Day 1 Training Camp

I sat in jobing.com arena from 9am until past 2:30pm. I have never been so happy to walk out into 100 degree weather before!  really needed to defrost after all that hockey! But it was an amazing 5 1/2 hours. I could not think of a better way to spend a Sunday.

I had high expectations today. I was going to take a ton of pictures and take notes and such so I could write an amazingly awesome blog entry. How did that go? Not a single picture or note was taken. I was way to giddy to see hockey and my boys again.

I did make a few observations though.

1) How is it that Joel Gistedt, Josh Tordjman & Al Montoya were better than Ilya Bryzgalov & Jason LaBarbera combined? I am not sure where all these goalies are going to go. G was looking good as was Tordjman and Montoya. LaBarbera was definitely the worse. He was lucky there are posts or more pucks would be in his net. I have a feeling he is going to SA and Montoya stays up. God, he is horrible. Tell me why we got him again…?

2) Francis Lessard is a tool. I hate him. Seriously, there is no reason to hit players who do not have the puck during training camp. There is really no reason to hit Viktor Tikhonov when he is already down. There is also no reason to run into his head either. You didn’t see big ol’ Mitch Fritz picking on guys smaller than him? OK… that might be a bit unfair as the only one his size is Mathieu Brodeur. Ugh. Francis just needs to go away. Someone said that he is a person we need on our team. Um… no. I don’t mind hits & fights but there needs to be a reason, not just because you want to make a team. Plus last year he talked smack to Doan and Jovo (and then got his ass kicked) but apparently he has NOT learned his lesson. I hope someone takes you out Lessard. You deserve it like no one else. Wow, I can’t believe I spent that much time talking about Francis. He totally doesn’t deserve it…

3) Adrian Aucoin & Taylor Pyatt look to be great additions to our team. Also, Jim Vandermeer looks like he’s got some potential. I need to see some more of him though before I form a thorough opinion on him.

4) Sauer was skating really well again. He was back to his form before he broke his foot. He looks like he will be a force to be reckoned with.

5) Upshall totally got robbed by Gistedt. It was AWESOME. G… I love you even more for that!

6) Vrbata still has some speed and major skills. I hope he doesn’t fizzle out at the end of the year. He has such potential. If he could keep it up all year, he will be a great player for this team.

7) Winnik has short blonde hair. RAWR. We were waiting outside and Vern Fiddler & Winnik come walking up. I am looking at the blonde guy going, “He looks so familiar. Who is it?” Then he turned around and I saw his lack of butt and I knew! I was like it’s Winnik!!! I really like him with the short hair.

8) Tikhonov was the token boy today. Everyone and their mom was hitting him. He either pissed everyone off or he said, “Hey guys… I need to toughen up. Just hit me all day, k? kthnxbye”. Sauer even got a mean face on and went after him in front of the net. Poor Tiki!

Ok, well those are my highlights. There were a handful of new guys that stuck out and then some who I didn’t even notice. The ones that stood out could either skate/score or hit. The scrimmage was pretty rough. It was like watching a real game except no penalties were called (or Francis would have been in the box the whole time). It seems like we may have a pretty good team this season. I was worried about D & goalies. Now I am worried about the goalie situation. I also think we still need a “true” goal scorer. We are getting there but are still a few pieces short.

Hang on Coyotes, this could be an interesting season!

Now I must go see about how my Flyers did today.