Things have been kind of crazy around JABS Mansion of late, for reasons that will become clearer in the next little while. The blogging has suffered some, but here's a couple of weblog-oriented items that have to be mentioned NOW, and can't wait for the usual Friday roundup spot.
First, a bad news/good news thing. The bad news is that Vancouver Canucks Op Ed is packing up its bag of tricks. I was a little shocked at the news. Great, irreverent blogs like this one don't come around too often. I'll miss it - where else am I going to go for a good CheliCart?
Good news is that VCOE's Alanah is going to keep contributing over at Kukla's Korner, and podcasting, and surfacing with a new, yet-to-be-URL-unveiled blog affiliated with KK, press passes (ever mindful of Don Carman's list) and pregame press meals. Well, three out of five ain't bad.
Meanwhile, the Falconer, blogging on the Atlanta Thrashers, has updated his monthly Penalties Drawn figures, similar to what I'm doing here at JABS with the Leafs, only he puts the numbers in terms of minutes and to be completely frank, he was the first to start doing this stuff:
To be perfectly honest I'm rather surprised to see the same four names atop the November leaderboard. Jon Sim in particular spent some time in the recesses of the Bob Hartley's doghouse and didn't always get a ton of ice time, yet he still managed to be his usual irritating self (well at least to the opposition).
(snip)
One thing that really surprises me is Kovalchuk's -4 minutes on the season so far. With his speed and skill he really should be drawing more minutes. I can't help but think that his diving tendencies in past years have given him a reputation among the referees and he is not getting the benefit of the doubt when he goes down.
What he's found is a mirror of what the Leafs' totals reflect - I'll update them later this week - the slick and slippery guys (Kovalchuk in Atlanta, Wellwood in Toronto) don't draw near as many penalties as you'd think, and the John Pohls of the world earn more than their share. I'm not sure why, but I'd go along with the reputation theory at least to explain some of it. These figures are worth looking at and needless to say, I'd love to see them broken out leaguewide. But the NHL is not going there, at least not yet.
And with Falconer taking the lead as he has from the start, I'll be back with some updated Toronto numbers later this week.
Thank you Chris, for your nice words. "Great, irreverant blog"... I might have to put that down on my business cards or something. :)
Posted by: alanah | December 13, 2006 at 01:53 AM