3:12 PM - The NHL has suspended Montreal Canadiens forward Mike Cammalleri one game for his actions against the Isles' Nino Niederreiter Saturday night.
This move is unsurprising, and I'm glad that he was suspended at the very least. I was hoping more for two games, but after comments coming out about Niederreiter's hit, I was hoping for just one at that point and not your typical inconsistency from Colin Campbell. Good stuff. The first Isles-Canadiens game at the end of the month should be fun.
1:09 PM - The Islanders have announced today that forward Rob Schremp is out three to four weeks with a lower back strain. Chris Botta seems optimistic that we could have him back in two weeks.
Obviously, this isn't a major injury, and for that we should be thankful. We'll have a little bit of a rough go for the first few games, but then Schremp will be coming back. For the time being, we look to John Tavares, Josh Bailey, Matt Moulson and Blake Comeau to pick up (even more of) the slack. I have not seen anything in any of their play that screams to me "regression." Throughout the entire preseason, these guys were some of the most hard-working individuals that I noticed. They were already poised to have breakout years of their own, without all of this factored in. I have faith that it makes these guys want it more.
Obviously, strong defense and goaltending is going to be key here. The Islanders strengthened their defense in the offseason, and we are going to hopefully see it come to fruition. For the most part, they will be playing minutes that they are best suited for. Keeping the puck out of our net just became all that more imperative until we can get some of the injured scorers back.
Very interested to see now how many of those forwards still with the team stay past Wednesday, or if they try and bring someone in on waivers after all. One interesting note, is that none are centers like Schremp. Curious who will fill that role as Bailey seems to be very comfortable at wing. Right now, we're most likely looking at Tavares-Frans Nielsen-Doug Weight-Zenon Konopka. Our depth at center will pay-off right now.
Keep an eye on us later, as news continues to come out as we rapidly approach the day when rosters need to be finalized.
-Chris
nyifyi@gmail.com
Showing posts with label Mike Cammalleri. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mike Cammalleri. Show all posts
October 4, 2010
October 3, 2010
New Podcast Posted; Sunday Evening Notes
As promised, Sean and I got together today and recorded our first podcast of the new season. The show can be found here.
We encourage you all to not only download this weeks episode, but subscribe so that you can get the subsequent installments as well. There are links on the side of the podcast site that tell you how to do so. As two loyal listeners pointed out to me tonight (thank you John in DC and jkeitz from Twitter), you can also subscribe through Google Listen or Dr. Podder for those of you who might not have iTunes. I am not familiar with either, or how they work, but for those of you who are tech savvy, by all means do so. Also, for anyone who knows other ways to download the shows, please do not hesitate to e-mail us about them so we can inform our other listeners, or leave a comment for all to see.
Today was a really good time to record a show seeing as the team just finished their preseason schedule, and also cut 17 players this morning. We were able to discuss items like that, which was a good change of pace. Don't get us wrong - we love doing the offseason shows like the free agency special or the training camp primer - but they are nothing compared to actually talking about the team and the performance on the ice. We were excited, and you can feel that it is the eve of hockey here in New York with the cold air finally arriving.
Now that the season has officially arrived, we encourage you guys to click around and visit some of the links that are here. Be sure to check out our NYI FYI home page and sign up for the newsletter, which should begin rolling in the next week or two.
SUNDAY EVENING NOTES: With teams having only until Wednesday to finalize their rosters, expect some movement. While there have been no rumors of the Islanders possibly making any moves, keep one eye open. There are supposed to be some decent forwards hitting the waiver wire. One forward, Michael Grabner, Sean and I spoke about in the podcast. He was unable to crack Florida's lineup to start the year, and in order to go down to the minors needed to be placed on waivers. I am a little surprised that Grabner is being placed on waivers, despite not having the strongest camp, and would be equally as surprised if no one claims him. Top-15 picks being placed on waivers does not happen very often. Still, he can be considered a bit of a project, but he did score 11 points in 20 games last season in Vancouver.
A couple of teams still have salary cap issues that need to be resolved by Wednesday. The most notable ones are the Boston Bruins and the New Jersey Devils. The Devils are believed to be shopping Colin White, Brian Rolston and possibly Jamie Langenbrunner. Bryce Salvador was once considered as the most likely player to be banished, but he is battling through some concussion problems. It remains to be seen what happens there. The word surrounding the Bruins is that they could possibly end up demoting Michael Ryder depending on if some of their younger prospects impressed them enough. The first week or so of camp there was a lot of talk about this, but not as much in the past week. Has Ryder done enough to redeem himself, or is he on his way out?
As far as defensemen go, there is the Sheldon Souray watch (we needed someone to painfully keep track of once Kovalchuk signed, right?) as people look for Edmonton to possibly put him on re-entry. Word out of Edmonton is that they still have hopes to trade away the disgruntled blue liner, but everyone knows their situation and is not offering them anything of value. We'll see what happens there. Shane O'Brien was put on waivers by Vancouver, and there is some belief that he will be claimed by someone, perhaps even the New York Rangers.
Some Isles fans are wondering what we are in store for when it coms to claiming players, but will we be putting any players on waivers? We already waived one player, defenseman Dustin Kohn. He seems to have gone unclaimed (so far) and will most likely report to Bridgeport. The Islanders still have eight defensemen on one-way contracts, leaving people to wonder about the status of Bruno Gervais. The fact that he was sent to Quebec City to play with the "B" team (and didn't have a great game, either, by many accounts) might tell us something. The real questions here are 1) do the Islanders feel comfortable having two defensemen as healthy scratches and 2) how confident are the Islanders in Radek Martinek's ability to stay healthy? If they are pretty confident, then they may have no reservations about waiving someone, or even trading them for someone elses spare part (like Ryder).
The only thing we know for sure is not to expect the Islanders to claim any of the defensemen. The search for blue liners ended with the signing of Mike Mottau.
Many of the players already on waivers have to either pass through or be claimed by 12 noon Monday, so we won't be waiting long to find out the landing place for those who have already hit the wire.
CAMMALLERI HEARING: Mike Cammalleri has a conference called with the league scheduled for Monday morning to discuss his incident with Nino Niederreiter during the Isles-Canadiens game on Saturday night. We'll keep track of any news of possible suspensions (there should be one).
-Chris
nyifyi@gmail.com
We encourage you all to not only download this weeks episode, but subscribe so that you can get the subsequent installments as well. There are links on the side of the podcast site that tell you how to do so. As two loyal listeners pointed out to me tonight (thank you John in DC and jkeitz from Twitter), you can also subscribe through Google Listen or Dr. Podder for those of you who might not have iTunes. I am not familiar with either, or how they work, but for those of you who are tech savvy, by all means do so. Also, for anyone who knows other ways to download the shows, please do not hesitate to e-mail us about them so we can inform our other listeners, or leave a comment for all to see.
Today was a really good time to record a show seeing as the team just finished their preseason schedule, and also cut 17 players this morning. We were able to discuss items like that, which was a good change of pace. Don't get us wrong - we love doing the offseason shows like the free agency special or the training camp primer - but they are nothing compared to actually talking about the team and the performance on the ice. We were excited, and you can feel that it is the eve of hockey here in New York with the cold air finally arriving.
Now that the season has officially arrived, we encourage you guys to click around and visit some of the links that are here. Be sure to check out our NYI FYI home page and sign up for the newsletter, which should begin rolling in the next week or two.
SUNDAY EVENING NOTES: With teams having only until Wednesday to finalize their rosters, expect some movement. While there have been no rumors of the Islanders possibly making any moves, keep one eye open. There are supposed to be some decent forwards hitting the waiver wire. One forward, Michael Grabner, Sean and I spoke about in the podcast. He was unable to crack Florida's lineup to start the year, and in order to go down to the minors needed to be placed on waivers. I am a little surprised that Grabner is being placed on waivers, despite not having the strongest camp, and would be equally as surprised if no one claims him. Top-15 picks being placed on waivers does not happen very often. Still, he can be considered a bit of a project, but he did score 11 points in 20 games last season in Vancouver.
A couple of teams still have salary cap issues that need to be resolved by Wednesday. The most notable ones are the Boston Bruins and the New Jersey Devils. The Devils are believed to be shopping Colin White, Brian Rolston and possibly Jamie Langenbrunner. Bryce Salvador was once considered as the most likely player to be banished, but he is battling through some concussion problems. It remains to be seen what happens there. The word surrounding the Bruins is that they could possibly end up demoting Michael Ryder depending on if some of their younger prospects impressed them enough. The first week or so of camp there was a lot of talk about this, but not as much in the past week. Has Ryder done enough to redeem himself, or is he on his way out?
As far as defensemen go, there is the Sheldon Souray watch (we needed someone to painfully keep track of once Kovalchuk signed, right?) as people look for Edmonton to possibly put him on re-entry. Word out of Edmonton is that they still have hopes to trade away the disgruntled blue liner, but everyone knows their situation and is not offering them anything of value. We'll see what happens there. Shane O'Brien was put on waivers by Vancouver, and there is some belief that he will be claimed by someone, perhaps even the New York Rangers.
Some Isles fans are wondering what we are in store for when it coms to claiming players, but will we be putting any players on waivers? We already waived one player, defenseman Dustin Kohn. He seems to have gone unclaimed (so far) and will most likely report to Bridgeport. The Islanders still have eight defensemen on one-way contracts, leaving people to wonder about the status of Bruno Gervais. The fact that he was sent to Quebec City to play with the "B" team (and didn't have a great game, either, by many accounts) might tell us something. The real questions here are 1) do the Islanders feel comfortable having two defensemen as healthy scratches and 2) how confident are the Islanders in Radek Martinek's ability to stay healthy? If they are pretty confident, then they may have no reservations about waiving someone, or even trading them for someone elses spare part (like Ryder).
The only thing we know for sure is not to expect the Islanders to claim any of the defensemen. The search for blue liners ended with the signing of Mike Mottau.
Many of the players already on waivers have to either pass through or be claimed by 12 noon Monday, so we won't be waiting long to find out the landing place for those who have already hit the wire.
CAMMALLERI HEARING: Mike Cammalleri has a conference called with the league scheduled for Monday morning to discuss his incident with Nino Niederreiter during the Isles-Canadiens game on Saturday night. We'll keep track of any news of possible suspensions (there should be one).
-Chris
nyifyi@gmail.com
Full (Almost) Roster Gives Isles 2-1 Win over Devils; Other Notes
In their only home preseason game, the Islanders iced what many consider to be the closet thing to their opening night lineup. For the first time, people were able to see how certain guys had chemistry with others, and more importantly, how good Rick DiPietro looks.
DiPietro made 25 saves, while Josh Bailey and Blake Comeau scored for the Islanders to help defeat the Devils 2-1, while just under 8,000 fans came out to the Coliseum for their preseason fix.
Doug Weight had an assist on Bailey's goal, making a nice pass from behind the net. The assist gave him three total in the two games he played. That's a great thing to see for a guy who has been injured for most of his stay here on the Island so far.
One of the things I was most interested in was to see how Scott Gordon was going to allocate the minutes among the defensemen. One look at the boxscore, and you can see that James Wisniewski led the way with 25:52, followed by Mark Eaton at 25:24 and Radek Martinek at 24:35. Newcomer Mike Mottau, getting his first game in as an Islander, logged 24:06 of ice time. The Islanders are going to rely heavily on Wisniewski to lead this crew. It appears that Gordon likes Mottau very much, and to be honest I have liked what I have seen out of him when watching him the past three seasons for the Devils as well. While the blue line may not have a huge amount of offense, they certainly are solid defensively.
Calvin de Haan played just under 10 minutes. I'm curious to see what the Islanders do with him, and to be honest while he has shown flashes of being a very good defenseman, isn't quite there yet. I won't say that his shoulder injury last season caused him to take a step back, but you can clearly see that he is still trying to work out the kinks, which is only normal for a 19 year old who suffers an injury like that. I really think he should go back to juniors, and something tells me the Islanders will agree with that.
The team did have their split squad in action once again, with the "B" team dropping their game against the Montreal Canadiens 7-2. Montreal had most of their NHL roster on the ice for that one. All but a handful of the Islanders skaters in that game were cut this morning and sent to Bridgeport, or released. I'll touch upon this later in the post.
The story out of Quebec City, however, was the battle between Nino Niederreiter and Mike Cammalleri. Earlier in the game, Niederreiter laid this hit on Cammalleri, one that he felt was unnecessary and illegal. After taking exception to the hit, and with the game getting out of hand, Cammalleri went after Niederreiter, essentially waiving his stick in his face, seemingly clipping Niderreiter. After that, while Niederreiter tries to skate away and with the referees watching, Cammalleri slashed Niederreiter on the back of his legs. Niederreiter did not return for the 3rd period with bruises from the slash. Cammalleri was thrown out of the game for his actions.
I don't really know what possessed Cammalleri to do what he did. Niederreiter is 6'3", Cammalleri 5'9". The difference in height is what probably made him go berserk like that, feeling that the hit was a shoulder to a head, but there is no place for that. The league is currently reviewing the situation, as they should. Many speculate that he will be handed down some kind of suspension. He should.
Unfortunately, I was not able to see the games and due to prior obligations, did not get to attend the preseason game at the Coliseum. However, some of my fellow Blog Boxers were able to attend or watch, and they wrote some good things. For more details of what they saw - which is a breath of fresh air for you guys and a break from my opinion - be sure to check out what they have to say.
Dee Karl of Islanders 7th Woman
Dominik of Light House Hockey
I'll add more as they post their stories from the game, so be sure to look out for that.
ISLES ANNOUNCE ROSTER MOVES: The Islanders announced on Saturday morning that they have trimmed their roster by 17. There are no surprises there. One thing that bothers me, however, is that all six players who were here on tryouts got cut. While that probably won't matter in the scheme of things, to me I felt that bringing in a guy like Dean McAmmond or Jed Ortmeyer on a two-way deal would have been a good idea. Meanwhile, there is no indication that they will even head to Bridgeport for a chance to crack their roster. So, it now appears that those players were just brought in to fulfill roster requirements for the preseason games. Oh well. Who knows, maybe someone ends up coming back in another couple of days.
NYI FYI PODCAST COMING: Sean and I plan to make a podcast this afternoon. Now with preseason games complete, we'll have some interesting topics to discuss now that we have actually seen the players perform on the ice and in game situations. Look for that at some point today. I'll be sure to post a link when it's up and running as well as a reminder.
-Chris
nyifyi@gmail.com
DiPietro made 25 saves, while Josh Bailey and Blake Comeau scored for the Islanders to help defeat the Devils 2-1, while just under 8,000 fans came out to the Coliseum for their preseason fix.
Doug Weight had an assist on Bailey's goal, making a nice pass from behind the net. The assist gave him three total in the two games he played. That's a great thing to see for a guy who has been injured for most of his stay here on the Island so far.
One of the things I was most interested in was to see how Scott Gordon was going to allocate the minutes among the defensemen. One look at the boxscore, and you can see that James Wisniewski led the way with 25:52, followed by Mark Eaton at 25:24 and Radek Martinek at 24:35. Newcomer Mike Mottau, getting his first game in as an Islander, logged 24:06 of ice time. The Islanders are going to rely heavily on Wisniewski to lead this crew. It appears that Gordon likes Mottau very much, and to be honest I have liked what I have seen out of him when watching him the past three seasons for the Devils as well. While the blue line may not have a huge amount of offense, they certainly are solid defensively.
Calvin de Haan played just under 10 minutes. I'm curious to see what the Islanders do with him, and to be honest while he has shown flashes of being a very good defenseman, isn't quite there yet. I won't say that his shoulder injury last season caused him to take a step back, but you can clearly see that he is still trying to work out the kinks, which is only normal for a 19 year old who suffers an injury like that. I really think he should go back to juniors, and something tells me the Islanders will agree with that.
The team did have their split squad in action once again, with the "B" team dropping their game against the Montreal Canadiens 7-2. Montreal had most of their NHL roster on the ice for that one. All but a handful of the Islanders skaters in that game were cut this morning and sent to Bridgeport, or released. I'll touch upon this later in the post.
The story out of Quebec City, however, was the battle between Nino Niederreiter and Mike Cammalleri. Earlier in the game, Niederreiter laid this hit on Cammalleri, one that he felt was unnecessary and illegal. After taking exception to the hit, and with the game getting out of hand, Cammalleri went after Niederreiter, essentially waiving his stick in his face, seemingly clipping Niderreiter. After that, while Niederreiter tries to skate away and with the referees watching, Cammalleri slashed Niederreiter on the back of his legs. Niederreiter did not return for the 3rd period with bruises from the slash. Cammalleri was thrown out of the game for his actions.
I don't really know what possessed Cammalleri to do what he did. Niederreiter is 6'3", Cammalleri 5'9". The difference in height is what probably made him go berserk like that, feeling that the hit was a shoulder to a head, but there is no place for that. The league is currently reviewing the situation, as they should. Many speculate that he will be handed down some kind of suspension. He should.
Unfortunately, I was not able to see the games and due to prior obligations, did not get to attend the preseason game at the Coliseum. However, some of my fellow Blog Boxers were able to attend or watch, and they wrote some good things. For more details of what they saw - which is a breath of fresh air for you guys and a break from my opinion - be sure to check out what they have to say.
Dee Karl of Islanders 7th Woman
Dominik of Light House Hockey
I'll add more as they post their stories from the game, so be sure to look out for that.
ISLES ANNOUNCE ROSTER MOVES: The Islanders announced on Saturday morning that they have trimmed their roster by 17. There are no surprises there. One thing that bothers me, however, is that all six players who were here on tryouts got cut. While that probably won't matter in the scheme of things, to me I felt that bringing in a guy like Dean McAmmond or Jed Ortmeyer on a two-way deal would have been a good idea. Meanwhile, there is no indication that they will even head to Bridgeport for a chance to crack their roster. So, it now appears that those players were just brought in to fulfill roster requirements for the preseason games. Oh well. Who knows, maybe someone ends up coming back in another couple of days.
NYI FYI PODCAST COMING: Sean and I plan to make a podcast this afternoon. Now with preseason games complete, we'll have some interesting topics to discuss now that we have actually seen the players perform on the ice and in game situations. Look for that at some point today. I'll be sure to post a link when it's up and running as well as a reminder.
-Chris
nyifyi@gmail.com
August 1, 2007
Hunter Award Coming Friday
Today, the Isles and Trent Hunter went to arbitration to determine his salary for next season. The Isles had hoped to sign Hunter long term before the hearing, but both sides were unable to agree. Both sides were fine going to the arbitrator, however, and the decision is expected to be out sometime Friday. Most of the time, arbitrators rule based on stats and not intangibles, so Hunter will most likely get a good salary in terms of his production. Last year, Hunter had 20 goals and 35 pts. Earlier today, Rangers forward Sean Avery was awarded $1.9 by an arbitrator. Avery had 48 points in 84 games for the Rangers and the Kings last year. Some see the Avery award as a comparable figure, and based on the stats Hunter should get below $1.9-probably around $1.2-1.3 million.
Recently, Hunter and his agent have talked through the media about the thought of possibly testing the market after next season. If that is the case, then the Isles might want to look at shopping him for some defensive help. I like Hunter very much and still have hopes of seeing him here for many years, but if he is unwilling to show a commitment to the Isles (though there is no evidence of this) then it would be in the best interest of the club to trade him. As the months and the season goes by, we should be able to get a better read on what Hunter's feelings are. Right now he seems intent on testing the market next July. That doesn't mean he can't come back, but 29 other teams will be bidding on him, making the chances not too good. He could also be traded at the deadline if the Isles can figure out his intentions by that time. But as of right now, i expect to see what comes Friday. Hopefully we don't have another case of Mike York on our hands here.
There have been no recent rumors for the Isles in terms of adding players. They sound like they are going to still be adding, the real question is when. The latest rumors came about a week ago, when some websites claimed that Snow called LA about Mike Cammalleri and were close to signing defenseman Danny Markov. But since all that news came out, all has been quiet here in Islander country. With arbitration awards being handed out now, and seeing the Edmonton Oilers make some really outrageous offers to RFA's, one has to wonder which route Snow plans on going. My guess is he'll wait till we get closer to training camp, and see which players are the odd men out on other rosters. A move can come at any time.
Earlier today, Mike Sillinger was on XM radio and said that the Isles are not done yet, and specifically spoke about the defense. That is good news because the current defensive corps, overall just isn't very good. Sillinger would not say if the move would come by trade or FA signing, but Snow does have some things he is working on.
One last note: recently there have been many talks about the Isles new jersey and what it looks like. The word right now is they are waiting until September to release the new designs, but some pictures have been leaked and there are a few different versions of what it will look like. In the near future, we will create a post with links to some of the photos and give you a general idea of what is going on with that.
Recently, Hunter and his agent have talked through the media about the thought of possibly testing the market after next season. If that is the case, then the Isles might want to look at shopping him for some defensive help. I like Hunter very much and still have hopes of seeing him here for many years, but if he is unwilling to show a commitment to the Isles (though there is no evidence of this) then it would be in the best interest of the club to trade him. As the months and the season goes by, we should be able to get a better read on what Hunter's feelings are. Right now he seems intent on testing the market next July. That doesn't mean he can't come back, but 29 other teams will be bidding on him, making the chances not too good. He could also be traded at the deadline if the Isles can figure out his intentions by that time. But as of right now, i expect to see what comes Friday. Hopefully we don't have another case of Mike York on our hands here.
There have been no recent rumors for the Isles in terms of adding players. They sound like they are going to still be adding, the real question is when. The latest rumors came about a week ago, when some websites claimed that Snow called LA about Mike Cammalleri and were close to signing defenseman Danny Markov. But since all that news came out, all has been quiet here in Islander country. With arbitration awards being handed out now, and seeing the Edmonton Oilers make some really outrageous offers to RFA's, one has to wonder which route Snow plans on going. My guess is he'll wait till we get closer to training camp, and see which players are the odd men out on other rosters. A move can come at any time.
Earlier today, Mike Sillinger was on XM radio and said that the Isles are not done yet, and specifically spoke about the defense. That is good news because the current defensive corps, overall just isn't very good. Sillinger would not say if the move would come by trade or FA signing, but Snow does have some things he is working on.
One last note: recently there have been many talks about the Isles new jersey and what it looks like. The word right now is they are waiting until September to release the new designs, but some pictures have been leaked and there are a few different versions of what it will look like. In the near future, we will create a post with links to some of the photos and give you a general idea of what is going on with that.
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