NHL: July first…What a wonderful day!!!

Posted: July 3rd, 2007 | Author: Buffo 95 | Filed under: Babble, Hockey, NHL | 5 Comments »

We should all respect the First Day of July!!!

by Michael Barker…who’s birthday is in the subject.

Ah…July the first. It’s Canada Day for those who care. It’s also the birthday of Alan Alda, and the former Princess of England, Diana. It is also my birthday, and more importantly the first day of free agent signings for the NHL.

The NHL opened it’s free agency doors in quite the open manner this off-season with some winners…and of course losers (due to the winners). Since this is a belated birthday gift to me (and my St. Louis Blues), I’ll just give you the winners, and let you figure out the losers.

My birthday…my team first.

St. Louis Blues

The Blues got Keith Tkachuk back from Atlanta where he drove the Thrashers to an amazing playoff push…oh, wait…I guess not. However, the Blues drove a stake into the heart of divisional rivals Nashville by signing Paul Kariya for three years and making a friend of mine back in Music City to wonder why she bought that 14 game mini-pack of tickets. Rumors are that JD isn’t done, as the Blues are in the running for many other free agents like Ray Emery, goaltender of the Ottawa Senators of last season…we’ll see. Dominik Hasek is UFA as well…

NY Rangers- The place where all good players go to die get a couple of players that can do so in my opinion. The blueshirts got Chris Drury of Buffalo and Scott Gomez of New Jersey so that they can hopefully beat those teams this upcoming season. Meanwhile, Brenden Shanahan is on the market…damn, it would be nice to see him come home to St. Lou.

Philadelphia Flyers- Philly decided that they may have sucked for long enough. They grabbed Kimmo Timmonen from the salary dumping Predators, and Daniel Briere (the other co-captain of Buffalo). However, Janni Pitkanen is a big name still looking for a home.

Colorado Avalanche- This makes me laugh so fricking hard. Mr Canada…Mr Edmonton Oiler…Ryan Smyth is added to the Avalanche thanks to a phone call by Joe Sakic to Mr. Giguere (the other one…the GM for Colorado). This Jeff Foxworthy look-alike has been punishing the Avs for years, now gets to put his talents up against his former team like…what…30 times. However, the Avs have Brisebois, Turgeon, and Konowalchuk to sign, if they can.

Pittsburgh Penguins- As if they didn’t get lucky in the draft with Esposito, the young guns of Pittsburgh add some veteren talent (along with Recchi, and Roberts) in Peter Sykora, and Darryl Sydor. DAMN…this team is going to be hard to beat next year.

Losers include the teams that lost players mentioned above, plus Dallas (Lindros, Nagy, Klemm, Barnaby are all unrestricted)

Oh, and for Zim…wow the Jackets signed Brookbank…oh, don’t know that name…neither does 90% of hockey fans…the other 10% are family members.

Last and definately least…
During the past playoffs I was hyping (and deservingly so) the Anaheim Ducks. However they made a move that has made me HATE them for evermore. The Ducks signed the criminal Todd Bertuzzi. Ugh. They also took Mathieu Schneider from Detroit as well…I can always hope that Detroit can’t sign Hasek, and that Chris Chelios and his walker fall down some steps. With the rest of the former Black & Blue Division looking like crap…The Blues win the Western Central next year. I can only hope…

More to come I’m sure.

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