Arizona Coyotes

PLUS/MINUS: 4 Months, Tons of Money and a Playoff Race for the Ages
March 19, 2017, 1:15 PM ET [78 Comments]
James Tanner
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"PLUS/MINUS is the NHL's best stat, and the only one I use"
- Craig Button*

PLUS: The USA Women's Hockey Team for refusing to pay unless they're paid.

MINUS: Those green Leafs uniforms. WTF did I just watch? A North Stars game?

I think St. Patrick's day falls somewhere below Halloween and Valentines day on a list of holidays I think are stupid, but this was really insane. Green uniforms? On the Leafs?

What moron came up with this idea? I have lived in the GTA my entire life and this is the most impact Irish culture has ever had on me, other than maybe MacDondald's milkshakes. You know what team this would have made sense for? The Bruins, a team that plays in a city known for it's Irish heritage.

Yes, I realize that the St. Pats were the Leafs original name and that Toronto was the home of many Irish immigrants once upon a time. It was still a dumb idea.



MINUS:Amateur sports are a joke. The Olympics are a corrupt, disgusting money making body that pays nothing to the athletes. The Ontario Hockey League, and whatever the body is that covers all of Canadian junior hockey, the NCAA and any other league that uses young/amateur players and doesn't pay them.

Also complicit are the people who know this and still watch it. March Madness will be all anyone talks about this week. Fat Cats stand to make billions and like 3% of the players will ever play in the NBA.

PLUS: Once again, Jack Eichel. He may look like Ted from Bill and Ted, but that dude is totally excellent. (Guitar sound) He's fast becoming my favorite highlight of the morning. (Still not going to watch Sabres games on purpose).

PLUS: The Coyotes may be in yet another ownership/arena off-ice controversy, and they may be, once again, the worst team in the NHL, but their future is pretty bright.

Dvorak, Perlini and Chychrun have cemented themselves along with Domi as core members of the team going forward. One has to assume Duclair and DeAngelo will also be part of it.

Then you add in Strome, Keller and whoever they draft this year and no one other than the Leafs has a better set of young players.

MINUS: NHL Players for whining constantly about the Olympics. You'll make way, way more money having another World Cup. It won't have to be held at 3 in the morning. And, you get to play the same players in the same tournament. The only difference is what it's called.

This way, no poor people suffer so you Canada can win another gold medal they don't need.

This whole "controversy" is just so powerfully stupid.



MINUS: The Players for making me agree with that dirty crook who looks like Kevin Spacey.

PLUS: One of those well-known anti-analytics guys chirped me that Eric Fehr was good enough to play for the Penguins (his stats were horrifying in last years playoffs).

So just pointing out that Mike Babcock apparently agrees with me is not only gratifying, but doubly so because I get to use the same kind of horrible logic to do it.

MINUS: Speaking of Stats and the Leafs, at least four people sent me messages to gloat about how Gardiner struggled in the game against Tampa where they made a public show about giving him Rielly's minutes.

The irony of this was that if you looked into the game stats, Gardiner actually did well against Kucherov's line, but was caved in by what was either the second or third Tampa line.

I point this out only to make the point that one single example as proof is called "bulls*it." Anecdotal arguments are not arguments. One example proves nothing. In this case, less than nothing.

But you see this all the time. Florida's bad season apparently proves that analytics is not the way to go. Nevermind that their franchise defenseman put up the counting stats of a 3rd pairing journyman, or that their best players spent the majority of the year on the injured list.

PLUS: I bought the Legend of Zelda: Windwaker for my Wii U and I am addicted. I'm not sure what I was thinking as I have hardly any time between work and work and family and whatever comes up to play video games - I'm still stuck half-way through the surprisingly long Earthbound.

PLUS: Brad Marchand. Who ever would have thought he'd be in the MVP conversation? That he'd end up being one of the best players in the NHL?

In age of stats and confident statements, I love to see a guy do something no one predicted.

PLUS: I enjoyed the movie Passengers. I thought finally there was going to be a critically acclaimed movie I actually liked, but when I looked it up, the reviews were terrible.

The movie does something most movies don't have the balls to actually even try: it makes the viewer confront a moral dilemma. I don't want to give it away, since even the previews don't, but i thought it was an interesting and original one.

To me, I thought the reviews were reactionary and over-simplified, black/white stupidity.

Anyways, I give the movie my highest rating: 3 Suicide Squads.



MINUS: The people I see on my TV daily defending the indefensible because it's their party. People who won't criticize their own team are the worst kind of people on earth. There should be no pride in being partisan.

Certainly the kinds of Liberals who whine about things like sexist old sayings, who shut-down speakers at campuses for saying things they might disagree with, didn't like the movie Passengers, or insist on eating Kale are not my friends. They're just as bad Jeffrey Lord and all the dumb blondes on CNN.

MINUS: Today it's four months since I quit smoking. I'm rich now and I smell better. I don't even like drinking anymore. But damn I could quit quitting so easily. I used to be so cool.

Honestly, it's a good thing I can't afford $15/ pack or I would probably never be able to quit. This week I was able to buy myself a bunch of DVDs, and food, and a video game, and I didn't have to feel bad about it, because it was like a week's worth of smoking money gone to a better cause. (Getting fat, apparently).

Every time I want a cigarette, I just Scrooge McDuck it into a big pile of money. Who knew I'd end up living like such a fat-cat? If this keeps up I'm going to hire a driver.

MINUS: Is the Nintendo Classic Edition coming out or not? Was it limited time? Does anyone know?

PLUS: Jeff Skinner - the best player no one talks about.

MINUS: The Leafs should be in first place in the Atlantic. They are the best team in their division. They have lost 15 points because of random bad luck in OT/Shootout.

Only five teams in the NHL have lost less in regulation than the Leafs.

MINUS: Why am I still writing this when I could be out trying to rescue some princesses in my boat that talks to me?



PLUS: To Pitchfork Media for recently rating my boy DMX's debut album It's Dark and Hell is Hot a 9/10.

Finally X is getting the credit he deserves.

Who else is gonna give it to ya?

*Not a real quote.