Olympic Hockey Thread

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Gangerolf
the participants

* Canada
* Czech Republic
* Finland
* Germany
* Italy
* Kazakhstan
* Latvia
* Russia
* Slovakia
* Sweden
* Switzerland
* United States

Is that a ranking?

[Asher]

Originally posted by Tingkai
Where did you get those numbers?

NHL.com's stats page.

McCabe is one of the league's top defencemen, which you would admit if he played for any other team.

In all the years with the Leafs, he's always been on the plus side of +/-.

The idea that McCabe doesn't know how to play D is just stupid. Same with the idea that he's slow.

McCabe at his prime. He's experienced and he can handle the pressure.

Phaneuf could become a great d-man. He's got potential. But he has yet to prove whether he can go the distance in the NHL. We've all seen guys who have started off great, and gone on to better things. And then there are those flash in pans.

McCabe is one of the league's tpo defencemen, but not for his defensive ability. He's slow as hell, but he's got a helluva shot and decent at best defensively. That's his niche, but that's not what Team Canada needs.

The only place in Canada that thinks McCabe belongs on Team Canada is Toronto. Everyone else rolls their eyes -- McCabe is someone too slow to be a forward, and not good enough to be a real defenseman. His slow speed is one reason he doesn't hit nearly as much as Phaneuf -- he can't! The reason he has so much more PIM than Phaneuf is because he can't keep up, so he takes stupid penalties like hooking and tripping instead.

TSN.ca's scouting report on McCabe says it all:

http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/teams/players/bio/?id=987&hubname=nhl-maple_leafs

Has cut down on his propensity to make mistakes in the defensive zone but still needs more work in that department. Takes too many bad penalties.

As for "flash in the pan" -- I heard that last season from you on Kipper too. You were insisting Belfour was the better goalie and you'd take him over Kipper any day, and look where they are now. The same is true with Phaneuf vs McCabe. Phaneuf isn't a flash in the pan, anyone who has followed him over his years in the WHL and World Juniors know this isn't him "on fire", this is how he is all the time. And that won't change in 2 days from now.

[Pekka]

Our cool trend conitnues, one forward out, not 100% but looks like Miettinen is injured.

Cool stuff That was only 9th, or 10th player ...

[Pekka]

Yeah, Miettinen is out. This sucks! Half of the team is now replaced on short notice.. we were challengers before this, but at least we were serious contenders.. now? Who knows. I'm very disappointed, I've been waiting for this tournament to happen for so long.

Our injured players such as Pitkänen plays over 20 minutes per game, so does S. Kapanen. Kipper plays almost every game, so does Lehtonen. It's BS that they are so injured that they can't play and need time to heal. If they were in such bad conditions, they would sit out right now. Total crap. I find it funny, that a team like Flyers would need Pitkänen and Kapanen so much, they've pretty much played super scratched the whole season and showed that no problem if you miss some players. But you don't play over 20 minutes regularly if you are injured that bad, that's for god damn sure.

Those are our KEY players damn it. NOW we have only ONE high class field.. only ONE. Then one quite OK but not great, but should hold their own against anyone. THen two average, very mediocre BS ones.

This is such crap, and the leadership chose definitely few wrong players to replace these guys, there's for example Nummelin in the defense who sucks horribly. He is small, weak and takes lots of chances, can't win 1 on 1 in the corners even against our players.

This can all go horribly wrong so easy now. I'm ashamed and disappointed. And 0 games has been played! LET'S GO FINLAND! Show these home staying pussies they can stay there!

[Pekka]

We also have the weakest coaching ever, so leadership is 100% in the team and the captain.

Here's something to look forward, the coach gave some hints about the lineups... 4th line BOTH J Ruutu and Nieminen on the sides.. I mean, both of them on the ice at teh same time? We can never get pass 4th shift without problems now

[Pekka]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

Now that Hagman replaced Miettinen who just scratched himself, now HE'S staying out too, due to scratch. WHAT IS GOING ON?!?!?

edit: ahh,, the iihf website screwed it up... so not true. I thinK?!

[Tingkai]

Originally posted by Asher
As for "flash in the pan" -- I heard that last season from you on Kipper too. You were insisting Belfour was the better goalie and you'd take him over Kipper any day, and look where they are now. The same is true with Phaneuf vs McCabe. Phaneuf isn't a flash in the pan, anyone who has followed him over his years in the WHL and World Juniors know this isn't him "on fire", this is how he is all the time. And that won't change in 2 days from now.

For every Kipper there's a Guigere, and Kip has a long way to go before he can come close to what Eddie has achieved.

Phaneuf isn't bad, but he's not spectacular. Look at his numbers. Average. He's playing in front of one of the hottest goalies in the league and all he has is a +4. There are three other Calgary d-men who have better +/- than Phaneuf. He's simply not that impressive. He's average and average doesn't get you on Team Canada.

Meanwhile McCabe's got the offense, number three in for D-men and the top Canadian D-man. He's got a +2 which is impressive given the struggles the team has gone through. And he can put way more time on the ice than Phaneuf.

Forget about what the sports writers said last summer and look at what McCabe has done.

McCabe earned his spot on the team, and he'll make a valuable contribution.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Tingkai
Phaneuf isn't bad, but he's not spectacular. Look at his numbers. Average. He's playing in front of one of the hottest goalies in the league and all he has is a +4. There are three other Calgary d-men who have better +/- than Phaneuf. He's simply not that impressive. He's average and average doesn't get you on Team Canada.

If you think Phaneuf is average you haven't seen him play enough. Really.

The +/- for Calgary players don't tell the whole story, simply because Calgary doesn't score a lot of goals, period. Toronto scores a lot more, which is what makes McCabe's +2 even more sad.

McCabe simply isn't as good of a defenceman as Phaneuf. I see a lot of Toronto and Calgary games (Toronto's televised at least once a week nationwide...), and McCabe's been in several of my pools so I've been keeping a close eye on both. McCabe is slow, very slow compared to Phaneuf. He doesn't really have smart defensive positioning or decision-making. What he does have is an excellent shot. If he was faster, he'd be a good forward.

Something tells me you actually haven't seen too much of Phaneuf play, which is unfortunate.

[Asher]

One of the reasons why Toronto is in high-scoring games and Calgary in low-scoring games are because of the lack of real defencemen in Toronto, including McCabe.

Ottawa just comes in and rapes Toronto on a regular basis. When Calgary played Ottawa, the tandem of Phaneuf and Regehr simply shut down Ottawa's top line completely. Toronto has never been able to do that, because their defencemen are too busy shooting at the net instead of being defensive.

[Tingkai]

Give me a break. Calgary and Ottawa have played once, and Calgary got lucky with an overtime win. That's completely different than Ottawa and Toronto who play against each other about twice a month. And in the last two times Ottawa won, McCabe wasn't playing.

As for the idea that "their defencemen are too busy shooting at the net instead of being defensive" look at the numbers:

McCabe and Kaberle have about 125 SoG each. The rest of the Leafs defencemen have about 30 SoG each.

The problem for the Leafs is that they only have two decent defencemen, McCabe and Kaberle.

Oh, and Phaneuf has 161 SoG. He spent more time playing defence instead of trying to score goals, maybe his +/- would be better.

[Asher]

His +/- is already better than McCabe, and he clearly has more offensive chances.

Phaneuf is an all-around defenseman that locks down the zone and hits anything that moves. McCabe is an offensive defenseman that has a reputation of taking bad penalties at bad times because he can't keep up.

Phaneuf averages 2.8 shots per game, McCabe 2.6 shots per game. Both players have a killer shot, McCabe got lucky in that he was paired with another offensive defenseman (and Phaneuf is not), which inflates his points in comparison.

But outside of the offensive capabilities -- where I consider both to be excellent -- Phaneuf is better defensively. The only reason he wasn't chosen was his age, and next Olympics, I guarantee you he'll be in the regular team, not even the taxi squad. His "career potential" says it all: Franchise Defenseman, compared to McCabe's "career potential": Pairing defenseman.

Nevermind the fact that McCabe gets injured more than Phaneuf, and he doesn't even throw hits nearly as much.

Give me a break. Calgary and Ottawa have played once, and Calgary got lucky with an overtime win.

And what was the score of that game? Compare that to the scores of the Ottawa-Toronto games. It's really pathetic on Toronto's part, because they do have a pathetic defensive corps with a goalie who should've retired during the lockout.

[Tingkai]

SoG has nothing to do with the other defencemen. Phaneuf is taking lots of shots and not scoring. The guy seems to think that he's a sniper, but he's not.

Maybe if he passed the puck to a guy like Iginila, Calgary would get some offence.

And in the end, Gretzky and the other Team Canada managers looked at McCabe and Phaneuf and decided that McCabe was better. Enough said.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Tingkai
SoG has nothing to do with the other defencemen. Phaneuf is taking lots of shots and not scoring. The guy seems to think that he's a sniper, but he's not.

Maybe if he passed the puck to a guy like Iginila, Calgary would get some offence.

And in the end, Gretzky and the other Team Canada managers looked at McCabe and Phaneuf and decided that McCabe was better. Enough said.

It becomes so apparent to me that you've seen maybe a couple Phaneuf games at best. My advice to you: quit while you're behind. Phaneuf doesn't take many shots outside of the PowerPlay, Sutter would rip him a new one if he did. That's one reason why McCabe's points are higher, he gets to play up in the offensive end a lot more than Phaneuf due to coaching styles.

Gretzky put McCabe and Bouwmeester in instead of Phaneuf, not because they're better...for McCabe it's because he was "more experienced" and because of the huge public opinion in Toronto demaning he be added to the team. Bouwmeester -- who is worse than Phaneuf categorically -- was put in because he has more experience (a world cup under his belt).

Inclusion in team Canada doesn't mean they're better. Staal is a better player than Shane Doan, but look who made the team. Phaneuf is better than McCabe/Bouwmeester too.

As for SoG not having anything to do with other defensemen/teammembers...have you not got the memo? Hockey is a team sport. Your linemates have an impact on your SOG.

[Tingkai]

Doan plays a different role than Stall. Doan is a checker. Stall isn't.

McCabe got in because he earned the spot.

Phaneuf didn't because he's not good enough, except for people in Calgary who apparently think he's the second coming of Orr. The rest of us know better.

No wait, the reason Phaneuf didn't make the team was because them damn eastern Canadians and them damn Liberal media are out to screw the West again.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Tingkai
McCabe got in because he earned the spot.

Phaneuf didn't because he's not good enough, except for people in Calgary who apparently think he's the second coming of Orr. The rest of us know better.

Sorry, this is rhetoric at best.

McCabe is simply a worse defenseman. He's a defenseman who wants to play forward, and Quinn is stupid enough to encourage that. Go figure that Toronto is the victim of countless blowouts and highscoring games, they don't have any defensemen or a coach who knows what they're doing.

Your attitude (and Quinns) is precisely why the Maple Leafs have been the pathetic team they have been for the last 40 years. You guys are missing some of the fundamentals of the sport here.

Look up "defense" and what it means regarding hockey, then compare that to McCabe. The guy doesn't hit worth a damn, he doesn't skate worth a damn, he takes bad penalties regularly, and he makes constant mistakes in his own end and makes way too many giveaways for somebody with his level of experience.

McCabe is only Team Canada not because he earned it, but because of public pressure from people who don't know any better (including Quinn, I suspect).