Hordichuk is an energy winger who takes too many penalties, is not a nucler deterrent (as MacIntyre is) but he knows his role and has no fear.
I'm happy with his signing because it means the 4th line has a chance to break even during many nights this season. I would prefer a 4th line like the old timey Oilers had (Jim Dowd was the center, often with Georges Laraque and other forwards like Boyd Devereaux) that offered the Oilers a physical presence, some hard earned goals and an enforcer who could play 4 minutes or 8 and not hurt you. It seems to me that the Oilers have some things (Belanger is the key) that could contribute to team wins in multiple ways.
Hordichuk offers the Oilers a reliable hand for the 4line role while also giving them a player who is easily scratched should a kid like Hartikainen emerge.
NHL Prediction for 11-12: 44gp, 0-3-3 (.068)
- Nice intro, except Eager is the 4line LW. Right, but the Oilers will have injuries and slumps among Hall, Smith, Paajarvi and Eager.
- Hordichuk isn't Laraque. Quite right. BG was an outstanding enforcer for the Oilers and when he turned over the puck is was 111 miles from the defensive scoring zone.
- He's not much better than MacIntyre. Hold that thought. MacIntyre's CorsiRel (-29.1) came in three and a half minutes a game. Hordichuk's CorsiRel (-0.5) came in 5 minutes a night. One player could be spotted a few shifts per evening without bleeding and the other was instant powerplay for the opposition. That's a gap, folks.
- Stortini was a better player. Yeah, I think you might have a point. But Tom Renney didn't like him (I think it was footspeed) and then he had that terrible event during the Krys Barch fight and that was probably all she wrote. I expect Stortini will have a career.
- You really like this guy? I consider him an ideal fit for Tom Renney. An enforcer option but also a guy who can be scratched or sit at the end of the bench. Plus they have toughness in guys like Sutton and Eager so Hordichuk might get scratched in division games on the road too.
- You think this is the way to win? Look, I miss MacT's 4th liners but lots of people wanted to throttle Toby Petersen and Kyle Brodziak and Marc Pouliot. I'd much rather have Marc Pouliot on this team, but that isn't going to happen.
- Fricking Petersen. Right, he was the problem.
- Who will Hordichuk play with? Hmmm. Belanger or an AHL type at center (if RNH gets sent out) and then wingers like Jones, Eager, that kind of group.
- So he's not even going to play with the kids? He'll play with the kidsmore than MacIntyre played with the kids, but very little overall. Hordichuk's skills are superior to MacIntrye's but you want your skilled men playing with other skilled men.
I heard on the radio a while ago he once had the perfect enforcer season.
ReplyDeleteNashville 07-08? 60 PIM 12 fighting majors. 45 games played. Not sure about TOI.
Anyways, I like this signing.
Yeah, me too. Hordichuk might take too many penalties but he can play the enforcer minutes without bleeding to death.
ReplyDeleteVery pumped for the first game against Vancouver.
ReplyDeleteHe's already said he want to make a statement against the Canucks, for whatever reason.
Perhaps it will be the measuring stick as to how effective or uneffective he will be in PIM column.
I like Hordichuk. Always have. He has a mean streak, plays with energy, knows what to do in his own end, understands his end of the bench role, and can actually put the puck in the net--in fact I remember a couple of pretty goals in his past. Few and far between, to be sure, but he's better with the puck than many other dreadnoughts from the battleship tree.
ReplyDeleteI have a good feeling about a Big Uke toiling in Perohe City. This movie has played well here before. He'll get some games in.
Crikey. The end of this East game is taking longer than Monday Night Friggin Football.
Edit: wants
ReplyDeleteEdit: ineffective
Taking some ESL tonight.
Eskies are on tsn2 right now. Man these guys are tackling hard this season. Completely different team.
ReplyDeleteWouldn't it be great to win the Grey and the Stanley in the same year again?
ReplyDelete1987?
Wow that would knock the socks off the city!!
The half that won't end.
ReplyDeleteFunny thing though you can hear the whistle. Better punch it in baby!
ReplyDeleteUnbelievable.
ReplyDeleteLT: I calculated that Hordichuk would give up one PP goal on 60 game (assuming he's got some pressers) than the average player at the rate he plays.
ReplyDeleteWell that was 6 PP, so a ''regular'' PK team would give up 1 goal.
You figure he'll PK a lot do you?
ReplyDeleteIs there anything Freddie Stamps cannot do?
ReplyDeleteThat was a beauty catch.
ReplyDeleteJesus guys, hold'em.
ReplyDeleteWow, thought they would go for that 3rd down with Shaw wearing the kicking boot.
ReplyDeleteUgly as hell game. Beauty perfect start.
5-0, first time since 1980. Man.
ReplyDeleteLT: Well not lol. Just with his ''agressive penalties''.
ReplyDeleteAh, the Eskimos winning. That triggers memory lane.
ReplyDeleteSome of my strongest memories involve the Eskimos in the playoffs, usually playing Saskatchewan on route to the Grey Cup game.
We would dump unshelled peas into the center of the living room in a pile so high I could barely see the bottom of the television screen. As soon as you shelled your way to a clear sight line, more peas! One year we put 90 lbs of shelled peas into the freezer and 90 lbs of hand-Frenched beans. The end of my thumb usually had more than a few serrations by the time the game was over.
I remember Jim Germany averaging 5.5 yards per carry in the early post-season. I remember George McGowan's record-setting season and a subsequent season doing nothing but trying to convince people he could still run. It took me a long time to grasp that my hero had choogled some kryptonite. Hard lessons of youth. In his golden year, if he was triple covered and all four men jumped, he came down with the ball. Magnets, glue, sextant, periscope, and sandpaper. One of my cousins had McGowan on his paper route. "He lives in a house among mortals?" Blew my mind. Surely 98 catches gets you into a valet Valhalla.
There was also Tom Scott, the Glen Anderson of exposed ribs. A true professional of the clutch first down in heavy traffic. And desperate late game Hail Mary passes to Larry Highbaugh, a few of which he actually caught. The opposing safety would begin the play at the warning track. Has both a 116 yard punt return and a 118 yard kickoff return. The man could scoot. Somehow at the time I didn't fully appreciate his 66 career interceptions.
I'm sure I recall a possibly 60+ yard Cutler field goal attempt where he bounced the ball off the horizontal upright and fell short. Even his misses were hard to fault. I can't find his longest miss on the Al Gore, only his longest completion at 59 yards. IIRC, the miss was in Sask. with a tail wind so fierce we were debating accuracy, not distance.
(TBC)
The Ice Bowl was my first permanent sports injury. From Terry Jones via Wikipedia:
ReplyDeleteWe really knew we had something when Gerry Dattilio caught a short pass from Sonny Wade and ran right past Larry Highbaugh for a big gain. Gerry will tell you that he was not ... well, he was not very fast. And Highbaugh was known as one of the fastest guys in the league. That's when we knew we had something. It was a big factor in that 41-6 win. To me, it was a big deal. I still have that staple gun. To me it's a prized possession.
Had a bet on that game against a farm kid a year older than me who reached 6'5" in his grade eight year and then stopped growing. I stopped growing in my first college year at close to the same height, six years later. He did chores every morning throwing 90lb alfalfa bales (if they were a bit wet) over 6 foot fences. For a couple of years in junior high, he was more or less discipline-proof. His senior school had more experience coping with man-boys so he had to settle a bit. Different story in his home life. One word of guff to his old man, he was lashed to a fence post faster than you could say Jack Rabbit Slims. My own father was left of Atticus Finch. Explains a lot, really. Anyway, skinny Bunyan boy had a way of really grinding your nerves about winning your bet. On the day of the Ice Bowl, I took a tour of the four stages of grief before the half time show. Then a second catatonic tour after the intermission. Sean Penn was so good in Dead Man Walking because he remembers that game. My last meal was a giant bowl of regular potato chips with a dill pickle dip. Only time of year we got to each chips. Inconsolable. I was beyond chips.
Nothing touched the Ice Bowl scar ... until Steve Smith.
To be truthful, Moon to Houston affected me more than Gretzky to LA. That was more or less the end of my CFL era. Subsequently there was the PEFL era (penis envy football league) and I tuned out completely. Expansion into non-traditional markets always works out so well.
The Wilkinson/Moon relationship is one of the more interesting cases of giving a star athlete in training a proper safety net to learn the game. For some reason I feel more strongly about that for QB than most hockey positions, except perhaps PMD. That must resemble playing QB on a pinball table. It can't be fun learning the ropes.
Eskimos 5-0 has a familiar ring to it. Good times.
DMW. If the ice bowl is the staples game in Montreal, I was at the game. Dead man drunk by half time.
ReplyDeleteAs noted above by Gret99zky, Hordi doesn't actually take an obscene amount of minors, that 2007-8 season here in Nashville was pretty remarkable. He's hung up on getting his double-digit fighting majors each year, and if he takes another lug off the ice, who cares?
ReplyDeleteDeadmanWaking: Just excellent stuff about Eskies in days gone by. I was a huge fan of McGowan and Germany as well, along with Brian Kelly and Stu Lang. They were all fierce competitors, but managed to do battle with a degree of class and a touch of modesty as well. There were many other players on those Eskimos teams in that era that fit that description as well, and it is sad that that type of individual is harder to find in professional sport now.
ReplyDeleteEskies are on tsn2 right now. Man these guys are tackling hard this season. Completely different team.
ReplyDeleteYou know the last time the Oilers were good, the Esks were rolling and Sather used them as an example - never lose two in a row - I believe was the line.
Could history be repeating? Please?
He'll play with the kidsmore than MacIntyre played with the kids, but very little overall. Hordichuk's skills are superior to MacIntrye's but you want your skilled men playing with other skilled men.
ReplyDeleteBut he was hired to protect the kids¡
hedging - I...I don't even. An actual word as verification? The hell you say.