Jeffrey recently created this nifty chart, based on Wikipedia data, showing the nationalities of drafted NHL players over the past 40 years or so:
It’s interesting to note the increase in American-born players around 1999. I wonder what happened during that period? Also, I was struck by the declining number of players from Russia. Their development system has gone downhill since the end of the Cold War. Additionally, I gather that Russian players can live pretty high on the hog if they stay home.
Speaking of hockey, how about last night’s game? I’m cheering for the Penguins. There is, of course, a sense of inevitability about the Red Wings’ victory, but it’s nice to see the series go longer. Detroit is such a dominating team–I’m impressed that Pittsburgh has managed to eke out two victories.
Who is Fabian Brunnström? With a name like that, I wondered if maybe he won the latest edition of Swedish Idol. In fact, he’s an undrafted forward (listed as a left-winger here) in the Swedish Elite League, and allegedly one of the best hockey players outside the NHL.
Yesterday, the CBC reported that the Canucks were close to signing Brunnström. From Scott Morrison’s blog:
No fewer than 20 NHL teams expressed interest in the 23-year-old Swedish winger, who went undrafted and played the past season in the Swedish Elite League with Farjestad.
As reported on Hockey Night in Canada on Saturday, Brunnstrom had a short list of five or six and further reduced that to one: the Canucks, whose general manager, Dave Nonis, did a good job of selling the youngster on the team and the city.
On the broadcast, Morrison calls Brunnström “the hottest player not in the NHL right now” and “speedy”. Here’s an earlier article from The Hockey News:
Brunnstrom, a 6-foot-1, 195-pound forward, is a classic late bloomer. Last season he was playing First Division in Sweden, which is two steps under the Elite League and was a star at that level, which prompted Farjestad to sign him this season. He skates very well and his three goals and 13 points in 21 games are probably not a clear indication of how good he is offensively.
Why wouldn’t he come to Vancouver? Canada is considerably more similar to Sweden than the US, it’s got the most favourable climate in the country and the Canucks are chock full of Swedes. I assume that the team has some kind of Swedish quota, and the Canucks are signing Brunnström anticipating Naslund’s forthcoming departure. Darren Dreger speculates that he might sign at $2 million per season.
If the Canucks do sign him, Brunnström will undoubtedly get a long audition with the Sedin twins. They’ve been missing an effective triplet since Anson Carter was stricken with delusions of grandeur. Who knows? Maybe he’ll fit in where everybody else on the roster hasn’t. I’ll also be pleased to see the team get younger.
Here’s a little video compilation of in action:
He’s wearing a #96 jersey. If he does play for the Canucks, he’ll have to decide whether he wants the monkey that comes free with that number on his back. When a team has a bad year, there’s often extra pressure on signings like this. Hopefully he can shoulder it.
I’m currently watching the live stream for the NHL playoffs from CBC Sports. The quality isn’t great, but it’s better than nothing.
I had some difficulty getting a reliable stream in Windows Media Player. It worked fine on my MacBook using Flip4Mac, and it worked okay using VLC on my Windows machine. Yet, Microsoft’s media player was showing me five seconds of live video, and then freezing (the dreaded ‘buffering’) for 5 to 30 seconds. Five more seconds of live footage, and repeat.
I checked my connection speed, which was a robust 14 MB/second. Combine that with the reliable feeds on other apps and PCs, and the problem was certainly (and predictably) Windows Media Player.
I eventually solved the problem. Here’s how:
Start up Windows Media Player.
On the Tools menu, click Options.
On the Performance tab, under Network buffering (yes, I’m troubled by the lack of title case), choose the second option. In the box beside Buffer, enter ‘30′. See the screenshot below. This ensures that Windows Media Player will always queue up 30 seconds of video, ensuring that you don’t get jittery or frozen video.
I can map my serious interest in the Canucks to Trevor Linden’s career. Growing up, I always kind of followed the team, but I didn’t get seriously interested until my teens, about when Linden entered the league. I don’t really remember his first game or anything, but I do recall the city being abuzz about this 18-year-old, drafted second over all behind Mike Modano. Modano scored more goals over the years, but I’m glad the team got Linden (that was a good draft year–four five great players in the top ten picks).
Like so many Vancouverites, Linden became my favourite player. I liked his intensity, his tenacity and his endless willingness to do the hard work on the ice. He was never the fastest skater, but I did like the little hitching half-step he took with his first stride. Especially in the early years, he wore his heart on his sleeve. Nobody seemed to feel a defeat more dearly in the media scrum following a game. I remember 1994 with fondness, how he put the team on his back against the Rangers and almost carried them to the promise land of the Stanley Cup.
Wayne Gretzky said that the legs are the first thing to go, and you could see Linden slowing down in recent years. He deserves a break. He’s sweated blood in the NHL for nineteen years. I hope the organization will find a spot for him if he wants it. And as Rebecca suggests, I hope they name a street after him. Sign the petition if you hope so, too.
The Leafs goalie Vesa Toskala just let in what is possibly the longest shot in league history. In his defense, the thing was bouncing all over the place.
For the past decade or so, I’ve made a habit of watching hockey highlights on television. I began with the sadly-defunct SportsPage (a triple-A show for much of the Canadian broadcast talent you see on the CBC, SportsNet and TSN), and subsequently watched TSN or SportsNet.
During the winter, these shows almost always open with hockey highlights, so I’d sit down at 23:00 and be done by 23:15 at the latest.
Living in Malta, there’s obviously no Canadian highlights shows on TV. Plus, we don’t have a TV. So, as I mentioned a few weeks back, I’ve been watching highlights on the web (the CBC, mostly).
This has resulted in one subtle shift in my viewing. Instead of sitting back and watching the highlights from all the games played, I must now pick which clips I want to view. What’s the result?
Surprisingly, I watch far fewer highlights. I always check out the Canucks, obviously, but after that I’m kind of left staring at the other results and wondering which I should choose. I lean toward the Canucks’ divisional rivals and Canadian teams, I guess. Plus I’ve been watching a lot of Penguins and Blackhawks highlights, because they have the most exciting young players in the league.
Part of my problem, I suppose, is that I don’t know which highlights are worth watching–besides the score, there’s no metadata. I can’t tell which games went to overtime, or to a shootout, or which featured a fantastic goal or save.
Here’s a feature request for CBC Sports: add rating functionality to each video clip, enabling viewers to judge each clip. That would help me assess which highlights I ought to watch, and which I can give a miss.
What’s the big lesson? Well, there’s isn’t one. What’s the small lesson? A reminder about mediums and messages, and how moving video from the TV to the web inevitably changes our relationship to it.
Having spent the start of the hockey season in Malta, I regularly want to watch NHL (and in particular, Canucks) highlights online. This proved surprisingly challenging. I’ve made a lengthy survey of the alternatives, and here’s what I came up with. I have a relatively slow Web connection here in Malta, and I’m running a MacBook with AdBlock Plus, which can play havoc with Flash-based videos.
Fox Sports - Decent Flash-based videos, though they’re in a popup window and you have to filter for ‘NHL’ before you can see any. They provide short clips and they only seem to cover the American teams. Grade: B-
ESPN - Again, decent Flash player but they only cover American teams and their videos often aren’t up to date. It’s December 3rd today, and they haven’t posted video from yesterday’s games. Also, the clips are on the short side. Grade: C+
TSN - It could just be my connection speed, but this site takes an eternity to load, and performs very poorly in Firefox and Safari on the Mac. The video itself is good, but getting there is too much trouble. Grade: D
SportsNet - The videos simply won’t play on my Mac, in either Safari or Firefox. Under the blank video window I see the message “Flash is required for Sportsnet.ca video.” I obviously have Flash installed, so I don’t know what’s up. Grade: F
CBC Sports - I’ve been watching these for a while, and they’re quite good. Yes, it’s an irksome pop-up window, but the Flash app is very fast, easy to use and the videos are lengthy and well-edited. Grade: A-
NHL.com - It took me a while to find these videos, because a search for “NHL.com video” indicated that their latest video was from 2004. These guys are the winners. They have a fast Flash-based player, the longest highlights packages, and you can choose individual clips–goals, saves, hits and other incidents–from the game summary. Grade: A
My universal complaint about these video sites and micro-sites is that they always disclose the scores before you watch the package. I prefer to watch the highlights with the outcome in doubt. I ought to be able to click a button to hide the scores in the web app.
I watched Toews play for Canada at the World Juniors as a 17-year-old. He was a little over-matched among the 19-year-olds, but still had outstanding speed and puck-handling skills.
At least, we certainly can’t find them on Gozo. I’ve looked in every bookstore I could find, and though they have a breadth of English magazines, including some computer ones, there’s no sign of Wired (of course, I’ve had that problem in Vancouver, too). Not surprisingly, there are also no NHL season preview and hockey pool magazines around, either.
The same goes for the Twizzlers, and licorice products in general (James and Monique, this doesn’t get you off the hook–we need to stockpile!). I can’t speak with the same certainty about the hand sanitizer, but our searches thus far have come up empty.
Many thanks to our latest guest who delivered them from the Great White North.
Knowing that I’m a hockey fan, somebody asked me today which rookie he should pick in his pool. I haven’t been following the training camps and pre-season very closely (though I’ve been enjoying the FanHouse’s team-by-team previews), so I had to go do a bit of research. These five rookies seem to be likely to make their respective teams and shine in 2007-08:
Jonathan Toews - Chicago
Nicklas Backstrom - Washington
Benoit Pouliot - Wild
Peter Mueller - Coyotes
Jack Johnson (D) - Blues
And these three seem less certain, but likely candidates as well:
