This post is so good I almost can't stand it, and not just on account of the humour ("To be fair, a small number of Ottawa residents are still keen to give him the key to the city, though only if he agrees to accept it rectally."). Try to find something to disagree with here:

What’s truly fascinating in all this is the utter ham-handedness with which Heatley has “managed” this situation. You’d think a guy who’s raking in millions might be willing to part with $10,000 or $20,000 for some top-notch strategic advice. Nothing fancy – just the basics: precondition the fans to expect an ultimatum, praise the community for its past support (…but golly, I’m an elite player in this league and want to go somewhere where the coaching staff sees me as such, etc. etc.), sit down with a sympathetic reporter and lay out the reasons for wanting out, enlist a teammate or two to speak out as a third-party supporter, maybe visit Ottawa and do a charity thing to emphasize the It’s Nothing Personal aspect of it all.

But nooooooooo. Heatley has done none of that. His trade request was crude and insulting and not couched by any (genuine or manufactured) love for Ottawa and its fans. He’s remained silent for weeks now, allowing the Senators to portray him as a total douche and giving reporters and columnists nothing to write about except those douchey musings. And now, having demanded out, he’s gone and vetoed the only decent trade the Senators could come up with – naturally, without so much as a word as to why.

Would most Ottawa fans be down on Heatley no matter what right now? Absolutely. But the level of hatred in the city could have been diminished, and the degree to which he’s now viewed as a Problem Child in cities around the league could have been avoided entirely.

If anyone still read this here blog, this statement might hurt someone's feelings, but we gotta keep it real: to an outsider, Dany Heatley comes off as the NHL's Patrick Bateman.

It really doesn't matter that you've been forgiven for your past mistakes, Dany: you should still be keeping your head down, working hard, being easy to get along with, and basically thanking the stars for your good luck on a daily basis. You drove your car into a wall and killed your buddy, and you're neither dead yourself nor in jail. Displeasure with your work environment is probably something you ought to be suffering in silence.

Craig MacTavish wasn't one-half the hockey player you are, but Christ could you learn some stuff from him -- the first being that you, like him, are never, never allowed to feel sorry for yourself for any reason. It's the price you owe, in perpetuity. Deal.

No deal with Bouwmeester (though I'm not going to stomp my feet if he signs). Pardy for $2.5M over 3 years. Steve Sullivan for ~$2M/yr X 2 or 3 years. Kent Huskins (or thereabouts) for $1.6M over 2 years. Jason Labarbera for 1 or 2 years at under $1M/yr. And a minor trade: Miikka Kiprusoff for Ryan Smyth

Why it Could Happen:

• Flames and Avs have a long history of dealing with each other
• Flames (based on years of rumours) have a long-standing desire to acquire Smyth; it was apparently pretty close to happening in July '07
• Their cap and salary numbers are pretty close (Kipper is $5.3M avg. salary, $5.83 cap hit for 5 more years; Smyth is $5.5M avg. salary, $6.25M cap hit for 3 more years)
• Avs have been unstable and/or poor in goal for several years; probably tired of it! Kipper has a Vezina, two near-misses, and a Conn Smythe near-miss too
• Given bullet #2 above, and that the Avs have been trying to move Smyth for a while, he'd likely waive his NTC to come to Calgary
• The Avs have had a positive recent experience with the rejuvenation of a former Vezina winner
  

Why it Won't Happen: oh, basically for the same reasons that I'd like it to. Smyth may be a bit overpaid, but he's a hell of a hockey player, always plays against the other team's best, and makes your team better at both ends of the ice. On a shift-to-shift basis, he was the best Avs player in every game of theirs I watched this past season.

Kipper's struggles have been monitored at some length at this site over the past two seasons. Darryl Sutter might be the only guy, along with some true-believing fellow Flames fans, who think he's a good bet to be an above-average goalie going forward.

But maybe if I close my eyes and wish really, really hard....

Item the first: Brent Sutter to leave Devils. Even back before he took the NJD job, I was never on board with the notion that he was a great fit to coach the Flames. It comes down to two semi-related issues:

1. The success he's achieved in his post-playing career has pretty much always been as the big dog; the guy who makes the final decisions on everything. I was surprised that he took the Devils' job in the first place, given Lamoriello's well-known status as the Ultimate Overlord of everything there short of signing the cheques. I'm not at all sure he wants another position where he's "just the coach".
2. Yeah, the Flames are turning into a Sutter family business, but Darryl's relatives in the org have roles that are quite specific and out of the spotlight. The coach's job is to do WHATEVER, that one way or another results in regular season and then playoff success. Sometimes, that's going to be odds with the way the GM has planned things. Let's imagine for a second that Brent was coach this past season, and thinks Olli Jokinen is basically crap. Darryl trades for him at the deadline, announcing that the org has been interested in him for years; he only did it because Olli has another year left on his deal; and that he only notified Brent the night before that it was about to happen ("GMs manage, coaches coach"). Does Brent really want to be in this kind of position, where his brother has autonomous license to affect what he thinks he should be doing to succeed? I'm not so sure.

Item the Second: Bankruptcy court to rule on Balsillie bid for Coyotes. The NHL (and/or Gary Bettman, and/or the Board of Governors, make your own distinctions) is specifically asking for a ruling that a court cannot supersede the rules and regulations of the league with respect to transfer of ownership or relocation. The NBA, NFL, and MLB are apparently all supporting the NHL.

This seems to me like a "careful what you ask for" situation. To look at it from another angle, the NHL is asking Judge Redfield to explicitly tell the secured creditors of every team that in reality, what they are is secured** creditors (**subject to a vote of the 30 Governors, who always have their own interests first).

If you're a major lender, then it seems to me that being secured is better than being secured**. If word comes down that what they are is secured**, I don't see how the result -- short, medium, and long-term -- could be anything but more difficult and more expensive financing for pro sports teams. Are the Governors, and the owners in the other leagues, sure they want to call that a Win?

Item the Third: Stanley Cup may be awarded tonight. "Young team with gobs of talent makes finals, gets schooled by veteran & successful franchise, learns what it takes to win, comes back the following season to match up with the same franchise, and takes the final step." As a long-time Flames fan, I've been bored with that narrative for approximately 25 years minus 5 minutes. Accordingly, I thought the most fascinating narrative for these Finals would be a Wings sweep. My second preference is "identical result to previous year", so I'll be rooting for the Wings to wrap it up tonight. The NHL can then save money by continuing to run that Crosby stop-motion TV ad through next season as well.

We are gathered here today to mark the passing of the 2008/2009 Vancouver Canucks. Let us pause for a moment of silence: to reflect on what might have been, but mostly to allow GM Place staff to clear debris tossed by petulant fans.

I was given the privilege of eulogizing the 2008/09 Canucks at Puck Daddy, and as you can see, I went for the blindingly obvious joke in the lede.

Whole thing here. Not my best work, but hopefully it does the job. Ironic given the title and origins of this blog, but I find it surprisingly difficult to be vicious and make sense at the same time.

Blast from the past: the gold standard for these pieces is Mike W's eulogy of last season's Flames ("We ask now that everyone remove their idiotic Stetsons as we bury your dreams.")

[...] one wonders at what point the owners look at this situation and wonder why they are propping up losing propositions everywhere they look.

That's BDHS, contemplating Gary Bettman and the Coyotes. Here's something I wrote in July 2007 that I think is still pretty relevant:

The present CBA has an expiry date. The next one, and the one after that, will be different. Extremely different? I doubt it, but time will tell. Maybe some of the cost certainty elements will be watered down. Maybe some of the revenue-sharing provisions will be altered. I dunno. What I do know is that NHL owners have to plan for this in some way; they do have incentives to make decisions that will benefit the value of their businesses regardless of exactly what the next CBA says.

Steadfastly supporting a franchise that appears to have no chance of being profitable in their present location is not one of those things. Keeping a team from relocating into a market that will be extremely lucrative is not one of those things. Exercising an extreme amount of collective control over the fate of an individual franchise is not one of those things. And being indifferent -- or hostile -- to overall league revenue growth is not one of those things.

(And let's not forget: the next CBA will not drop out of the sky, it will be negotiated. If the league and owners spend the next 4 years trying to torque everything except Hockey Related Revenues, then the notion of the "partnership" will be in much bigger shambles than it is now, and it will considerably more difficult to negotiate a CBA with terms favourable to them.)

When I assess the short, medium, and long-term interests of NHL owners, each weighed as appropriately as I can figure, I think they must be in favour of the Balsillie bid for the Preds. It got denied this time, because Gary Bettman aggressively intervened (note: his interests are not identical to the owners'), and because Balsillie overplayed his hand (acting as if it was a done deal, instead of simply being clear about his intentions). Next time -- especially after all the owners have had time to reflect on this past bid -- Gary's veto is going to be overridden. Or at least, that's my prediction.

Developing...

There will surely be fallout in Calgary, and Keenan’s head is probably on the block. If he is fired it will be the first time he didn’t deserve it. - Tom Benjamin

I endorse this statement. My vote is for a one-year contract extension (so through 2010-11). In evaluating the Flames' achievements this season, whether they are headed in the right direction, and why they suffered a 4th straight Round 1 defeat, I'd say there's several more obvious answers than "wrong head coach".

The GM. My take on Sutter (this week, at least) is that he deserves to keep his job for another season. Starting in 2005/06, the annual consenus has been that the Flames have a better chance at winning this season than next. And yet, next season the team is always pretty good, and they've made the playoffs for 5 consecutive seasons.

He made some nice acquisitions/signings this past offseason of guys who provided above-average play for below-average wages. I've been mostly impressed with the play of the AHL call-ups -- these are sub-cherry prospects, so I think it speaks well of player development, and Sutter is owed credit for that.

That said, I wish there was some way for him to get a clear and unmistakeable rebuke for a couple of things, and that's setting aside the specific issue of the Jokinen for Lombardi + 1st round pick, which looks worse than awful heading into the summer.

One: the cap fiasco at the end of the season. Injuries (substantial, but not unforeseeable) do not in any way excuse the lack of a buffer that forced them to dress a short bench -- which contributed to, if not caused, the loss of the NW Division. Quick primer if you need it: the amount of salary you can carry today and tomorrow is increased by how far below the cap you were yesterday. If through 3/4 of the season you are "on pace" to be $1M below the cap, you can increase your salary by $4M over the last 1/4 of the season.

Now consider that in a late season game, it was reported that Warren Peters was called up for a game instead of Dustin Boyd because of the difference in their salaries (which I believe, because there's no other 'good' reason). Boyd made $742k; Peters made $487k: a difference of $255k.

1/82nd of that difference is $3,000. The salary cap was $56.7M, and the Flames had to make a roster decision for a game based on three thousand dollars of cap space. That's outrageous.

Two (and this is related to One): his absolutely insufferable attitude in front of the media. His deadline day answer to a reporter asking about the Flames' cap situation -- ~"You guys have no idea" -- is all the more shameful in hindsight. We should have learned, from guys like Sean Avery, that working your ass off on the ice does not equate to character, so I have no idea why that label is affixed to Darryl Sutter (and his kin, to a lesser extent).

Like I said, I'm not sure the Flames could do better in the GM department, and I know they could do worse, but when Sutter eventually takes a bullet, I won't shed a tear, because at least that jerk won't be the face of my franchise any more.

The Goaltending. I realize it comes off as picking on one player, which is not my desire, but facts are facts. The numbers say that, over four seasons, the Flames have gone from having way above-average goaltending, to above-average, to around-average, to below-average. The most plausible primary explanation for this is that Miikka Kiprusoff is getting progressively worse at his job.

There's really no evidence that overwork in a given season is the reason -- his finest stretch this year was in February -- and even if it is, it brings up the question: "If your goalie is both a slow starter and suffers when overworked, doesn't that represent a somewhat intractable problem in itself?" Also, I'll hear no talk of Mike Keenan being personally responsible for Kipper being less able to stop pucks. Keenan didn't jerk the goalies around mid-game, deployed them in the exact manner of his two predecessors, and by all accounts doesn't really talk to them.

The numbers strongly suggest that #34 is declining, and precipitously. The other explanation is that year-by-year, though their Shots Against have stayed relatively stable, the Flames are allowing better and better quality scoring chances. Oh, and that it isn't reflected in any of the several current methods of tracking shot quality around the Web. If that's the case, surely a lot of the blame falls on

The Assistant Coaches. Jim Playfair's rep as a great defensive teacher is suffering by the season, even if a good chunk of the blame belongs to the one defender wearing the mask. I have absolutely no idea what Rich Preston brings to the table. What would you point at to advance the argument that David Marcoux is a good goalie coach? Etc.

I don't want Mike Keenan within ten steps of a trading phone or a Standard Player's Contract, but I still don't understand why he has never been able (allowed?) to bring in at least one or two ACs of his choosing.

If it were up to me: I'd give Playfair one more season, but dismiss the rest of them. The org can choose a new goalie coach, and Keenan can choose another bench coach (w/ JP) and a video/pressbox guy.

Injuries. Of course injuries are an excuse. No one likes to do that, because "excuse" in our vernacular doesn't mean "reason", it means "bad reason". "Good excuse" is essentially an oxymoron.

The Flames are a better team with Robyn Regehr and Mark Giordano in the lineup, and they're a better team when Conroy, Bourque, Langkow, Sarich etc. are healthy than when they're injured. Having lots of injuries makes them much less apt to beat another good team in a seven-game series. How can this even be controversial?

The Flames were a pretty good team this year -- 5th in a tough 15-team conference -- despite some lackluster goaltending. A lot of Mike Keenan's sins are imaginary (he's in Kipper's head!), or are the sins of basically every other current and prospective coach (he juggles his lines too much! he dresses the goon even though he sucks! all else being equal, he favours veterans!). I'm considerably more impressed with the guy than I thought I'd be the day he was hired, and I hope he's back next season.

Go Flames.

UNRELATED POSTSCRIPT, 807PM MT, VAN up 1-0: Continuing on with my thus-far unimpressive system of picking playoff winners, I'm going with the Wings, Hawks. Bruins, and Caps, and have more confidence in the WC picks than the EC picks.

Now I wish I hadn't, but I decided to look up the Flames' record since the lockout with Robyn Regehr out of the lineup; the horrifying results are at left. (Amazing but true: Games 2 thru 6 of that playoff annihilation by the Red Wings is the most successful stretch of games the Flames have had with the Brazilian in the basement.)

That noted though, I'm not any more down on their chances than circumstances dictate. On balance of play, this series could easily be tied. The Hawks have looked better than I hoped, but the Flames have a lot of good hockey players and (IMO) a pretty good coach, and now they get a chance to come back at home.

Calgary 4 Chicago 2. Iginla in the first, Langkow and Moss in the second, and Conroy blows the lid off with The Most Exciting Play in Hockey late in the third. Go Flames.

How do you pick playoff series? I get pulled in eighteen different directions by various factors. This time I'm doing it systematically (with one notable exception).

I wouldn't say that the system I've chosen is the right one; not at all. But at least there's a method to it, as opposed to (for example), deciding that Rangers will beat the Caps because you (correctly) believe that Lundqvist is a better goalie than Theodore, without accounting for why the Caps finished 13 points ahead of the Rags despite that truth. Call it an experiment.

• I'm looking at EV play, because most of the game is played at EV and (b) some of the things that make players successful at EV translate to the PP/PK as well
• I'm interested in Shots+/-, because I think in a sample that's large enough, it tells me what I want to know better than Corsi#, and yet it's still small enough that GF/GA is subject to too much randomness.
• I'm looking at play when the score is tied only. Because my intention is to use shots as a proxy for scoring chances, I'd rather not use the shot data from when one team is ahead, because there's some decent evidence (see mc79hockey) that a trailing team shoots more and those shots are less likely to go in. In other words, if I included all shots data regardless of score, it might run counter to my purpose.
• I'm looking at data since February 1st only. The idea is partly to acknowledge that some teams have improved or suffered internally since the first half of the season, but mostly because the roster compositions since then will more closely approximate playoff rosters (re: injuries, acquisitions, etc.). I think it's a big enough sample (30-odd games worth of shots) to be useful; YMMV.
  

So to sum up, I'm going to look at Shots For minus Shots Against at EV with the score tied since Feb1, and use that as (what I am positing is) the best available predictor of who will have the biggest advantage (and disadvantage) in scoring chances in the playoffs. Throw in a bit of goaltending factor after that, and ta-da: you have an empirical basis for predicting who will be best (and worst) at outscoring the other team, and thus who will be most and least likely to win. Take it or, as I would assume and possibly recommend, leave it.


So in the East:

• Add in the reasonable assumption that Hankqvist will stop an extra 1 of 100 shots than Theodore, and Caps/Rags looks like a coin flip.
• Pitt should handle Philly even if they don't sustain those insane percentages.
• Montreal looks like a not-very-good team, the Bruins are the right pick.
• Maybe if the Hurricanes had home ice they'd be worth a look, but it looks like the Devils are the pick there.

Tiebreaker: I'll use the American TV conspiracy theory, where Ovechkin is gold, but New York is platinum. Rangers. Good thing I took so many Caps in my playoff pool. In the West:

• Columbus has actually relapsed a bit since the first half. Better goaltending won't be enough to beat the Wings.
• The Sharks' shooting can't stay that cold forever, so they're the pick.
• The Blues look real. Don't forget that they had solid special teams all season too. I'm with Puck Daddy -- Blues in 6. Sorry Mirtle.
• Uhhhhh, Flames in 6!!!

So over at the Calgary Herald's site (which naturally, like most canada.com sites, I can't get to load right now), they had a bunch of their staff and contributors post their Flames/Hawks predictions with a few notes, one of which was "Key Flame". About half of them identified Miikka Kiprusoff as said Key, and to them I say, Bravo.

At right is the same info as above, but with the 16 teams ranked by their EVSV% (score tied since Feb1 etc.). Anyone else notice a slight gap there between 15th and 16th? I'll listen to arguments that Calgary gives up higher quality scoring chances than any other playoff team, but: that's not a slight gap, it's a giant chasm, and a lot of it has got to be on #34.

Now, having had 76 regular season starts in which to warm up, Kipper needs to be better in the playoffs. He just does. If he (or his replacement, haha) isn't, the team isn't going far.

On the bright side though (seriously), they're in the playoffs, and when you're in, you have a chance. It sure beats the hell out of the alternative.

Go Flames.

Flames @ Canucks, 8PM MT, RSN West

I guess this is a huge game tonight, but I find myself not caring all that much. I get more convinced by the week that, notwithstanding the impact of injuries, the Blue Jackets are at least as tough an opponent as the Blackhawks. I'd like Game 7 in Round 1, if it comes to that, to be at home, but I'm not losing sleep over it.

And the other thing is, a big part of the fun of the regular season is not just seeing where your team finishes so much as finding out what kind of team you have -- and nothing in the final three games is going to affect my opinion of that one way or the other. The Flames:

• are a pretty good 5v5 team that reliably outshoots the other guys
• give up too many shots and chances on the PK
• have an average PP that could go either way over a short stretch of games
• have a stupidly effective "3rd line" of GlenX/Conroy/Moss
• aren't quite as good defensively as they ought to be given their payroll on the blue (and their payroll overall)

And most importantly, aren't going on a deep run unless they get significantly better goaltending in the playoffs than they've gotten in the regular season. On January 29th, I posted about Kipper's steadily declining EV SV%, .907 on the season at that point. Then on February 27th, I noted triumphantly that in the intervening 29 days, his EV SV% was .931 -- huzzah! I mean, harrumph, because in the 38 days since then, it's .892 [runs to office washroom to yack, sob quietly].

Since the evidence points so clearly towards Kipper needing lots of work to stay sharp, I'm sure the lads will lose tonight, and #34 will start both ends of the B2B against the Oilers too -- it'll work out for the best!

Calgary 2 (Langkow, Moss), Vancouver 3 (Sundin, Sedin, Salo in the OT). But, Go Flames.

Well, the Oilers made a fine hash of what was a promising situation only eight days ago, didn't they. The good news is, with the playoffs now out of reach, the org can devote its full energy to the important issues -- like the need for a new arena, and what their radio broadcasters are talking about on the pre-game show.

So I had a marginally clever April Fool's post set for today. I was going to announce that, having moved to Edmonton, and been treated so well, and just enjoying it so damn much, that I got swept up in things and found myself to be an Oilers fan ("I never expected this to happen at all, let alone so soon...").

But seeing as how not even Oilers fans want to be Oilers fans today, the whole thing seemed kinda... limp. So I scrapped it.

Carry on.

So, a 5-0 loss to their most likely playoff opponent... nice. The Flames' night wasn't quite as bad as the Oilers', but that's not good. Neither is 3-7-0 in their last 10.

Or perhaps I should say 4-7-0 in their last 11, those being the 11 games in which they've had an upgraded Big Body Down The Middle^TM centreman. I was at least fairly clear when the Jokinen for Lombardi Plus trade went down that I didn't much like it in the big picture, but that there were reasons for optimism and that it could work out. If you had told me back on March 5th that Olli would score 8 goals in his first 11 games... well, I should like the trade more now than I did then, shouldn't I? I don't, yet. Score a bunch of goals in the playoffs, help win a round or two, and all is forgiven.

And Go Ducks.

That's about what it's down to, now. Dallas is toast (let's all have a facetious moment of silence). Columbus would really have to yak on the balance of the schedule to be passed by three teams. So it's the Oilers, Ducks, Preds, Wild, and Blues for the two remaining spots, and they're separated by but one game. The remaining H2H games involving these teams are:

Mar 27 (EDM @ ANA); Mar 29 (MIN @ EDM); Mar 31 (ANA @ EDM); and Apr 10 (NSH @ MIN)

All five teams realistically control their own destiny, as they're packed together closely and they have 8 or 9 games left. Something like 6-3 over the last 2+ weeks would pretty much assure any of them of a spot, though in the case of the Oil, they might not want those '3' to be the wrong three.

Based on both their remaining schedules and their wee headstart, the Oilers and Ducks are the best bets to get home, though the Flames could spoil a lot for the Oil (and Wild).

Speaking of the Flames, they're in Columbus tonight, and no I'm not brimming with confidence. The lads haven't had much success this season in the second half of back-to-backs, and the BJs are a good team who handled them last game at Nationwide (and significant parts of the two at the 'Dome).

But, what the hey. Calgary 3 (Moss, Iginla x2), C-Bus nil (McElhinney!). Go Flames.