NCAA comes out tomorrow, and so I will become even more distracted than ever. There’s a new mode that allows you to put any Heisman trophy winner on any team you want to, and as much as I hate Desmond in a Buckeye uni, this commercial is priceless.
Hopefully this game lives up to the hype. EA Sports has struggled recently, and unfortunately Madden 13 will be a train wreck.
I’m a person that is usually pretty short on patience. The Wings took a major hit when Ryan Suter signed with the Minnesota Wild, he could have played valuable minutes for the Wings and stabilized the blue line. They were never going to land Zach Parise, because the New Jersey Devils could offer comparable money, and he says that if he didn’t go to the Wild that he would have just stayed put. Then to make things worse, Steve Yzerman signed Matt Carle down in Tampa Bay, and suddenly options A and B were gone for the Wings. Thankfully though, Ken Holland does not make any reactionary decisions. He could have gone out and overpaid for Carle and three years down the road, every Wings fan could have been complaining about how terrible the contract was.
Yet again another Michigan Hockey commitment has defected to the OHL. Defenseman Connor Carrick is not the first person, nor will he be the last. It isn’t always the OHL that is at fault, as the QMJHL and WHL have done just as much. It drives me literally insane when kids who are committed, decommit during the SUMMER before they are supposed to end up on campus and go the CHL. I understand that these kids need to do what they think is best, but I think a major, major reason is that most of the NHL teams that pick these kids influence them to leave. The biggest issue here is that this scholarship is burned for the next year and Michigan or another school cannot go out and add another player. A player that would feel happy and blessed for an opportunity to play college hockey, and not one that thinks he is entitled to the opportunity. Carrick is a 5th round pick of the Washington Capitals, and I could sit here and spew statistics about the probability of success for a player to make it to the NHL from being drafted in the 5th round, but that would be wrong. Statistics and probability of success do not apply to the NHL draft like they do with the NBA or NFL Drafts. The players that are picked are typically 18 years old and they haven’t finished developing yet. Carrick could develop into the best defenseman in the entire draft; highly unlikely, but still probable given the Long Term Athlete Development in hockey. Each athlete is entitled to their own shot, and no two players are the same, so you should try not to group them together in such a general manner.
This picture is from ESPN’s Facebook page (good thing they can spell COLLEGE), and these are all of the basic details that are available at the moment and have been hammered out. Coincidentally the current BCS TV contract is up around the same time this playoff system is supposed to start and there are talks that it could yield a $5 Billion contract over the 12 year span. I firmly believe that at some point the playoff field will expand to eight teams, especially once they see how much more money they can make from the new system and how much people enjoy the finality of a playoff. There will always be people who question the system, but there is finally a playoff in every NCAA sport, at every NCAA level, to determine the National Champion.
First and foremost, there cannot really be an analysis of who “won” or “lost” during the draft, and so I’ve decided to focus on another aspect of the draft weekend. The NHL draft is unlike the NBA or NFL draft and probably every player in this draft except for maybe three, will not play a game in the NHL this year. The draft is always about taking the best player available, because down the line it could be a need position. Rarely can you fill a need for the upcoming season on the big club during the NHL draft. The only real way to do this is to make a few trades, and there were certainly plenty of those, even with a lockout looming
The Oilers did the smart thing and took the best player available when they drafted Nail Yakupov, but many wondered why they did not take a defenseman. People fail to realize that defenseman rarely jump right to the NHL, and if you push a guy too quickly, you end up with Luke Schenn, a 22-year old defenseman with no confidence, a huge contract and a serious lack in development. Bottom line, always draft best available.
You can either agree with me or disagree with me on this, but nothing you say will change my mind. The NBA is a league that is completely rigged and full of soft players. Yes, I am calling the league rigged and yes, I am calling NBA Players soft. A team that won seven games this past year did not win the Draft Lottery, but the team that has been run by the NBA for the past year, while they could not find a buyer, won it. It is an interesting coincidence to say the least.
Two days ago, Brad Stuart signed with the San Jose Sharks for 3 years at $3.6 Million per year. This was to be expected since the Wings dealt him there prior to the July 1st start to free agency. Even though he had a bad year, it’s nice to see him get a chance to be with his family again.
Yesterday, the Wings signed Darren Helm to a 4 year, $8.5 Million contract. They probably overpaid a little bit for him here, but they had to get him signed prior to July 1st to see what cap they would have to work with. Priority one is still to sign Ryan Suter and then Zach Parise. Cross your fingers.
Not sure if anyone noticed, but I dropped the WordPress from the URL and upgraded it to just thedailytraub.com; hopefully now it looks a little bit more professional.
It was announced by the Nashville Predator’s GM yesterday that Ryan Suter will test the free agent market. This is obviously huge news for the Wings, but it is still not a guarantee that they will sign him. I personally cannot stop reading into every little thing that comes out about Suter, because it is imperative that the Wings sign him. In other news, the Wings apparently looked into acquiring Rick Nash and it was going to require at least, Valtteri Filppula, Brendan Smith and their 2013 1st round pick. I personally would have looked into making this trade, if Lidstrom or Stuart had stayed. But at the same time, it is extremely tough to trade your best defensive prospect with an aging blue line. Maybe if they somehow sign Justin Schultz, a coveted young free agent defenseman, then they could look to make this trade. That being said, I do not see the Wings acquiring Nash under any circumstances. The Columbus Blue Jackets GM is trying to trade rape anyone that will offer something for Nash, because he knows his job is in jeopardy if he keeps putting a garbage team on the ice.
Some relatively interesting news coming out today, but once again another slow day in sports now that the Stanley Cup Finals are over. In the college football world the Michigan Wolverines, according to Twitter, have agreed to a home and home series with the Utah Utes in 2014 and 2015. They would play at the Big House in 2014 and then play on Thursday Night in Utah in 2015. This is a pre-cursor to the Big Ten/Pac 12 agreement that is set to start in 2012-2013 for men and women’s basketball and the Olympic sports, and then in 2017 for football. Many Big Ten and Pac 12 football teams already have games on their schedules to play one another before the agreement officially starts and so the teams left for Michigan to play were very slim. I personally would rather have not played any Pac 12 teams before the agreement starts simply because there were not any good teams left to play and the fact that Michigan has already played Utah within the last five years. Besides, who wants to play on a Thursday night? Utah may have moved to the Pac 12, but they are still complete benders with garbage game time slots.
As of about fifteen minutes ago it has been announced that the Detroit Red Wings have traded Brad Stuart to San Jose for Andrew Murray and a conditional 7th round pick in 2014. Detroit will only get the pick if the Sharks sign Brad Stuart, and both players are unrestricted free agents on July 1st. It has been well known around the league that Stuart wanted to return home to his family in California, and now he has the chance to return to the team that drafted him 3rd overall in 1998. And because it has been known around the league that he was likely leaving Detroit, that is why the Wings literally got nothing for him. Quite frankly it’s the best they could do given the fact that everyone was probably low balling them, and it is better to get something than let him walk for nothing. I don’t see the Wings making an attempt to sign Murray, but if they do you can guarantee it will be a two-way contract and he will be playing in Grand Rapids.
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