The Canadian Olympic Hockey Team Roster

I can't even begin to say how many times I have been out and about and heard 'Hey, you're Ogie Oglethorpe, aren't you? What do you think of the Olympic hockey roster?'. 

I find it interesting anyone cares of my opinion on anything hockey-related as I continually finish in last place in any hockey pool I join. Perhaps they want my advice before they go and bet against it. Heck, I probably would too. But in all fairness and critique to my commissioner, dynasty hockey pools suck if you start out losing. 

1st things 1st, I don't care about the Olympics. Not one bit. I'd rather Canada took pride in other, more important things such as leading the world in cancer cures or space exploration or alternative fuel sources or social health or righting economic inequity or the number of rescued dogs and cats than to take pride a Canadian won a medal with a 4 year time limit that states they were Doubles Moguls Half-Pipe Champion or one of the best in 2-man Figure skating, which even I know is 20% skill and 100% politics.  

It's a thing, I saw it on TV so it must be true.

That said, I am Canadian, I am male so I have to have a vested interest in hockey. It's in our Constitution, somewhere near the bottom with an addendum that follows on the back that now includes women's hockey. 

But I need something to write about, so I'm going to go back and review my own predictions for the Men's Hockey Team and see how I did. I wrote about it here, back in August when all of Canada came in from the Lake and watched the roster announcements with bated breath, clutching their Canada flags. These picks were obviously before the TSN/Earth shocking news of Steve Stamkos injury and his super-human attempt to defy the laws of nature and bone structure to return in time for the Olympics. 

So how did I do, Ogie?

Goalies;  

Ogie's picks;

Corey Crawford, Roberto Luongo, Carey Price

Stevie Y's pick;

Luongo, Price, Mike Smith

Are my feelings hurt?  

No. Not true. A little. While the 3rd goalie is really there more for the vacation, it looks as if the Blackhawks Crawford drew the short straw. Perhaps the Vancouver/Chicago rivalry crossed over into Olympic selections. Everyone was confident Luongo would be in there, despite giving up that last minute goal in the Gold Medal match against the USA which everyone forgot about thanks to Crosby.  

The Case for Crawford?

Well, he's won more cups than the other 2 combined, consistently goes up against a couple of the world's best players in practice with Hossa, Sharp, Toews and Kane. While he's only #16 in the league in GAA with 2.35, it's right between Price (#14) at 2.33 and Luongo (#17) at 2.38. Smith is way down at (#33) He's won more games than Luongo and Smith and also has a better save %.  

Interesting Fact to Annoy 'That Guy'; 

Josh Harding (#1), Ben Scrivens (#4), Brian Elliott (#7) all have better GAA's than our current Olympic goalies.

Defense;

Have stick, will travel

Ogie's picks;

Shea Weber with Kris Letang
Duncan Keith and Brent Seabrook
Dan Hamhuis w Pk Subban
Dan Boyle         Marc Methot

Stevie Y's picks; 

I never said...forget it...

Duncan Keith/ Shea Weber

Jay Bouwmeester/Alex Pietrolangelo
Marc Vlasic/ Drew Doughty
Dan Hamhuis/P.K. Subban

Extenuating Circumstances?
Yes.

Explain

Kris Letang's injuries this year, which have now upgraded to a 'life-threatening' birth defect guaranteed to open up a spot for someone. The St. Louis Blues' concept of having 3 of their top 9 scorers be defensemen and somehow keep winning despite having Jay Bouwmeester make Team Canada Associate coach Ken Hitchcock look like a misunderstood genius which I'm sure influenced Stevie Y's picks. Not having one player from the Blues on the Olympic team would be a huge shock to the team behind the scenes. Much like it was for Babcock when he realized he had no Canadians on the Red Wings. Could that be why Detroit is slumping this year?

Guy who got screwed;

Brent Seabrook. His +24 is behind only Johnny Boychuk and Francis Beauchemin (also 2 non-invites) for all Canadian defencemen in the NHL and he's 5th in scoring among defencemen. He's won two cups, which is ties him with teammate Duncan Keith and is 1 more than the only other defenceman with a Stanley Cup, Drew Doughty.

Forwards

The Danish national team Women's Team..

Ogie's picks;

Kunitz    Crosby     Stamkos
Sharp      Toews     St. Louis
Neal       Bergeron  Thornton
Getzlaf    Giroux     Marchand
Spares
Richards, Perry, Hall, Eberle

Stevie Y's picks with Mike Babcock's opening game lineups; 

"It's going to be interesting not having
to speak through an interpreter."

Chris Kunitz - Sidney Crosby - Jeff Carter
Patrick Sharp - Jonathan Toews - Rick Nash
Patrick Marleau - Ryan Getzlaf - Corey Perry
Jamie Benn - John Tavares - Patrice Bergeron
Spares
Martin St. Louis, Matt Duchene

Big Surprises;

It was the beard. Just too threatening for Russia and hockey in general.

Definitely Joe Thornton over Patrick Marleau. Joe has the hands of an angel and the beard of a lumberjack while Patrick Marleau has the beard of an angel and at times the hands of a lumberjack. It saddens me that this happened, probably because of the Olympics snub. Jeff Carter has a chance to equal his goal total for 2014, seeing as how he hasn't scored in his last eight NHL games in Los Angeles. Look for him to head to the front of the net for the rebounds and deflections as Crosby looks for Kunitz.

John Tavares was a nice surprise, seeing as how he's been lighting it up recently on the Island in relative obscurity. Plus, since his days in junior, I think most of Canada wanted to see him back competing for something. Marty St. Louis for Steve Stamkos was a no-brainer, giving Stevie Y a chance to redeem himself in the man who is a carbon copy of himself.

Rick Nash. I get it, he's a one man wrecking team, although rumours have dogged him since early in his career the team he wrecks is usually the one he's on. Maybe AV has changed him a bit since taking over in New York. Plus, he was on that last gold-medal winning team so maybe...just maybe...

In conclusion; 

So, out of the 26 possible positions, I picked 16 of them to start for Team Canada. Not bad, but not great, which is why I am writing this blog and am not currently taking calls to be on the Hockey Central panel. 

Although they look more like the All-Star Team of
Air-brushed Bank Managers than hockey experts

Next thing for me to do is load up my roster on EA/NHL and play it out all school.  Old school being of course, auto-play. Now I just need to get me a copy of EA/NHL, a playstation and a few extra hours then I can prove my theory that I am slightly smarter than Mike Babcock, Ken Hitchcock and Stevie Yzerman...sigh...

Oh well, it will all be over in 2 weeks.  

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