Rumblings of Leaf Defections

Don't listen to the rumours that Brian Burke, subjected to an avalanche of public scorn in recent weeks, is planning to take a six-month leave to get his personal and professional house in order while leaving right hand man Dave Nonis in charge.

"I've never considered it and ownership has not asked me about it," Burke said last week. "Quit is not in my vocabulary."

But while those who would have Burke dismissed after his short tenure as Leaf president and GM won't be satisfied, they may be able to take solace in the fact that the club's controversial goaltending coach, Francois Allaire, may be looking to make an exit.

As reported first by Elliotte Friedman on CBC's Hockey Night in Canada on Saturday night, there is strong speculation that a frustrated Allaire may soon resign his position with the Leafs and retire as an active NHL goalie coach. Allaire, the mentor behind Patrick Roy's ascension to hockey imortality, has goaltending-related business interests outside of the NHL.

When contacted by The Star about the reports, Burke said he had not heard directly from Allaire that he was intending to step down. What appears to be the case is that friends and associates of Allaire are making his unhappiness known.

If Allaire does want out, it would be a frustrating development for Burke, who just days ago gave his goalie coach a vote of confidence and said he stands behind him, but now may find Allaire prefers to depart from the media storm that has engulfed the Leafs in the wake of the club's shocking second half collapse. It would be nearly as painful a blow as extending the contract of former head coach Ron Wilson in December, then being forced to fire a nearly helpless Wilson later in the season.

Allaire, who has earned three Stanley Cup rings, left Anaheim in June, 2009 to re-establish his working relationship with Burke in Toronto. He was barely mentioned in his first two seasons or the first five months of the 2011-12 campaign, but when Leaf netminding went sideways in February, many critics targetted Allaire and his goaltending philosophies as the reason behind the inconsistent and often poor play of Jonas Gustavsson and James Reimer.

If Allaire leaves, the Leaf goaltending picture would be tossed into even more uncertainty. Already, its clear Gustavsson won't be back, Reimer was injured again late in the season and while Burke has talked about upgrading the club in the blue paint, there are no marquee free agent goalkeepers on the market this summer.

 

 

 

 

Still Waiting

Huge game for the Canucks, quite obviously, when they take on the Kings in Game 2 tonight, which brings us back to one of the most intriguing trades of this NHL season.

It happened way back at the end of October, and most analysts believed that not only had Vancouver acquired a legitimate top six forward in David Booth, they'd fleeced Florida and GM Dale Tallon by sending only veteran forwards Mikael Samuelsson and Marco Sturm south.

Six months later, the Canucks, who also assumed the contract of Steven Reinprecht ($2.05 million) in the deal and acquired a third round pick, are still waiting for Booth to assert himself after an up-and-down 16-goal season. In Game 1, with his old nemesis Mike Richards having a terrific game on the L.A. side, Booth was relatively a non-factor with four shots in 14:37, albeit on a night when many of the Vancouver offensive players spent a lot of time on the bench because the club took so many penalties.

With Daniel Sedin still out, Booth becomes that much more important to the Canucks. So far, he certainly hasn't delivered what Vancouver thought it was getting, and Samuelsson, in eight fewer games, scored only three less goals for the Panthers. 

It's beyond this season, meanwhile, where the ramifications of the deal become more interesting, particularly if Booth continues to be rather average.

The contracts of Samuelsson and Sturm expire after this season. Booth, however, has three more years left on a contract that pays him $4.25 million per season, precisely the reason Florida wanted to get rid of him even though they'd spent madly over the summer adding contracts just to get to the salary floor. Tallon has found Vancouver to be a useful dumping ground for contracts he prefers to be rid of, such as the Keith Ballard deal, which was sent to the Canucks in 2010 for Steve Bernier, Michael Grabner and a first round pick.

That contract also still has three years to run at $4.2 million per season. Ballard, meanwhile, was on the periphery of the Vancouver defence corps a year ago in the run to the Cup final, and this year he has been sidelined since Feb. 7 with a concussion. Grabner was a Calder Trophy candidate and the Panthers used the first rounder to select Quinton Howden, who has 70 goals in the past two seasons with the WHL Moose Jaw Warriors.

Don't know if the Canucks are happy with the Booth and Ballard deals. But the Panthers sure are.

Ballard can't yet play, but tonight would be a most convenient time for Booth to deliver the goods for Vancouver. Ditto for Sammy Pahlsson and Zack Kassian, two players picked up by GM Mike Gillis at the trade deadline.

If none of these players step up and become significant contributors this spring for Vancouver, the judgment on Gillis may be rather harsh. He inherited all of the club's key core players when he took over from Dave Nonis, and so far, unless you count Chris Higgins as a core athlete, he has failed to augment the roster with significant impact players.

Booth was supposed to be that guy. He needs to start being that guy.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Second Night Drama

In some ways, its like the 2011 Stanley Cup playoffs have simply bled over into the 2012 tournament.

Boston's unbeatable, Vancouver can't win for whining and NHL supplementary discipline leaves almost everyone searching for the logic behind it all.

But not to worry. The '12 second season will, in time, define itself, and four overtime games in the first seven matches played is certainly one way of doing that.

The Bruins, Sharks and Coyotes used extra time to get the jump on their first round opponents on Thursday night, making early playoff heroes out of Chris Kelly, Martin Havlat and Martin Hanzal, respectively. Philadelphia, of course, had roared back to beat Pittsburgh in OT 24 hours earlier. 

Thursday was a day chock-full of news, most of it before the games even started:

--Calgary parted ways with head coach Brent Sutter during the day, with Sutter's unsuccessful years in New Jersey now looking like a veritable dynasty compared to the nothing he accomplished in Cowtown. 

Remember when Sutter was the hottest coaching candidate not in the NHL? Now, you wonder whether he or Ron Wilson will next get work as an NHL head coach. Meanwhile, nobody has any idea what direction the Flames are headed in.

--A pair of disciplinary decisions by NHL executive Brendan Shanahan left pretty much everyone mystified as to the criteria used to differentiate between incidents.

Shea Weber essentially got a free pass for his mugging of Detroit's Henrik Zetterberg, while fringe Canucks winger Byron Bitz got two games for a hit-from-behind on Kyle Clifford of Los Angeles. Bitz also got booted partway through Game 1 to make this essentially a three-game ban, while Weber's ugly assault from behind on Zetterberg came at the expiry of the third period, which means he basically wasn't penalized at all for his actions.

The complaint about NHL justice have always been that it appears like they're making it up as they go along. Not much has changed.

--Detroit's Darren Helm is out for the season because of a serious lacetion received from a skate during Game 1 of the Wings series against Nashville. That's a significant blow for a speedy player who has been a big part of everything Detroit has done in recent seasons.

--Chicago got captain Jonathan Toews back for the first time since Feb. 19 (concussion) for their opener against Phoenix Thursday night, while the Coyotes lost winger Radim Vrbata during the first period with an apparent shoulder injury.

It was that Coyotes-Hawks game that might have been the most entertaining and physical game of the opening seven, with Hanzal deflecting a point shot past Corey Crawford in the Chicago goal to win it. Given that we are clearly edging close to a final decision on whether the Desert Dogs will stay in Arizona, this was an early indication that the Coyotes, unlike last year, won't use the uncertainty that has been swirling around their team as an excuse for losing quickly. It was certainly a night when, watching the passionate "white out" support there for the club in Glendale, you wondered why it is this franchise has struggled so badly.

Mike Smith, the amazing human goalie story, was the difference for Phoenix, which won 3-2 despite blowing a 2-1 lead in the final moments of regulation.

Compared to Wednesday, there were no controversies emanating from the four games played.

The champion Bruins did get their title defence off on the right foot, with Kelly's slapshot the only goal in a 1-0 victory. The B's, as expected, controlled Alex Ovechkin, including a collasal collision between Ovechkin and Boston blueliner Dennis Seidenberg.

St. Louis, meanwhile, beat San Jose four times during the regular season, but this time allowed a late goal on home ice to create overtime, then were burned by Havlat to lose to the Sharks.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Same Old Canucks

For 82 games, the Vancouver Canucks tried to prove to the hockey world they'd learned their lessons and had changed their ways.

Then, in the first game of the playoffs, the Canucks went out and seemed to prove only they're the same diving, head-snapping crew that collapsed against the Boston Bruins last spring and made them a detested hockey club in much of Canada and the hockey industry.

Indeed, after a 4-2 loss to the Los Angeles Kings on the opening night of the 2012 Stanley Cup playoffs, the Kings' official Twitter feed @LAKings seemed to rub it in and seize upon Vancouver's reputation by tweeting, "To everyone in Canada outside of B.C., you're welcome."

Nasty, and probably unwise bulletin board material.

But also true.

Vancouver's lousy performance was the biggest and boldest headline of the opening night of these playoffs, although a couple of other stories were noteworthy:

--The Pittsburgh Penguins blew a 3-0 lead and lost to Philly in OT 4-3 on a misplay by star defenceman Kris Letang. Key to the Flyer comeback was a badly blown, missed offside play that result in Philly's first goal and started the comeback.

--Daniel Sedin wasn't available to the Canucks, adding a new layer of controversy to the late-season hit by Chicago's Duncan Keith that ended Sedin's regular season and now is compromising his post-season. Keith received only a five-game suspension, returned to the Blackhawks lineup before the season was over and will be in the lineup when Chicago opens the playoffs in Phoenix.

NHL hanging judge Brendan Shanahan was way too lenient on Keith's cheapshot,and now the league is looking bad while Sedin deals with the very concussion issues the Bettman administration claims it is trying to deal with aggressively.

--There was an ugly moment at the end of Nashville's taut 3-2 series-opening win over Detroit. Predators defenceman Shea Weber, feeling he'd been illegally hit by Henrik Zetterburg, first punched Zetterberg in the back of the helmet then grabbed the Red Wing star and smashed his head into the glass.

With the NHL having backed off on tough supplementary discipline calls in recent months, few expect Weber to receive any extra penalty.

In sum, three games on opening night and lots of controversy and bad feelings all around. Good start to the second season.

In Vancouver, the Canucks dropped their fifth playoff game in their last six outings, and second straight on home ice, dating back to the Cup final against Boston.

Led by Mike Richards, the Kings pounded on the Western Conference winning Canucks and outplayed them by a wide margin. Vancouver, meanwhile, took a host of bad penalities, including a five-minute hitting-from-behind foul on winger Byron Bitz in the tradition of ex-Canuck Raffi Torres that knocked Kyle Clifford out of the game and could receive further scrutiny from league officials.

It was a night when the Canucks seemed to get back into the cheap histrionics that made them so disliked throughout the hockey industry last spring and led to their downfall. Ryan Kesler, as usual, led the way with some embarrassing dramatics, first getting away with an interference call on L.A. goalie Jonathan Quick on Vancouver's first goal, a play Kesler sold to the officials with one of his patented head snaps for effect.

The refs seemed to understand they'd missed one, and shortly thereafter Kesler was penalized for unsportsmanlike conduct for snowing Quick in his crease. Purely bush league stuff, the kind of things the Canucks weren't supposed to be doing anymore.

Later in the game, Kesler faked an elaborate tumble in the neutral zone that the officials ignored, then stuck his stick in Jarret Stoll's privates after the whistle.

No one seems to know why such a talented player gets involved in such nonsense, but Kesler made a strong statement on opening night that he intends to continue to try and get away with the same garbage that didn't work last spring against the Bruins. By the third, Alex Burrows and Henrik Sedin were diving again to try and draw penalties. The Kings, meanwhile, just played through it, with Richards delivering the punctuation mark on the night with a devastating open ice hit on Burrows.

Dustin Penner, he of the pancake injury, potted the winner late in the third to snap a 2-2 tie.

For Vancouver, all those penalties and all that nonsense was a big surprise. Unless the Canucks knock it off and fast, this could be a brief Stanley Cup playoff appearance rather than the beginning of another long spring run.

 

 

Even When Jackets Lose They Can't Win

No Taylor versus Tyler. No RNH.

Now what will the Edmonton Oilers do?

They may not be very successful on the ice, but the mighty Oil is damn good at the draft lottery, winning the 2012 version on Monday night and jumping ahead of the sad-sack Columbus Blue Jackets, worst team in the NHL this season, to grab the first pick overall for the third straight year.

Everything seems to work for Edmonton in the lottery. Last year, they didn't win it, but because New Jersey did and could only move up four slots to No. 4 in the draft, the Oilers kept the top pick anyway and selected Ryan Nugent-Hopkins after picking Taylor Hall ahead of Tyler Seguin the year before.

The intriguing question now becomes whether, after stacking up a pile of good forwards in the draft in recent years, the Oilers will finally recognize the urgent need to add some blue-chip talent to their thin defence corp.

Most see two Russian forwards, Nail Yakupov and Mikhail Grigorenko, as the class of the '12 draft. But the first round is loaded with good defencemen, and the question now becomes whether the Oilers will make one of them the top pick - rock steady Ryan Murray of the Everett Silvertips is the obvious choice - or trade down to let some other team select first and then pick a quality defender lower down.

Its A fascinating dilemma for GM Steve Tambellini, who is in limbo these days, waiting to see if he or head coach Tom Renney will get a new contract.

The Leafs, with designs on getting a top centre out of this draft, stayed at No. 5 in the draft order, but they might be one of the teams interested in the top pick. Toronto president/GM Brian Burke and Edmonton president Kevin Lowe aren't the best of negotiating partners, but Tambellini and Burke's right hand man, Dave Nonis, can take care of that.

Would Luke Schenn or Carl Gunnarson and the fifth pick get the Leafs the top pick from Edmonton? The Oilers would love to think they could get more, but in this draft, they may not get many suitors for the top selection. Moreover, adding Schenn or Gunnarson, then picking an elite blueline prospect like Morgan Rielly, Matthew Dumba, Griffin Reinhart or Cody Ceci, would give the back end of the Oilers a big boost.

If Edmonton were to stand pat and go with Murray at No. 1, and Columbus and Montreal then grabbed Yakupov and Grigorenko, the Leafs would then definitely get a shot at one of centres Filip Forsberg, Alex Galchenyuk or Radek Faksa regardless of what the Islanders were to do with the fourth pick.

So perhaps there's not enough to be gained by going after the top pick anyway.

"There's more than five players in this draft," said Burke after the results of the draft lottery were announced.

Burke and Nonis have already had viewings of the top prospects, as has Leaf executive Rick Dudley and all the amateur scouting staff.

Burke said he could move up or down, and doesn't feel he needs to draft high to increase his favourable rating with doubtful Leaf fans.

"I'm not on the defensive. I'm not going to say we won't trade down," he said. "Our lack of success this season hasn't changed our mindset."

All in all, while the draft lottery was again as dull as dull can be, the run-up to the draft, with three Canadian teams in the top five, will be as intriguing as any recent draft year. Burke and the Leafs will be right in the thick of it.

 

 

 

This Sorry Season

Sorry, I don't understand what they're saying sorry for.

Which also means I don't believe MLSE is sorry about anything, and its hard to be believe anyone would take this corporate press release as something either meaningful or necessary. That it was delivered not in person but rather by type underscores the reality that it means little. Actually, less than little.

Still, sorry for what? Not winning enough NHL games this season? Well, presumably another 28 teams will soon be issuing similar apologies, for only one will actually have won enough games when its all over.

Are the Leafs saying they didn't try, or that there was some kind of mole buried deep in the organization who sabotaged their best intentions? Were there laws broken, innocents abused or victimized?

To me, an apology like that offered today in full newspaper expression was something that was necessary after the sex scandal was totally unveiled at Maple Leaf Gardens. It would be necessary if someone deliberately misled customers into purchasing tickets or diverted funds from a charitable effort to their own pockets, or if, like the Boston Red Sox, it was discovered a cabal of veterans was gorging itself on junk food and cheap booze between periods of important games.

Just don't see what the Leafs have to be sorry about.

These are the facts, folks. A large group of well-meaning, well-paid, well-intentioned hockey people spared no expense in organizing and training a team for the 2011-12 season, a very young team that most industry observers believed was destined to miss the Stanley Cup playoffs because it lacked both sufficient talent at key positions and experience and because teams at this stage of development generally don't make the playoffs.

Most analysts acknowledged that the nature of the NHL salary cap system has squeezed the free agent market, so the team assembled by Brian Burke and Co. really relied (hoped?) more on the improvement of individual young players than others acquired over the months of July and August.

From October to mid-February, this team was good enough to secure one of the eight playoff positions in the Eastern Conference. From mid-February to early April, it slumped horribly, lost key players to injury, made a coaching change in an attempt to reverse the flow but ultimately was one of the worst teams in the league over the final crucial weeks.

Were there, and have there been, miscalculations and investments made in individual players that proved faulty? Absolutely. That's pretty bloody obvious, wouldn't you say?

But unless Larry Tanenbaum is saying those decisions were deliberately made in order to make it impossible for the team to prosper, its very difficult to understand what this apology is for. Unless he's saying the front office knew Ron Wilson would steer the team into a ditch and retained him as head coach anyway, or reveals an internal memo warning that James Reimer would be unable to stay healthy the entire season, what does sorry mean? Truth is, he's saying he and MLSE believe in the plan, which means they actually don't believe at all there was any flaw in their thinking.

Is it for not winning the Stanley Cup since 1967? Well, Tanenbaum and those that own the team can hardly take responsibility for all of that. For missing the post-season since 2004? Sure, except they've overhauled the team and management in the intervening years, ostensibly to try and produce a more successful squad, and they did so while being told it would take years to get back on a winning track.

See, MLSE is mixing up the need for an explanation with an apology. They don't need to say sorry. They need to honestly articulate that what went wrong.

And they're never, ever going to do that. Apologizing is much, much easier.

There's no chance there will be a detailed explanation as to why Wilson failed as head coach, or a step-by-step presentation by goalie guru Francois Allaire on why Reimer and Jonas Gustavsson couldn't stop enough pucks.

That stuff is top secret, folks.

There's no chance Burke or Randy Carlyle are going to give a truthful assessment of the leadership abilities of Dion Phaneuf, or tell you why Phil Kessel can be such an effective attacker but so mediocre or weak in other elements of the game, or tell you which players didn't get along or which weren't in good enough physical condition to compete.

Understand, sorry is just way to avoid having to explain. That's what your 13-year-old is hoping for when he breaks a basement window and quickly apologizes, and why he gets such a pained look on his face when you say, "Well, what were you thinking?"

If I were a Leaf fan, I'd be offended by this corporate missive disguised as sincerity. The only thing Tanenbaum should be sorry about is paying a PR flack or consultant to come up with this pointless corporate strategy. Don't tell me you're sorry. Offer me a refund. Or tell me how it went wrong in meaningful detail and what organizational and personnel changes you're going to make to deal with the problem. 

"We failed, and I apologize for years of consistently putting the needs of our shareholders ahead of our hockey fans. Today, because of that, I want to announce the following organizational decisions effective immediately and a reduction in ticket prices of 25 per cent across the board for next season. . . . . "

But the fans didn't hear that from Tanenbaum, did they?

The rest is just wasting time. And trees.

 

 

 

 

 

Insignificant Shuffling

For those focussed more on tomorrow night's NHL draft lottery for the moment than the upcoming Stanley Cup playoffs, here's all you need to know.

Whatever happens, its not going to turn the draft upside down.

For starters, thats not what the lottery is intended to do. For the most part, its a bit of a sham, a pretend attempt to maintain the integrity of the NHL season by making it less useful to tank in the final part of the season to get a high draft pick.

The problem is that only the five lowest teams, if they win, can get the No. 1 pick because none of the 14 non-playoff teams in the lottery can move up more than four places. That's what happened last year when New Jersey won the lottery and moved from No. 8 to No. 4. The Edmonton Oilers, with the worst record, were unaffected by the lottery, and still drafted first overall because only one team actually "wins" the lottery, and the rest just shift a little depending on their pre-lottery position.

So if the Oil had been inclined to tank it, exactly how were they penalized?

This year, Columbus has the worst record. But even if the Oilers, Islanders, Habs or Leafs win the lottery and do get the No. 1 pick, for the Blue Jackets it only means a slip to No. 2.

The right way to do this lottery is to make it a straight draw of the 14 non-playoff teams, and let the cards fall where they may. Yes, that would mean Calgary, at 17th overall, could get the first pick if it was drawn that way. What's wrong with that? It really would make teams inclined to compete to the bitter end, and really, this business about competitive balance being ensured by the draft really isn't borne out by reality, is it? Or the Islanders wouldn't have a top pick every year. Or the Oilers. Or the Blue Jackets.

So while the league will try to create great drama surrounding the draft lottery, its really unwarranted. The order will end up about what it is now. The Leafs will draft fifth, or win the lottery and draft first, or drop to sixth if a team below them wins the lottery.

Now, in some years, getting that No. 1 pick, or moving to sixth from fifth, would be a big deal.

But not likely this year. Not this draft.

This will be a terrific draft to watch, and to evaluate in five years, because more than most it will clearly identify the teams with sharp scouts and the teams that don't do their homework, go in blind and pay for it.

Why? Well, because the nature of this group of teenagers means draft position, at least in the top 10, won't matter that much. You're no more guaranteed to get a good player at second overall than seventh overall, and you're just as likely to get someone who can't play.

This is the scout's draft, a chance for the best in the sport at evaluating players to shine.

So, if the Leafs have a terrific scouting brigade led by Dave Morrison, they'll get one of the top kids. If they're too conservative, or unwilling to think outside the box, or too slaven to the NHL Central Scouting list, they're just as likely to fail. Those final Central Scouting rankings, by the way, will be released todayhttp://www.nhl.com/ice/news.htm?id=626755.

Yes, Nail Yakupov is likely to be the top pick, but as a smallish, speedy winger with great hands, he's not exactly what the Leafs need. This is their chance to get a big centre with a chance to be a No. 1 centre. Even if they were to get No. 1, they'd have to look hard at Mikhail Grigorenko of the Quebec Remparts.

Except Grigorenko is anything but universally loved. Some scouts love him, some think he's slow and a little lazy. What do the Leaf scouts think, and if they don't love the kid, would they be willing to advocate passing on him and Yakupov and going for, say, Radek Faksa? Or in even more of a gamble, Alex Galyenchuk, who missed almost the entire year with major reconstructive knee surgery but is still the No. 4 ranked North American? 

Are the Leafs willing to be a bit risky with this high a pick given the season they've just experienced? Are their scouts willing to advocate such a move to embattled GM Brian Burke? Right now, there's certainly reason to wonder if the Leaf scouts got the best prospect possible in 2009 with Nazem Kadri at 7th overall, there's strong evidence that players taken after Luke Schenn was selected fifth oveall in 2008 (Tyler Myers, Erik Karlsson, Jake Gardiner, Michael del Zotto, Jordan Eberle, John Carlson) were superior teenage prospects and we know for sure Jiri Tlusty was not the best available player at No. 13 in 2006 because Chris Stewart, Claude Giroux and Patrik Berglund were selected after Tlusty in the first round. (To be fair, the Leafs best draft pick that year might have been Viktor Stalberg at 161st overall. And he was traded away.)

So you've got a GM under fire and a scouting staff that with a so-so record in recent years facing a draft where information and insight will need to be precise and nearly perfect to get it right.

Columbus, at either No. 1 or No. 2, will face the choice of drafting another Russian player after failing before with Nikolai Zherdev and Nikita Filatov. Drafts are usually not about position but about the best player available, yet most believe the Oilers and Isles have to be looking for defencemen in a draft that appears richest with blueliners. At the same time, the player who might be the best of those D-men, Moose Jaw's Morgan Rielly, has been out almost all year, like Galchenyuk, with a knee injury. Rielly was sidelined Nov. 14, but to that point had 18 points in 18 games and remains fifth among North Americans on Central Scouting's final list.

So see what I'm saying about this draft? Due to the fear of Russians going to the KHL, there may be a chill over Yakupov and Grigorenko. And due to the injuries suffered by Rielly and Galchenyuk, teams better know exactly what they're doing if they want to expend a high pick on either player, and similiarly a club might be sitting there at No. 10 and find itself looking at the chance to draft one of those highly talented players because teams above them were scared off.

You can call this a crapshoot, or you can see it as an opportunity for the best and the brightest of NHL scouts to shine by identifying the elite out of a rather confusing pile of players.

All in all, the drama isn't tomorrow with the draft lottery. It'll be on the draft floor in June in Pittsburgh.

 

 

 

 

 

Little to Play For

Remember the final day of last year's baseball season with the Red Sox and Tampa involved in a wild couple of games to decide playoff berths?

Yeah, well, the NHL's getting none of that this spring.

Everything's decided with two days left of regular season competition. Okay, not everything. We still don't know who is playing who in the first round next week, although we do know the 16 clubs that will be playing for Lord Stanley's mug and the 14 that will be supplying players for the world championships in Finland.

All that was settled Thursday night, with Buffalo suffering a tragic fate and Dallas being eliminated with a loss to Nashville. We do know we'll have the Predators and Red Wings lock horns in the first round, while Pittsburgh will play Philly in a delicious series that is already ugly before a puck is dropped.

The other six series matchups will be decided over the next 48 hours. 

At the other end of the spectrum, we also don't yet know the final order for Tuesday's draft lottery. All 14 non-playoff teams are in the lottery, but since no team can move up more than four positions, only the lowest five finishers can get the No. 1 pick. The dumbest part of the NHL lottery is that a team can win it, but not get the first pick. Dopey.

The Leafs, Wild and Ducks all won on Thursday, which for Toronto fans fearful that a late-season push will knock them out of a top draft pick, means nothing has changed and the 26th overall Leafs would still go in to the lottery with the fifth best chance of getting the first pick if the lottery was held today.

The Leafs can still get to No. 4 depending on how they do against Montreal and the Islanders fare in their final match in Columbus. If the Leafs beat the Habs in regulation, OT or a shootout, they also could yet move to No. 8, depending on how other games go.

Other playoff-bound clubs will be resting stars on Saturday. Should the injury-decimated Leafs give Phil Kessel and Dion Phaneuf the night off in Montreal? Don't bet on that happening.

Regardless, rest easy, Leaf fans, and don't pull out any more hair than you already have. In a draft year that includes as much uncertainty as any in recent memory, with a aosme key prospects - Alexander Galchenyuk, Morgan Rielly and Slater Koekkoek, among others - injured for much of the season, the final order will matter less than the ability of individual organizations to peer through the muck and identify the best youngsters. More than most drafts, this will be one for scouts to shine. The potential for getting it completely right or completely wrong is just as strong at No. 1 as at No. 10.

But that's hardly a "race" to keep you glued to your TV, is it? Pretty thin gruel overall for the final two days of the NHL regular season.

 

Wednesday Meanderings

Points to ponder on a Wednesday morning:

--That Jays starting rotation after Ricky Romero and Brandon Morrow is at best unproven and at worst dicey. If it makes you feel better, AL East rivals Boston, Tampa and New York have pitching troubles of their own. Boston closer Andrew Bailey needs thumb surgery and won't be back for a while, while Tampa closer Kyle Farnsworth will start the season on the DL. With the Yankees, their big off-season acquisition, right-handed power pitcher Michael Pineda, starts the season the DL and Ivan Nova has been blowing up this spring just like Brett Cecil. In sum, everybody has their problems. Its about whether you have substitutes that can produce.

--Looking forward to my first-ever opening day experience at the dome next Monday. Not looking forward to the idiocy which Toronto baseball "fans" believe is part and parcel of the occasion.

--So Kentucky wins the national title and now all of its starters will leave for the NBA. Its not like they're mostly seniors with a junior or two. We're talking three freshmen and two sophomores. This is not the NCAA basketball of days gone by, and the style of play, generally, is unwatchable. The NBA draft rule is now that players must be at least 19 years old and a year out of high school. The league wants to increase the age limit, but the players union was unwilling to go along with any change in last year's CBA negotiations.

--Good for Connor McDavid to be recognized as an exceptional player for this weekend's OHL priority draft. Kid sounds super-talented. But part of the deal is that he must go first overall, which means this 15-year-old has to pack up, leave the country and go play at least three years for the Erie Otters, an operation that has lots of youth but has fallen on hard times. Moreover, there's some instabiity there, with talk the team may move to Hamilton. Its understood this may be McDavid's best option rather than a year of midget hockey or Tier Two or shuffling off to a U.S. prep school, but its a lot trickier than John Tavares going two hours east to Oshawa or Aaron Ekblad leaving his Windsor-area home to play under Dale Hawerchuk in Barrie.

--I have no earthly idea why Mike Milbury would say what he said other than to be intentionally colorful and controversial. You may not like every element of Sidney Crosby's game, but he absorbs a lot more abuse than he metes out, competes like hell and has worked extremely hard to fight back against injuries. Concussions, obviously, are no joking matter. All this said, why would Milbury apologize? If you want to go out on a limb, have the stones to stay there. If he said it, he obviously meant it. This post-comment censorship is silly, iike it makes it all better. Unless he was coerced or somehow tricked, stand by your words, man. Why turtle?

--For a contract worth $58.5 million over nine years, the Rangers have received excellent early returns for their money from centre Brad Richards. The timing of the move was perfect as it coincided with the maturation of many of New York's young players, a group that may add winger Chris Krieder as soon as this weekend. The nature of the industry these days makes the contract an early success, although what Richards will be like in year six or seven of the deal is unclear. But the Rangers are better now and a Cup threat, no question.

--There's something about Ben Scrivens worth liking. Just hard to say whether he can stand up to the rigours of not only playing in the NHL but playing for the Leafs. Love the personality and ability to play the puck, though. He has a great chance in the upcoming AHL playoffs to make a statement about his ability.

--Add Mike Smith alongside Brian Elliott to the list of goaltenders once thought below average who prospers with a little more support around them. 

 

 

 

Stamkos Stuff

Some random thoughts on Steven Stamkos as he nears the end of his spectacular season:

--Still odd that when you walk from the gate to baggage claim at Tampa Airport you are greeted by a voice recording from Vinny Lecavalier, usurped some time ago as the face and star of the Lightning by Stamkos.

--Its an open question still as to whether the NHL can successfully market a player skating out of Central Florida as its marquee star. With the Sid vs. Ovie era essentially over, there's room for a new commanding presence at the top. Not sure it can be Stamkos as long as he's playing in Tampa.

--As Stamkos was potting two goals against Washington on Monday night, it seemed almost a  symbolic passing of the torch from Ovechkin to Stamkos as the best, most dangerous scorer in the game.

--As badly as the Lightning once overpaid in both salary and term to lock up the services of Lecavalier, they appear to have nailed down a bargain when it comes to Stamkos, who is finishing the first year of his five-year, $37.5 million deal. It averages $7.5 million per season, and with the cap likely to surpass $70 million next season (if there is one), that means the Lightning star will soon be earning about half of the maximum salary allowable to any single player. If the Blue Jays have a terrific bargain in Jose Bautista, the Bolts may have an even better one in Stamkos.

--Stamkos will be an unrestricted free agent in the summer of 2016, which was the calculated risk taken by Tampa when it signed him for only five years. Leaf fans can start the countdown to dreaming of Stamkos now if they want.

--If you ever could entice Steve Yzerman into trade talks, this is the kind of player you would give up four major pieces of your future to acquire. Not Rick Nash.

--Stamkos, you may recall, wasn't able to earn a position on Team Canada 2010, and good thing for Yzerman et al that Crosby potted that golden goal or it would have been a roster absence discussed for a long time. As it is, Stamkos will be front and centre in Sochi 2014 (assuming NHLers are there) and the only open question now is who he'll play with. How does a one-two punch of Stamkos and John Tavares sound?

--Stamkos for the Hart Trophy? As magical as he's been this season, not in the top three on my ballot. To me, the Hart winner has to be in the post-season. The challenge for Stamkos going forward, and for the NHL if it wants him to be a leading man, is that the Bolts may be going through a period where the playoffs may not be part of the plan for a few years. Trading away Steve Downie at the deadline to get a first round pick wasn't a move for immediate success.

The good news is that this draft is chock full of promising defencemen, which the Bolts desperately need. At or around the No. 10 pick, they should be able to get one.

--The most impressive Stamkos stat is that 46 of his 58 goals so far have been at even strength. The least impressive is that only 22 of the 58 have come on the road.