Chirps from Center Ice

What you have been waiting for is finally here. Today on the WBS Twitter feed, the Pens finally announced details for the Dec 30 game in Pittsburgh at the new CONSOL Energy Center against the Hershey Bears. You need to look no further than at Chirps from Center Ice for all the details as follows:

• If you are a WBS season ticket holder (STH), a Pittsburgh STH or a Bears STH, you already have a section reserved for you by your team. WBS will be in Section 103 at CONSOL. Hershey and Pittsburgh will have their own separate sections. Call your respective team ticket rep starting tomorrow to get a ticket in your designated section.

• Prices are $30 lower bowl and $15 upper bowl.

• Everyone else can go on Ticketmaster starting Tuesday, November 9 to buy tickets in other sections. The password is, TUX . The presale runs thru Thursday, after which you do not need the code to buy tickets.

There you have it. I will be there by hook or by crook. Stay tuned to the blog and my twitter feed as we get closer.

Go Pens.

It’s been a while since I have done an AHL Roundup blog post so it’s high time I get one out. More on the title of this blog post in a minute.

The AHL announced it’s 2011 Hall of Fame Class today. Two players, a pioneer and a coach. One of the players has ties to and in Hershey. These men will be enshrined during the All-Star festivities in Chocolatetown in January.

More on the AHL, President David Andrews was honored last night with the Lester Patrick Award. Nice video here.

Beat writers are my heroes. The league has them all listed over on their Twitter page here. You’ll notice I don’t follow the list and the reason for that is because I follow every single person on that list individually.

I am going to pitch an idea to the league on Twitter to create a “fan” list, with the main focus truly being on amassing a list of fans, which represent at least each team once. It’d be nice to see what other fans in other cities such as Rockford, Grand Rapids, Chicago and Norfolk have to think about their team and league in general.

The Pittsburgh Penguins announced today what their Winter Classic jerseys, err, sweaters will look like. I personally like them. I know there is a good majority of fans and media who do not. To each his own.

To no ones surprise, Rochester Americans beat writer Kevin Oklobzijia reported today that the Florida Panthers have notified the Amerks they will not be renewing their affiliation agreement past this year. I find this interesting because all the other teams have dance partners and Rochester is one of the AHL’s most tenured teams. This means they need a new parent and Florida needs a new place to put their prospects meaning either a new team in a new city or an existing team in an existing AHL city currently affiliated with a different team. I don’t see the AHL going back to 29 teams, but I can’t say for 100% certain that this just won’t happen. We’ll see, I suppose.

Onto the etiology of this blog title. I mentioned yesterday that if Brett Sterling played in any of the weekend games I would eat my shoe. Well, I better stay hungry because Bombulie reported that he practiced today and might play Saturday in Hershey. I guess the only thing left is to decide if I want fries with my shoe I will be eating. Maybe even, shoestring?

Phantoms tomorrow. In the meantime, I am going to work on my jokes.

Extremely slow news day for WBS. Their twitter feed has been silent for a good part of the day. Since I don’t Facebook, I can’t speak to that at all.

So I was going to run with news out of Hershey today that Braden Holtby and Brain Fahey have been called up to Washington and more shocking news that Sheldon Souray broke his hand in a fight this past weekend and expected to miss 2 to 4 weeks. Until…..

Jonathan Bombulie blogged about the very same thing.

JB also touched on Rochester Americans Michael Nylander’s season ending surgery and even a gem I was going to write about, Noah Welch’s promotion from the Chicago Wolves to parent Atlanta Thrashers.

So I have been scooped, if you want to call it that!

Bombulie also reported that Eric Tangradi and Andrew Hutchinson have yet to arrive in Wilkes-Barre (at least for practice this morning) and Brett Sterling did not skate today. I asked Brett yesterday if this were playoffs would he play and without hesitation he told me yes. So, whatever it is, it’s minor, the team wanting to make 1000% sure he’s good to go.

It is not looking good for me making visits in either Glens Falls on Friday or Hershey on Saturday. Making hotel reservations and the desire to drive to those places just isn’t there right now. It can change at a moments notice, but as of right now it looks like I will be tuning in for this weekends games on AHL Live.

This afternoon Sheldon Souray was loaned to the Hershey Bears. Just when you thought the weak spot for the Bears was going to be defense, BLAM! they get Souray on loan. Article from Bears beat guy Tim Leone here.

Lots of mixed feelings on this from just about everywhere. I think that any time you get someone who is a three-time NHL All-Star is certainly helps your cause. It just makes this coming Saturday night in Wilkes-Barre all the more interesting.

Home in Wilkes-Barre, plenty of news:

• Andrew Hutchinson and Ryan Craig both cleared waivers, per TSN’s Bob McKenzie.
• Bombulie reported today that Pascal Morency was cut and Keven Veilleux missed practice today due to injury. It’s minor. He should be back next week.
• Ryan Schnell was offered a contract.
• I completely whiffed yesterday in mentioning here that Bryan Lerg is in town on a tryout. I remember the name from last year in our games with the Springfield Falcons. He plays center, and goodness knows we need depth at this position.

Bombulie scribbled down line combinations during practice today. Nothing official, but certainly close to what you will see Saturday.

Sterling-Jeffrey-Johnson
Conner-Vitale-Wallace
Collins-Lerg-Walker
Schnell-Sill-Boulerice
Haddad-Street-Petersen

Wagner-Potter
Strait-Bortuzzo
Fata-Sneep
Peltier-DeSantis

If you are a goalie geek, the good people over at The Goalie Guild released the October Scouting Journal.

Apparently Eric Tangradi has been shipped to the Wheel and Patrick Killeen has been recalled from The Nail straight to The Show. These look to be paper transactions only, as they want to keep Tangradi and Killeen in town in case Arron Asham can’t play tomorrow and if Marc-Andre Fleury or Brent Johnson get food poisoning or something.

For what it is worth, and it is nothing official, I called the Coal Street offices today and spoke to my ticket representative Chris and inquired about the December 30 game v. Hershey in Pittsburgh. They (Pittsburgh) bought out the home date from us (Wilkes-Barre) so they (Pittsburgh) control the tickets for the event. Chris had nothing official but said there may be a pre-sale for Season Ticket Holders. Let me repeat that. He had nothing official. So please don’t take my word for it (or his for that matter.) I also inquired about the January 1 game v. Norfolk. He told me that WBS has pushed the AHL hard to get the date moved, but Springfield isn’t budging. That doesn’t make any sense, because you are taking away 400 people who could hypothetically be in Pittsburgh for the Winter Classic instead of in an AHL arena watching an AHL game.

More tomorrow right before the NHL season kicks off with Penguins / Flyers.

A very, very, very candid discussion one post down between you guys regarding who’s right / who’s wrong regarding this Radio Show business. Let’s get the word out there. Lots of views today too. Good. Glad you are here. Bookmark this page on your browser and visit often.

General consensus is that many fans dislike the “sanctions” imposed. You all know where I stand regarding this. I stand behind everything I said below and in the comment sections. The fact that a hack blogger like me has stirred up a debate like this means that I must be doing something right.

In other news from around the East Division, Andrew Hutchinson and Ryan Craig were put on waivers by Pittsburgh. Our friend Joe Depto from the Fourth Period reports that Simon Despres is on his way back to the Saint John Sea Dogs of the QMJHL. Analysis, as always, from Jonathan Bombulie here.

For the Bears, the Capitals assigned Jay Beagle, Mathieu Perreault and Andrew Gordon to Hershey today. Andrew Gordon has to clear by noon tomorrow. I think he will because the Florida Panthers waived Michael Grabner and he was claimed by the New York Islanders. Bears beat writer Time Leone tweeted today that that claiming off of the waiver wire lessens the risk of Gordon being claimed.

While I have eyes here, I did an AHL Preview for all 30 teams a few weeks ago. Just click the division you’d like to be taken to!

East Division / Atlantic Division / North Division / West Division