Here it is.  Took some emails, talked about what movement we might see in the east, and some more Sharks trivia.

Also, I’m on deck to do a Kings preview sometime this week, so stick around for that.  If you want us to talk about something specific on the show, or you have feedback, email us.

This time around, Mike and Doug reprise the “Who’s Not Done” segment, but for the eastern conference.  But all isn’t rosy on the horizon- an email is addressed that questions the Sharks future defensive prospects.  At the end, more Sharks trivia, now becoming a regular part of the show.

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Since there’s just not that much to talk about and the subject of how the Sharks are going to get under the cap totally beaten to death, let’s start to take a look at the Pacific Division and the state of our competition, shall we?

The Phoenix Coyotes came on strong at the end of season in 2007-08 and were a better team than many expected, including myself. Don Maloney is building this team the right way, with a combination of youth and veterans, but sticking with the young guys in key roles instead of bringing in vets who are stop gaps and just stunt the growth of the team.

THE GOOD
This team is stocked full of young, exciting talent up front. Martin Hanzal, Brett MacLean, Peter Mueller and Kyle Turris all appear to be in a position to have an impact on this season with this years draft pick, Mikkel Bodker, potentially available to play in the NHL this season as well. This means all four of the Coytoes first round picks could be major contributors to the big club, which says a ton for how well they’ve drafted the past few years. Adding Jokinen was a major get and he should help this team take the next step and give Shane Doan the veteran support he needs, both on the ice and in the locker room.

Also good is their goaltender, Breezy. He can steal a win on any given night and was a true steal for Phoenix off waivers, and an excellent deal at 4.25M per season. He could have been the most prized goalie on the UFA market this offseason, probably getting 6M from either Chicago or Washington. Not sure it was a great move by Breezy’s camp to not wait it out, but it was a sure sign of loyalty that they believe in what Phoenix is doing.

Also good is the mountain of cap space Phoenix has both this season (13M) and going into next season with around 24M of room with only Derek Morris as their major UFA. So, it’s possible the Coyotes could be in prime position to add a big piece at the deadline and try and convince them to stay on for the ride….Marion Gaborik anyone?

THE BAD
Todd Fedoruk. Daniel Carcillo. Brian McGrattan. A trio that provided around 500 PIM’s last season, and that is with McGrattan and Carcillo not playing a full season respectively. Why the hell do you need all three of these guys? I think this could backfire big time for a team looking to take the next step – and the Coyotes could find themselves on the penalty kill more often than not. Talk about following the Ducks model…literally. Their old back up goalie, some talented young forwards and a couple of thugs. Didn’t Phoenix learn from last years playoffs that this model might be out of date and killing penalties all game is no way to win?

I’m also not sold on the Coyotes blue line. Jovo-Cop is not worth the 6.5M he gets at this point in his career and management didn’t do a great job of replacing Boynton and Ballard, instead it looks like they are rolling the dice with Avalanche cast off Kurt Sauer and Calgary reject, David Hale. This is a weak spot for the Coyotes for sure.

THE UGLY
Why would you give Todd Fedoruk a three year, 3.3M deal? Did they forget that this guy got waived last year by Dallas? I guess he was effective for the Wild, with over 100 PIM’s and 11 points, but usually a guy who performed so poorly to get waived in season isn’t worth a three year term. Could backfire for the Coyotes. I smell an offseason buyout….

What do you think about the new look Phoenix Coyotes? Tough to beat or gonna bust?

The numbers for the latest podcast are much lower than usual, and I realized this morning it’s because I didn’t mention it here.  As an avid RSS user both with blog feeds and podcast feeds, I hope all you out there in the series of tubes are keen to the wonders of automatic XML-driven updating.  We release the podcast every Wednesday, rain or shine, but I will keep reminding y’all.

Anyway, the latest podcast is about a couple of articles that raise various questions about the Sharks, and we take a couple of emails later in the show.  Especially now, we can use ideas for things to talk about, so if there are any topics you want us to weigh in on, either about the Sharks or other NHL topics, please email us here.

This week Mike and Doug discuss a couple of different articles written about some Sharks.  First, they discuss Allen Muir of si.com’s view that Joe Thornton should be left off the 2010 Olympic team.  After debunking that idea, they discuss an article in the Hockey News written about Douglas Murray, and his potential unrestricted free agency in 2009.

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Clowe has re-signed, and Vlasic is in talks, but the stories and topics of the week come from the loyal listeners. Defense, offense, hypothetical, and finally, trivia questions are posed and answered.

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New episode here.  We did have some business to attend to in the Clowe signing and the Vlasic extension report, but the rest of the show was taken up with the trivial (trivia questions) and non-trivial (listener emails).

I just discovered this blog, and not to put too fine a point on it, it’s fantastic.  The good news is it gives amazing insight to the inner workings of an NHL team’s hockey management philosophy and strategy, including posts by the actual GM, assistant GM, and director of hockey ops.  The bad news is it’s about the Minnesota Wild.

I just read a book called Money Players that talks about this sort of thing, mostly a historical perspective on the players union, and the various CBAs that have been around.  It doesn’t really cover the new deal much because it was written during the lockout.  And actually, it’s not at all complimentary to Doug Risebrough, the current GM (and blogger) of the Wild.  According to the book, he made some pretty bad decisions back when he was GM of the Flames.

For whatever reason, I’m fascinated by this “game beyond the game”.  With the new CBA to navigate, changing U.S. to Canadian dollar exchange rates, rule changes, crazy UFA periods, it’s a whole science and art in itself.  It’s not easy identify good players (both good now and those that will be good in the future), choose what to pay them, and fit them under the salary cap, all while meeting any other goals ownership has set.  Plus you have constant scrutiny of your moves by fans, journalists, and oh yeah, you’re directly competing against 29 other guys who are trying to eat your lunch.  It’s like trying to do a puzzle where you don’t know the picture, the size of the final image, and the individual pieces are always changing size and shape.  Sometimes you have to get out the hammer to pound some pieces together, and sometimes they fit together like Legos.

So let me lead the call- we need Doug Wilson, Wayne Thomas, and Greg Jamison to start a blog.  Great job, Minnesota Wild.  Good luck not having Rolston and Demitra.

As the lone holdout from last years roster waiting for a new contract, it appears Ryane Clowe’s deal could be announced in the next few days, as David Pollak’s blog hinted today. This is very good news, very good news indeed but it might be hard to speculate what the dollar amount and term will be of Clowe’s new deal. Before I had guessed that due to his injury last season, overall lack of NHL experience (only 91 regular season games and 44 points) and his recent brush with the San Jose Po-Po, Clowe might settle for a two years deal worth 3M total. But, the market has been bizarre for a player of Clowe’s stature in the RFA market.

Daniel Carcillo got 2 years, roughly 1.8M from Phoenix. He has only 75 NHL games under his belt and 31 career points. Patrick Eaves got 4.2M for three years with 168 games and 76 points. Steve Bernier got 2.5M with 177 games and 90 points. Antoine Vermette just got two years, 5.5M for 297 games and 139 points.

So what is Clowe worth in this market? Will he take less term and less dough in order to cash in later? Will he want security and will Doug Wilson pull a “Matt Carle” type of deal of overpay for the potential long term investment? I see the former happening. I’m sticking to two years and 3M, and it should be no more than 3.2M or that’s a minor slap in the face to Little Joe.

As for some of the McLaren bashing that is happening on other message boards, and I admit to being a little guilty of it at first – don’t we think that Kyle deserves a little more than being thrown out like trash to the lowest bidder? With a positive suggestion in the post below, bcsteve brings up the LA Kings could take Kyle and his 2.5M salary to make the cap requirements and Lombardi might have a passing interest since he’s the one who brought McLaren to San Jose in the first place. Good idea, and I’m sure DW would prefer to send him out of the division, but with Kyle the odd man out – he might not have a choice…and neither might the Kings.

Newest podcast episode can be found here. Let’s hope we’ll be talking about Clowe’s new deal next week as a done deal.

Newest episode here.  As last week, most of the ideas for the show came from you, the listeners.  I know it’s not a real hip-hop-happening time in hockey right now, but it’s a good opportunity to discuss those issues that aren’t particularly affected by whether Mark Parrish has been bought out or not.