He Did It

Following on from Saturday's entry, Calgary Flames general manager Darryl Sutter this evening landed star unrestricted free agent Jay Bouwmeester on a 5-year, $32.5 million contract. He has signed him having effectively given up the negotiating rights to UFA Jordan Leopold and a 3rd round draft pick; tomorrow he may have gone for $7-8 million a year, so in anyone's terminology, a steal. Is there a better top four defence anywhere in the NHL than Bouwmeester-Regehr-Phaneuf-Sarich?

The real demonstration the Flames have stolen a march on their rivals? The egregious quantities of utter f*cking stupid spouted on canucks.com and HF message boards about 'salary cap hits', 'lack of top six forwards' and 'cancers in the dressing room'

Darryl Sutter, I raise my metaphorical hat in your direction!

EDIT: This evening's deal in Cowtown is not the only activity in the northwest division of the NHL this evening. Want-away Ottawa forward Dany Heatley - having waived his no-trade clause - has signed for the Edmonton Oilers in exchange for Andrew Cogliano, Ladislav Smid and Dustin Penner. A 50 goal forward swapped for a promising centre not fulfilling his potential, a second/third pair defenceman and a colossal, overpaid bust. Edmonton wins this trade hands down. I'd like to smoke whatever Sens GM Bryan Murray is smoking if he thinks that's a good trade! Yikes!

And what of the Sedin sisters in V*****ver? Still no signature on the dotted line. If they were to decamp as free agents to Montreal or Toronto, then it's fair to say they are the significant losers in the musical chairs of the last couple of days. It's all very well having a top three goalie, but if your entire forward corps are made up of journeyman third liners (and the incredibly-good-value-for-money Mat$ $undin), expect a regression in the coming season. Which suits me just fine :-)

EDIT 2: Heatley refuses to be traded to Edmonton and will not waive the no-trade clause. in this instance. Marian Hossa, Jaromir Jagr, Dany Heatley; all sane enough to realise that although Edmonton isn't the end of the world, you can certainly see it from there...!

What He Said

You'd have to have been living in Siberia or somewhere to have not heard that Michael Jackson had died last Thursday. Wall-to-wall coverage duly followed on all my TV news channels. Far be it from me to sound curmudgeonly, but I'd have liked to have heard some other news as well. Here are some thoughts articulated by the Guardian's Charlie Brooker, in more humorous style than I can manage.

Darryl Sutter: Magician

It just goes to show what you miss out on sometimes when you have a bit of a lie in on a Saturday morning.

Last evening was the NHL entry draft, in which the 30 NHL sides pick from the best available players wanting to enter the NHL. The teams with the poorest records in the season just gone pick first: the New York Islanders, once a powerhouse team in the 1970s but recently fallen on hard times picked the Ontario Hockey League's record goalscorer John Tavares. The top three players in the draft were all roughly equally talented and it was interesting to see who the Islanders picked. Had they picked either Victor Hedman or Matt Duchene, then a whole domino effect of trades could have been triggered, but as it was they took the star goalscoring forward. The Pittsburgh Penguins, a team in the same position five years ago, but now the Stanley Cup champions, due to a stream of high picks in Marc-Andre Fleury, Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin an Jordan Staal, picked last. Calgary had the 20th pick in the first round, but general manager Darryl Sutter swapped with New Jersey for the 23rd pick, plus a pick in the third.

The Flames got the man they wanted, Swedish defenceman Tim Erixon (who they figured would go in the top 15, so they were pleased to get him at 23rd), plus a bonus pick for free. That concluded the evening last night at an interminable 4 hours, and bedtime soon followed. Rounds two to seven of the draft were this morning, and when I logged on to Calgary Puck this morning I found it lit up like a Christmas tree. The reason? The Flames traded their freebie pick to the Florida Panthers, in addition to the rights to negotiate with free agent rental player Jordan Leopold, for the rights to negotiate with defenceman Jay Bouwmeester; arguably the biggest catch in the free agent market this summer. Florida have been trying to trade away his rights to get something back before he walked for nothing for some time, but the rumour on the draft room floor in Montreal was that he wouldn't move before July 1st when he can field several offers.

So it is that the Flames can now negotiate exclusively with him till Wednesday, when he can then speak to other teams. This has already prompted sniping from Edmonton and Vancouver (where else?) that Calgary cannot possibly fit him into the salary cap for next season. Sutter's answer? To immediately trade the grossly overpaid Jim Vandermeer ($2.3m a year for a third pairing defenceman is 3-4 times what he's worth) to the Phoenix Coyotes in exchange for Brandon Prust (who was traded to Phoenix in the deal that brought Olli Jokinen to Calgary) on a salary of. $0.5m a year, so clearing up $1.8m a year on the salary cap at a stroke. (as an aside, it's hardly beneficial to the Coyotes finances to take that contract on, but the NHL has made it's own bed and must now lie in it)

If Sutter can succesfully tie Bouwmeester down - his girlfriend is a nurse in Calgary and he's building a house here, so it looks good on that front - having effectively given nothing up, he's nothing short of a genius. Contrast his under-the-radar style to the incessant stream of hot air that is Brian Burke from Toronto who talks a good game but cannot walk the walk (at least in Toronto, anyway). His being on a microphone last night just shouted out "look at me, look at me!" which I found equally amusing and a bit sad. 42 years and counting for the Maple Leafs; it might yet be a few more.

There is more cap room than people think. If Cammalleri ($3.35m a year, and wanting far more in free agency), Bertuzzi ($1.95m a year, 1 good game in 5) and Aucoin ($4m a year, overpaid and turning circle of an oil tanker) are all not renewed, there is now $11.1m of salary cap space available. For sake of argument, if Bouwmeester signs a long term deal at $6.5m a year, there is now $4.6m to fill out the roster and sign up the younger free agents to improved deals. A couple of players might get promoted to higher forward lines - a slight decrease in goals might come of this, but hopefully the new defence-first attitude of new coach Brent Sutter offsets this - then the 2009-10 Flames could look like this (with salary in brackets, and resigned free agents in red):

Forwards
Bourque (1.35) - Langkow (4.5) - Iginla (7.0)
Backlund (1.271) - Jokinen (5.25) - Moss (1.3)
Glencross (1.2)- Conroy (1.05) - Boyd (1.0)
Nystrom (0.688)- Peters(0.6) -Prust (0.5)
Van Der Gulik/Greentree/Lundmark (ca. 0.5 each, only one player called up at any one time)
(26.209 total)

Defence
Bouwmeester (6.5) - Regehr (4.02)
Phaneuf (6.5) - Sarich (3.6)
Giordano (0.892) - Pardy (0.9)
Pelech (0.85)
(total 23.262)

Goalies
Kiprusoff (5.833), McElhinney (0.535)
(6.368 total)

Total salary: $55.839 million, salary cap for 09-10 = $56.8 million. It's quite close to the cap, but to free up a bit more room, on the back of an indifferent year, Daymond Langkow could be traded. Olli Jokinen could then be moved to the first line and a couple more UFAs at 2m could be signed, thus letting Mikael Backlund develop a bit more in the WHL. When does the schedule come out again...?

Two Months

I booked my flights back to the UK for a two week summer break this evening. In stereotypical fashion I have spent about a week trying to find the cheapest carrier, but when there are really only three to choose from it makes life easier (unless you want to book via Continental Airlines and go Calgary-Houston-Newark-Manchester...!). Quite what posesses me to leave the reasonably guaranteed 25-35C and clear skies for two weeks in completely random weather is open to debate. As it is, an 8.30pm Friday take off time means I can take my suitcase to work, and then head straight to the airport at 5-ish. No going to Heathrow is also a massive plus.

I'm already trying to make plans re: visiting people. Hopefully there is a trip to sunny (ha!) Coventry to have more curries (and/or birthday parties), though there might have to be a careful choice of venue, given a recent spot of bother here. Maybe a trip to Ally's in Earlsdon again (or {or as well as} Gabriel's, mmmmmmmmmmmm). This visit will probably encompass a visit to the last lab I worked in; it would be a special treat to meet some of the new group members I have heard so much about this last nine months (if they haven't failed their first year PhD transfer by then). It is truly a shame (!) that I never got to work with them. Though I might have slashed my wrists by now had I done.

A visit to see other friends I missed at Christmas (who are arguably at least partially responsible for me ending up out here) would also be nice.....given the middle weekend of my trip is a bank holiday this could also be doable. It'll also be nice to see my nephew again and hold a conversation (of sorts) with him; he seems to lead everyone a merry dance. One downside is the football. Only one home game in the two weeks I am there, and this is the holiday weekend I'm likely to be travelling.

Two months today! Let's see if we can have a 'eureka moment' at work in the meantime.

[looks out of window and sees squadron of flying pigs on final approach to Calgary airport]

Time To Get The Thermal Socks Out

It's just been announced this evening on one of the various sports channels that there will be an outdoor hockey game played in Calgary on New Year's Day. Such events are becoming a bit of a fixture on the NHL calendar; the first in Edmonton in 2003, Buffalo in 2008, Chicago this year, in addition to the possible one in Calgary. Here's the scene in Buffalo for the Buffalo Sabres-Pittsburgh Penguins (boooo!) game, where 71,217 attended:

(image downloaded from flickr; see here for the original and more images)

Calgary is hosting the 2009 Grey Cup Final (the CFL version of the Superbowl) in late November, so there will doubtless be temporary seating at either end of McMahon Stadium, boosting the capacity to somewhere approaching 50,000, and so leaving it in place seems good sense. The capacity of the Saddledome is 19,200, so demand will surely be high - the more available seats the better. How good is it that my plans for this Christmas season involve staying this side of the pond?!

Just one consideration; the weather. It could be -30C and brutal windchill., making it less than fun to sit and watch. It could equally be +10C if the Chinook is blowing that particular day which would make life difficult for the skaters. I'd better make sure the thermals are ready, just in case...

Stiff Upper Lips

Now and again, during the course of everyday life I'm occasionally prompted to remark to either to myself or the locals about how very British something is. Take last night, where I had to walk home from work in the regular-as-clockwork afternoon downpour in a pair of shorts and a polo shirt; the weather was warm and sunny when I set off that morning. No hiding inside or sheltering in a doorway for me. And no umbrella either.

Another instance that made me think this was something I was reading about on the internet this week. A labmate of mine was flying to Tokyo via Vancouver on Monday to attend an exchange visit in Japan for two months. Except, when she arrived at the airport in Calgary her flight had been cancelled due to a volcanic eruption in the Russian Kurile Islands (north of Japan). The eruption was emitting enough volcanic ash into the atmosphere to scupper trans-Pacific flight from the west coast of Canada. Presumably, this is because detours around the cloud were beyond the range of the aircraft on the route. A little research on wikipedia showed the diversion is necessary because volcanic ash is incredibly bad for jet engines, as originally found out by a British Airways flight in 1982.

BA flight 9 was on a London-Bombay-Madras-Singapore-Kuala Lumpur-Perth-Melbourne-Auckland routing, above an erupting Mt. Galunggung in Indonesia when they began to fly through a cloud which didn't appear on weather radar (weather radars on aircraft detect water, so volcanic ash being fine particles of stone didn't show). Within two minutes, two of the 4 engines on the plane failed, and in the rush to start the engine shutdown procedure, the next two failed simultaneously. The pilot quickly worked out he could glide for 25 minutes before (if the worst came) attempting to ditch in the sea. The passengers, understandably, got a bit agitated; and so the pilot made a public address:

"Ladies and Gentlemen, this is your Captain speaking. We have a small problem. All four engines have stopped. We are doing our damnedest to get it under control. I trust you are not in too much distress."

Very British eh? A masterpiece in understatement. The tale has a happy ending; after gliding out of the cloud, the flight crew attempted the first (and currently only) re-start of engines at altitude, and managed to land in Jakarta on two engines. The aircraft windscreen was almost totally obscured by volcanic ash, leading the captain to remark on navigating his way to an airport entirely on instruments "a bit like trying negotiate one's way up a badgers arse".

Full story here.

Tasteful Metaphor of the Week

From the Guardian, tonight:

"Another engine breaks away from Gordon Brown's fuselage, and the damage done looks set to bring him crashing out of the sky. Even if he can judder on, the injury done will diminish him further. Which other engines may now break away too? Those who would bring him down say the prime minister is beyond repair. The party faces a terrible choice it can no longer avoid."

Classy! Let's not let the unexplained death of 228 people get in the way of a witty segue into the seemingly imminent political post-mortem of Gordon Brown. A very poor quality bit of judgement from my current regular source of UK print news. I gave up on the Independent due to one strident, pompous, hectoring front page too many; I refuse to buy the Times on the basis of who it's owned by and am not Tory enough to buy the Telegraph. I hope whichever subeditor allowed the above quote to pass into the comment section will get an appropriate shoeing in the near future.

Culinary Delights

I'm in Hamilton, Ontario on a 'business trip' to give a project update to my industrial supervisors, who are both, in addition to my boss, attending the 92nd Canadian Society for Chemistry's annual convention. Given all three of them were here, my having to attend was pretty much a given. I've spent the last day and a half watching chemistry presentations from the great and good of the Canadian scene, and tomorrow I give my update.

It's been an odd sort of a trip. Up at 4:50 on Sunday morning to get a 5:30 taxi to be at the airport before 6 am. To then spend 3-and-a-bit hours on a plane that wants to charge you for the in flight TV (and anything more than a bag of peanuts), to then have an extremely bumpy and turbulent landing. Followed by a taxi driver determined to eke out every last cent on the trip from the airport to the hotel. Ah, the hotel. If I've stayed in a dodgier part of any town I can't remember it. Last night, I went one block out of the hotel before deciding to go back inside. Bear in mind I've been through the Harlem area of New York City and some iffy parts of Chicago, (and Calgary, I suppose) this is quite something. What an excellent place to put a 1200 bed hotel and a convention centre! The 'beers of the world' pub next door looks like it hasn't been open for 20 years, but is a tourist must see, apparently. Bates' Motel is a more enticing venue.

The hotel is hilarious; none of the lifts work properly, meaning if you want to go upstairs or downstairs, you must take the staff elevator which stops at every floor. This morning, people were so fed up of waiting (including a very prodigiously rude, though sadly unidentifiable frenchman) they went down the fire escape setting off alarms as they went through various doors, only to then to have to bang on the only-opening-one-way-doors of the convention centre to be let in. A final touch; the drunken yahoos who are in a room three doors down and career up and down the hallway at 4am are nespecially nice. They are quiet now, so no shopping them to the front desk, now I know which room they are in. One unnamed professor from UBC is less than impressed with them.

The chemistry talks yesterday were very meh, but were much better today. But the room allocation is nuts; top American professors with worldwide reputations have to give talks in poky little rooms which are horribly hot because they are so full, and ones in which more people are standing than sitting. Other sessions in enormous rooms draw barely 50 people while having the air conditioning on so high people have to put on layers to sit in comfort.......to then scoot next door to see the next talk they want to see in a stifling room with nowhere to sit! One person I know calls this the worst organised CSC he's ever seen.

At lunchtime, I went to grab something to eat in the food court of the shopping mall opposite the convention centre (and on top of which the hotel stands). It was like being in the Kirkgate centre in Bradford. This is not a good thing. The city seems generally to have seen better days. It's a port city on Lake Ontario, and so I presume the port traffic and the steelworks are much quieter than they have been in past years.

This evening, I've spread the wings a bit and visited a pub a little further out of the city centre with a couple of people I know through mutual friends. Being the displaced Brit, we decided on an English style pub, and so we came to "The Winking Judge". It was awesome in it's old fashioned English-pub-ness, but can I say the fish and chips in there is the best I have had in 15 months in the Great White North by a country mile. Or several. Just awesome. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. I can't adequately explain how good it was to have something approaching the real thing. So if you're ever in Hamilton, here you are. Awesomeness. Squared.