Alex Tanguay compared to Vinny Prospal

Alex Tanguay admitted he didn't have a great season in Tampa when he joined the Bolts in 2009-10. The one thing that was working against him from the get go, however, was the fact he was replacing a fan-favorite in Vaclav Prospal (better known as Vinny Prospal). The popular left-wing had been bought out by the club (...and still affects the salary cap to this day) and was replaced by the younger Tanguay.

Three years later, dot he players still compare? In the hearts and minds of Lightning fans, no. They hold a grudge against Tanguay and against former GM Brian Lawton for getting rid of Prospal...

But what about their numbers?

Both wings have 735 points in their career -- the difference being Prospal needed 1060 games to get there, while Tanguay did it in 883. Both have had injuries limit playing time... Tanguay has a better team around him in the Calgary Flames than Prospal does at current with the Columbus Blue Jackets (he had been with the New York Rangers after his buyout in Tampa).

It's a moot debate to be had now, as Prospal's multiple tenures with the Tampa Bay Lightning were much more productive than Tanguay's single-season effort with the Bolts...

[Note by John Fontana, 09/04/12 2:59 PM EDT ] Vinny Prospal's name was originally mispelled in the title of this post.

So, if you haven't heard yet, it seems the Jackets tried to sign veteran forward Jaromir Jagr before he chose to sign with the Dallas Stars.

One the one hand, it seems like a move for pure PR, especially with the reported $4.2 million price tag, but it's not quite as crazy as it seems when you think about it.

• Veteran Experience - Even if he's not at his prime, Jagr still brings 20 seasons worth of NHL experience to the table, and his skills are still sharp enough to put up a 54 point season when he returned from the KHL. Used as a mentor, Jagr was credited with helping guys like Claude Giroux, Jakub Voracek, and Sean Couturier improve their games. With guys like Ryan Johansen and Cam Atkinson expected to shoulder a larger workload, having that kind of mentorship in the room would have been a good thing.
• Familiarity - Not just Craig Patrick's familiarity with his former #1 draft pick, but you'd think the Blue Jackets knew that the Rangers were, most likely, the destination for Rick Nash, and who might be coming back in return. Brandon Dubinsky's first full NHL season came with Jaromir Jagr as his captain in New York. Think they could pick a few things up? I bet they could have. Also consider that Vinny Prospal, already a leader for the club, has been playing with Jagr on the Czech Republic team in international competition for most of their careers. One would think that they'd be able to share a bit of chemistry.
• Boosting Talent - The addition of Jagr would have added at least 40 points up front to this club - probably more. He might not be a point a game player anymore, but he's still someone who adds value beyond simple name recognition. Having veterans who can add to the scoring and help to bring the kids along is the same logic that was used to bring Adrian Aucoin to the defense, and it makes sense on the forward lines as well. Oh, and there's the small matter of the all star game. Think Jagr would have instantly become a candidate for Columbus? Me, too.
• Low Risk - I generally don't like big money contracts to players over 35, but it's worth pointing out that this was a one year deal from a team that had money to spend. If things didn't work out or the club couldn't stay competitive, it's almost a given that Jagr could have been flipped to a contending club at the trade deadline, bringing back a decent return.

In the end, it didn't happen. Jagr took a bigger offer down in Dallas, and we'll see how it plays out. Scott Howson has earned his fair share of criticism, but this was a reasonable path to explore, and obviously another team valued the same player even more than he did.

Just like that, it's September.

Almost any other year the turning of the calendar from August to September meant that training camp was about to begin, shaping teams for the start of the season in early October.

This year is different, because of the looming threat of another work stoppage/lockout.

Here at The Cannon, we'll keep you up to date on all of the lockout-related news, but we're not going to let it keep us from going ahead, business as usual, with our other content. To kick things off, I'm going to give you part one of our "Training Camp Battles" series.

Let's see which players are duking it out for a job on the top two forward lines.

Vinny Prospal
Vinny showed us last year that he still has some tread left on his tires, and he could provide offense. He's a hard worker, and that not only rubs off on linemates, but the rest of the lineup as well. At this point in his career, he is relied on for veteran leadership, and makes a very good case for being a stabilizing influence in the top six.

Artem Anisimov
Arty is a pivot with good size, and is very responsible defensively. He also has some untapped offense in him, leading him to being a candidate for a top six role. Given the fact he's so good when the puck is on an opposition stick however, he may be better suited for the role as shutdown center on the third line. If he shows a scoring touch in camp however, he may force his way on to a scoring line.

R.J. Umberger
There are few things that are for certain with the Jackets, but one thing is- Umby is going to bring it every night, and he's good for 25ish goals. I don't think there's much of an argument here, Umby will be on a scoring line.

Ryan Johansen
This is an important year for Johansen. The former first round pick has yet to nail-down a spot in the lineup, but with added bulk and experience he may be ready to take ownership of a scoring line center spot. He'll likely have every opportunity to take that job and run with it, but he'll have to fight off the likes of Anisimov to keep it. His skill set and Arty's defensive ability gives him the upper hand when it comes to the second line centerman slot.

Derick Brassard
The role of number one center is Brassard's to lose. He doesn't have the burden of trying to force feed Nash anymore, allowing him to unleash himself offensively on the opposition. At this point, he's one of the team's most talented players, and in my estimation the best playmaker. He finished the season strong a line with Umby, the duo may continue to ply their trade together on a line this upcoming season.

Brandon Dubinsky
Dubinsky is a wildcard, not so much due to his underwhelming season a year ago, but rather due to his versatility. Like Anisimov, Dubinsky is adept defensively. On the other hand, he also has a boatload of offensive talent. He can also play both wing or center. There's a huge hole on the right wing with Nash gone, and Dubinsky may be the best player to fill that hole.

Cam Atkinson
Speaking of that hole on right wing, Atkinson will be out to prove that he's the best man to fill the void left by number 61. He and Dubinsky are the top candidates for the top six right wing spots, but they'll duke it out for prime time on the big line.

Nick Foligno
See a pattern yet? The Jackets' forward corps is loaded with versatile, gritty, two-way forwards. Umby, Dubinsky, Anisimov, Prospal...now Foligno. Foligno is coming off a career year offensively, but he'll have to top that to steal a top six spot from the aforementioned players. They all have similar styles, but Foligno brings more grit with a touch less offense.

Mark Letestu
Test Tube will make things interesting once camp starts. He has offensive ability, and is very good on the powerplay. He can also play both center or wing, making him a threat to steal a job from the eight aforementioned players. If those guys can nail down the spots they're expected to, you'll likely see him moved to the fourth line to add a dose of offense to the energy/grit line.

The Battles

Second Line Center - With Brassard having dibs on the top pivot spot, look for Johansen and Anisimov to fight for the number two spot. If Anisimov earns it, don't expect Johansen to slide down to number three. He'll likely see time on the fourth line if he can't lock that spot down. If Johansen wins out, Anisimov is ideal as checking center.

Prediction: Johansen comes to camp hungry, and snags the number two center spot. Arty starts the season as checking center.

Top Line Right Wing - Atkinson and Dubinsky are both worthy of this spot, but Cam is a pure goal scorer. You'll see more of my method by the end of this, but if we're assuming Brass is the top center, Cam is the finisher for Brassard's passes.

Prediction: Camsanity starts the season as the top line right winger, with Dubinsky holding down the number two slot to the right of Johansen.

Second Line Left Wing - This position could see the most intrigue. If we're assuming that Umby has the top line left wing spot (and that's exactly what I'm doing) then we have Vinny, Foligno and Letestu fighting for the left wing slot on the line with Johansen and Dubinsky.

Prediction: Johan is the young pup in the lineup, and placing Vinny on the line makes the most sense. He can mentor the young centerman, while also benefitting from Johansen's playmaking ability. Additionally, Prospal and Dubinsky are former teammates from their Ranger days. This puts Foligno and Letestu on the third and fourht line left wing spots, respectively.

To recap, my predictions would give the following lineup:

Umberger - Brassard - Atkinson
Prospal - Johansen - Dubinsky
Foligno - Anisimov - Dorsett
Letestu - MacKenzie - Boll
Gillies

Stay tuned for a look at the bottom six predictions, along with a look at the battles on defense and in goal.

Anything can happen in camp- injuries, poor play, strong play from unexpected players, you name it. This is an exercise in prognostication, and a bit of fun. Let's just hope we're able to focus on training camp, and not daily CBA updates.

Though we've all been getting updates on the new Dispatch Media Center courtesy the Blue Jackets' live stream, it's one thing to read about the massive new HD scoreboard, and quite another to get a look at the new beast.

The interesting thing is, once I started talking to Game Ops director Derek Dawley, I realized how much of a revamp Nationwide Arena is getting.

"This arena is, pretty much, still the top of the league. The layout, the facilities, the design, they all stand up against any building in the NHL. But the electronics...all of the equipment dates back to when it was built. That's twelve years. Do you remember what your phone was like twelve years ago? Your computer?" The previous server rack that controlled the team's lights, sound, etx was the size of a small counter. Now they have a respectable closet's worth of big iron, plus a sizable data center in the video production room at ice level.

It's somewhere between shocking and staggering to consider what the team has been doing with that equipment, and how much has been accomplished before these upgrades.

So, now that we know that, what else is being done? Well, let's start from the top...

Things are much improved now, and even as the equipment is still being installed, it's clear to see that the new suite will offer better visibility and better communication for the entire game ops team.

At the moment, the arena floor is dominated by the scoreboard and the attendant equipment being used to install it.

The old scoreboard came down the day after the Blue Jackets welcomed OSU's new freshman class in late August. Once the new equipment was delivered on August 22nd, crews have been working constantly to bring the new gear online. "7 days a week, guys are in and out day and night", Dawley explained, and it's starting to pay off. The new LED displays ringing the arena are already functional, running calibration patterns as they confirm that everything works as intended. The "media center" itself is actually in the final stages of assembly - the crew hopes to be firing her up for testing in the next few days.

(Just to point home how big this new scoreboard is...here's a look at the INSIDE of the scoreboard, including the catwalks that will be used both for assembly and maintenance.)

Fans will also be able to see new displays handling out of town scores, stats, and penalties where basic displays had been providing information at either end of the arena. In fact, fans are going to be seeing a lot of new features, starting from the moment they enter the arena.

"With everything we're doing, it doesn't make any sense to keep those old tube monitors all around the concourse and suites. HD flat panels will be going in all over the arena. Not one for one, because we'll try to improve how they're arranged for fans, but you won't see a single CRT once we're done."

Once you find your seat, there are a few other improvements you'll notice, and perhaps a few that you might not.

At the party towers, the current sign boards are in the process of coming down, starting with the large ads located at the top of each tower.

In their place will go an all digital display system, mostly for advertising, but Derek promised "a few special things" in store once the season begins. The new frames are massive, being welded into place section by section (I happened to see one of them being hoisted up while we walked the arena floor), and each of the larger display boards will have upper and lower maintenance catwalks to make them easier to maintain.

As to the boards themselves, the displays on the tower won't be true HD, but they will feature much higher quality than the old system. Here's a look at a few of the component sections waiting to be assembled.

Another improvement? The new stanchions and dasher boards.

In addition to the thinner blue stanchions, the dasher boards now feature a "seamless" construction that eliminates the "rim" around the bottom that could cause problems with odd bounces or sometimes even skates getting stuck. In addition, the tops of the boards are now made from an absorbent rubber that will offer better protection on impact than the previous hard plastic material.

Last but not least, the final major improvement for the fans will be a new sound system to bring the noise.

"It's ambitious. Normally all these projects would take a year, easily. We'd been talking about it off and on through most of last season. Then the all star game and the arena lease came together and really spurred this into high gear."

The most impressive change, however, may be in an area that fans won't be able to access, though the results will be obvious for everyone - the video production room.

In addition to the new displays and layout tools, the production room now features an editing room (the door to the right), server racks, and terabytes of storage to support the all digital video system.

The arena will feature in-net HD cameras, above ice cameras, and more angles than ever before, all of which will be transmitting their footage down to the production team. As they review the footage, they'll be able to edit highlights and replays within moments, to share them on the main scoreboard or publish them online. "We're going to be able to do so much more than just cut basic replays. We'll be able to add digital effects, help to show highlights, and much more."

The more I talked to Dawley, the more obvious his enthusiasm for the new upgrades becomes clear. "Players who have been to Nationwide before aren't going to recognize it! There's so much that we'll be able to do."

He also recognizes that with all the changes this offseason, there will be a lot of challenges in the new era of Blue Jackets hockey. "This is...really a fresh start for everyone. I've talked to guys in New York, Ottawa, Phoenix...learning about all the guys coming in. We're really starting from scratch in a lot of ways."

With that fresh start comes plans to focus more and more on the city itself as they build the new game ops environment.

"One of my goals is to show that we're not just the Blue Jackets - we're the Columbus Blue Jackets. This is an amazing, beautiful city, and I want to make it a big part of who we are and what we do."

If everything goes well, and the CBA negotiations get back on track, the club will start to unveil the new game experience with the pre-season match on the 24th.

It's likely to be a lot of hard work and sleepless nights before that happens, but the more I see, the more I believe that fans in Columbus are in for a real treat, particularly when the time comes to welcome fans from around the NHL in for the All Star Game festivities.

Thanks to the Blue Jackets and Derek Dawley for the opportunity to go behind the scenes!

Welcome back to another episode of "Name that Panther!" If you would like to know how the list was puzzled together, click here for all the relevant details.

In yesterday's article, we looked at two-time fan favorite and career Panther leader with 16 shorthanded goals, Radek Dvorak (613 games, 113 goals, 155 assists). Today, we take a gander at a 20 year NHL veteran who spent three and a half very productive seasons in South Florida.

To read more, follow the jump.

Whitney, a 5'10" left winger from Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta, was a star player for the WHL Spokane Chiefs. He increased his offensive statistics in each of his three seasons with the club: 71 games, 17 goals, 33 assists in 1988-89, 71 games, 57 goals, 56 assists in 1989-90, and 72 games, 67 goals, 118 assists in 1990-91. After the season, the San Jose Sharks selected him in the second round of the 1991 NHL Entry Draft, 23rd overall.

1991-92 would be a very busy year for Whitney. He spent the bulk of the season with the IHL San Diego Gulls (63 games, 36 goals, 54 assists), making token appearances with the Sharks (two games, zero goals, three assists), the Canadian National Team (five games, one goal, zero assists), and Cologne EC in Great Britain (10 games, three goals, six assists). 1992-93 would see him split the season between the Sharks (26 games, four goals, six assists) and the IHL Kansas City Blades (46 games, 20 goals, 33 assists).

Starting in 1993-94, Whitney would enjoy three uninterrupted seasons in the bigs with San Jose (160 games, 44 goals, 62 assists). After starting out slow with the Sharks in 1996-97, (12 games, zero goals, two assists), he would end up spending most of the season with the IHL Utah Grizzlies (43 games, 13 goals, 35 assist), also making a brief appearance with the AHL Kentucky Thoroughblades (nine games, one goal, seven assists). The writing was on the wall, and Whitney's services were not retained by San Jose.

Before the 1997-98 season, Whitney signed a free agent contract to play for the Edmonton Oilers. After totalling one goal and three assists in his first nine games, Edmonton placed him on waivers. Florida was more than happy to pick him up in what was probably the best waiver wire grab in team history. He got onto the scoresheet in each of his first seven games and in nine of his first ten with the Panthers, culminating in a two goal, two assist effort on November 26th in a 10-5 dismantling of the Boston Bruins. He then started out December with a five game point streak (one goal, six assists). He had 15 multi-point games that season, including five two-goal efforts. He would lead the team with 32 goals on 156 shots, a better than 20 percent success rate. He also pitched in with a team second best 29 assists, leading the team with 61 points. He led the team with a plus-10 rating and 12 power play goals, getting caught for only 28 penalty minutes. He was the unquestioned offensive leader of the club, even though he only appeared in 68 games.

1998-99 would see Whitney put up 14 multipoint games, including a four point night (one goal, three assists) on November 28th in a 6-2 victory over the Buffalo Sabres. He averaged 18:20 through 81 games for the Cats, again leading the club with 26 goals (on 193 shots), 38 assists, 64 points, seven power play goals, and six game winners. He collected a minus-3 rating and only 18 penalty minutes.

In 1999-00, Whitney slightly increased his offensive output, scoring a team second best 29 goals on 198 shots (second to future Hall-of-Famer Pavel Bure's 58). He also ranked second on the team with 42 assists and 71 points. He averaged 18:41 in 81 Panthers games, ranking fourth on the team at plus-16, also spending 35 minutes in the box. He figured onto the scoresheet frequently to start out the season, with 19 points (eight goals, 11 assists) in his first 15 games. He enjoyed 16 games where he had more than one point, including a season opening effort (two goals, one assist) in a 4-3 win over the Washington Capitals. He added one goal in four playoff games as the Panthers were swept from the opening round by the New Jersey Devils.

In 2000-01, Whitney played in 43 games for the Panthers. On October 30th, he dished out four assists in a 6-5 losing effort to the Devils. In 17:41 per game, he scored 10 goals on 117 shots with 21 assists, 28 penalty minutes, and a minus-16 rating. The Panthers traded him to the Columbus Blue Jackets with "future considerations" on March 13th for Kevyn Adams and a fourth round pick (Michael Woodford). Yeah, we lost that one.

Whitney played in parts of three seasons with Columbus (151 games, 45 goals, 95 assists). He would later play with the Detroit Red Wings (67 games, 14 goals 29 assists), the Carolina Hurricanes (372 games, 119 goals, 215 assists) and the Phoenix Coyotes (157 games, 41 goals, 93 assists). He was recently signed by the Dallas Stars to a two-year, $9,000,000 contract.

#13 Ray Whitney (via MaksN77)

All-Time Statline: Four seasons, 273 games, 97 goals (ninth all-time), 130 assists (10th all-time), 227 points (10th all-time), plus-7 rating, 109 PIM, 25.5 APS.

Thanks for checking us out today. Make sure to come back next week as we look into three forwards and two defensemen in the rankings from 12 through eight.

One year ago today, those of us on this side of the Atlantic Ocean woke up to the news that tragedy had struck the hockey world yet again, this time on a large scale.

Seconds after taking off, the charter jet carrying the KHL team Yaroslavl Lokomotiv struck a radio tower well beyond the end of the runway and crashed into the river. Everyone aboard, save a player who eventually died of his injuries and a flight engineer who survived, was killed, including former Dallas Stars defenseman Karlis Skrastins.

Now, a year later, the search for answers continues. Pilot error has been blamed for the crash, and now a former airline executive has been charged in connection with the crash. Vadim Timofeev, the former deputy director at Yak Service who was in charge of the flight operations, has been charged with violating rules of air traffic safety and air transport operation.

"By putting the crew in the air Timofeev broke the rules of air transport operations. At the moment of the disaster, that crew wasn't entitled to fly," [Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir] Markin stressed. "Timofeev had allowed the captain to fly based on falsified documents, and the co-pilot hadn't finished his training on the Yak-42 plane and had no right to be in air."

There's another article, written in Russia, linked to this Puck Daddy post, and one from The Moscow Times here, but reading more about it doesn't make it any less infuriating. This was such a pointless tragedy that could have been prevented in so many places. And like we talked about last year, the aviation industry in Russia has some significant problems, though spurred on by the crash, the country is taking steps to address many of them.

After the jump, much more on remembering Skrastins and the rest of those lost one year ago today.

• I'm going to start with an article that is several months old, but it's still incredibly powerful and relevant. While we remember Skrastins and what he brought to this hockey team and the game overall, we should also keep the families he and the rest of those involved left behind. This powerful piece about Skratins wife Zane and her three daughters shows just how hard it has been on them, and if the last quote doesn't make you well up, I don't know what will. [DallasNews.com]
  
• The Skrastins family crossed paths with the family of Ruslan Salei several times, and the two men spent some of their final days together after being excused from some pre-season conditioning. This glimpse into the Salei family's life is just as poignant. Their widows should meet for the first time today at the memorial ceremony in Russia. [ESPN]
  
• This article is in Latvian, so I'm working from a very sketchy Google translation. But the gist is that there is a book in Latvia about the life of Skrastins. [TVNet.lv]
  
• Former Stars forward Niklas Hagman is among the former NHL players who will play for Lokomotiv as it returns to the KHL this season. As you might expect, it's a fairly surreal and sad experience for the players on this year's team, who opened the season with a 5-2 win. [Toronto Sun]
  
• Turning our focus to this year's team, Cody Eakin spent some of the summer skating with his former junior team, and he talked with the local paper about his hopes for the upcoming season. [The Townsman]
  
• The Stars were obviously not the only team after the services of Jaromir Jagr earlier this offseason, but this is the first I've seen of another confirmed offer. Jagr turned down a one-year, $4.2 million offer from the Columbus Blue Jackets. [Puck-Rakers Blog]
  
• If you live in the Grapevine area and have a kid who wants to try hockey but isn't sure he or she will enjoy it, the fine folks at Polar Ice are offering a free four-week program to introduce kids to the sport. [DallasNews.com]
  
• Nicholas Cotsonika has a great take on the CBA negoations, the looming lockout and all the games of leverage that are going on right now. [Yahoo]
• The Idaho Steelheads have sold 4,300 tickets to a Stars exhibition game during training camp, which is supposed to take place in Boise. But the lockout is putting that game, and other revenues that would be generated from the camp, in jeopardy. [KBOI2.com]
• Shane Doan has a contract ready to sign with the Phoenix Coyotes, if only that laborious negotiation between Greg Jamison, the NHL and the city of Glendale work itself out. [Arizona Republic]
• Former Stars center Mike Ribeiro strapped on the goalie pads a few times during informal skates in Dallas, and he continued that tradition with the Washington Capitals. Not only that, but he brought his two sons out to the skate. [Russian Machine Never Breaks]
• In one of the most touching and memorable gestures in the immediate aftermath of the Lokomotiv tragedy, Dynamo Minsk took to the ice on the day they were supposed to play their fallen comrades. Instead of a game, they held an incredibly moving on-ice memorial service. If you only have a few minutes, the condensed version is here, but if you've got some spare time today, the full 35-minute video below is worth your time.

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One thing we love to do at The Cannon is to provide complete analysis of all players from the top to the bottom of the depth chart with the Blue Jackets.

Over the next few days we'll give you some of the details on the newest members of the roster that you will (hopefully) see hit the ice this fall.

First up is Nick Foligno.

Position: LW/C

Number: 71

Birthplace: Buffalo, NY

Age: 24

2011-12 Stats: 15 G, 32 A, 47 Pts, +2, 124 PIMs

Previous team: Ottawa Senators

Who Columbus gave up: D Marc Methot

Contract: Re-signed to a new three-year deal with Columbus after being acquired.

Strengths: Great defensively and is praised for his work ethic. Should fit perfectly in the locker room with Jack Johnson, James Wisniewski, R.J. Umberger, and newly acquired Brandon Dubinsky.

Weaknesses: Hasn't had quite the breakout year people had hoped for in Ottawa, seems to possess more grit and determination than skill.

Where he fits: top six or bottom six, both Mike and Matt seem to agree it's up to his play as to where he ends up.

The bottom line: Foligno is a welcomed addition to the roster, effectively replacing the likes of Jakub Voracek or Antoine Vermette. With the lack of order in the CBJ forward group, he will have every chance to make a name for himself as a solid top six forward in Columbus. The biggest hurdle for Foligno is without the breakout skill to make plays happen, he may not have enough around him to elevate his game any higher than it was in Ottawa. If he can click with Dubinsky, Umberger, or an offensive dynamo like Cam Atkinson, then you could see him make more of a noticeable impact.

From Peter Raaymakers of Silver Seven:

Foligno's improvement has been steady and obvious since he began his pro career. He's never broken 20 goals, but he's been a good complementary player on the second line, and looked even better as a leader on the third line. He seems to be a "tweener" stuck between the second and third line, but he's only 24 years old so there's still plenty of time for him to mature into a good top-six forward.

Welcome back to another edition of Dan P.'s Mailbag here at The Cannon! Thanks to everyone who sent in a question. As always, you can send me an e-mail with your question. Be sure to include your Cannon commenting name, so that everyone knows who's writing in if your mail message gets chosen for the week.

Alright, for this Mailbag, I've chosen three items to explore. Today we're covering the All Star Game, the goaltending situation (a running theme with the mailbag), and then a scorcher: the lockout (duh-DUH-DUHHHHH!!!). Here we go!

OK here's a hypothetical for you...The NHL season is canceled, and the Columbus doesn't get to host the All-Star game. The NHL can make it up to you in one of two ways: 1) Host the 2014 All-Star game or 2) Host a Winter classic (presumably against a division rival like Detroit or Chicago). Which would you choose? --Trav614

Hmm. I'll be honest. When I first saw this question, I honestly thought the answer was pretty simple: All Star Game. But, there are a few wrinkles, and the longer I thought about it, the less sure I was. There are pros and cons for each answer, so let's take a look.

All Star Game

To me, this was the initial no-brainer answer, and here are the reasons. The All Star Game is an exhibition. It doesn't put the focus onto the team's roster so much as it does the organization and the fans. And, this last one is the big seller. The fans of Columbus get to show the rest of the league how strong they are, how into it they are, and that there is a hockey market here in Columbus. And, we get to show off our building while doing it. A Winter Classic WILL bring in fans from the other team, and as we've seen that can sometimes lead to, how you say, embarrassing displays. Do we want to show Ohio Stadium 70% full of Penguins fans? Not so sure...

The All Star Game gives us a chance to show our arena, our arena district, and our fanbase to the rest of the league, without the chance of getting run 7-2 on the ice by someone like the Red Wings, Penguins, or Blackhawks (seriously, look back to last season's Blackhawks games, at the scores, and then tell me whether or not you want to have the ENTIRE league watching that game on New Year's Day on continental television).

With all of the changes and upgrades being made to Nationwide Arena, that's the thing I want the world to see, honestly.

The All Star Game is not without warts, however.

The Winter Classic

First and foremost, 2014 is an Olympic year, and if the NHL continues to send its players to the Olympics, there won't be a 2014 All Star Game. That would push it to 2015, and who knows what irons the league may already have in the fire for 2015? So, the club is forced to look at the issue of alienating an already strained fan-base by having sold season ticket packages under the expectations of the All Star Game this coming season, and possibly not being able to deliver on that for two more years (though, through no fault of their own, necessarily). Perception is reality, and for the "casual fan" that's going to be a tough pill to swallow.

The Winter Classic is appealing for a couple of reasons: 1) as much as I personally hate Ohio State sports, my guess is that the Horseshoe would be a pretty awesome venue for a hockey game. It would be crazy-loud. And, 2) the ticket sales could be off-the-charts, as the capacity at Ohio Stadium is only a few thousand below The Big House, which is hosting this year's game (assuming there is one, of course). There's obviously a big income potential there, which is good for the city and for the franchise. The franchise gets the same TV exposure, albeit outside of their home venue.

Further than that, odds are good that in a 2015 All Star Game, Columbus will not be well-represented, unless some guys take huge leaps forward. A Winter Classic allows the Jackets to put all of their players on the big stage in front of that massive audience. For some young guys like Cam Atkinson, Ryan Johansen, Ryan Murray, et al, that may not be household names but may be very talented players, the exposure would be great.

Decision Time

So, to me, there are reasons for each. In the end, I'm still leaning toward the All Star Game, simply because I want the league to see that we have a state-of-the-art building that is second to none in the league. I want the chance to have the All Star fan experience here in Columbus, in our arena district (having the Winter Classic at OSU negates the entire AD as a part of the game atmosphere). I went to the 2011 ASG in Raleigh with my brother, and it was awesome; and their arena is not downtown like ours is!

Also, I don't want to see my team get embarrassed in front of the entire league, both by getting beat badly on the ice (always a possibility) and perhaps having their fans outnumbered in the seats; think to the sound in the arena when Detroit, Chicago, or Pittsburgh scores a goal, and now multiply that by 10... not good times, eh?

I answer the ASG knowing that it might mean not having the game until 2015, but the trade-off is that there's potential for more Jackets All Stars. A hypothetical: Jack Johnson has Captained Team USA twice in the World Championships, and it's not outside the realm of possibility that he could do so again at the 2014 Olympics. If he's then the Captain of the Jackets as many expect, it wouldn't be a huge "Who??" move to have him captain one of the All Star Teams. If, say, Ryan Murray or Ryan Johansen or Cam Atkinson, or ANYONE else on the Jackets gets to play in that All Star Game, it will give the fans a little more to cheer for than they may have even this coming season. That's potentially a very good thing.

I'm not saying I don't want to see the Winter Classic here; I think it would be awesome. But I don't want the WC until the Jackets are a solid, competitive team. So, put me down for the 2015 ASG!

If you had to guess, which goaltender will start more games next season? Mason or Bob? And if you were Todd Richards, how would you manage them? --ducktrance

I'm going to go out on a limb--though not a long limb, by any stretch--and say Sergei Bobrovsky gets more starts. It is my belief (and I have no information to base this off of other than my gut) that Scott Howson is about as done with Steve Mason as he can be without having completely cut ties. Steve Mason is the reason Scott Howson is on the hot seat; Howson put all his eggs in that basket, and has gotten burned for three straight years. Howson hasn't been shy about talking about the need at the goaltender position all off-season, and that certainly is no endorsement of Mason.

Bobrovsky is a guy for whom the club gave up assets. That alone probably means he's going to have the slight-inside track. Beyond that, I think most fans could see that the team on the ice seemed to have more confidence when anyone other than Mason was in goal last year. Curtis Sanford became a huge shot in the arm in November and December. Mason didn't seem to have much in the way of confidence, and that seemed to permeate the entire team at times. Bobrovsky comes to the Jackets with a clean slate in that regard, and so I think the team will play with a little more confidence in front of him.

So, whether fair or not, I think Bobrovsky's going to get the "starter" minutes while Mason gets more of the "backup" role.

Can you give us your take on the lockout? I know you don’t have a crystal ball, but do you think it’ll end anytime soon. What are the major sticking points besides the revenue split? Which problems are just window dressing and will fall into place? --Gr8fulnfa

Oh, you're getting your money's worth on this one. And, I didn't feel it was right to answer this one solo, so I enlisted the help of some of the other Cannon writers. I think you'll find, however, that we have similar feelings. First, though, I think it's important to differentiate--where possible--between the last lockout and this (potential) one.

The last lockout had villains on both sides: the owners plead poverty based on their calculation that 78% of all revenue was going to the players, and the players called "BULL!" on those numbers while also saying that ALL of the owners' proposals were tantamount to a salary cap, and by God they would NEVER agree to a salary cap. SERENITY NOW!!

Fast forward a year, and the players not only took a HUGE paycut, but they ended up with a salary cap. But, public perception placed more blame with the players--and more specifically Bob Goodenow--than with the owners, and the players ended up with more of the short end of the stick. There was a salary cap, dropped to coincide with 54% of the hockey revenues. There was revenue sharing, though some would argue it's not very effective because of the benchmarks that must be met to get the money.

So, what do we think of the *current* situation? On with it!

Dan P.

To me, it's simple. The last lockout didn't form a perfect solution, but it created a league where teams could survive despite the absence of the big TV sponsor (gesturing my head toward Bristol, CT). The Jackets are a revenue-neutral team on the hockey side now that the arena is taken care of. It's not a perfect system (14-year contract, anyone?), but it's allowed for more league parity as well as more revenue for everyone, and the league seems to be thriving. Consider that the initial salary cap was $39 million in '05-'06. The projected cap for '12-'13 is $70.2 million, which is an 80% increase. 80%!!

Are there some problems? Sure. The contract-length issue is my biggest pet peeve. There are still teams struggling financially. However, the last lockout is not even in the same stratosphere as this one. The last lockout had villains on both sides, and had a legitimate issue at its core: cost certainty.

Fast forward to now, and I doubt you'll find too many people who don't feel like the owners are the ones bunging this situation up so much. For one, most teams are doing quite well under the current system (though, again, some are still struggling). Free agency is a big ticket item every single off-season. The cap goes up by a good chunk each off-season. The Minnesota Wild gave almost $190 million to TWO PLAYERS this summer, knowing full-well that this labor dispute was coming.

So, what's the rub?

It's the "rich" teams, if I may be so blunt. Consider The Player over at Puck Daddy, whose take is very well stated in my opinion:

As we know, in 2011-2012 players received 57 percent of the revenues, which are believed to be in the neighborhood of $3.3 billion. So, over the course of that time revenues have increased by over 50 percent while player costs have only increased by about 15 percent.

In real terms, the amount of money that the owners have "saved" since 2004 — that is the difference between paying the players three quarters of revenues vs. 57 percent of revenues — is in excess of $3 billion.

If the League asks us to reduce our share to a straight 50/50 split, thus lowering the cap via what amounts to a 12.3-percent rollback, our question will be, "Why?"

One could predict that the NHL will concede that while some teams are doing well, others are barely hanging on. If that is the case, is it the players' responsibility to bail them out? Haven't we been down that road before?

Bettman got the system he wanted, one that he assured us would give us 30 healthy teams. My opinion is that if we have teams that are "sick," as we surely do, then simply re-setting salaries once again will neither be palatable to the players nor will it really fix the problem. Not in the long term. History has shown us that.

Clearly the system, as it exists now, does not work for everyone. If we simply roll back salaries again, who's to say we won't find ourselves in the same position five or seven years from now? Once reset, the cap (and the floor) will simply rise again over time as revenues rise.

Then we are back to square one.

The league's revenues are growing. If The Player is right and the owners have pocketed an additional $3 billion than they would have under the previous system (so, an average of $100,000,000 per team), and there are STILL unhealthy teams, then how can one even argue that player contracts are the problem?

Consider another way of looking at it: in the last season before the lockout, the top contracts were: Peter Forsberg and Jaromir Jagr, both making $11 million. If you look at calendar-year salaries, this past year Brad Richards and Ilya Bryzgalov both made $12 million, and Shea Weber is slated to make $14 million this coming season. In other words, in just seven years we're right back to where we were before in terms of salaries.

All of this is a fancy way of saying: if something is broken, it's NOT PLAYER SALARIES. If it IS player salaries, then why in the name of all that's holy is Nashville paying Shea Weber $14 million this season??

If you guessed "because a rich team painted Nashville into a corner," you get a gold star for paying attention. To me, this falls squarely at the feet of the "rich" owners. Philadelphia made that offer to Weber thinking there was no way in hell Nashville would match it. Nashville didn't want to face losing their Captain purely because of money, and so they took the gamble and matched. No skin off of Philly's nose, but Nashville now has to sell out their entire season JUST to pay their Captain this year.

And now, the owners want to cut the players' share from 57% to 46%? Why?? How does this change anything? If rolling salaries back in 2005 has led to the same salaries we had prior to the lockout, and has teams like Philadelphia able to purposely front-load a deal with $14 million JUST because they know a poorer team probably won't be able to match it, how is rolling back salaries AGAIN going to solve the problem long term?

It's not. All it's going to do is make 11% more money for the teams making money.

It takes me back to something I noted above: don't tell me the situation is untenable when Minnesota is doling out $190 million in one off-season. They're either doing it because: 1) the situation is NOT untenable, or 2) they're trying to compete with the small sect of teams that are making the lion's share of that estimated $3 billion in additional revenue that The Player alluded to.

The owners' original proposal had five main points to further stick it to the players: the aforementioned salary-to-revenue roll-back, longer ELCs (thus keeping players on cheaper deals for a longer period of time), 10 years before UFA (again, keeping players from being able to cash in on the open market for a longer period of time, which in turn holds down player salaries), no arbitration (which, AGAIN, holds down player salaries by preventing them from getting an independent arbitrator to bolster their salary while they're under that 10-year team control before UFA), and five year contracts (lets owners off the hook faster for expensive contracts downstream).

In short, everything NOT to do with money for owners is window-dressing: it's ALL about making/hoarding more money at the players' expense long-term, and it does nothing to fix the issues that are hurting the smaller-market or struggling teams. Since gutting player salaries didn't solve the problem last time--assuming you believe we need to go through all of this AGAIN--how is it going to solve the problem THIS time? How will we not be in the same position again five-to-seven years from now? It took seven years for salaries to get back to the same numbers they were before. It stands to reason it will happen again. What's that old saying about those who ignore history...?

And, the owners aren't even touching the idea of revenue sharing, which is the players' main point of making all teams able to survive and thrive.

So, my take on the situation, after all of that? It's ENTIRELY on the owners, and their proposals are draconian and ridiculous.

All of that having been said, I can see this one going a long time. If there's one thing Gary Bettman has shown over the years, it's that he doesn't really give a crap about what the fans think.

Matt

This is basically a case of 1000% greed from a small group of owners who are working as a bloc on the BoG and setting Bettman's agenda. I don't think the NHL's proposals do anything to help with the future of the game, and if anything they just set up for more labor issues down the road.

Fixing teams losing money by forcing player salaries to roll back doesn't help with the same clubs demanding rollbacks go out and push the UFA market to stratospheric heights. Better revenue sharing and less draconian terms that keep teams facing challenges (like Columbus, Nashville, the Islanders, and, yes, the Coyotes) from accessing their full shares of revenue sharing will.

(For the record, I've never understood why the NHL's response to teams who struggled with attendance was "well, we won't let you actually get full revenue sharing. That's like taking a family on food stamps and saying "Well, you lost your job, so we're cutting your benefits.")

The NHL is also shooting themselves in the collective foot with their organizational gag orders. While the only news on the ownership position is coming from Bettman or NHL VP Bill Daly, the NHLPA is running a broadband PR assault through the main organization, player agents like Allan Walsh, and seemingly every high profile player who makes use of social media tools like Twitter and Facebook.

The more they wall themselves off, the louder the voices of players get, and most fans are already on the NHLPA's side thanks to their consistent charm offensive.

A lockout seems inevitable at this point, and I think the NHL is going to collect a bunch of black eyes in the process of making a small group of owners happy. I don't see it ending well, and however this CBA is eventually settled, I'm betting that if things continue on the current course, we'll have another lockout when it expires.

Mike

Dan and Matt did a great job of offering up the facts along with their opinion. I want to go another route, and that is to offer up my personal thoughts on what looks to be an impending lockout.

As a fan of the NHL, the thought of another lockout so soon after the last one is sickening. The last time around, the NHL took the fans for granted, trusting that they'd all flock back to the arenas once play resumed. Luckily for the league, they did. Thanks to a huge uptick in on-ice excitement, largely due to sweeping rule changes, more and more fair-weather fans started to attend games as well. Fast forward to today, and another lockout would mean that you can kiss those fringe fans goodbye. There's also a good chance that a large portion of the serious fan base will decide to spend their hard-earned dollars elsewhere.

I remember how emotionally invested I was in the last CBA negotiation. I soaked up all of the information I could, hoping every day that the two sides could come to an agreement and I could have my beloved NHL back. This time around, since the word "lockout" started to appear more and more, I find myself not giving a shit. I want the season to start on time of course, but I don't care what needs to take place to have that happen.

I look at it this way, we have Owners vs. Players, Rich Owners vs. Poor Owners and a need for some rule changes. Until the Board of Governors gets revenue sharing figured out, and back off of the band-aid demand for players salaries to be reduced, we won't have NHL hockey.

I mean, how can the NHL owners not be worried about the effects of another lockout? Here's where I think the problem lies- the "rich' owners don't have to worry about a lockout. They know that they can fill their building whenever play resumes. Unfortunately, most of the league isn't in that situation. Teams like Columbus are worried about a lockout, but they aren't the ones driving the bus, it's the big dogs, and the big dogs don't want to give handouts to the league's poor teams in the form of proper revenue sharing. Even if it makes for a healthier league.

The whole thing stinks. We all want to see the schedule start on time, but I'm taking a step back from everything this time around, with the hope that everything gets worked out, and the new CBA is strong and sustainable.

***************

Thanks to everyone who sent in questions! See you next week!

Welcome back to LBC's exclusive Panthers roster countdown, where we post a profile of every player to ever skate or tend goal for Florida's southernmost franchise. There's more explanation behind this link.

In yesterday's edition, we touched on the career of former all-star center Viktor Kozlov (414 games, 101 goals, 190 assists). In our story today, we're going to take the time to look at a defenseman from Ontario who is currently a member of Florida's coaching staff.

To keep on keeping on, follow the link below.

11. Gord Murphy

Murphy was a 6'2" defenseman from Willowdale, Ontario. In 59 games with the 1984-85 OHL Oshawa Generals, he totalled three goals and 12 assists. The Philadelphia Flyers selected him in the ninth round of the 1985 NHL Entry Draft with the 189th overall pick. He would spend two more seasons with the Generals, scoring 14 goals and 45 assists in 120 contests.

Murphy made his professional debut with the 1987-88 Hershey Bears (62 games, eight goals, 20 assists). He logged eight assists in 12 playoff games with the Bears as the team took home the 1988 Calder Cup. He joined the Flyers the following season out of training camp, catching on with the team for the next three and a half seasons (261 games, 31 goals, 97 assists). The Flyers traded him to the Boston Bruins on January 2, 1992 with Brian Dobbin, a third round pick (Sergei Zholtok) and a fourth round pick (Charles Paquette) for Garry Galley, Wes Walz, and a third round pick (Milos Holan).

In parts of two seasons with Boston, Murphy appeared in 91 games, scoring eight goals and 18 assists. On June 20th, 1993, the Bruins sent him to the Dallas Stars for future considerations. He never played a game in Dallas. He was left unprotected in the expansion draft just four days later by Florida.

Bill Lindsay, along with Murphy, were the only Panthers to play in all 84 games of Florida's inaugural 1993-94 campaign. He led all Panthers defensemen with 14 goals on 172 shots, placing third on the club with 29 assists. In total, his 43 points on the season represented a career high. He finished the year with a minus-11 rating and 71 penalty minutes. He had seven contests where he totalled more than one point, including a three assist effort on January 24th as the Panthers pummeled the Montreal Canadiens, 8-3.

1994-95 would see Murphy play in 46 of Florida's strike-shortened 48 games season. He had five multi-point games, and again led Florida blueliners with six goals on 94 shots. His 16 assists ranked second on the club, and he finished out the season with a minus-14 rating and 24 penalty minutes.

Murphy started out strong in 1995-96. In only his third game totalling a goal and an assist as the Panthers beat Montreal 6-1. Later, he strung together three consecutive two assist games from December 16-23 (all wins). On January 23rd, he put up a season high three points (one goal, two assists) as the Panthers defeated the Washington Capitals, 5-4. He played in a total of 70 games, scoring eight goals on 125 shots with 22 assists, a team fourth best plus-5 rating, and 30 penalty minutes. In 14 playoff games, he dished out four assists as the Panthers advanced to the Stanley Cup Finals.

In 1996-97, Murphy scored eight goals on 137 shots through 80 games played. On January 5th, he scored a season high two goals in a 5-0 win over the Los Angeles Kings. He had 15 assists, a plus-3 rating, and 51 penalty minutes through the season. In Florida's postseason five game series loss to the New York Rangers, Murphy led the Panthers with five assists.

1997-98 would see Murphy rank third on the team with 79 games played. He six goals on 123 shots, pitched in 11 assists, finished at minus-3 and spent 46 minutes in the sin bin. On October 4th, he had a season high two assists in a 5-3 win over the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Murphy averaged 19:57 TOI through 51 games in 1998-99. He failed to score despite putting 56 shots on net, assisting on seven goals and rating a plus-4 with only 16 penalty minutes. The Panthers traded him to the Atlanta Thrashers with Herbert Vasiljevs, Daniel Tjarnqvist and a sixth round pick (eventually became Justin Cox) for goaltender Trevor Kidd on June 25, 1999.

Murphy played two seasons for the Thrashers (85 games, four goals, 21 assists) before finishing out his playing career with the Boston Bruins (15 games, zero goals, two assists). He officially announced his retirement on March 19th.

Starting in 2002-03, Murphy made his coaching debut as an assistant with the Columbus Blue Jackets. After seven seasons, he joined the Panthers staff for the 2010-11 season, and remains with the club. His son Connor was a first round pick for the Phoenix Coyotes in the 2011 NHL Entry Draft.

All-Time Statline: Six seasons, 410 games, 42 goals, 100 assists, 142 points, minus-16 rating, 238 PIM, 30.0 APS.

Thanks for reading today. Make sure to check back tomorrow as we breach the top 10 with a Hall-of-Fame right winger from Moscow.

In the third edition of our "Get to know..." series, it's time to look at the first of the former New York Rangers: defenseman Tim Erixon. Erixon has had an interesting start to his career, after being Calgary's first round pick in 2009. Being unable to sign him, Calgary traded Erixon's rights to the Rangers in the summer of 2011.

Fast forward one year, and Erixon is on the move again, this time as part of the blockbuster trade of Rick Nash to the Rangers. The 21-year-old defenseman was considered the Rangers' top prospect not really in the NHL. Last season was Erixon's first in North America, as he previously spent three full seasons with Skelleftea HC of the Swedish Elite League. He spent the majority of the year with the Rangers' AHL affiliate in Connecticut, where he played in 52 games. He notched just three goals, but poured in 30 assists. For the Rangers, he appeared in 18 games, with no goals and two assists.

Erixon comes to Columbus as part of a now-suddenly-deep blue line, as despite his pedigree and development track he is most like the seventh defenseman at best right now in Columbus. This is a good problem to have, as the club continues to rebuild from the defensive end first.

Erixon is added to the stable of young defensive players including John Moore, Ryan Murray, David Savard, Dalton Prout, Cody Goloubef, and Will Weber. And Erixon might have about as high a ceiling as any of those guys, except for maybe Murray.

Anytime you can add that kind of a player to your pipeline, it's not a bad thing. Let's learn a bit more about Erixon.

Position: D

Number: 53

Birthplace: Port Chester, NY

Age: 21

2011-12 Stats: 18 GP / 0 G, 2 A, 2 Pts, -2, 8 PIM

Previous team: New York Rangers

Who Columbus Gave up: Rick Nash, Steve Delisle, and a conditional third rounder in exchange for Erixon, Brandon Dubinsky, Artem Anisimov, and a first round pick.

Contract: Erixon is going into the second year of his three-year entry-level deal, where he will have a cap hit of $1.75 million per season.

Strengths: Erixon is a smart, two-way defenseman who has good vision and is positionally sound, and he has great size and mobility. He can play the point on the PP, and has a strong, active stick defensively.

Weaknesses: Erixon is not a guy who, despite his size, is going to be overly physical on defense; he relies on positioning and stick work. While he will contribute on offense, he doesn't have a super-high ceiling offensively.

Where he fits: Right now, Erixon is probably going to Springfield unless he has a tremendous training camp and Ryan Murray and John Moore aren't ready. Down the line, Erixon projects to be a top-four defenseman, with the potential to be a top pairing guy if he reaches his full potential.

A long-lost sports business simulation that we wish could have stayed lost, Ice Hockey Lockout is no fun for anybody.

THE GOOD: Unique presentation; challenging co-op play; adequate box art.

THE BAD: Terrible play control; confusing and frustrating gameplay with constantly changing victory conditions; lousy graphics, even for the era; contains no actual ice hockey; has only one musical track, which sounds like an out-of-tune rendition of "Lady of Spain."

Modern sports video games have come a long way from the unrefined, abstract pixel people that we once imagined were our favorite athletes or even, perhaps, ourselves. Where once we were happy to haphazardly control a rudimentary player on a blank field chasing a dot of a different color, today's sports video games offer not only unlimited control over players, leagues and rules, but are presented with incredible visuals on par with televised games featuring real people and personalities. To get any closer to these sports, you would have to strap on pads, get out on the field and feel the crushing impacts and physical exertion on your own body.

Unfortunately, despite its high-minded premise, ICE HOCKEY LOCKOUT is not a modern sports game.

Designed and published by failed fly-by-night developer InActivision, ICE HOCKEY LOCKOUT was a crushing disappointment upon its release in 1980. I'd like to say the game was a misunderstood triumph that was ahead of its time, predicting labor strife and contract negotiations between sports leagues and players associations that would torment fans for the next 30 years. But I can't.

The game is a poorly-designed, unplayable mess of programming. It's not fun or entertaining in any way, shape or form. It's buggy, broken, boring and boneheaded.

The game requires two players - one controls the hockey team owners while the other handles the players association. The object is to finalize a new collective bargaining agreement by negotiating terms such as revenue sharing, contract lengths, a salary cap and escrow payments. The problem is that ICE HOCKEY LOCKOUT makes this so difficult and so excruciatingly awful, that you may never want to touch it again.

Although in-game tutorials were not de rigueur when ICE HOCKEY LOCKOUT was released, the objectives of how to play or what's going on are never made clear. When first starting, users are presented with two characters in a room with ladders and platforms. Periodically, items will appear and the PA and owner characters have to scramble to collect them. The pick-ups could be TV contracts, player contracts, shared revenues or other hockey related objects, but you're never sure what you're running after or how it will help or hurt your chances of winning.

via www.atariage.com

Meanwhile, there are two on-screen meters with mysterious purposes. A dollar amount at the top of the screen increases to enormous totals regardless of who has what in their possession. An "Fb" or fanbase meter at the bottom only rises or falls by a few increments at the end of the game. The starting points for both seem arbitrary and were different every time we began a new play session.

via www.atariage.com

Once every few minutes, a UFO will fly across the top of the screen. If the player controlling the team owner can grab that UFO, he or she gets to compete in a mini-game in which they descend directly into the PA player's pocket to extract treasures from their opponent. Why there's a UFO in a game about sports contract negotiations is not explained.

via www.atariage.com

Even the instruction manual for the game offers no help. It includes charts, graphs, long explanations of sports economics, numbers on top of numbers and a ton of anecdotal minutia that only manages to create more aggravation. It mentions that the salary cap item is "tied" to the league's revenues, but I have no idea what this means or if it's even correct.

There's a rumor that the manual was written by a well-known hockey journalist at the time. If true, I'm sure he tried his best to make some sense of this confusing and contradictory game. But all the explanations in the world aren't going to sort out this mess out and make it understandable for everyone who simply wants to enjoy a game.

ICE HOCKEY LOCKOUT is one of the worst games I've ever played, bar none. Video games are supposed to be entertaining and fun. This was neither. It is embarrassing that a game came to be released in this state. I don't know what could have been done to save it. Probably nothing. There is no doubt that a sports business sim can be fun and interesting, and could exist on the cutting edge of gaming technology. But there's got to be a better way to do it than this.

And the most frustrating part is that, despite the title, the game does not include any actual ice hockey. Bummer.

RATING: 1.5 out of 3.3 Billion.

___

This is a parody. The first two screenshots are from a very real and very rare game called "Tax Avoiders." The other picture is from the actual worst game of all time. Visit AtariAge for all your Atari gaming needs. Apparently, some other hockey video game came out today.

A bit of a surprise acquisition in free agency, Adrian Aucoin could be a major find for Scott Howson, much like the addition of Vinny Prospal to the team's forwards last season.

Position: Defense

Number: 33

Birthplace: Ottawa, ON (Canada)

Age: 39

2011-2012 Stats: 64 GP, 2 G, 7A (9 pts) +14, 42 PIM

Previous Team: Phoenix Coyotes

Who Columbus Gave Up: None - acquired as a UFA

Contract: 1 year, $2.25 million dollars. The team could negotiate another deal during the season, or wait until next summer if they want to retain him. Otherwise he'll be able to seek a new contract elsewhere on July 1st.

Strengths: Aucoin is known for being an excellent puck handler who has great "hockey sense". Despite his age, he's extremely solid in his own end. He can settle the play down easily and has a hammer of a shot when he gets the opportunity to use it. He's also surprisingly solid in the shootout for the same reason. Known for being a leader in Phoenix and Calgary, he's respected for his mentoring and work ethic.

Weaknesses: At 39, he's beginning to slow down, and his skating ability has never been regarded as top-tier. He tends to be a little less aggressive than many like to see from a "shut down" player, and he's frequently chided for not shooting the puck enough, though it's worth pointing out that Phoenix and Calgary both tended to pair him with more offensively minded partners the last few seasons.

The Bottom Line: Aucoin adds veteran experience and mentoring ability, much like Vinny. He's not going to accept anything less than top effort from anyone, including himself, while teaching guys like Ryan Murray, Tim Erixon, and Nikita Nikitin some of his tricks. I'd expect him to spend most of his time on the third pairing, but don't be surprised if he acts almost like an additional assistant coach in practices. I'd be interested to see if he spends some time on the PK units, and I'd love to see his howitzer in the shootout now and then as a surprise for opponents. Given his experience and history of leadership, I'd also bet he has a few lessons to pass along to guys like Derek Dorsett, Jack Johnson and James Wisniewski as they take up larger leadership roles in the room as well.

A few thoughts on Aucoin from Travis Hair over at Five for Howling:

Aucoin basically gets you what you'd expect in an older veteran d-man. He's not going to rack up many points nor is he going to be the fastest guy out there. However, he does a few things that many defensemen don't.

Chief among them would be you hardly ever find yourself yelling at him for missing coverage or making a boneheaded play. He's the perfect guy to have show your young players the ropes. For most of last season he was paired with Oliver Ekman-Larsson. That turned out pretty well for both of them as Aucoin's defensive focus allowed Ekman-Larsson to join the play more frequently. OEL has also cited Aucoin's guidance as one of the main reasons that jump to the NHL last year was so easy.

Finally, the last place Aucoin will be missed will be, oddly, in the shootout. He didn't do anything fancy, just blasted it from between the dots but no one could stop him. That got him the nickname "The Closer". Frankly the only reason Aucoin isn't back with the team is we have too many young guys that are very talented and need to start getting playing time. He's a great guy that just does his job and eats up minutes.

Sounds like exactly what this team needs to help cement their defense behind Wiz, JJ, Tyutin, and Niki6. I wouldn't be surprised if we see him logging 15-18 minutes a night and taking key defensive starts.

A new chapter is about to begin in Columbus.

Now that Rick Nash is plying his trade in Manhattan, leaving his captain's "C" up for grabs, the writers at The Cannon want to give you our thoughts on who we think the next Captain Columbus will be.

It's been said time and time again that the Columbus locker room is/was a black hole of complacency, with a "country club" atmosphere. There are likely a handful of reasons why that would be, but with recent roster changes, bringing in the likes of high-personality leaders like Jack Johnson, Vinny Prospal and James WIsniewski, the culture is going to change. We've already seen those three players speak out against the attitude that losing hockey games was acceptable.

I think you'll see an obvious theme among the four of us. Vinny Prospal and Jack Johnson are two players who's CV boasts experience and leadership, and each player makes a ton of sense as Columbus' next leader.

Vinny is an excellent role model. The young players only need to watch his all-out effort every game, combined with his off-ice work ethic to get an idea of what it will take to be a long-tenured NHLer. He took his teammates to task last year, calling out work habits in what turned out to be a breath of fresh air. It was great to finally see a player hold his cohorts responsible.

Jack Johnson most recently continued his duties as captain of Team USA at the World Championship. He's a leader through-and-through. He's signed long-term with the Jackets, and is the new face of the franchise after #61 orchestrated his own departure. JMFJ is not only the leader of a revamped and uber-talented group of defensemen, but he's also the guy who will take the Jackets back to the playoffs.

Using the military as a parallel, Johnson is the platoon leader, while Vinny is platoon first sergeant. Johnson is the unquestioned leader of the group, while Vinny is the guy working behind the scenes, making sure everything is running smoothly and giving the troops an ear, as well as a mentor. This is why I believe Johnson should get the "C". Full-time alternate "A" to Vinny, Johnson's right-hand man on the leadership scale.

Following the recent process of rotating home and road "A's", R.J. Umberger and James Wisniewski serve as assistant captains. One joins Vinny with an "A" at home, while the other does so on the road. The leadership core doesn't stop with letters, however, as guys like Derek Dorsett, Brandon Dubinsky, Fedor Tyutin, Adrian Aucoin, and heck, even Derick Brassard will be looked to as leaders.

The Jackets really can't go wrong with JMFJ and Vinny running the show, regardless of what's sewn on the front of their sweater.

Andy

We're headed for Captain Jack's reign in Columbus. In my opinion, Jack Johnson more than deserves it. He caught a lot of flak while he was with the Los Angeles Kings, and by nearly all accounts he was simply a different person in Columbus. He stepped into a very difficult situation and handled it perfectly. I think the fact that a Michigan Wolverine quickly became a fan favorite in Buckeye Country tells you all you need to know about his personality. The added pressure and prestige of being an NHL captain should only improve JMFJ's accountability. He doesn't seem like the type of player that will be satisfied with the status quo, and the CBJ need a little (OK, a lot) more of that in Nationwide Arena. That he was captain of the U.S. World Championship team this year only strengthens his case, as it shows his growth, experience, and level of respect from his peers and coaches.

Matt

In a perfect world, Vinny Prospal would be the 6th captain in Blue Jackets' franchise history. His veteran experience (1000 games and counting!), his leadership, and his willingness to invest in this franchise both physically and emotionally is exactly what the club needs as they transition out of the post Nash era. He's been down these roads before, and I think he's already made strong steps towards helping the team establish their identity.

But for good or ill, I don't think the club is interested in a captain who likely only has 1-2 more seasons left in him. They're looking for someone locked up for the long haul, and that brings us to Jack Johnson. JMFJ slid into the locker room like the missing piece of a puzzle, tying the defense together and equally energizing fans and players. With a contract that runs through the 2018 season, he's already been a captain in International play for Team USA, and it seems like he's earned respect through the entire organization as a player who speaks his mind, leads from the front, and works to get the best from his teammates. People may not be a fan of his advanced stats (and we may not be as thrilled with him at the end of a full season), but for now he seems like the candidate that most, if not all, expect to see named.

Dan

To me, the next Captain of the Blue Jackets will hinge on one factor: the lockout. If it doesn't drag on too long and the season gets underway soon, I think the Captain will be one Vaclav Prospal, and I see that for a couple of reasons. First, this club is in transition. The Nash Era is over, and the roster has been stripped down to the studs. Prospal is a guy who, upon coming in to the Country Club Jackets, immediately sounded off the need for change. Well, that request was answered. Prospal won't be a player for too many more years, and so he would be the perfect transition-Captain until the new identity is forged post-Nash.

Second, Prospal has also agreed to stay with the club for the foreseeable future as either a player or a front office guy, and I think that signals a huge commitment to the rest of the room. If the biggest thing that needs to be changed is the culture of this team's dressing room, who better to lead that change out of the wilderness than a guy who came in, spoke up, and went all-in for a team clearly heading down the drain when he could have gone to a contender at the trading deadline? Vinny put his money where his mouth was, and he continues to set the example of commitment and drive. That's the Captain this club needs.

Bruins owner Jeremy Jacobs called for an official, on the record vote to support lockout. Vote was unanymous. Solidarity recorded.

— Darren Dreger (@DarrenDreger) September 13, 2012

The NHL's board of governors met in New York on Thursday and voted unanimously to approve a lockout, should it be necessary come midnight on Saturday, September 15th. It will likely mark the third NHL lockout of Gary Bettman's tenure as commissioner.

Don Fehr, after a meeting with the players this morning, reiterated what's been said time and time again: A lockout will be the choice of the league, and the players are willing to play while negotiations continue.

Bettman said the board voted on that [not playing another year under the current system] today as well. It too was unanimous. As everyone has known for months, there will be no hockey without a new agreement in place.

Gary Bettman: "we said that the proposal that we made yesterday would not be on the table on the 16th. We did not say take it or leave it."

— Renaud P Lavoie (@RenLavoieRDS) September 13, 2012

Gary Bettman also told media this afternoon that the owner's "take it or leave it" proposal from yesterday was anything but. Except that it is? He added that the players' proposal was couched in nearly identical terms yesterday.

The two sides remain utterly divided on core economic issues with little more than 56 hours remaining. The players want to give back a percentage of speculated growth moving forward. The owners want an absolute reduced percentage for the players tied to revenues.

Continued after the jump, why not...

In addition to not agreeing on how best to reduce the players slice of the pie, the NHL added that they've [the NHLPA] made no meaning movement from proposal to proposal. Our friend Mr. Mirtle begs to differ...

To say there has been "no" movement in NHLPA proposals is flat out false. Fourth year of first offer was 57%. Has changed dramatically.

— James Mirtle (@mirtle) September 13, 2012

The league says they've come a long way. One can only assume they mean they've come a long way off their first proposal and not the current agreement in place. As the players have noted, the league has not offered a single thing in concession where the current agreement is concerned.

"Less money, fewer rights," Fehr said. "I think everybody understands why the owners would like that. Every employer would like that. I have a difficult time understanding why anyone would expect the players would make an agreement on that basis."

Fehr continued, discussing that the players are the only ones taking any kind of a hit in the proposals made so far. Quote transcription from Puck Daddy...

"What you might call 'shared sacrifice.' If there is going to be sacrifice here, and the players are going to take less money than the current agreement provides them, then the question is are they the only ones whose compensation and circumstances are to be limited or reduced. Is there any other cost or expense - anywhere in the NHL, National Hockey League enterprises, any team or anywhere - where the owners are willing to say they are willing to constrain those costs as well. So far, the answer is 'no,'."

The owners could speak up for themselves and offer some wisdom and justification from their side of the fence, as many players have been doing this week - Except for the fact that the NHL Bylaws prohibit them from doing so.

Bettman Gag Order-NHL Bylaw 17.17: "Board of Governors and owners prohibited to speak with media on CBA issues."

— Allan Walsh (@walsha) September 13, 2012

There has been much speculation that the owners of the Panthers, Islanders, Blue Jackets, etc, may have a different perspective on things as compared to the Toronto's and Philadelphia's of the world, but the unanimous votes and the so called "gag order" squash any such talk at the moment.

Both sides are united and holding firm. Both sides also continue to claim an open door, ready to listen to any new thoughts the other may have.

All the fans have is a really open schedule for the next seven months.

Because this is a hockey blog, you're going to have to forgive me for a bit while I talk about...baseball.

The Blue Jackets reached out to several CBJ bloggers and "social media" personalities to ask if we'd like to go up to the Jake (yeah, yeah, I know what they call it now. It's still the Jake) and check out their "Social Media Suite".

In the interests of full disclosure, the team paid for our tickets, the transportation to and from Cleveland, and pizza for the drive up plus a meal at the game. I was not offered any financial compensation to write about the trip.

So now that that's out of the way, let's talk about the suite, and how it matters to the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Our party for the trip consisted of myself, several members of the Blue Jackets digital media / marketing team, members of the Pepsi Power Patrol and other in-arena promotion crews, Leo Welsh, and two other CBJ bloggers whose identities I will not reveal in case they also plan to write their own bits.

Once we arrived in Cleveland, we were met by Curtis Danberg, the Indians' senior manager of Communications, and got a brief tour of the park, including a chance to walk on the field during the Tigers batting practice.

During the tour, one thing I noticed around the ballpark was promotions by the team to take advantage of fans packing their smartphones. QR codes around the ballpark let you scan them to sign up for giveaways and the official Indians fan club. Fans were encouraged to take pictures and tweet them with a "#Tribe4life" hashtag to get them up on the scoreboard. But nobody really talked about the social suite itself outside of the sign on the suite railing.

After the tour and lunch in the club's press cafeteria (perhaps not as gourmet as the spread at Nationwide as made famous by Ryan Holtmann, but a beautiful view), we were shown to the suite.

On the one hand, it's about the same as most suite boxes, and the basic amenities are about the same as a suite at Nationwide Arena, but on the other, there are a few key differences. For one, the suite has it's own dedicated Wifi access for the fans sitting there (it holds about 20 total, but because of our visit the club only had 8 guests on hand). Banners were hung on the wall for fans to tag with their twitter accounts, favorite hashtags, or general silliness, and a wall of chargers to support phones or laptops were there to make sure you wouldn't run out of juice during the event.

Oh, and the view isn't half bad.

When I talked to some of the fans at the suite, I found out they had to apply to get in. Two of them are big fans of the club on facebook, and responded to their updates there. The others were mostly on twitter, though one was the father of the club's "Rally Baby". (Sadly, if you know the score to Saturday's game, you know that the Rally Baby was not quite enough to overcome three early errors and the Tigers' big bats, but hey, the baby was pretty cute.)

Most agreed that they liked the way the Indians reached out and connected with fans, even when the club went into the toilet this summer, and they felt like the suite was a good perk for fans who interacted with the club online. We discussed the challenges of rooting for a struggling team, and shared in lamenting the existence of Detroit fans. On the other hand, they also mentioned that it was rare to see the club actually retweet or share stuff posted by fans from the suite, and as the game went on they were less concerned with talking about the game, and more focused on their fantasy football and just how badly the Browns were going to lose to the Bengals on Sunday.

Oh, and a certain bearded gentleman may have done an interview for Jackets TV.

By the end of the night, the Tribe's late attempt to get back in the game petered out, the fans in the suite said friendly goodbyes (and took invitations to come down to Columbus to visit for a hockey game some time), and we had a ride back to Columbus thanks to our friendly bus driver.

It was a very fun afternoon, but more importantly, I took away a few keys that I think the Blue Jackets can embrace, especially if they plan to offer a "social suite" of their own.

• Interact with your fans - the Jackets already do a solid job of this, but particularly for a team that struggles more often than not, keeping up that communication and bringing the community "inside" is vital to keep them interested. A common theme from Indians fans was that sense of community being something they did "way better" than teams like the Red Sox or Yankees thanks to the way the club reached out online.
• Create Engagement - The idea of a dedicated spot for blogging / social media types to watch a game is not new. The Islanders have been doing it since the 2005 season. But promoting the content and making people who get the opportunity to attend the game from that seat feel like their opinions matter makes a big difference. If some of the tweets and facebook statuses posted during the game would have been on the scoreboard or promoted by the Indians' social media feeds, I'm betting that the fans would have been paying more attention to the game, and less to their knitting.
• Build Interest - Aside from the folks in the suite, it didn't seem like most fans were that interested in it, and the club didn't really do much to change that. Maybe it's because it's late in the season, but there were no actual mentions of the Social Suite by the club during the game - not even a "hey, fans, would you like to attend the game from here..." shot with the cameras or their in game promotions crew. Why not call attention to it and try to draw more fans in?

Perhaps one of the things working against the Indians is the general pace of a baseball game. It's a languid sort of sport, and it pairs well with lazily sipping your beer as you wonder when something interesting might happen. With the faster paced set of hockey, I think it's actually better suited to fans getting up to tweet about a sick goal, a bad call, the big hits, or a crazy fight, helping to fill in those feedback loops.

The more intimate atmosphere at a hockey rink may also help to bring fans in - it's easy to feel closer to the team when you don't need binoculars to see a guy's face after he celebrates a goal, after all, and the way NHL players have taken to twitter and facebook helps to build more connections to fans using those platforms.

All in all, it's an experiment the Indians have made and handled well, and one that I hope that we'll see the Blue Jackets take as a baseline to improve on.

As the lockout rolls farther into day one, the next step for many teams is reaching out to their respective season ticket holder bases to address what will be done in the event the lockout leads to games paid for being cancelled. The Stars sent the following letter to their customers this morning:

As you may be aware, the National Hockey League and the National Hockey League Players’ Association were unable to reach consensus on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement as of September 15, 2012. Since a new Agreement was not established and a work stoppage is in effect, I wanted to inform you that the Dallas Stars training camp has been postponed and there is the possibility of preseason and regular season games being rescheduled or canceled.

We appreciate your commitment to the Stars, and obviously, you will not be charged for any games which are not played. In the event we do not start the season as scheduled, the following will be our contingency plan for your ticket package:

You will receive account credit for all home games which are not played, based on the original 2012-2013 NHL schedule. In addition, we will credit your account 5% of your ticket value for any un-played games in your plan. This account credit may be applied to purchase tickets or suites to any Stars home games during the season or playoffs. Or, you may choose to apply this credit towards your 2013-2014 season tickets.

At this time, you do not have to do anything. We will continue to communicate on a regular basis on the status of the work stoppage. You will receive your account summary and season tickets immediately after the 2012-2013 schedule is confirmed by the NHL. If for some reason our policy is not ideal for you, we will provide a refund for any home games not rescheduled. Please contact your Customer Service Manager at 214-387-5535.

While we are hopeful that there will be a positive and quick resolution to collective bargaining between the NHL and the NHLPA, we ask for your patience as the owners and players work together to establish a new agreement that is mutually beneficial to the future of hockey and the Dallas Stars.

Sincerely,

James R. Lites

President & CEO

How does that compare to other teams in the league? Aaron Portzline is reporting the Columbus Blue Jackets are offering 4% interest. Other reports have the Carolina Hurricanes offering 3% and the Washington Capitals fans getting 1%. The Stars offer seems to be the highest interest rate seen yet. The Stars wouldn't be in the position to make this offer had Tom Gaglardi not purchased the team back in November. It's a silver lining to an otherwise bleak current outlook on the season.

TORONTO (Canadian Press) _ As it begins its third work stoppage in 19 years, the National Hockey League announced Monday that it has engraved a post-lockout message to fans on the Stanley Cup.

The prepared statement, which was also posted on individual team websites on Sunday morning, will take the place of the championship-winning teams and players that customarily appear on the Cup's body.

NHL commissioner Gary Bettman, who made the announcement from a bomb shelter deep below the Hockey Hall of Fame, said that while perhaps controversial, having the the memo engraved on hockey's ultimate prize demonstrates the team owners' sincere pledge for a more stable business model.

"As I've mentioned previously, I feel terrible about this situation," Bettman said. "But we want the fans to know we'll do everything we can to get the games back up and running as soon as is humanly possible.

"With our message now a permanent part of the Stanley Cup, any time anybody looks at the most recognizable trophy in sports, the first thing they'll think about is our owners and players hard at work at the negotiating table, restructuring how our ever-growing revenues are shared."

The league's Collective Bargaining Agreement with the NHL Players Association expired at midnight Sunday with the sides unable to come to an agreement over how to split the $3.3 billion in revenue the NHL now takes in annually. As of right now, the players are locked out of their teams. Some players have already made arrangements to play overseas, while others are waiting to see how long the work stoppage lasts. The NHL previously lost the entire 2004-05 season and the first half of the 1994-95 season to lockouts.

Bettman said the move to engrave the missive on the Cup was done to address the league's economic future and was not meant to downplay or diminish the history of hockey, the NHL or the Stanley Cup itself.

'Just Look it up on Wikipedia,' Bettman Says

"I mean, if you want to see who was on the '85 Oilers, just look it up on Wikipedia," the commissioner said. "That's what I do. Seeing their names etched on a piece of metal doesn't really change anything. They still won it."

Teams winning the Cup have been engraving their names on it since 1893. The Montreal Hockey Club, the first team to be awarded the trophy during the "Challenge Cup" era, was also the first to make their mark by adding a ring to the bottom of the original bowl and adding "Montreal AAA" and the year to the side. More names were engraved though the years, usually at the team's expense, on additional rings as well as on the upper bowl itself. The NHL took over awarding the Cup in 1926 and has been adding the names of the league champions to it ever since.

Bettman said that even though no games would be played, the NHL's quest for a more fair division of revenue is just as important as any team's quest for a championship.

"Half of the names on the Cup are misspelled anyway," Bettman said. "Having this message engraved on the Stanley Cup lets everybody know our true focus going forward - fiscal responsibility, sensible negotiations and a more sustainable business model for both players and owners. And then, if there's time, maybe some hockey."

Deputy commission Bill Daly said the existing engraved rings, featuring the names of Stanley Cup champions going back over 100 years, would eventually be removed from the Hall of Fame, melted down and molded into tie clasps and cuff-links to be given to team owners at Christmas.

___

This is a parody. I hope.

Though we're still facing the reality of a lockout, it's our hope that this will be a short term problem rather than a long, drawn out battle. Because of that, we're going to keep talking about the new guys on the club, and hope that we'll get to see them in action sooner rather than later.

Position: Forward (C/RW)

Number: 42

Birthplace: Yaroslavl, USSR (I mean, it's Russia now, but back then...)

Age: 24

2011-2012 Stats: 79 GP, 16G 20A (36 pts), +12, 34 PIM

Previous Team: New York Rangers

Who Columbus Gave Up: Rick Nash, Steven Delisle

Contract: 1 year, $1.875 million (RFA in 2013)

Strengths: AA may not be a prime time goal scorer, but he's an extremely versatile two way forward who is comfortable at center or wing. With a big frame (6'4", 200 lbs) and excellent skating, he can get to the puck and use his size to help get control of it quickly, then drive the play up the ice. The sense from a lot of people I've asked about him is that he could be primed for a breakout if he gets the opportunity to see more ice time.

Weaknesses: As mentioned, he's a big guy, but he doesn't always use that size. It's also hard to say if the Rangers weren't using him more on offense because of their depth up front, or because there's a limit to how far his skills can really develop. It's likely that he's going to be asked to take on a bigger role in Columbus, and we can't be sure how he's going to react to that. Will he blossom, or will he wilt?

The Bottom Line: At the absolute worst case, Columbus got a young forward who is incredibly consistent in his own zone and knows how to push the play up ice, but may not be able to put everything together to make him a constant scoring threat. That's a very good thing to have in our bottom six, and if he does bring it together with more opportunity to show his skills, suddenly we have a legit top six guy who could become one of the driving forces for this club. I wouldn't be surprised if we see him on the top PK unit, forcing teams to treat him as a shorthanded threat, and possibly some second unit PP time. It's pretty much a win/win situation for the Blue Jackets once they can get this guy onto the ice.

What They're Saying:

I asked Joe Fortunato over at Blueshirt Banter to say a few words abut Anisimov...

It's really hard for me to answer questions on Artem Anisimov, because he's such a wild card. In the role he was used in (keep this in mind, it plays a major role in my analysis) he was a defensive player who helped create offense off of his defense.

Tortorella mostly used him on the third line. Putting him on the ice when he needed some defensive stability. Make no mistake, Anisimov is a remarkably consistent defensive player. He always seems to be in the right spot at the right time, his stick skills are fantastic and his ability to spring up the ice and go from defense to offense with the flip of a switch is fantastic.

With that being said. He saw no power play time. His offensive roles were limited, and he never really got a chance to flourish offensively.

I don't know if that's because of his skills or Tortorella simply not using him offensively because he needed him defensively.

He's a wild card. If you look at what he did on the Rangers, his offense took a step back last year. Was it because of him? Or because of the role Tortorella threw him in? We'll find out this year.

His ceiling is a second line center with great hands. But if he ends up being a third line defensive specialist, you still got a hell of a hockey player.

Yesterday, we put up a survey asking fans to provide the specific names of the teams they'd either fold or relocate for the good of the league. After counting 1,200 responses, we've got your answers.

First, a note on the nature of the poll. We asked specifically the "fold OR relocate" question because I wanted this to be more about the specific markets than a breakdown of how many clubs there should really be. Second, The "Other" option was used entirely as a red herring. Knowing that this is the internet and there are few things the internet loves more than skewing numbers on polls for the lulz, that option was placed to give them the path of least-resistance to having their answers ignored.

While there's still a bit of creative answering and I do somewhat regret not statistically counting the person who bravely answered "None" to the question via write-in, I'm generally happy with the results. Follow me through the jump for a review of the results and of what they mean.

Phoenix Coyotes - #1 (1,033 votes - 86% of all responses)

The Coyotes are the obvious choice, much to the chagrin of the die-hard fanbase that is struggling to grow in the desert. Despite a visit to the conference finals, the Coyotes struggle with attendance, have struggled to solve the ownership gap left by Jerry Moyes' awful tenure, and have claimed staggering losses through their ownership by the NHL. The damage to the franchise's ability to operate in Glendale may be irreparable at this point.

Florida Panthers - #2 (723 votes - 60.25% of all responses)

Florida made a return to the playoffs for the first time in more than a decade this season by winning the Southeast. They lost to the eventual conference champion Devils in seven games. The Sunrise cats haven't been better than 19th in home attendance since before the last lockout and are consistently priced below league average for tickets. Despite this, Some of the team's finances seem to indicate an odd stability for a franchise that looks like it should be as bad off as Phoenix. I'll have more with Litter Box Cats' Donny Rivette soon to get a bit more in-depth into that situation.

Columbus Blue Jackets - #3 (700 votes - 58.33% of responses)

The Jackets just can't catch a break. Their one trip to the playoffs found them crushed by a juggernaut and a combination of bad luck and horrible management have combined to destroy fan confidence in the franchise. Despite a high number of votes, I feel that they're a decent team away from having a strong foothold in the area. If you dispersed their collection of players and moved the Coyotes franchise into town, you might just rejuvenate the area.

New York Islanders - #4 ( 403 votes - 33.5% of responses)

The Isles have the misfortune of being the third best team (of three) in a metropolitan area that has more people in it than the entire state of Florida. They also have the misfortune of being in a kind of hard-to-get-to area, the misfortune of being disqualified from revenue sharing, the misfortune of having been mismanaged, and the misfortune of having one of the worst arenas in sports. While the greater New York area has enough people to support three teams, Long Island's viability as a market is coming under serious fire.

5-10

Carolina Hurricanes (168 votes - 14% of responses) - Honestly a little shocked to see Carolina ranked this high.
Nashville Predators (154 votes - 12.83% of responses) - Nashville is a victim of telling their own press how poor they are. Along with Carolina, they may be a model franchise for non-traditional market growth.
Anaheim Ducks ( 148 votes - 12.33% of responses) - The LA area is ten-million strong, but getting SoCal interested in two hockey teams may not be possible.
Tampa Bay Lightning (145 votes - 12% of responses) - New ownership, new commitment to the team, some smart guy as their GM. No.
Dallas Stars (131 votes - 10.9% of responses) - Dallas fell on hard times through an ownership change, but now at least are working towards having a team identity again. I don't see them moving away from a huge population center.
New Jersey Devils (106 votes - 8.8% of responses) - $80M in debt is no small feat, but neither is what this franchise has accomplished in New Jersey.

Other Trends

As you can see, the trend of people voting for multiple markets dropped as expected, with most responses just calling for one or two sacrifices and the number dropping off significantly after four. Only four total people voted for all 10 teams in the poll.

I didn't run through all the permutations, but I'm confident the most-common vote included both Phoenix and Florida. 631 responses included both of those teams and 103 included only those teams. That's still less than the 126 people who voted for only Phoenix.

Other interesting votes:

• 132 people would at least empty Florida of hockey teams.
• 35 people would leave the Pacific Division to a battle between the Sharks and Kings by choosing to fold/move Anaheim, Phoenix, AND Dallas.
• 27 people would relocate or fold both the Devils and Islanders (although, in fairness, some of them voted in favor of moving at least one of them somewhere else in the same area)
• 55 ballots would gut the Southeast the same way as the earlier Pacific exodus, eliminating the Lightning, Panthers, and Hurricanes.
• 38 votes came in favor of completely emptying the Southeast US of hockey (at least south of Washington DC).
• 16 votes got rid of all the southernmost teams on the list (ANA, PHX, DAL, NSH, CAR, TBL, FLA)

These are kind of the votes I was looking for immediately. Really, the entire purpose of the poll was to see how many people who talked about the "simple" solution of eliminating southern teams would go so far as to empty the Southeast or the entire South.

I have to admit that I was pleasantly surprised to see so few people taking such extreme steps, all things considered. For those wondering why the NHL insists on having teams in those markets which are apparently an affront to the northern spirit of the game, I offer you a simple reason why:

Image created by and used with permission from Josh Howard

The yellow dots are US hockey cities. The blue stuff is rough population density. The darker the spot, the more people. Now let's let the Southeastern hockey-haters (and the Phoenix realists) have their way:

This is the map that any television provider is going to be looking at in the future if the NHL ever wants to complement the NBC deal they just got or when it comes time to renew or renegotiate that deal in the future.By 2010 census numbers and some rough regional figuring, the difference in population exposure between those two maps is roughly 20% of the US Population (or more than 62 million people).

Matthew Yglesias at Sate made this point pretty well in May:

But to maintain that national deal, the NHL has to present itself as offering a true nationwide sports league which means you need teams in the sunbelt.

Obviously, there are limits to how much the league can take when it comes time to keeping teams in untenable markets for the sole purpose of trying to grab a television deal, especially since the league has not yet transitioned from a mostly gate-driven league. They might have to lose Phoenix and they could possibly get away with the loss of Anaheim, one of the New York-based teams and potentially Columbus or one of the Florida teams. Thanks to some regional overlap, it might not be so harmful (which, especially when taking the nature of southern sports fans into consideration is probably the biggest reason they could lose Atlanta and their 5 million+ residents).

The thing is that there's only so far you can stretch a region and the southern tendency to still root for a regional friend over a northern foe doesn't hold up nearly as strongly south of the Florida Panhandle.

However, even with regional overlaps, part of the southern expansion plan was created to build a hockey culture in a portion of the country where there previously was none. Abandoning markets like Raleigh, Tampa Bay, Dallas, Nashville, and Anaheim (or even Sunrise and Phoenix) is still a loss of a foothold.

The larger clubs are not going to want to subsidize these footholds while they wait for a potentially viral growth spurt to make them self-sustaining, especially while those subsidies are helping those teams directly compete with them. But if the league wants to move past the old gate-driven model and into a national broadcast model, the best bet is to continue to strive for growth in non-traditional markets. At this point, I believe Phoenix is a lost cause and would like to see them relocated (potentially to Seattle, if they can get an arena built), but I think that relocating or folding hockey teams elsewhere (especially Florida) would be a mistake.

I would also call for a CBA which creates more of a partnership between club owners and more choice. The current revenue-sharing system with its various means of disqualifying recipients from the dollars they need and the salary floor system which doesn't properly adjust for a widening of revenues between top and bottom earners is in drastic need of an overhaul. There are going to be some tough decisions for the league coming out of this lockout. Hopefully, they'll make the right ones.