Everybody Hates Pernell Karl: Sabres Game Preview and Open Thread

 

Okay, we get it. No, really, we get it. WE UNDERSTAND, Pensblog. And Mr. Cherry. And Mr. Richards. And Miss Lupul. And the rest of you. You think our little guy is disrespectful. Or arrogant. Or a cheapshotting punk. Or too big for his britches. Got you, loud and clear.

No, I didn't say uppity. No, I don't think you are all American History X/National Front/Chelsea Headhunters racists. Do I think some of you aren't exactly comfortable discussing PK's race? Maybe, but I don't think there is a global old white guy conspiracy to keep PK down like some sort of 21st century Roots. Part of the problem might be stupid stuff like this that only served to set off sirens in everyone's head that make everything about PK Subban somehow a racial issue.

It's not.

PK is an issue because he's a potential star in one of the biggest markets in the NHL, a market that has been starved of a) any real success and b) a true superstar for almost 20 years. It's an issue because the captain of another major market team (Richards) spouted off about respect and people ran with it, with Montreal fans defending PK, traditionalists defending Richards' sentiments and Montreal haters piling on. It's an issue because a media icon (Cherry) jumped on the story, and TSN's Darren Pang Freudian slipped into infamy, and PK scored an overtime winner and celebrated too much, and threw on a Carolina jersey to play up to the fans, and didn't do the right thing in a fight with Lupul, who just happened to be a recent addition to the most widely followed team in the NHL.

Does PK need to zip it sometimes? Probably. Is he unfairly singled out for criticism? In a league where the Islanders pull their stunt from last Friday, and Matt Cooke remains employed, and the Bruins see nothing wrong with firing punches at guys who are already beaten to the ice, and owners get indicted, and players are rumoured to be sleeping with teammates wives, yeah, I think the whole "PK is disrespectful" angle gets a little too much play. Sadly, such is life on a team with such a polarizing place in the game. It works both ways. I can read 1000 "Brian Burke is a blowhard jackass who lucked into a Cup, ha hah ha Kessel trade" articles for every mention of the amazing support he and his family show towards the gay community in Toronto and elsewhere in the wake of Brendan Burke's coming out.  Life in the internet age isn't always fair and balanced.

The challenge for PK is to continue to learn how to be a good professional hockey player without curtailing his unique skill set too much. The challenge for Canadiens fans is to not take any criticism of PK's attitude as a personal affront. People didn't like Patrick Roy's attitude either, you know. A guy named Chris Chelios didn't win a lot of friends his rookie year. Ask Mike Milbury what he thought of Guy Lafleur. Even that Rocket fellow ran afoul of his colleagues once or twice. PK will learn, or not. If he does, the Canadiens and the league will benefit. If he doesn't, the league and the Canadiens will move on. And so will everyone else.

What does this have to do with Buffalo? Well, PK is playing versus Buffalo tonight, if that helps.

What, you guys again?: For what seems like the millionth time, Buffalo meets the Habs at the Bell Centre ce soir. 7:30 on RDS, Versus, and TSN-Habs. Canadiens stopped three game losing streak with Saturday's shutout of Toronto, while (look out!) Sabres are a runaway train lately, winning 7 of 10 and sneaking to within 4 points of the playoffs with a bunch of games in hand.

Leading the charge: Sabres are getting scoring from Drew Stafford (8 goals in 4 games) and Tomas Vanek (7 points in 4) with rookie Tyler Ennis starting to find his feet in the absence of whining diving crybaby Derek Roy. Habs are being lead by the kids lately, as Max Pac (4 points in 3) DDD (First star on Saturday, 6 points in his past three) are helping out uber-consistent Pleks (10 points in 9).

Dragging the boat down: This space might soon become the Scott Gomez and Andrei Kostitsyn memorial paragraph, if they don't start scoring more consistently. Unless it becomes the "OMG, we gave up Jaro for a stiff, Lars Eller is way over matched right now" memorial paragraph. Not to put too fine a point on it, but Lars Eller has one more point that Josh Gorges. Josh Gorges is a low-scoring defenseman WHO HAS MISSED THE LAST TWENTY GAMES. When Squid gets back, please send Eller to Hamilton for the Max Pac treatment. Thank you. Sabres are hard charging towards 8th and have a lot of guys hot, but would be even better with some more help from Paul Gaustad and Rob Niedermayer.

Not Miller time. Price is Right: Cliched headlines abound when the Sabres and Habs meet, because Ryan Miller and Carey Price usually man the nets and the mainstream media is full of idiots. Let's see how the spin the fact that Jhonas Enroth is rumoured to be starting in goal for Buffalo, ending a string of starts for Miller that began on November 26. Suddenly, I'm worried Alex Auld will break down under his massive workload backing up Price.

Owies: Whining diving crybaby Derek Roy is out for the season with a bruised va-jay-jay ... no, wait, he had surgery on his left quadriceps. Sissy. Walk it off. Steve Montador is questionable after being concussed in the head. Habs missing long-term absentees Markov, Gorges, Cammy (for a few more days). Darche and Max Pac are probable for tonight, and Hal Gill and Spacek are questionable so the Habs called up big fella Brendan Nash from Hamilton.

Read this, if only for the title: Die By the Blade.

After game entertainment: See if these ladies want to trade up from Pominville and whining diving crybaby Roy.

Um, Let's Talk About the Future, Shall We? Phlyers 6, Habs 2

Admit it, you were thinking it. Stop it.

Well, that was unpleasant.

Lots of negative things to take out of that home-and-home against a second tier team with more goons than brains. We could start the discussion with lack of clutch goaltending, move on to talk about how tired and old both Hamr and Jaro 2.0 looked (among others), continue with a lament about how Gio and Pleks are the only forwards who could find the crease without a road mad (don't get me started on Gomez), and finish off with how unlikely a playoff spot now appears, especially give the injury situation.

So let's not do that. Instead, let's talk about the positive.

P.K. Subban.

I don't recall being more exciting about a young skater for the Habs since a certain young Finn in the early '90s. After all, when was the last time you saw a home-grown player wearing the CH go coast-to-coast? Not in my lifetime.

The Norris Trophy pic is obviously wishful thinking. He got caught out of position a couple of times - once forcing Spacek to take a tripping penalty which later resulted in a goal. He has a lot to learn.

But it was his second game, and you can teach defence. You can't teach the guts it takes to spin on the blueline or the puck skills to pull it off, or the heart it takes to rush the puck up the boards when you know you'll pay the price. Even when it didn't work, he's such a great skater (arguably the Habs best already) he's often right back on D when the play goes the other way - if he doesn't create a scoring chance or draw a penalty, like he did against Brayden Coburn.

This is the Habs, after all, so the hype machine will be in overdrive after the 2 game-2 assist weekend for this bright and engaging young man who seems destined to force his way onto the blueline in the (relatively) near future. We're been down this road before: Benoit Brunet rightly (oh, I feel dirty) pointed out that the very same finicky fans chanting "PK!" were also chanting "Gui!" a few short seasons ago - and we all know how that turned out. Although it should be pointed out that, for a large contingent of Habs fans anyway, there was, let's say, other non-hockey-related reasons to see more in Latendresse that there really was.

(See also: Price, Carey.)

So here's an idea: let's not predict multiple Norris Trophies; let's not start engaging in hypothetical trade scenarios ("Now let's trade Hamr, Spacek and Dagger to TBay for Lecavalier and St Louis!"); let's not place the weight of 24 Cups worth of expectations on a very young man, albeit with exciting potential; let's not even assume he should be on the NHL roster when the Olympics are over.

He may yet turn out to be the best and most exciting Canadiens defencemen of our generation. But let's see him earn it before we ruin yet another prospect with unrealistic expectations.

One last thing, now that the Habs are officially on their Olympic break (and Darwin knows they needed it):

GO CANADA GO

Crank up the quote machine for the next 3 years

I think we can all agree that the Habs signing The Subbanator to a 3-year deal may be the highlight of the off-season.

Canadiens' Contingent at the WJC

Unfortunately Kyle Turris wasn't drafted by the Habs, cause his mom his smoking (although this photo really doesn't do her fine MILF self justice).

One year after the Habs had 3 players play major roles for their respective teams, including the the tourny MVP the Habs again have 3 players in this year's edition of the WJC, albeit in much reduced roles. 2 of the three are now playing major roles for the Habs - TFS(tm) and Little Tits. Meanwhile, the last of the trio is not far behind - the Little Russian Tank, Pavel Valentenko, is learning how to low bridge forwards on North America size rinks in Hamilton.

This year's collection is not likely to have the same impact, at least in the short term. However, partly this is because all are young, being drafted in 2007, and are eligible to return next year where they may play bigger roles in Ottawa.

P.K. Subban (Canada), aka the (self-proclaimed) "Subbanator", earned the 7th spot on Canada's defence, mostly to play on the PP. The Subbanator has had a terrific season in Belleville so far, and has continued to show the foot speed and rifle from the point aht makes his offensive upside so exciting. Although only a depth player, this edition of Canada's defence corps is a deep group with a bright future, including the 4th overall pick in 2007 (T. Hickey) and two potential top 5 picks in '08 (Drew "Dough Boy" Doughty and Luke Schenn). We also can't wait for his big yap to get him in trouble for the first time with the Montreal Media, which may make him our own version of Ray Amery. Can't wait for his first interview with Chantal Macabee - "you know what they say about 'going black,' right Chantal?"

Yannick Weber (Switzerland) is another example of the Habs obsession with Swiss players. (I think Trevor Timmins must have a Swiss Mistress over there or something. Or maybe Aebischer's parents let Habs scouts stay at their place for free as payback for the unearned checks their son cashed last year.) The future Swiss Mister is playing on this side of the pond this season, and like The Subbanator, is an offensive defencemen in the OHL, with Kitchener. He's not very big (he is Swiss, after all), but he's got an edge, racking up 49PIM in 31 games. Sounds like another power play specialist to me, and probably will end up fighting with Matheiu Carle and the Subbanator for a blueline spot in a few years. Don't look for him to be too much of a factor at this Tourny as the Swiss don't have a strong team, but the experience will do him good.

Max Pacioretty (U.S. and A.) looks like he will someday earn "My Boy" status from the token FHF WOP (myself), plus he's hyped as the great white hope for as homegrown power forward. He's a few years away, playing college hockey in the States with Michigan, maintaining a point-per-game pace before leaving to join USA's WJC entry. Habs fans can only hope he follows in the footsteps of HF10's Boy Chris Higgins, along with Komo and Rhino. Although he was supposed to be playing on a scoring line, he has yet to notch a goal thusfar. Let's hope he's not waiting to score against Canada in the finals.

The Habs have to be disappointed that none of Ryan White ('06), Ben Maxwell ('o6), David Fischer ('06) or Ryan McDonough ('07) made their respective national teams. Maxwell was hurt and supposedly had a good shot at making the team otherwise. White is a grinder and Canada has lots of those on this year's edition of the team. But both Fischer and McDonough were first rounders, and the Habs have to be disappointed about other lower-drafted defenceman making the team.

Then again, after watching the Habs play of late with Guimauve, Little Tits, TFS(tm), Komo, Rhino, Big Tits, Chips, Pleks and Higgins all making contributions, we'll trust in Trevor Timmons and the scouting staff. It likes like the 20-year Curse of Doug Wickenheiser is finally over. Good times.

The Morning Skate for Tuesday, July 17th

Bullet points for what you missed while dreaming of a six-team league...

• Ex-Habs coach Michel Therrien gets a one-year extension with the Pens. I'd pay to coach that team;
• Tha Gazette's Stephanie Myles continues her series on the Habs drafted players, this time THE SUBBANATOR. It's pretty dull for a guy who is supposed to be a quote machine. We're expecting better in the future Sub.

So Development Camp over, training camp almost two months away. We're in the dog days now people. Leaves more room for random strippers I guess, so that's a good thing.

Will PK Subban Play on the PK?

And the FHF all-draft-all-the-time long weekend drags on. If I may say so myself (and let's face it I may, given my Blogger account and all), the sheer volume of draft posts around here is amazing. TWO as-it-happens draft reports? Sure my posts were just drunken snark, but Panger brought the snark and the analysis. Nice. On a totally unrelated note, the FHF will soon be having staff meetings to, you know, discuss who is doing what around here.

Anyway, the story for the Habs was D and Minnesota. 6 defensemen taken. 4 picks from the 11th Canadian province. Of course, I have no fucking clue who any of them are. We'll leave the anlysis to Panger. All I see is the handsome young gentleman you see above, PK Subban, aka The Subbanator. Apparently he can't play D at all, is really an offensive D, so I'm guessing he won't be on the PK at all. Just tragedy for headline writers.

Always a story around the Habs is the Quebecers. We did manage to grab Olivier Fortier from the Oceanic, but he's the only one. Of course, this is part of the larger story of the smallest number of Quebecers drafted ever. But one Québecois for the Habs will not satisfy the 110% crowd, talent evaluation be damned.

Cheer up francophone media, the free agent period is only 6 days away. Then you can really complain.

A final note - for those of you who think I only posted the picture above to show The Subbanator's, er, background, I only posted it because I still can't find a picture of Kyle Turris' mom.