanen’s injury, which occurred on an icing race, will cause him to miss the season. The full extent of the injury was realized just before training camp. I’m sure that had an influence on the players voting about hybrid icing. Sure, people aren’t happy about putting another judgment call in the hands of the officials, but I think most could agree that they’d rather see the linesmen make a wrong call than see a player taken of the ice on a stretcher.

-The Maple Leafs signed Phil Kessel to an 8 year extension with an $8 million cap hit. Yeah, the Maple Leafs keep their best player, who’s put up great offensive numbers and was a point-a-game player the last two seasons (granted one of them was shortened). Yeah, that’s a really high number, but with the cap expected to rise, possibly by a considerable margin, in a couple seasons, it doesn’t seem terrible. The Leafs must believe they won’t have salary cap problems in the future like they have now. Also the number of quality free agents has been dropping, so someone would’ve thrown a bucketful of money at Kessel in the offseason if he got there. That said looking at the other players with $8 (Ovechkin, Crosby, Malkin, Perry, Eric Staal, and Getzlaf) Kessel just doesn’t seem to be in the same range. Excluding Ovechkin, they’ve all won Stanley Cups. Excluding Ovechkin and Perry, they’re all centers (and Perry has an elite center in Getzlaf to play with). Kessel is also a winger, but doesn’t have an elite center, he has Tyler Bozak instead. Is Kessel worth an $8 million hit? It appears the market has dictated that. However, there are a large number of players superior to Kessel, who’ve had more individual and team success, who will now see this as a benchmark. Hurah, escalating salaries!

-The Panthers has signed Tim Thomas, Tom Gilbert, Brad Boyes, and Ryan Whitney, who were all on tryout contracts during the preseason. Thomas, Gilbert, and Boyes were with the Panthers, while Whitney was in camp with the Blues. So much for that youth movement in Florida. Thomas had said he wanted to be a starter wherever he played, so does this mean Jacob Markstrom is playing backup? Or is he going back to the minors when Scott Clemmensen is healthy? This was supposed to be Markstrom’s year, and he’s been pegged as the goalie of the future for a couple seasons now. The Panthers defense is now heavy in offensive transition players, with Gilbert and Whitney joining Brian Campbell. While this could help them improve their offensive game, it could also create a lot of odd-man rushes going the other way. Better hope Thomas is ready to face a lot of shots to make up for his year off. Personally, I’d much rather have Ilya Bryzgalov’s philosophical musings about space than Thomas’ Tea Party politics back in the NHL. Here’s to hoping Thomas isn’t too outrageous and divisive and Bryzgalov finds an NHL job.

-The Lightning have sent 3^rd overall draft choice Jonathan Drouin back to juniors, where he will likely dominate the QMJHL again. Many people were expecting Drouin to play on a line with Steven Stamkos and Martin St. Louis, and many had him pegged as a Calder finalist. It’s an interesting choice, especially considering he could’ve been given a 9 game trial before a year of his contract would start to count. GM Steve Yzerman is following the Detroit approach though, which means not rushing anybody, no matter what kind of numbers they put up the year before or how ready they look for the NHL (guess he learned his lesson rushing Brett Connolly). Now, if only he could find someone to impersonate Nick Lidstrom on defense.