by Jes

As you might have noticed, the volume of posts on this site has slowed in the past month. Besides the lack of good hockey news, I'm still feeling under the cloud of Blogger Burnout. Even if there is a good story to be had, I just don't have the spark.

Remember the story of young Steven Legein? He's the Columbus Dinner Jackets prospect that quit the game simply because he grew tired of it. All of the practices, training camps, video sessions ... it just wasn't worth it for the young prospect.

This type of burnout seems to be happening more these days among our nation's youth, and most of it can be traced to those parents that push their children so hard in a usually-futile attempt to land a lucrative spot in the NHL.

From The Province:

But the seeds of hockey burnout are now being planted long before a player reaches the junior level, and [Canadian Hockey Head Bob] Nicholson agrees it is becoming a problem.

"It's a big concern of ours that players aren't playing soccer, baseball, lacrosse like they used to (in the summer)," he said. "We're in board meetings now looking at ways to try to make sure that they're not playing competitive hockey 12 months of the year."

Part of the problem is overzealous hockey parents with dreams of their son becoming the next Sidney Crosby. They're the ones forking out the cash for the summer hockey programs, which aren't cheap.

"I think a lot of it comes right from the parents," Nicholson agreed. "It almost seems like it's worse now with the 9-, 10- and 11-year-olds. The message doesn't seem to be getting down to the parents right now."

It's not that the kids don't like playing hockey, it's that they don't like playing it ALL THE TIME, and they don't like the constant work involved. Most kids don't like practices, and most kids certainly don't want to feel pushed into training year round. It just saps the fun out of the game entirely, doesn't it?

Think of how many kids play at the highest level of junior hockey in Canada. It's a very small percentage of the total population of hockey players in that age group. Now, think of how many of those kids will ever make the NHL. It's a very small percentage.

The fact is that if your kid can't possibly be one of the elite players during the course of a regular season, those few extra months are not going to make him the next superstar. That extra training might help the very best young players, but it's not going to help the mass majority become THAT much better.

Again, we must look over to Europe to see how they do things right.

In the summer, even the pro teams never set a foot out on to the ice. In Europe, the players play soccer and tennis ... they go mountain biking, they go jogging, they have fun doing other stuff that isn't even related to hockey.

The result? The players are happier because they get a break from the game, and the players are better trained.

Better trained?

Yes. Soccer and tennis, especially, develop athletic traits that aren't always worked on so well in hockey. Both sports are great for developing agility and stamina, allowing players to develop quickness on a different surface. Biking is obviously great for developing stamina and vitality, something short-burst hockey training doesn't always do.

Having a kid play hockey 12 months a year will leave them rather 1-dimensional in terms of their athletic training, not to mention bored to tears. It's hard for any mind to develop creativity and creatively when it is constantly focusing on one type of task.

Edit: OK, I totally mis-read the Cherry quote. Woops. What do you make of this, anyway? sheesh

Last March, on the Grapeline radio show, host Brian Williams asked Don Cherry what he thought about hockey parents whose kids missed games during spring break to go on a family vacation.

"What do I think of them?" Cherry roared. "You want to know what I think of them? I think they're selfish rats that can't be counted on. The parents that take the kids out of the team and go on vacation are rats that can't be counted on. Can I say it any clearer?

"That's not only my opinion," Cherry added, "but real hockey people think they're selfish rats who can't be counted on."

Labels: burnout, Don Cherry, junior hockey, Steven Legein

by Jes

Who said fighting in hockey is dead? First, we got that massive Russian Superleague brawl, and now we get this after-the-game brawl between the Sarnia Sting and Oshawa Generals. Thanks to JP from Japers Rink for passing this linkage on.

What looks like ye olde typical post game celebration turns ugly ... w00t!

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On another note, Joe Pelletier has details about Dave Semenko's exhibition boxing match vs. Muhammed Ali. I never knew the two fought, but apparently Ali's people agreed to have his boy fight Gretz's bodyguard. All of this was put together by Mark Messier's uncle, proving there isn't anything the Messier's won't do for a buck.

Semenko apparently trained quite hard for the event, training under Rocky Addison, a former Manitoba middleweight champion. They watched video of Ali's fights looking for tendencies, and hit the gym for many hours. They held a one week training camp at the worst possible time for Semenko.

"They'd only just introduced Happy Hours in the lounges in Edmonton and the first think Rocky did was put me on the wagon. "Two for one sodas are not my idea of a Happy Hour on a hot June afternoon."

He gave up beer? Wow, that's dedication!

Labels: Brawls, Fight, junior hockey, Semenko, video

by Jes



As hockey-starved as I was this month, I just couldn't get up enough craving to watch too much of this "Super Series" between Canada and Russia.

In case you are American, or living in a cave, Canada whooped the Russkis 7-0-1 in the 8-game series, completely dominating the vodka drinkers in a lopsided pile of contests, and outscoring the Russians 39-13.

Just a few things ...

1. Canada vs. Russia doesn't have any mystique to it, anymore. Sure, beating up the Russians always feels nice, but it's no longer special. The Iron Curtain is gone, we've played the Russians many times, and there wasn't anything all that different from this game from previous Canada/Russia affairs.

2. "We wanted it more!" - This cliché was actually pertinent as the Russians didn't appear all that interested in breaking a sweat. The Canadians? Sutter had them playing with gusto from the first puck drop, and they just seemed to be a lot more interested in paying the price to win. The Russians? Their hockey media probably didn't give this tournament much coverage. In Canada? There is a lot more to lose, so to speak, with the media having little else to cover.

3. The only time the Russians seemed to care was in the last game, when they started throwing a few 'sore loser' cheap shots. Canada made them pay with Power Play goals. Nice try, Boris.

4. Kyle Turris - He wanted to prove that he's the real deal, and led Canada with 7 goals. Coming from the Junior "B" BCHL, Turris is one of the riskier top picks in the past few years, but he certainly was incredibly impressive.

5. Sam Gagner was the series MVP with 15 points. Omygaw, an Oilers pick that doesn't completely blow ... at least, not yet. Gagner had 6 more points than second-place Tavares, who should be allowed to enter the NHL 'early'. Arbitrary cut-offs suck.

6. Canada and Russia have generally been looked at as the top 2 hockey powers in the world. Well, we know that is a-changing, with the Americans producing many more fine prospects, and the Russians churning out ... not much.

Like Germany, Russia spends a lot of money on stars and foreigners, but little on player development of their own. Combine that with the lack of prospects who come to North America, opting to stay in Mother Russia, and you have a country full of players who won't be able to compete against North American hockey as well as they used to.

Certainly, stars like Ovechkin, Semin, and Frolov will continue to come out of that country and wow us with their puck-handling ability, but the depth just isn't there, any longer, especially on D.

7. "Looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo-cheech!!"

Labels: junior hockey, Kyle Turris, Milan Lucic, Sam Gagner, Team Canada, Team Russia

by Jes

You'd never know that both the Medicine Hat Tigers and Vancouver Giants were both already guaranteed a spot in the Memorial Cup as they went the distance to settle the WHL Finals.

Game 7, Double OT...too bad the Tigers came out on top with a 3-2 win. :^(

This series was tremendous, with both teams giving everything they had, and the Tigers fighting back from a 3-2 series deficit to take the final 2 games at home. It didn't help that Cody Franson was out with injury, and the Giants were playing with 5 d-men for most of the final game.

The Giants had a 2-1 lead in the 3rd period of Game Seven, but the Tigers showed a lot of desperation and basically took the tide of the game from then on. The loss prevented the Giants from repeating as WHL champs.

The game featured quite a few fog delays in the overtimes, reminiscent of the Buffalo Sabres foggy playoff games of the 70s. The refs called on the players from both teams to skate around and dissipate the fog.

Matt Keetley, the 20-year old goalie for the Tigers, was named Playoff MVP.

In terms of playoff performances among Giants prospects ...

Michal Repik, who slid in the CSS final rankings, led all playoff scorers with 16 assists and 26 points in 22 games. He was using his speed well to create offence all playoffs long.

Kenddal McArdle and Wacey Rabbit led all goal scorers with 11.

Cody Franson was either injured or not nearly as effective with just 7 points in 19 games. Ever since he came back from the WJC, he hasn't been the same player as he was before. What happened over there?

Mario Bliznak, the late Canucks pick, had 12 points in 22 games and was his awesome defensive self. He's still a long shot, but definitely one for Canucks fans to keep an eye on. He works very hard and showed some offensive ability in tight situations.

Now, both teams need to recover for the Memorial Cup, which starts here on Friday.

So, congrats to the Tigers, and may you have bad luck in the Memorial Cup ;)

PS: Bonus points to the Tigers music director who played Boney M's Rasputin before the first overtime, as well as some other 80s hits. The Giants or Canucks need to hire this guy.

Labels: junior hockey, Medicine Hat Tigers, Vancouver Giants, WHL

Continuing the previous discussion on the state of Slovak hockey, it seems the Slovak Extraleague and Slovak Hockey Federation have taken the giant step of creating an exclusive Under-20 team to play in the Extraliga.

The league currently has 8 teams, so this U-20 team and a promoted Division 1 team will be added next year to create a new 10-team league. This is a very unique experiment geared to improve Slovakia's ability to produce good hockey players.

There are still many details to sort out, such as scheduling, who runs the team, etc etc etc..and where will they get the players for this team? Most of the best Slovak juniors play either in the CHL or Czechia.
1. The CHL will reduce their import limit to 1 per team, so more kids will be available.
2. The other Extraliga teams will be forced to contribute their U-20 kids if they are selected.
3. Having a team in the Extraliga will entice many would-be travelers to stay home and earn a regular paycheque in the Extraliga, rather than almost nothing in the junior leagues.

Is this team likely to get slaughtered against older Extraliga vets? Yes, probably. Teams filled with junior aged players in previous seasons tended to get their asses kicked hard. Still, the juniors display a lot of hustle that the grumpy vets and lazy stars sometimes don't. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

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It is true that the Slovaks have done a much better job producing goaltenders (their biggest weakness) and defensemen. Long gone are the days of throwing out Roman Mega, Jaromir Dragan, or Pavol Rybar and praying that the opposition didn't score 14 times a period. Youngsters like Peter Budaj, Jaroslav Halak, and Michal Valent are very talented goaltenders who have taken the reigns alongside Jan Lasak, the best Slovak goalie produced since old Vladimir Dzurilla.

The big problem is that the Slovaks just aren't producing many very talented forwards these days and it will catch up to them in a few years. Demitra, Satan, Bondra, Handzus, Zednik, Stumpel, and Palffy (retired, for now) are all 30+. A small core of Hossa, Nagy, and Gaborik are in their primes with just Svatos and Meszaros coming up behind them. There are a few other prospects like Marek Zagrapan and Stefan Ruzicka, but the cupboard will grow bare up front.

Another problem that I see is that TOO many kids are going to the CHL, and it ends up hurting them. Instead of further developing their skills, they spend 1-3 years trying to learn an almost completely different game, and no longer work as much on their skills as supposed to trying to survive physical punishment and learn a new language.

Many of these kids do not do well in the CHL, and end up returning home. Since their skills growth has been stunted, and they've been playing a different game, they often struggle to catch up and adapt back to the European game.

Take Vladimir Kutny, a 6'4" giant from Trencin (and CHL teams love the tall ones) who came to the QMJHL and put up just 69 points in 187 games over 3 seasons.

Kutny went back with Dukla Trencin last season and put up a whopping 6 points in 42 Extraliga games. He has just 2 points in 23 games this season. If he had stayed home the entire time, he likely would have developed his skills further and been a much better player for Trencin in a bigger role. There are many other examples of talented, but not great, Slovak players who end up being worse off for their CHL tenure.

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My Slovak pal, Daniel, had some further comments on why Slovak hockey is struggling to produce talented players up front and sucking so bad at the WJC these days.
***
Here are some thoughts about the ”success” of Slovak national team on WJC. I can see four following main reasons:

1. System of Play - As most of Slovak teams the players do not know what to play. There does not seem to be any team-work and/or system, which is a very important factor of European teams. Except for Slovakia and Czechia, all other teams were comprised of mostly Europe-skating players. All these players have played about 10 games on one team in last 3 months. The Europeans are not like Canadian or US players who are collected from plenty of different teams and leagues. The other teams need just couple of games to play well as a team. Slovak team showed chaotic play without any thought or system.

2. Inability to score - Though plenty of kids were expected to be good scorers, a lot of them struggled to score, especially those who skate in the CHL. Except for Juraj Mikus, Sinkovic (both QMJHLers) and Mikula, the others are not any elite scorers on their teams this season. Slovaks created many good opportunities to score but they did not convert. For your information Slovaks outshoot all teams (GER, SWE, USA, SUI, BLR) except Canada but they lost all of their games except to Belarus.

3. Coach - I mentioned the Jasko’s ”amazing” year. Well, he was fired by the hockey federation from the national team today.

4. Suspect Nominations - It is up to the coach and his ”advisors” to do the best selection of players. There are always questionable players on the team every year. Ones who skate in NA are often preferred, although coaches cannot see them in action and have very poor information about their fitness levels.

One example from last season: Juro Mikus was the best junior on Extraliga but coach sent him to 4th line to play 5-8 minutes per game while preferred Petruska or Lemesani (who played in NAHL). Best scoring junior duo in Extraliga Richard Lelkes (6+2) and Marcal Hascak (4+4) were ignored by Jasko. The player’s agents have very long fingers and push their kids to national teams all the time. Many kids who play in Slovakia feel they are omitted and have no real chance to play in the championships. In the last seasons the coaches always tested 25-30 Europe skating kids on two 4-nations tournaments (in August and November) however 3-4 ones were the favorites (and they have to play on WJC) while the rest of them have to fight for other 3-4 spots because the others spots were reserved for players from CHL.
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Just more food for thought.

Labels: junior hockey, opinion, Slovak hockey

Canada/Russia in the finals again?
Been there, done that, and have the media guide.

Like most Canadians, I haven’t been able to get much into the tournament, and can't watch the final game because it's on when we're AT WORK. Good job, IIHF, schedule the final game for when your prime TV audience is at work and can't watch the games. Even the NHL wouldn't be that stupid.

People have asked me to comment on the Slovaks' performance at this tournament, since every other blogger (except Greg) hates or doesn't give a rat's ass about Slovaks.

I picked the Slovaks to finish 7th, and the fact that they were in the relegation round was no surprise. The level of hockey talent has fallen drastically in the country since the fall of communism, and the Slovaks have had major troubles at this tournament in the past few years.

Going into yesterday's action, the Slovaks were in grave danger of being relegated, which is a fate I hadn't expected at all. I felt the Slovaks were a shoo-in to be safely in Pool A, and never thought they'd have to rely on another team to save their asses..

Thanks to a 9-0 beating over the fascist Belarussians, and a Swiss cheese victory over the Sauerkrauts, the Slovaks managed to save their Pool A lives by the slimmest of margins, finishing 8th overall.

*phew*

Now, the decline of Slovak hockey has been fairly steep and I expect the country will struggle in the 2nd tier with the Germans, Swiss, and Belarussians for some time.

Look at the Slovak stars in the league. Most of them are in their prime or over 30. Marian Gaborik is the rare exception of a Slovak star produced after the Velvet Revolution. Demitra, Satan, Bondra, Visnovsky, Hossa, Chara, and Handzus were all products or partial-products of the 'old' system. Sure, there are some talented youngsters like Andrej Meszaros, but certainly nothing like the glory years.

Just to rehash some stuff I've probably already talked about...

After the 'fall', the Slovak government no longer pumped lots of money into the hockey programs and schools (Since most kids played hockey in elementary and high school in their city). The split of Czechoslovakia also left the Czechs with most of the rinks and resources, and left the Slovaks with a very weak economy.

Hockey has become a rich man's game, way more so than in Canada, Sweden, USA, and even Czechia. In relative terms, the average Slovak cannot afford to put their kids into hockey like the average family of most other big hockey countries. Many talented players never get a chance to play hockey, and a lot of the kids who do play hockey happen to be kids or relatives of former and current hockey players.

While the Slovaks will always continue to have a strong hockey culture, the level of talent is not likely to return to the high levels experienced in the 90s and early 00s for a long time. The Slovaks are basically a feeder service for many other European leagues, with the rare exceptional Meszaros type coming out of the woodwork once a year. The Slovaks will likely have major struggles at the senior level (WC, Olympics) when many of the current stars get old and retire.

Sure, Marian Gaborik is building a new rink on Trencin, but this won't help the average kid be able to afford expensive hockey equipment (in relative terms most equipment is priced higher in Europe than North America).

My Slovak friend, Daniel, also offered his take on why the Slovaks did so poorly at this tournament.

1. The development in Slovakia is poor. Plenty of kids leave to play in CHL and Czech leagues. All too often, it's a also case of stupid parents who think their kids are next Hossa, Gaborik or Palffy while they can't even skate.

2. Poor nominations. Richard Lelkes and Marcel Hascak are two regular Extraliga players who weren't nominated and Lukas Bohunicky is a WHLer who should have gone. You probably don't know who they are, but you'll have to trust me on this one.

3. Starting goalie Vladimir Kovac suffered an injury one week before the tournament and Branislav Konrad was forced into action as the #1 goalie.

4. Perhaps the most important reason: Coaching!

In Daniel's words:

Jan Jasko should get to the Guinness book of records as the worst coach in history. Count with me what he recorded during last 365 days:

He coached Zvolen but was fired during regular season 2005-06.

Several weeks later was signed to coach Slovan but after eliminated in quarter-final was fired again.

Just couple days later Nitra's GM fell in love with Jasko and fired Stavjana, during semi-series, to sign Jasko. Of course Nitra was eliminated soon and Jasko was fired again. Meanwhile he worked as assistant coach of Frantisek Hossa on the national team.

Of course this "amazing" duo recorded the worst result of national team in last 6 years on WC (Slovakia was 8th). And his last success was this WJC. If you want to relegate Canada from pool A in next season please sign Jasko ;-)

This whole WJC was disheartening for Slovak fans, but I feel that many future WJC's will be just the same. As long as the Slovaks keep producing a much lower level of talent than in the past, they'll keep struggling to maintain a Pool A presence in the face of increasing competition from the Germans and Swiss.

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As for the Czechs... just a few thoughts

1. Goalie Ondrej Pavelec was surprisingly awful. He's a great young talent and I believe he's got a good shot at an NHL future, but a 2-3 record with a 88.97SV% was bad.

2. Secondary Scoring: Where was it? The Czechs got good performances from Michael Frolik, Vladimir Sobotka, and Tomas Svoboda. Michal Repik? He finished with 0 points in 6 games. Other than those 3 forwards and Tomas Kana, the Czechs weren't getting good support.

3. Defence - The Czechs had a group of offensive-minded defensemen and have had trouble producing some good defensive defensemen in some time. There seems to be a lot of moaning that the Czechs Extraliga and Czech hockey in general is not producing enough good solid defensemen.

4. Too many CHLers! I realize that a lot of the talent has gone to the CHL over the past decade, but the Czechs always seem to have this problem of integrating the European and CHL players. The Russians, Swedes, and Finns don't have this problem because so few of their guys play in the CHL. The Slovaks and Czechs need to start taking more Euro-heavy teams.

Labels: IIHF, junior hockey, Slovak hockey, WJC

On Friday night, I went to the Giants game with a couple of buddies of mine.
It was Teddy Bear Toss night, and there were just under 11,000 people there.

My friend, Duc, posted this video of the ensuing chaos.

The Vancouver Giants hosted the Everett Silvertips in a matchup between the two top teams in Canadian junior hockey. Over 10,000 people watched the game at the Pacific Coliseum; the fact that a few of the top players from each time were at training camps for the upcoming World Junior Championship did not deter from the playoff-like atmosphere.

Tim Kraus scores on a regulation-time penalty shot to give the Vancouver Giants the lead 1-0 over the Everett Silvertrips.

The Giants played a very good game and set up a penalty killing clinic that night. However, the Giants could only kill penalties for so long until the Silvertips tied it up 1-1 in the third period.

The Giants lost the game on a shootout, the real winners that night are the children receiving the teddy bears

Labels: junior hockey, Teddy Bear Toss, Vancouver Giants, video