Haliax

Thought that this breakdown of travel was pretty cool. Of note to me: how did Vancouver only play 5 back to back games in 2010-11 and 2 in 2011-12 when the league average was 17 and 15? This coming year it will be 17 for them. On the opposite side of that coin, Carolina had a crazy amount of back to back in 2010-11 with 33. Why is that? If you look at the past 2 full seasons you see that this number varies by a much greater margin among teams than it will in 13-14. At least they seemed to have gotten that figured out. The amount of travel is interesting too. Detroit will do less travelling in the coming season than they have in at least the last 6 years, according to the writer of the article, despite the inclusion of the Florida teams in their division. Overall, it seems like the Rangers have the easiest schedule in the league, at least going by travel/ back to back games. Also of note to all you Flyers fans, despite travelling quite a bit more the last full season and this coming season than in 2010-11, the number of back to back games has also dropped significantly, less than half what it was in 2010-11.

Looking at this article, it is pretty cool to compare travel distance for the Wings this coming season versus in the past. This will be the least travelling the team has done in at least 6 seasons, according to the writer of the article. At the same time, the Wings play less back to back games. Overall it looks to be an easier schedule for the team, at least in terms of travel, even despite the Florida teams being included in the division. And look at the ridiculous amount of travel the Sharks and Coyotes do. Ouch.

Yeah. You're like a friggin unicorn. Get's Kronwalled but not injured. I could endorse that.

@jammer2 I'm sure the fanbases will hate each other. But I don't think the teams will. Which is the actual interesting part of a rivalry, to me.

There is a decent Wings following here, but there are still far more Leafs fans. I never worried about a team having a rivalry, or disliking a team, but I don't like arguing with irrational fans over small points of contention. It all boils down to a bunch of fanboy whining and its boring. A rivalry like Detroit/Colorado where the teams actually hate each other is much more interesting, but I don't really see the Wings/Leafs getting there. Remember when the Canucks had like a 12 game road trip because of the last Winter Olympics? That would suck.

Yup. Honestly, it isn't a stat I've ever really paid attention to.

Yeah, this is what I meant, just explained better. Hopefully it is successful and those 2 teams can make more money and generate some more interest among the locals at the same time.

@flyercanuck I don't think that Bettman made the decision unilaterally.

The thought that the Red Wings are in the Atlantic Division is somewhat odd for me. I don't really know why they wouldn't have called the Metropolitan division the Atlantic and thought of something different for the 4th. I don't like metropolitan, I don't know how it fits with the other division names. If we want to talk about the re-alignment, it will always be weird to me that Florida and Tampa Bay are in the same division as the Wings/Habs/Leafs/Sens etc. It has to be purely to try and increase interest in those 2 franchises.

@Commander Clueless Ha, yeah. Would suck to have to play against an extremely motivated Grabo 6 times a year, wouldn't it.

I'm not sure that I would have watched otherwise. It would have been the same for me as with the WJC. I have some interest, but only enough to check what the scores were at the end of the night.

Maybe his comments on the way out the door hurt him more than he expected they would. Because I really can't see why that would be the case otherwise.

Full schedule announced here There are a couple long road trips that look like they could be pretty brutal. Including 7 out of 8 on the road at the end of December/ beginning of January. Really only interrupted by the Winter Classic, which will an exhausting game itself. And then 5 games of 6 in February on the road. Looks like a good amount of the games will make their way onto national television. Kind of looking forward to playing the Leafs more often, but I really don't like dealing with their fan base. Good thing there aren't very many of them here.

I hope you're right. I think Weiss is a bit of risk, since he missed so much time with the wrist injury and really didn't play well even when he was healthy. Hopefully he can fully rehab the wrist over the summer and come back fully charged in the new season.

At least they got this right. I really wonder why it took them so long to work things out.

It probably had to do more with how highly they viewed Weiss, or that they wanted to address their center issue as early as possible in free agency. If I remember correctly, Grabo was kind of busy getting married on July 5th. Or maybe they just don't like Grabo as much as I (we) do.

@yave1964 I don't think Murray is a great choice, I don't think that he is as effective as he used to be. Kuba might be okay. I don't really know, I've been hoping that they would make a move to get a top 4 defenseman, but I don't know how feasible that is anymore.

Yeah. Realgud Lashoff. I really hope we don't end up running with him as the 7th defenceman, because I don't see him as someone we can rely on, and we're going to need someone when we inevitably run into injury problems.

@JR Ewing I thought that they did implement some restrictions a couple years ago? Or was that more to do with shoulder pads? I tried to look it up but couldn't find anything. Maybe it's just my head making things up.

This really just confirms what I've seen in Grabo in the games I watched. I think the guy is far from a floater, he is actually pretty effective defensively and is a competitor. He just really didn't get along with Carlyle. Before the Wings signed Alfredsson and Weiss I had hopes that they were going to go after Grabo because he plays exactly the type of game the Wings like. I hope that he finds a job with an NHL squad and sticks around after, because he would be a major loss to the league if he left for the KHL.

@yave1964 His size was definitely something that was going to hold him back. I think that they probably wanted him back in Grand Rapids, but the Wings didn't have enough contract space to give him a NHL contract, they are already at the 50 contract limit. So it was probably more his decision looking for a 2-way contract. And the Wings have a lot of pretty great defensive prospects that are turning pro next season- Jensen, Nedomlel, Sproul, Marchenko, and Ouellet. Something had to give, I guess. I hope the guy has success with the Flames and makes the big squad, I just don't really think he has it in him.

I've always liked NHL players in the Olympics. For me, to not allow them to play dilutes the talent pool and it isn't a true representation of the worlds best players. I also think that the Olympics are a great marketing opportunity for the NHL, though I don't really have concrete numbers on how this affects attendance etc. Not allowing the players to go will also run the risk of upsetting some of the Russian players that are obviously dead set on going- see Ovechkin's comments on going to Sochi whether the NHL allows it or not. But obviously I'm speaking from a fan perspective. From an owners perspective, it makes sense to be wary of sending players to the Olympics, largely for the risk of injury.

@WingNut722 I hope that Nyquist is ready to fill that role by then, because I'm not sure that he really fits in the bottom 6 at all. If not him, Tatar. And if not Tatar, we'd better do a little bit of trading because these guys aren't the prospects we think they are.

Ha, that's quite the entrance Amo. Glad to see you here.

@yave1964 I never really considered Billins a prospect anyways, I think he only had a contract with the Griffins, didn't he? He might do well with the Flames, but I really only see him as a career AHL player. I felt like Mursak could be more, but I understand why he left for the KHL. Bit of a log jam at forward for us.