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Canes signed Tuomo Ruutu today to a one year $2.25 mil contract.That number seems a little large in my estimation - to me he's still kind of an unknown in the offensive area (although not in the ability-to-get-stitches area). But, hey, it's only a year - if he doesn't live up to it, at least it's not a long-term contract. But if he can hit and fight and score, then it's money well spent in my book.
Interestingly, the player we traded for Ruutu, Andrew Ladd, signed a two-year deal with the Blackhawks as well today. Hope things continue to go well for him and he scores lots of goals this season (as long as they're not against us!).
Yesterday, Jeff Hamilton and David Tanabe were placed on waivers to be boughtout by the team. Which is sad in Tanabe's case, as he doesn't seem to have recovered from that concussion he suffered at all.
And hiding in that article about the buyouts was this gem:
Additionally, Hurricanes general manager Jim Rutherford said the team has been unable to reach an agreement with forward Darcy Hordichuk, whose free-agent rights the Canes obtained from the Nashville Predators on Thursday. [...]
"The fact that we had tried to get a jump on it and he wasn't interested in what we had to say, it would appear we're not getting him," Rutherford said.
So, the point of that trade was...?
And to cap all of today's news off: Barry Melrose was instated as the Tampa Bay Lightning coach. Which is just sort of weird.
So, on Friday, the Canes absolutely steamrolled the Thrashers, winning 7-1.
And, man, this game was extremely chippy. I find it interesting, that with the return of losing to Atlanta, returns the crap that made Caniacs hate this team even when we were beating up on them. Altogether 115 penalty minutes on the game.
So, yeah, Canes absolutely kicked butt in this one. Ruutu got two, Hamilton got two - 5 goals were on the power play, one was shorthanded. A really great game to watch, if you were on the Canes side.
But, then, last night the Canes dropped one to Tampa 2-1, allowing the C[r]apitals to come within 2 points of the Canes in the standings.
Is anyone else just a tad bit concerned that the C[r]apitals are so close with only three games left?
Anyways, the Canes were leading when I switched to the Tar Heels game, Chad LaRose having scored on a "three way passing play" in the words of Chuck K. It's great that Chad is back to his old self - no lack of energy there!
So, Canes play said C[r]apitals on Tuesday - can anybody say "must win"?
Erik Cole stats (Friday): 2 assists
On the season: 22 goals, 27 assists
Chad LaRose stats (Friday): 1 assist
Saturday: 1 goal
On the season: 8 goals, 11 assists
Canes lost in a shootout to the C[r]apitals 3-2 last night.
Honestly, I think the Canes are lucky to get a point out of this meeting. They really didn't play well, and had no real offense to speak of. I mean, our two goals were pretty lucky - Hamilton's in the first was an improbable bank shot off of a Washington defenseman's leg, and Cole's was lucky to be called a goal - at least if the delay in reviewing it is any indication - he literally crashed the net, being pushed in by a C[r]apital. Otherwise the Canes offense was sort of meh...
Of course, this might be because we are missing a huge number of people, Patrick Eaves being added to the list because he apparently caught the flu. It was like watching the Albany River Rats without moving to New York and dealing with all the snow.
Speaking of Albany, the Canes signed their first round pick Brandon Sutter to a three-year deal. He'll report to Albany for now.
So, yeah, lead in the Southeast is down to four with five games left... not cool.
Next game's against the Thrashers on Friday.Erik Cole stats: 1 goal
On the season: 22 goals, 25 assists
Well, Mick McGeough proved once again why he is the worst ref in the NHL in last night's 2-1 OT win over Jersey.
Tuomo Ruutu (who missed warmups, but still made the game) got stabbed in the face by Patrick Elias, and left a trail of blood leading back to the bench that could be blatantly seen from the third level. He needed 40 stitches to sew up the laceration.
McGeough - GET SOME CONTACTS!
Grr...
Anyways, game was great for the Canes. They had some really good cycles against the Devils - and didn't really let them score, as Bret Hedican (I think it was him) inadvertantly knocked the puck in the net.
However, the game was not great for Tim Gleason, who got hit head first into the boards by Jersey's Mike Rupp. Scary looking when he tried to get up - almost had none of his own support skating off the ice. Only update on him I can get is that it's a head injury (duh), probably a concussion.
At least Wade Brookbank got Rupp back, totally kicking his arse later in the period.
Sergei Samsonov looked awesome, scoring both of the goals for the Canes.
Jeff Hamilton was sent down to Albany before the game.
I thought Ruutu played really well. He came out and had a huge hit on some Jersey dude, and looked to be a tough player - maybe a touch of scoring? He did get an assist on Samsonov's first goal.
As for Eaves (who also made his debut) - meh. Granted, he only had 6-ish minutes, but he did nothing spectactular.
Canes are looking great (Better than Ottawa, who fired their coach today). Tomorrow's game is against the Rangers.
Man, today was a nice day. Off of school, beautiful blue sky, balmy temperatures.
So nice that I decided to lug a chair and a radio out onto the deck to listen to Chuck K's broadcast of the 1:00 game against the Devils.
Then the moron next door decided it would be perfect to mow his grass, so not only did I have to deal with his movements messing up the radio reception, but I also inhaled carbon monoxide for the first two periods.
Sounded like the Canes decided to inhale some CO before playing this one: 5-1 loss.
Although, to their credit, the Canes were missing Cole and Whitney, along with the usual crowd of 25 million that grace the IR.
Jeff Hamilton scored the lone goal in this one.
And then, on Saturday, the Canes had a come-from-behind victory against the Panthers. I'd recap it, but I don't remember much of it because I felt sluggish due to a nasty cold and I just really don't feel like trying too hard right now.
Erik Cole stats (Saturday): 1 assist
On the season: 13 goals, 22 assists
Canes won last night in OT 3-2.
The overtime period was absolutely unnessecary - Toronto scored a goal with 11 seconds left in the game to tie it up, forcing me to lose sleep and watch the OT.
In which Brind'Amour scored the winning goal, so it's all good.
I had a semblance of a post thought up in my mind, but it's all gone now. Probably because there's two Pittsburgh games coming up very soon, and I always look forward to those. (Boo Orpik!)
But here's an oddity for you: Jeff Hamilton was waived Wednesday, but still played for the Canes last night because Matt Cullen was out with vision problems after his concussion that wasn't a concussion but really was a concussion.
I get the feeling I'm not communicating very well today. I'm calling it Pittsburgh Anticipation Syndrome. I really love watching those games. They're always exciting and fast-paced and I get to boo Orpik.
Today the Canes traded David Gove for a Joe Jensen from those self-same Penguins. I guess it's a depth move.
Next game is tomorrow against (guess who?) the Penguins! I can guarantee I will be booing Orpik from the comfort of my own home.
Canes slaughtered Buffalo last night 6-2.
The scoring opened up real fast in the first - 38 seconds in Rod Brind'Amour took the lead. Sadly, the lead didn't last long, as Buffalo tied it back up at 2:52. With Buffalo's goal, the Canes lost some of their momentum, not getting anything done on the 3 powerplays that period.
The Canes took the lead again in the second period, but Buffalo tied it up at the end of that period after the Canes took two penalties on the same shift.
Then came the totally awesome 3rd period. The Canes exploded with offense, scoring 4 goals in that period. One of them was a laser of a shot on the power play from Jeff Hamilton - who I've nicknamed the power play savior! due to the fact that, since he came, our powerplay has kicked some serious behind.
This was an awesome game. It's always nice to see the Canes score a bunch of goals against a rival like Buffalo.
Next game is tomorrow against the Canadiens - again! This is the third time in October that we've seen them - the NHL scheduler needs to be fired...
Not really much from a team standpoint with the Canes, as they don't play until Friday, but there's some interesting stuff out there in general:
- The Canes site has a nice article on Chad LaRose and how awesome he has been so far this season.
- The site also has a good article on Jeff Hamilton and how he has suddenly made the Canes power play freakin' awesome.
- Bob Hartley, coach of the Atlanta Thrashers, was fired today after the team starting 0-6. I bust up laughing at the following quote from the GM in the TSN.ca article:"Whether Bob should be the victim here or not, time will tell, but unfortunately in this business coaches, all have shelf lives,"
I guess when I think of "shelf lives" I think of moldy cheese that smells a little and is slighty fuzzy... and picturing an NHL coach like that was just hilarious...
Okay, yeah it wasn't that funny. I still think it's quote-worthy, though.
- I think heated skate blades would be the bomb.That's it for now. More when something newsworthy comes up or the Canes play a game. Whichever comes first.
Tons of stuff went down yesterday. There's going to be a lot of new faces on teams this season...
First and foremost, the Canes signed center Jeff Hamilton, formerly of the Chicago Blackhawks, to a two-year $800,000 contract.
Let me take this moment to point out that this is why I hate the NHL's current schedule - I have absolutely no idea who this dude is because the Canes haven't played the Blackhawks in a year.
Anyways... he had 39 points last year - a good number on the Blackhawks team - but the kinda scary part is that the guy looked to be a career AHLer before last season. Is this supposed to be our third line center? Or is this just getting more depth on the team? Personally, I'm thinking there's still something bigger waiting for the Canes.
As for the rest of the league: whoa! That's a bunch of signings!
- Ryan Smyth went to the Avalanche for 5yrs/35.25 mil ($6.25 mil per year).
- Rangers signed Scott Gomez for 7yrs/51.5 mil ($7.35 mil per) and Chris Drury for 5yrs/35.25 mil ($6.25 mil per).
- Flyers got Daniel Briere for 8yrs/52 mil ($6.5 mil per).
- The long-awaited Joni Pitkanen trade went down - Oilers traded Jason Smith and Joffrey Lupul for Pitkanen and Geoff Sanderson.
And there's some others, too - I just don't feel like typing them all out. NHL.com's summary of the day is here.
The moral of today's story is: If you want more money - go to the New York Rangers!
