Thursday, December 13, 2007

Plays of the year will be great

Philadelphia of this year, is buffalo of last year. Buffalo was a team that had enormous depth. Every line they had was an amazing second line. Centered by the likes of Drury, Briere, Roy or Connoly and playing with wingers such as Vanek, Kotalik, Afinogenov and Pominville. When Drury and Briere left this summer, I thought it would be years before we saw a team again that had that much offensive depth. But i was wrong.

Philadelphia Collins:

1 C Mike Richards PHI 28 14 20 34 30 10 3 4 3
0 80 17.5 25.4 21:06 52.2
2 C Daniel Briere PHI 28 13 19 32 36 -5 0 6 3
0 61 21.3 22.0 19:22 52.4
3 R Joffrey Lupul PHI 28 9 14 23 14 5 0 4 2
0 79 11.4 23.3 19:13 100.0
4 C R.J. Umberger PHI 26 6 14 20 11 10 0 2 2
0 61 9.8 22.5 17:16 36.7
5 R Mike Knuble PHI 28 9 9 18 24 2 0 7 0
0 52 17.3 23.0 19:15 30.0
6 D Kimmo Timonen PHI 28 3 13 16 22 -2 0 2 1
0 37 8.1 28.9 24:23 0.0
7 C Jeff Carter PHI 28 9 6 15 31 5 0 1 2
0 63 14.3 21.1 16:31 48.9
8 D Randy Jones PHI 26 2 10 12 31 12 0 0 0
0 30 6.7 26.4 19:30 0.0
9 D Braydon Coburn PHI 28 2 9 11 28 7 0 1 0
0 31 6.5 26.3 20:23 0.0
10 R Scottie Upshall PHI 18 6 4 10 12 -2 0 2 0
0 34 17.6 18.3 13:36 100.0
11 L Simon Gagne PHI 10 4 4 8 0 0 0 2 2
1 26 15.4 21.2 17:47 100.0
12 L Scott Hartnell PHI 26 3 5 8 69 2 0 0 0
0 49 6.1 20.0 15:10 38.5
13 D Lasse Kukkonen PHI 26 1 4 5 16 3 0 0 0
0 18 5.6 22.9 16:30 0.0
14 D Jason Smith PHI 28 1 3 4 29 5 0 0 0
0 17 5.9 24.8 18:42 100.0
15 C Denis Tolpeko PHI 13 1 3 4 16 0 0 0 0
0 19 5.3 13.8 9:40 0.0
16 R Sami Kapanen PHI 24 3 0 3 6 -3 0 0 1
0 22 13.6 19.9 14:30 30.0
17 D Derian Hatcher PHI 13 1 2 3 2 6 0 0 0
0 8 12.5 24.8 21:38 0.0
18 C Jim Dowd PHI 27 2 0 2 4 -4 0 0 0
0 15 13.3 15.3 9:04 45.7
19 L Riley Cote PHI 18 0 1 1 61 2 0 0 0
0 2 0.0 6.8 3:53 0.0
20 C Ryan Potulny PHI 2 0 1 1 2 0 0 0 0
0 2 0.0 8.0 7:57 44.4
21 D Rory Fitzpatrick PHI 17 0 1 1 11 -11 0 0 0
0 7 0.0 19.4 13:02 0.0
22 L Ben Eager PHI 21 0 0 0 60 -6 0 0 0
0 10 0.0 8.5 5:39 25.0
23 R Stefan Ruzicka PHI 7 0 0 0 19 2 0 0 0
0 3 0.0 11.4 7:30 0.0
24 R Jesse Boulerice PHI 2 0 0 0 15 0 0 0 0
0 0 0.0 7.0 3:46 0.0
25 D Nathan Guenin PHI 2 0 0 0 2 2 0 0 0
0 0 0.0 15.0 9:56 0.0
26 R Steve Downie PHI 2 0 0 0 0 -1 0 0 0
0 0 0.0 7.0 5:08 0.0

Simon Gagne is injured while Carter, Upshall and Hartnell aren't having great years, but if they could get everyone to take a lesson from Joffrey Lupul and all learn how to pick up their games, then this team is a real contendor. They're young and only getting better. That forsberg trade will be paying off dividends for years to come.

This leads me to my next point. The contract extension of Mike Richards. It's rumoured to be 5 million per year for 10-12 years. Bobby Clarke is pulling a 'Millbury', as we call it in the blogging biz. But look at Richards points from last year:

2005-2006 Flyers 79 11 23 34 6 65 1 3 1 168 6.5
2005-2006 Canada WC-A 9 3 2 5
10




2006-2007 Flyers 59 10 22 32 -12 52 1 4 3 130 7.7

Pitiful. just awful. How can you justify signing a guy to this much after only having half of a good season in his entire career? Even if this guy does get good, his performance will likely taper off in his early thirties and there's no guarantee the cap will continue to climb on this fast pace.

But maybe i have spoken too soon. Maybe these rumors of his contract extension, are just evil jokes created by Bobby Clarke to get bloggers everywhere to talk about him.

Also, look at Scottie Upshall. Remeber at the deadline when he was traded in that enormous forsberg deal. Philly got him and he played amazing for a few games. He's back down to normal. Also, Rory Fitzpatrick. Don't vote for Rory this year. How can you be -11 on one of the most succesful teams in the league. I seriously believe there is a chance he is sabotoging the team.

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