UMFan83

Yeah I'm sure the Big Ten didn't appreciate Nebraska trying to deflect the blame for the dismantling of the Big 12 to essentially Texas.

Agreed on Bolland. As long as he can stay healthy. Back injuries are interesting long term. Does this plan work at all? 1. Huet to minors 2. Bye bye Versteeg, Byfuglien, Ladd, Madden, Sopel 3. Resign RFAs Hjalmarsson, Niemi, Fraser, Skille, either Hendry or Bickell or both if they can afford it 4. Resign UFA Burish (maybe) Line 1: Beach Toews Kane Line 2: Brouwer Sharp Hossa Line 3: Kopecky Bolland Skille Line 4: Burish (? I know he's a UFA, is there value for him around the league or can we sign him cheap?) Fraser Eager D1: Keith Seabrook D2: Campbell Hjalmarsson D3: Hendry/Bickell Lalonde G: Niemi Crawford I don't necessarily think that's a huge dropoff. I guess it all depends on how well Skille, Lalonde and Beach adapt to the NHL. But from what I read, they are all fairly highly regarded. And our depth with the 2 scratched players to take us to 22 will be minimum salary players. So we probably wouldn't be contending for a 1 seed necessarily with less depth to overcome injuries. But if we can be fortunate and stay healthy going into the playoffs, I think we can challenge for the Cup again. That said, like I've said before, I always worry about when a really really young core reaches the highest level so early. I don't know if they will be able to keep their focus up like they did this year, because they will need to with less depth and overall talent on the team.

I'm assuming your talking about Niemi. I think it depends on what management is thinking with regards to the Huet situation. If they have a plan that will rid themselves of most or all of his cap hold by getting rid of him, you can afford to keep Niemi. If they cannot move Huet, then yes I think you can accept letting him go. I mean if you let Niemi go, then you are either sticking with Huet as your guy next year (or having him backup Crawford), or you are getting rid of Huet too, and leaving yourself in a situation where you have to acquire another goalie somehow. I don't believe in that pixie dust cup winning crap. Any halfway smart person, which all GMs should be, can see how mediocre Niemi was in the Finals. They also have to know how good our defense was and how much that contributed to our success in goal prevention. Look at the end of the year when Campbell was out and Seabrook missed some time. We struggled to prevent goals. I'm not saying Niemi is garbage, I'm just saying that no team is going to consider Niemi enough of an upgrade at goalie to risk a 2nd round pick or more on acquiring him.

Well then...I guess the Big 10's plan has to be getting ND and who else?

But.....but...I don't want it to be the postseason yet... Is there really not a game tomorrow? What am I going to do now?

Yeah it must be brutal to sit there and know that your conference is only improving and your school is going to bring in a ton more money. I didn't say it wasn't bad as a Big Ten fan. As a college sports fan or just a fan of colleges in general, it's not really as good. I guess I just didn't expect this whole thing to be as catastrophic as it has been. I am pretty sure Jim Delany and his guys had to have some idea the effect this was gonig to have on other parts of college football.

I love the Big 10 and I was/am all for expansion, but I'm not a fan of how complicated this is getting. I guess there was no way it wasn't going to get complicated when you are just pulling teams from conferences. I also don't think how it seems like the Big 10 is trying to strongarm Texas and ND into joining the Big 10. In a way its brilliant and cunning, but in another way it sucks because its leaving a lot of other teams in the dust. Anyways, you guys have all discussed this way more than I've thought about it so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong about any of this.

I heard Dan Bernstein on the radio the other day trying to educate fans on advanced baseball statistics, and was using FIP like it was the king of all pitching statistics. Whoever was with him (not Boers) was noticing that Jimenez wasnt among the top 10 pitchers in FIP and calling the stat out based on that. Dan's response was to defend that damn stat to the death and kept talking about how its more important than anything else you can look at because it's independant of fielding. I was just shaking my head. These stats are great, but people have to understand that there is not one single stat that determines the value or worth of an individual player.

2 ties and 2 total goals scored is not exactly going to captivate the US casual fan base haha

Either the peripherals don't tell the entire picture, he was extremely lucky last year, he's extremely unlucky this year, or a little of both of the last 2.

Seems dubious, but we're not talking 2/3 of the population, we're talking 2/9ths, or ~22% of the Chicago metro population. That does seem like a ton though. I was one of those people running after the last bus. Felt kind of douchy doing it, but I just got swept up in the moment. I felt bad seeing people randomly getting trampled in the mob of people though.

I do like angry Lou but he does sound a little like an angry old man there.

haha no not me. I'm on LaSalle and Washington. Abc Nbc and wgn are doing various reports around me so I wouldn't be surprised if I was on some sort of news report. But I'm wearing a hossa shirt not a Stanley cup ha. What's with the delay? It's Hot as balls out here.

I think Hill is trying to play his way out of Lou's favor by throwing him under the bus, for the good of the team. I respect that.

What kind of fallout was there? Did Ozzie demand his son get drafted and KW didnt want to?

To that I think they'd say to a Cubs fan that their track record of building championship teams speaks for itself.

Why? I don't get it man. Your team just won the Stanley Cup, why spend even 5 seconds looking to see what your rival thinks? Their rival fans, of course that's what they're going to do. If the Vikings or Packers won the Super Bowl last year you and Bears fans would be saying how lucky they got or how they won't be as good next year. It's just what happens. I didn't say we wouldn't say that if the roles are reversed. For me part of the fun of winning a championship is sticking it to our rivals. So yes I feel completely fulfilled going to our rivals board and picking apart the bitter reactions. I've spent years hearing rivals taking my teams fans quotes and laughing at them. Now it's my turn. You enjoy a title your way this is how I enjoy it.

Oh yeah, and most of them are certain that the entire Hawks team is going to be gutted this offseason and they are going to be a shell of their former selves next season.

BTW, good old Red Wings fans...I went to a message board to see what they were thinking about the Hawks title, and here are some of the threads on their main page -chicago area wings fans (talking about how annoyed they are with all the "bandwagon" hawks fans giving them crap) -Fire sale in Chicago (regarding the offseason, how apparently we are going to be dismantled.) -Toews: Most undeserving Conn Smythe winner ever? losers

He had a bad concussion, and I guess he's had issues with concussions in the past. But with this being hockey there was so little information regarding his status, it became a running joke that he had died.

What if we don't win the draft lottery to get Kane? What if we don't lose the draft lottery to get stuck with Barker instead of Ovechkin or Malkin? Here's a fantastic one: What if Niemi doesn't beat out Crawford on the last day of exhibition season? What if Kim Johnsson didn't die? What if Q didn't take out Brouwer and Colin Frasier (it's amazing that he never saw playoff time after the third game against Nashville), what if Q decided to stick with the veteran Huet and tried to let him work out of it? What if Martin Erat didn't make a horrible ill-advised blind pass with time running down in game 5? Mine aren't as good as yours but still, I could do these all night. It's amazing how it all comes together.

Amazing that the Hawks finished off their season by winning 12 of their last 15 games. As the journey got tougher, they got stronger.

When was the first time you really legitimately thought the Hawks could actually win the Cup this year? For me it was after destroying San Jose 7-2 in San Jose just before Thanksgiving. Before then, I knew they were good and they could be a contender, but after that moment it was like a lightbulb went off and I thought "wow, we really really could/should win this thing!" I went to bed that night dreaming of the Hawks winning the Cup...I couldn't stop thinking about it. I had to force myself to think of something else because it was only November and so much had to happen between then and June. It is amazing everything that had to happen to get to this moment. All the highs and lows....a lifetime of memories. BTW, the Cup is making its rounds around Chicago right now. I keep getting updates on Facebook from friends that are out and about and somehow ran into the Cup. One person said they saw it at Stanleys (Lincoln and Armitage). Another said it was at Market (Randolph and May). And the most recent update is that it was at Will's Bar (Wellington and Racine), and it was with a picture of Campbell, Madden and Burrish holding the Cup. I am told that it has since left though. Edit: It was also at Harry Carey's where they passed the Cup around to fans, who got to drink out of it, as well as Tavern on Rush and Rockit downtown earlier in the day. is tracking it, but they don't have anything about Will's...but I have a photo: http://img815.imageshack.us/img815/5243/dacup.jpg And Toews at Ann Sather this morning: http://img809.imageshack.us/img809/5485/toewsannsather.jpg

Odd...I guess it's cool but I think a bit over the top and unnecessary.

I just thought the soccer thread was long as it is and it really doesn't need 200 more pages. Plus we'd probably get more casual fans coming into the World Cup thread vs. that huge soccer thread. If people don't want it, by all means delete it.