Curmudgeon

Except that she is no longer Queen of Canada. Charles is now the King of Canada. The currency and postage stamps will bear his likeness. Protocol, you know.

Podkolzin is going nowhere. That is all.

As of today: This contract reflects more than Miller just wanting to get paid. It appears to me that he accepted lower dollars so that the club would have money to spend on making the team better. It is a flat out hometown discount, and good for Allvin and company for negotiating and good for Miller and his family in accepting a fair offer..

Most of those guys will get a contract. I'd go for Anton Stralman. Right shot, veteran, can play 18 minutes a night and most of his zone starts are in the defensive zone. I think he'd be Schenn, only better.

That's what she said....

How about focussing on a right shot defenceman instead of a journeyman forward who, on his very best day, is no better than a third line centre. With Lazar and Dickinson, why would you think Gagner would be a good signing?

I could see Stralman on a PTO. The Pacific Division is shaping up to be pretty talented offensively, and Vancouver hasn't been able to add skill or talent to the defensive right side. He averaged about 21 minutes a night for a really bad Arizona club, and had 70% defensive zone starts. Clearly he was relied upon heavily when having to play against the best players on the other teams. Yes, his Corsi, Fenwick and all that other stuff aren't great, but that's what happens when an AHL-level team is in the NHL. If you could get even 16-18 solid minutes from Stralman, and he's willing to play for a million or so, it would definitely improve the defence.

Tossup between Ovechkin scoring while sliding on his back and Erik Karlsson's perfect pass.

That's the logical move, Joe, but teams who could use Miller to push them over the top and to a Stanley Cup are mostly all capped out and can't afford him. I do wonder about Carolina, now that Pacioretty is out until at least mid-February. Maybe they send us Pesce and we'll call it even. (in my dreams)

My first computer was a Commodore 64 that played games from 5 1/4" floppy disks or plugin game cartridges. It had a really responsive joystick and I really liked Wizard of Wor and Boulderdash. I can't remember the full details, but it seems to me in order to load a program, you had to type something like "8"run program name and it would take 4-5 minutes for the game to load. No multi tasking and no icons, everything was text based. Except games. Fun fact: The Apollo mission that landed on the moon in 1969 had an onboard computer with a whole 72K of ROM memory and just over 4K of RAM. Not Megabytes, not gigabytes, but kilobytes. That was state-of-the-art in 1969.

This statement implies that Allvin was not a fan of Motte's play, but I believe it was more about not being able to afford a legitimate fourth liner in a tight, tight cap world. Motte would have been looking for 2-3 million AAV on his next contract and no fourth liner is worth that much in the market. He's a really good, honest, hard-working guy, but unless he agrees to league minimum, he won't be coming back to Vancouver.

If I may be so bold, maybe we could add a few additional categories: (Don't feel obligated to participate) Best opening act before the headline act: Band that didn't appear to give a damn: Best old time rockers who can still do it: Band/act I walked out on: Most underrated live performer I have seen: My guilty pleasure (an act I shouldn't have liked, but loved): Unknown Band/act you think everyone should see: I'll start: Best opening act before the headline act: Led Zeppelin opening for Vanilla Fudge, December 1968 Band that didn't appear to give a damn: ZZ Top in Abbotsford Best old time rockers who can still do it: Chilliwack Band/act I walked out on: Neil Young, somewhere around the 25th minute of an endless, nasal, droning dirge. Most underrated live performer I have seen: Joe Bonamassa My guilty pleasure (an act I shouldn't have liked, but loved): Great Big Sea Unknown Band/act you think everyone should see: The Brothers Landreth, Martyn Joseph

First Concert: Led Zeppelin (December 28, 1968) Last Concert: Brit Floyd Best Concert: The Wall (BC Place, Roger Waters) and Supertramp (1981 Empire Stadium) Worst Concert: Blue Rodeo Loudest Concert: Led Zeppelin (May, 1969) Seen the Most: Eagles Most Surprising: Corb Lund and the Hurtin' Albertans and Walk Off the Earth Next Concert: This is Not a Drill, Roger Waters, September 15/22 Wish I Could Have Seen: Moody Blues Upon further review, I would like to change my nominee for Worst Concert from Blue Rodeo (who refused any of the music that people might recognize) to ZZ Top at Abbotsford. Worst acoustics, muddy sound, they mailed it in and there was no joy anywhere to be found. Hideous.

I think you have hit the nail on the head. I have known hockey players from Junior through the pro level and have heard countless stories of puck bunnies and bizarre homoerotic sexual practices masked as initiation or hazing. I knew a player who was arrested when stepping off the team bus in another city on a charge of sexual assault. He later played for several seasons in the NHL where he was admired by all. I once asked an official from a WHL team what the club was doing about instruction about safe sex, sexual assault and consent. The guy was puzzled and said "Nothing". Now, that was two decades ago so maybe things are different now but there is one thing that to me is abundantly clear: the entire organizational roster of Hockey Canada needs to be terminated and replaced by people NOT connected to hockey and who are predisposed to rooting out abusers and the officials who tolerate it and turn a blind eye. It will take decades to undo what has taken a hundred years to develop, but it must be done.

So, the onus is on the potential victim to avoid those rascally boys who will be boys? How about strict instruction as early as 13-14 years old for all players about sexual activity, consent, the dehumanizing effect of gang-assault and the dehumanizing effect of initiation rituals and hazing having to do with sexual activity? If you want to stop sexual assault, stop the assaulters, and to stop them you have to educate them.

Vancouver can make the playoffs this upcoming season without bringing in a high-powered, right shot defenceman.

BTW, Tanev is still injured and is not expected to be ready for training camp. Torn labrum, separated shoulder and sprained neck. He's a tough old bird but you have to wonder how many more serious injuries can he absorb and still comeback strong.

I fully expect that Miller starts the season in Vancouver, gives 100% effort every night, breaks 35 sticks and shouts the f-word 7.8 times per period, and is leading the team in scoring by Halloween. He's not stupid. He knows he's going to get paid big dollars over long term, but he also knows his relative value will depend on how well he plays and how much he scores next season. Make no mistake, it is a risk for Miller to end up a 59 point guy rather than a 99 point guy. That's why, unless Allvin can trade him this summer, Miller will do everything he can to enhance his future value. Win for Miller and win for Vancouver to get at least one more year of peak-Miller. JR and PA's team know exactly what they have in Miller and are in zero hurry to do anything other than let it play out. Que sera, sera.

A team's identity doesn't just appear from nothing and it can't be assigned from on high. That identity comes through playing winning hockey and practicing the habits that make the probability of winning more likely. That's when other teams decide that the Canucks are a tough team to play against because they are anfast, skilled and physical group that is hard on the forecheck and defensively responsible. That's when and how this team's identity will emerge and not until.

Not really. Brian Burke went out and acquired Rob Neidermayer, then sold Scott on the chance to play with his brother.

True, but a few of us were concerned that in the year after his draft year, his production dropped from 45 to 21 goals, he was injured for a portion of that season, yet still made the NHL team in the fall. Even then, I still felt we had a young Dustin Brown if he lived up to his hype. He did not. He was gifted a roster spot, then ate his way into the doghouse. The rest is sad, sordid history.

I was hugely disappointed that Vladimir Krutov lacked the character of his countryman and linemate Igor Larionov. Apparently Krutov had a serious hot dog habit and didn't really make the transition to the North American game. He lasted 61 games in Vancouver, while Larionov played 921 NHL games, counting 169 goals, 475 assists and two Stanley Cups. Krutov, for me, was the biggest disappointment in a lengthy list of disappointments in Canucks history. On the positive side of the ledger, I wasn't excited about Alex Burrows in his first couple of years (21 points in 124 games), but once he clicked with the Sedins he was an undisputed top line player. Quite a leap for an non-drafted kid who started his pro career at the bottom with the ECHL Greenville Grrrrowl, Baton Rouge Kingfish and the Columbia Inferno, then continued with the Manitoba Moose until arriving in Vancouver, scratching and clawing for every minute of ice time he could get. Burrows has to be the poster boy for what ambition can achieve in the face of long odds.

A Twitter warrior is NOT media. It's just a guy with a keyboard and an account. Just like us.

Excellent post. three weeks ago, there were lots of head coaching jobs to fill. There are no other jobs left. So who goes to San Jose? Candidates: Travis Green, Claude Julien, Alain Vigneault, Rick Tocchet, and long shots Joel Quenneville and Mike Babcock. Oh, and Barry Trotz is out there sitting in the weeds, watching, waiting and ready.