DEADLINE THOUGHTS AND WORLD JUNIORS

Thank you all for your participation on my last post. The intent of this blog it to give you the chance to discuss and talk about the team in a constructive manner. I know that not everyone will always agree and that is ok. No matter what side of the fence you are on, one thing is tremendously clear…we all care.

As we all know the MJHL trading deadline passed at midnight on Sunday night and in my opinion, the Flyers are a better team after the deadline then they were before. This year was very different when you compare it to other years. Usually the brain trust of the team is huddled in the office burning the midnight oil and drinking cold Tim Horton’s coffee right up until the stroke of midnight. That was not the case this year.

After the December 1st roster cut down deadline the Flyers had 21 players on the roster and 4 available cards in which to fill before yesterday’s trading deadline. They added Matt Loopkey right after the Christmas break. They traded Caleb Suderman to Neepawa for T.J. Ahvenniemi and Graham Fast last week and then added Erik Soderlund early yesterday evening. So the trading was spread around a little bit and a little less stressful then waiting for the 11th hour.

Losing a guy of Suderman’s caliber is tough, but we have already seen that the guys the Flyers got in return are no slouches either. In his first 2 games, Fast has 5 points, Ahvenniemi has proven to be a great skater, a good puck moving guy, and has the ability to stir it up a bit in the corners. Loopkey seems to be up to his old ways that made him co-rookie of the year last year with the Flyers. And all I know about Soderlund is that he is huge. He was playing on a very, very deep team in Vernon. The Vipers are arguably one of the best teams in the country and are obviously loaded for a run this year. That sometimes leaves good players without a place to play and I think that is one of the reasons that the Flyers were able to get him. If he is as advertized then the Flyers blue line will be a little scarey once Jordan Peters and Troy Kliever come back from injury.

After looking and what the rest of the teams in the Addison Division did at the deadline there is no reason to believe that the Flyers can’t come out of their division this season.

As promised before I had the opportunity to head back to the Promised Land (Saskatchewan) over the Christmas break and got to take in some of the World Junior Hockey Championship in Saskatoon. Back in 1990 when the tourny was in Saskatoon my dad bought two tournament passes. He went to every game and me and my brother got to alternate. Just so happened that I got to go to the opening ceremonies and the final game where Canada beat Russia for the gold. It was interesting to sit there (this time) and wonder which of these players were going to go on and be superstars, cause last time I was at the tournament Trevor Kidd, Eric Lindros, and Pavel Bure were on the ice. I got to go behind the scenes thanks to my brother-in-law who was one of the in-house camera operators and needed an “assistant”. So I volunteered. Being an assistant camera operator if a very hard job. It involves many hours of….ah who am I kidding. I just got to sit there and watch the game haha. I worked one game and watched Canada beat Switzerland 6-0 on December 28th. Here are a few of my pics. And a big thank you to Josh. You are my favorite brother-in-law on the Friesen side of the family.
p.s. (he is the only one)

JAMES DUTHIE AND BOB MCKENZIE JUST WATCHING THE GAME

WHAT A NICE SMILE! (i think he is thinking of jennifer hedger)

BOB DEEP IN THOUGHT

BEHIND THE SCENES AT THE TSN DESK

HAHA BOB IS HUNGRY

RIGHT BESIDE MY SEAT
(this is the reverse isolation shot camera, he has a list of players that he has to follow for isolation shots. he doesn't get to watch the game itself...just follows a single player around the whole time....kinda neat)

GIGANTIC CANADA FLAG BEFORE THE GAME STARTED

GORD MILLER AND "MONSTER" PIERRE MCGUIRE

ST. MALO NATIVE AND FORMER WINNIPEG SAINT TRAVIS HAMONIC (it was quit something seeing a guy who i used to see everyday doing flyers games play that the world juniors) READY FOR THE OPENING FACEOFF 6-0 WIN OVER THE SWISSJORDAN EBERLE WAS THE PLAYER OF THE GAME (i think the Flyers were in the running to get him at the trading deadline but just missed...i wish) AND LAST BUT NOT LEAST HERE IS JOSH...THANKS BUDDY