Chirps from Center Ice

Back for the (checks calendar) 13th season of the blog, hope everyone had a good summer. Mine is always too short. There’s nothing I like about cold weather, wearing shoes, being perpetually cold all the time and sunsets at 7. Give me sunsets after 8:30, flip-flops, humid weather, mid 80s, a heatwave sprinkled in and call it a season.

You may have noticed the lack of updates here this past summer. Well, I was outside.

There wasn’t any type of preview this season either. Sorry! I was outside.

I’ll take a stab though.

1 Providence – I think the Bruins will be good again this year.
2 Hershey – Bears are defending champs and may have gotten better in the offseason.
3 Hartford – I think they are for real this year, really.
4 Springfield – I think they will be fine, not a door mat and not a contender.
5 Charlotte – Same as Springfield but slightly worse.
6 Penguins – I don’t think they miss the playoffs this year because the new management won’t allow it. More on that in a minute.
7 Lehigh Valley – Flyers are a mess, and that crap runs down hill.
8 Bridgeport – see Lehigh Valley, Islanders aren’t that much better either.

Music to set the mood…

Poison was such a good band.

A Quote…

High expectations are the key to everything…
– Sam Walton

This offseason, the Coal Street signed a bunch of guys to AHL contracts. With every signing, I just said, “Sign a bunch of guys, but make it a different year.”

Part of me wants to thing that its more crap coming in for the crap that was going out.

I think there is hope, but we were fooled last year thinking that that team was going to build off of their fourth place showing and compete. Quickly, it was discovered that the team was one dimensional and when the injuries and callups happened, what faint hope of a late push went straight down the drain.

I think Garret Sparks is just another Dustin Tokarski. A good goalie from yesterday playing out what’s left of his career here in Wilkes-Barre. The rest of the signings (made by Wilkes-Barre) are just a bunch of guys. We’ll see.

I do think that new GM Kyle Dubas did a good job of supplying NHL contracted players destined for the AHL. I don’t like, however, the amount of waiver claims (thus far two) by Pittsburgh because in the tea leaves it reads to me that there is a pile of junk at the AHL level that can’t help the NHL team. Trying to solidify your NHL franchise dumpster diving in waivers claims is a bit of a bold move. We will have to see how it pays off.

The AHL Penguins could be good and historically start strong. But we have all seen this fish before.

Also, on coaching, I think J.D. Forrest escaped the housecleaning by Pittsburgh but if the AHL team stumbles out of the gate he’s out of here by December.

The Setup

Two in Charlotte this Friday and Saturday. A good test for this Penguins team, I’d say.

Records

Everyone is undefeated. These are the first games of the season.

Who’s Up? Who’s Down? Who’s Out?

Full strength, I think. Again, I haven’t paid much attention because I was outside.

Wheeling got a boatload of players Tuesday.

At the end of last season, those guys are probably our top six. Somewhat surprised to see Svejkovsky get sent down, but he will get the reps he needs vs. 12-15 minutes a night buried on some fourth line.

What can we learn about the Penguins this week?

Discount everything you saw in preseason. It doesn’t matter. Sure, they went 3-1 and only lost 1-0 to Hershey with an ECHL lineup, but as a famous wresting promoter said once, “we’re live, pal.” None of that matters. If they run out to a 2-0 start, then sure, there’s promise. But remember, this last place team from last year was the last AHL team to be dealt a regulation loss, and that wasn’t until November. I don’t want to say October is meaningless, but there’s no way you can tell if you have a championship caliber team after two games in Charlotte, much less in the month of October.

Who’s in goal?

Unless they send Joel Blomqvist down, we are doing the whole carrying three goalies thing again. Magnus Hellberg and the aforementioned Garret Sparks are here also. My guess is Blomqvist is their horse and Hellberg and Sparks are the veteran backups. Blomqvist starts Friday and Hellberg goes Saturday.

For Charlotte, I have no idea. It took me 15 minutes to how to learn how to embed a tweet since Elon bought Twitter and renamed it X, or whatever. Bear with me.

Who is running the show?

Morgan McPhee and Harrison O’Pray are your debut referees Friday with Sean D’Loughy and Felix-Antoine Voyer on the lines. On Saturday, MacPhee, O’Pray and D’Loughy are back and Tyler Willie replaces Voyer on the lines.

Looking ahead…

Leaf raking, daylights saving time, having to turn the light on at 4:30 to see the last half hour of your work day. Snow. Oh wait….

Visit to Hartford next Friday then the home opener against Springfield.

Give us a bold prediction…

Three power play goals scored by the Penguins and a shutout and we will quickly forget that sorry abomination of last season.