There are a lot of people out there who write about hockey. Unfortunately, many of these people are awful at their jobs. Channeling the spirit of Fire Joe Morgan (but with a lot less snarkiness), here's our response to a recent article that was particularly loathsome.
Some teams in the National Hockey League have a reputation of struggling between the pipes, and the Ottawa Senators were one of those teams. But now with Pascal Leclaire in net, they can finally say they have a number one goaltender - maybe for the first time in the history of their franchise.
This would be a good time to mention that the title of this piece is "Emery-Flyers Marriage A Good Fit For Both Sides". As in, neither the Ottawa Senators nor Pascal Leclaire were mentioned. The Senators, by the way, have had above-average goalies for this entire decade, be it Patrick Lalime, Ray Emery, Martin Gerber or Dominik Hasek. And if Hasek isn't a number one goaltender, I don't know who is.
The Philadelphia Flyers are another one of those teams that have been plagued in goal since Ron Hextall left the team in 1999.
I know I said in my season preview that the Flyers haven't had a great goalie since Hextall. But they're hardly "plagued". They just happened to have a number of goalies that didn't have very long shelf lives. Since Hextall left, Brian Boucher led them to the 2000 conference finals, then Roman Cechmanek finished second in the league in GAA for the next three years. Cechmanek was followed by Robert Esche, who finished fifth in GAA in 2003-04. Does that sound like a "plague" to you? Me either.
OK, maybe they haven't had a ton of luck since the lockout, but they had stellar goaltending for the first half of this decade. It just happens that that stellar goaltending has come from a bunch of different people.
In the last 10 years, the Flyers have really struggled to find a goaltender that can do the job and now they have Ray Emery who seems to be a much different guy then last year based on opening night.
A different guy? What does this even MEAN? Has he converted to Islam? Does he tell different jokes in the locker room before games? It's okay to say he was a whiny bitch in Ottawa, but now he isn't.
He shut out the Carolina Hurricanes in the season opener
Good for him. But I was wondering how he did when the Hurricanes were on the power play.
and did a particularly good job when the Hurricanes were on the power play.
Wow! That's amazing, especially since the Flyers had the league's 6th best penalty kill last year, while Carolina was only 18th on the power play. It must have taken a Herculean effort for Emery to shut the Hurricanes down.
It's obviously going to take longer than one game for the Ray Emery experiment in Philadelphia to work
BUT HE WAS PARTICULARLY GOOD ON THE POWER PLAY!!!
but at this point in time, considering what his cap money is
According to NHLNumbers.com, Ray Emery is the 29th highest paid goalie in the league at $1.5 million. Goalies making less money than Ray Emery:
- Chris Osgood ($1.45m)
- Martin Biron ($1.4m)
- Jonas Hiller ($1.3m)
- Scott Clemmensen ($1.2m)
- Steve Mason ($0.9m)
- Semyon Varlamov ($.85m)
- Jonathan Quick ($.57m)
- Pekka Rinne ($.725m)
Just about all of these goalies have either had better careers than Emery or have more potential than Emery. So let's stop pretending he's on some great contract. He's got your typical take-a-flier contract (see Biron, Martin). If he sucks, no biggie. If he does well, he'll cash in elsewhere. This is the NHL equivalent of Michael Vick's contract with the Eagles, only no dogs were killed.
and considering that he came back with a lot to prove after having been in exile for all intents and purposes in Russia, it's going to be a good move for the Flyers to have this guy.
Emery signed with the KHL on July 8, 2008. He could have competed for a starting job in the NHL if he really wanted to. Instead, he went to Russia, dominated an inferior league, and suddenly he's a valuable commodity? If you say so.
The Emery-Flyers marriage is a really good fit for both sides. In other words; a team who desperately needs a goaltender to step up and do something for them and a goaltender who desperately needs a good team to surround him and allow him the opportunity to get back in the good grades with the NHL.
I'm not sure what it means to "get back in the good grades" with someone. But hopefully it means Emery does well. If he doesn't, it could get ugly. Emery couldn't handle things in Ottawa. Philly fans are a bit more... um... angry than Ottawa fans. Thankfully, we have seen that the Flyers and Ray Emery are a match made in heaven and that Ray Emery will go 82-0 with 82 shutouts as the Flyers sweep through the playoffs. After all, he was particularly good on the power play.
No comments:
Post a Comment