These kids have been terrific all season, but before we get into their performances I’d like to give an honourable mention to a player that I feel could easily have been nominated.  I won’t speculate on who should be swapped-out, but I am quite surprised that St.Louis’ Kevin Shattenkirk wasn’t at least mentioned.  Since 1997 when Bryan Berard won the Calder with 48 points in his rookie campaign, there have been only 5 rookie defensemen to score 40 or more points.  1997!  Last season, Myers won the Calder with 48 points beating out John Tavares and Matt Duchene.  As a defenseman, Barret Jackman won it in 2003 with 19 points!  He was a +23, but still only 19 points, which beat out Zetterberg and Rick Nash.  I’m not suggesting that he should win the Calder, but there can easily be a case made for having Shattenkirk nominated.

Michael Grabner, 23 years of age born in Villach Austria was drafted 14th overall by Vancouver in 2006.  2006 was the Erik Johnson draft which featured Jordan Staal, Jonathan Toews, Nicklas Backstrom, and Phil Kessel in the top 5.  It also featured the likes of Claude Giroux late in round 1, and Milan Lucic in round 2.

The speedy goal-scorer displayed his speed at the 2011 All-Star Skills Competition by winning the Fastest Skater.  In 76 games, he scored 34 goals (3 game winners), 18 assists, was a +13, and landed 22 hits on a team who finished 14th in the East and 27th in the league.  All this while taking only 10 PIM.  Grabner is the only player of the nominees to not be playing for the same team who drafted him.  He was acquired Oct 5th 2010 off of waivers by the Islanders.

Jeff Skinner, 18 years of age born in Markham Ontario was drafted 7th overall by Carolina in 2010.  The 2010 draft saw Taylor Hall, Tyler Seguin, Erik Gudbranson, Ryan Johnson, and Nino Niederreiter in the top 5.  This draft class also featured Atlanta’s Alexander Burmistrov at 8th and Anaheim’s Cam Fowler at 12th.  The only nominee who was drafted in the most recent draft.

Skinner seems to be one of those rare players who requires little time to develop.  He played just two seasons in the OHL where he recorded 27 goals 24 assists in 63 games in his first season with Kitchener, and 50 goals 40 assists in 64 games his second.  That’s it.  That’s his junior career.  27 goals in your first Junior season is quite the rookie season.  With Carolina he scored 31 goals (2 game winners) and 32 assists in a full 82 game season.  He was a +3 with 18 power-play points.  Unlike Grabner, Skinner was a tad more physical with 70 hits and 46 PIM.

Logan Couture, 22 years of age born in Guelph Ontario was drafted 9th overall by San Jose in 2007.  The 2007 draft saw Patrick Kane, James Van Riemsdyk, Kyle Turris, Thomas Hickey, and Karl Alzner in the top 5.  2007 featured other notables such as PK Subban and Wayne Simmonds in the 2nd round.

Couture scored 32 goals (8 game winners) 24 assists in 79 games this past season.  He was a +18 with 14 power-play points, 41 PIM, and 60 hits.

The fact that Skinner is only 18 years old is remarkable.  That he is in only his 3rd season since being drafted by his Junior team, the Kitchener Rangers, is amazing.  Compare that with Grabner being in his 9th and Couture in his 8th.  I don’t know how much of a factor this plays into the selection, but it impresses me.

Couture’s 8 game winners is also impressive, and may prove to be the difference maker.  That’s 16 points of their 105, which is a significant amount and second to only Marleau on the Sharks, and 7th in the league.  His +18 and 14 power-play points is also definitely worth a closer look.

Grabner’s 34 goals and +13 while playing for one of the league’s worst teams is a major achievement and will be considered for the award.  So will him playing the least amount of games than the other two with only 76 games.

All three rookies have their own unique accomplishments that separate them from the other two.  If Skinner wasn’t so young, I would hand over the award to Grabner because of who he plays for and that he only played 76 games.  I think Skinner will walk away with the award this season.

It’s very rare to have any rookie score 30 goals.  Dany Heatley and Kovalchuk didn’t hit that mark.  Neither did Kane or Toews.  Malkin scored 33, but all three this season passed the 30 goal mark.  It’s a special class for sure, and all three will provide excitement for years to come.

Despite the consensus amongst Leafs Nation, I submit to you that Ron Wilson will not get fired and nor should he.  Not only will he not be fired, but he will be instrumental in pushing for Cup contention.  I think the overwhelming notion is ridiculous, and that we’re smarter people than that.

Ron Wilson is an excellent coach, and his record speaks for itself.  Even when people criticize Wilson, they preempt it with some sort of acknowledgement of his past success prior to landing in Toronto.  A champion at the 1996 World’s is nothing to ignore, neither is making the Stanley Cup finals in ’98 with the Capitals.  When we talk about all-time NHL coaching wins, Ron Wilson is 8th in the entire history of NHL regular season wins.  In his 4 full seasons with the Sharks, he averaged over 46 wins per season.  The season he came in the middle of, the Sharks mustered 19.  To put those numbers into perspective, Washington ended this season with 48 wins, and Philly had 47.

A lot of people take those numbers and say, “yah, he had a good career and now he’s past his time.”  To that I point to the 2010 Winter Olympics.  He took a team that was expected to fall behind the Russians, the Canadians, the Swedes, and the Finns to the finals, and took them to OT.  He didn’t have a great team on paper.  When Mike Komisarek is one of your better defensemen, you don’t have a good team on paper.

It’s far too easy to criticize the Maple Leafs these days.  There is a lot to throw mud at.  I also think that because Wilson is so sarcastic and not sympathetic to our love for Don Cherry, that we just don’t like him as a person.  He doesn’t care what Leafs Nation thinks of him, and sometimes ignores questions that reporters ask him.  He’s quite cocky too.

The most important piece of information is the fact that Wilson didn’t come from San Jose and take over the Red Wings.  He didn’t take over the Pittsburgh Penguins, or even the LA Kings.  During 2008-09 the Leafs were no better than an above average AHL club.   Look, when a US college graduate signed only days ago steps into the lineup and becomes a part of your top 6, you’re an AHL club.  He had to coach the same type of garbage for two and a half seasons.

How can you judge anyone’s coaching abilities by looking at the performance of the Toronto Maple Leafs between 2008-and January 2011?  That’s ridiculous.  That’s like you and I playing a game of one-on-one hockey, only I get a hockey stick and you get a ringette stick.  Then we’re going to judge your performance by the result of this game, and then call for your head if I win.  Get the point?

The players are playing for Wilson.  They got rid of a lot of fat… Beauchemin.  Look, I was a huge fan of Beauch in Anaheim.  In fact, I think he’s playing great for them now.  However, he is solely responsible for 4-5 of Toronto’s losses this past season with irresponsible cough-ups and errant passes in front of his own net, that ended up with the puck in the back of it for game winners.  Just getting him off the ice did wonders for all the players.

Now that the Leafs have a goalie, I think we can finally start to judge Wilson’s abilities with the Leafs, but only now.  Burke’s message when he came in was that they were not going to win the cup overnight.  This wasn’t about getting Wilson to turn horse manure into Sweet Chili BBQ ribs on a Saturday afternoon.  This was about having the right coach in place now, for when he finally put the right team on the ice.  Key phrase – finally put the right team on the ice.

Let’s relax a little bit, and put common sense back into our judgement.  There is nothing wrong with what happened this season, or last season.  What happened was supposed to happen – it’s all part of the plan.  Let the former Stanley Cup winning GM put together a championship team for us.

Ron Wilson is an excellent coach.  He won’t be fired anytime soon.

Rick Dipietro was the recipient of one of the worst contracts ever created by Garth Snow

With the latest CBA’s introduction of a salary cap, the NHL hasn’t been quite the same since.  The salary cap brings  a new dimension, another layer of complexity, to building a team that couldn’t have been dreamed of in a pre-cap era.  Today, deals are made sometimes strictly for cap relief.  In other words, teams will actually give away talent for free just so that they can create flexibility within their depth charts.  A good example is the latest Bruins’ deal involving Chuck Kobasew.  “It also gives me some cap space for next year,” said Chiarelli.  You would never have heard a GM talk about financial impact to a deal, in a pre cap era.

It’s all about response, and flexibility helps you respond.  While John Grigg of the Hockey News talks about the best NHL bargains, I present to you the leagues worst contracts – contracts that restrict a team the most.

Rick DiPietro – G – $4.5M

There’s a lot to like about this contract.  I just don’t have the ability to see it.  On June 8th 2006, Neil Smith was named the new General Manager for Long Island.  This was a significant moment for the Islanders because Smith was supposed to be the man to turn this franchise around.  Smith brought with him some serious credentials, including two Executive of the Year awards and a Stanley Cup.  However, after 41 days on the job Islanders’ backup goaltender Garth Snow announced his retirement and was immediately named the team’s new General Manager.  Wait, it gets crazier.  On September 16th, two days shy of two months later, Garth Snow signs an unproven, often injured young goaltender to one of the craziest contracts ever.  Rick DiPietro was then the new owner of a 16 year contract that ends 2021, and is responsible for a $4.5M cap hit each and every single one of those seasons.

Four seasons later, DiPietro still isn’t a $4.5M goaltender.  Where’s this potential we were promised?  His NHL record stands at  117-112-21, owns a .905 % and a 2.79 GAA.  Just around the same type of record Snow put together.

Scott Gomez – C – $7.35M

In 2007, a year where all sorts of general managers were handing out crazy contracts, Scott Gomez scored big time.  Just not on the ice.  Ok, he scored 13 goals in his 2007-08 campaign, but so did Lee Stempniak.  Heck, even Tie Domi did that twice in his career.  The Rangers didn’t just sign Gomez, they signed him good.  Locked him in with a seven year contract, which ends 2014.  I know Lecavalier’s contract, which ends 2020, is questionable, but I’d rather pay him $7M than Gomez.  Lecav’s off to a slow start, but that’s only because his expectations are so high.  He has 6 pts in 7 games, and that’s considered slow.  What happens when he gets going?

At $7.35 cap hit, you’d think that would translate into a point-per-game type performance.  Not according to Gomez.  His first season under this contract he scored 70 points, and followed that up with 58 pts.  Bob Gainey must have figured that was only because Gomez doesn’t like playing in the Big Apple, because he made a move (candidate for dumbest trade of the season) for Gomez.  How’s he done thus far?  4 pts in 8 games.  They call him the Difference Maker.

Brian Campbell – D – $7.14M

In July 2008, the Blackhawks signed this puck-moving defenseman for eight years at $7.14M per, with a NTC (no trade clause).  Campbell’s contract ends 2016, which still seems like forever.  The contract represents over 10% of the Blackhawks’ salary cap, but Campbell only represents just over 4% of the team, assuming a 23 man roster.

Campbell made his way in the top 10 in scoring last season, at 52 pts, but that doesn’t justifying paying him Lidstrom money.  On a surging Blackhawks team, Campbell struggled with a +5 rating.  Teammate Duncan Keith scored 44 pts, but led the league with a plus 33 rating.  Duncan earns $1.5M.  During the playoffs, Campbell was playing as the number 5 and 6 defenseman, and only played top line minutes during the powerplay.

Even though he has 7 pts in 9 games this season, his +1 rating and $7.14M cap hit is reason enough to hire a hitman and eliminate this contract.

I’m going to tell you right now, Heatley is not going to be a Ranger this season.

There are far too many stars that need to align in order to make this happen.  But don’t go anywhere, I’m going to discuss which star alignments are necessary and pretend that this deal is going to go down.  Let’s break this down.

To start with Heatley’s cap hit is a whoppin’ $7.5M.  That’s ok because he pops in 40-50 goals consistently.  The Ranger’s available cap space is $7.8M.  $7.5 is less than $7.8, YAY it works!  Not so fast.  New York only has 15 players under contract.  Most teams go into the season with 23.  Tampa Bay already has 25.  This means that with the $7.8M, Sather needs to sign at least 8 more players.  If they sign each of those 8 at $850k, then that takes $6.8M of cap space up, leaving only $1M.

So we have $1M, which makes Heatley’s $7.5M now $6.5M.  Let’s make a deal!

Before we go New York Ranger shopping, we need to consult their do-not-disturb list, ie players with no-trade clauses.  This list includes Drury, Redden, Rozsival, and the jury is still out on whether or not Kotalik has one.  I haven’t found a single legitimate source.  So for the sake of fun, we’re going to assume that Kotalik is in play, and has no no-trade clause.

Right off the bat, it’s recently signed Kotalik and Brashear who have the most cap space to contribute with their $3M and $1.4M respectively.  $2.1M is now required from the Rangers in order to make this deal cap-friendly.  Ryan Callahan can certainly make this deal fit, with his $2.3M cap hit.  However, Callahan scored 52 goals in his last season with the Guelph Storm, and popped in 22 last season.  At 24, I say he’s got too much potential for Sather to give up.  But, Sather may say something else.  Chris Higgins‘ cap hit is $2.25M, but he’s a centreman, and the Rangers badly need quality centremen.  You can’t simply mishmash a bunch of forwards like we used to do in pond hockey, Mr. Scanlan.  Marc Staal has been the main headliner in this whole deal.  This guy is quietyly becoming the Ranger’s future captain and a serious shutdown defenseman.  Why any GM would move this kid is unknown to me.  Think Scott Stevens, but with more intelligence.  His salary hit is only $827K.  We’re either going to have to include another defenseman Girardi with his $1.55M, his and Staal’s total $2.37M, or we’re going to have to convince Sather that Callahan needs to be part of this.  There is a lot of talk about Brandon Dubinsky.  The thing is that he’s not on the Ranger’s books at the moment, so he doesn’t help make this deal cap-friendly.

Let’s take a look at what we have.

Heatley’s 40-50 goals

for

Kotalik’s 20 goals, 23 assists
Brashear’s 1 goal, 3 assists, 121 PIM
Callahan’s bright future
1st Round 2010, 1st Round 2011

The biggest problem with this deal is that Kotalik and Brashear do little for Murray.  $4.4M in cap space for a couple of suit-case Charlies doesn’t exactly justify moving Heatley.  The 2nd biggest problem is that Glen Sather needs a #1 centreman in a bigway.  Chris Drury’s 22 goals just isn’t justifying the $7M scam job he did to NYR.  When you start to add in players like Staal and Callahan, it becomes that much more painful for Sather.

That said, I do see one possible way in which we could see Heatley traded, involving the Rangers.  At least Bruce was right about the Sharks being the number one possible destination.  The Sharks badly want Heatley, and have lots of moveable expensive pieces like Cheechoo, Michalek, and Clowe.  The Sens don’t want Cheechoo, they’ve been open about that.  And, they are after Joe Thornton, so fat chance of that happening.  However, if Marleau were to go to the Rangers, Sather would get his centreman.  Heatley could go to the Sharks, and have say Michalek come back, and perhaps the Rangers could toss in something extra.

Not exactly slam dunk material, but it’s the closest to reality that I’ve read.  Marleau waiving his no-trade clause may never happen.  There is speculation that he’s open to it, but not for an Eastern Conference team.  Bottome line, Heatley is not going to New York.

This may seem like the craziest thing you’ve ever heard of.  Especially if you’re operating from the context of “hockey players make logical and great business decisions.”  Even I required a day or so to digest this entire deal.  However, all you have to do is look back to the 2004-2005 lockout season to remember when the NHLPA turned down one offer, didn’t get paid for a season, only to return to work after accepting a worse deal.

TSN’s Darren Dreger reports that Kelly was fired because he wasn’t close enough to the players and too close to the NHL brass.  However, former union VP Vinny Damphousse feels that the real reason is because the union is suffering from paranoia.  If you’re confused, that’s ok.  It means you’re a logical human being.  These two reasons couldn’t be further apart from each other.  Dreger’s insights and specualtions are some of the best in the industry.  Damphousse had a leadership role in the union.  This isn’t coming from the National Inquirer.  So what’s really going on here?

Not the players, or even the majority of them, but the players’ executive board (comprised of 30 players) say that they came across some information, based on their “checks and balances.”  This piece of information, Ladies and Gentlemen, was probably the 2011 CBA renegotiation date.  They took one look at Paul Kelly, and thought a smiling prosecutor is not who they had in mind to battle Bettman.

This decision was made in the craziest of ways.  Firstly, only the 30 players really knew what was going on.  The rest of the players had no clue what was going on, except for what was being reported.  ”It was a surprise because I don’t really know exactly what’s going on,” Toronto Maple Leafs defenceman Mike Van Ryn told CBCSports.ca. “I haven’t been contacted by [Leafs player representative Matt Stajan].”

Pierre LeBrun feels the exact same way.  He mentions how some of those 30 players went into that meeting not realizing that firing Kelly was going to be the end result!  Are you kidding me?

Let’s say that Paul Kelly cut a deal with Gary Bettman that would not be in the players’ best interest come 2011.  Let’s just say, so that we’re comign from the worst-case-scenario.  If that’s what happened, why is it even necessary to meet and decide in a hotel at 3am of any night?  It’s not like they had the successor in the next room, and they were going to swear him in at any moment.  They don’t know who’s going to replace Kelly, long-term, yet.

It seems like 30 players know exatly what’s going on, and the other 775 don’t. Some smell conspiracy, some don’t.

What I do know, is that the government should be extending to the NHLPA the same sort of protection they extend to seniors.  You know, the rule where seniors can’t really make proper decisions for themselves anymore, so any financial transaction is not really official until approved by their offspring.

Either that, or the agents should be running the NHLPA.  I mean, the sports agent didn’t enter the scene in the 60s because they knew hockey better than the players.  They knew business better!  They’re there to level the playing field because owners were crushing players in deals.

I know there have been some shady sports agents in the past, but they also have a track record of looking after their own future.  Players don’t exactly have that going for them.  Taking care of the players in this regard, would be an indirect way of taking care of their(agents) own future.

Interests are aligned..