redwing77

I still don't understand what makes Fairbanks a better recruiting locale than Anchorage.

While we're in ridiculous talk: We boot UAA out of the WCHA, add Penn State. UAA admitted to CCHA to rival with UAF. It would be awesome because then we can have an Eastern team in a Western conference.

Yes, GB is the team to beat in the NFC North, but it's not going to be a cakewalk for them even in conference. Favre can pull wins out of his ass (one of the things that makes him a HOF QB) so I think Week 1 proves nothing. Brandon Jackson is a HUUUUUUUUUUUUUGE question mark. He, too, has injury history in college and the pros. There are some RBs out there, but I don't see GB going out and getting one. I thought Denver beat them to the punch. Maroney was cheap-ish and if the Pack does as predicted, that's going to be a late 4th rounder (I think it was a 4th rounder) anyways. I wouldn't panic if I'm the Packers until after this weekend. If Jackson does alright, then you address depth. If he doesn't or he gets injured, then panic sets in. As for the Vikings, the NO game was just one you look for glaring errors and work to fix it. I never though the outcome was in doubt. The Vikings played very poorly in their secondary and in their offense. They'll need to step it up if they wish to succeed, but they will. They have to. This is it. THE season for the Vikings. After this season, Favre flakes out and signs with the Chiefs (where every HOF QB goes to fade into the sunset...see Montana and I think even Young) and the Vikings are left with Childress and TSuck/Webb. Childress is alright provided he doesn't make ANY calls on either side of the ball and hires future head coaches to do the work for him and adjust at half time accordingly... wait.. Why is Childress employed again? Nevermind. Anyways, this is the year folks. After this, it is mediocrity at best despite Rice, Harvin, Peterson, etc.

So my understanding is to abandon the WCHA, align with DU and CC and then attempt to woo other teams like Notre Dame. Cool! So.... when the pick and choose conference is formed and we're in a conference where, basically, every player will have enough frequent flyer miles to take a trip from Grand Forks to China every year or two, will they reconsider in order to.. you know... make travel costs.... less than incredibly unrealistically expensive? Travel expenses... Think about it. You want to help pay for it? We will. They'll be part of the entity known as..... TICKET PRICES and Merchandising. No thanks. The WCHA won't be as badly affected as the CCHA, but to try to pick and choose will be ridiculous. The "non BTHC" powerhouses that remain are DU, UND, Miami, and Notre Dame really. This is dumb to align with despite its strength (and I know I pontificated adding Miami). The issue is with the CCHA. If the BTHC is formed, the CCHA is left with 8 teams. What will they do? Will they try to go back to a 10 team conference and add UAH and perhaps target a stronger AHA team like Niagara?

No. The only way the NC double nickel ever cracks down on the Fighting Irish is if they start losing money hand over fist. Even with the bad seasons they've had, they're still a very marketable team. Money talks to the NCAA. Just like if UND was FBS in football (playing in a BCS Autobid conference) and brought the same or similar kind of income for the NCAA as FSU, CMU, or Notre Dame, I doubt we'd be having this discussion.

Doesn't mean anything but... Moncton has a goaltender that measures 5'1" tall! Holy crap! He must be a stand up goaltender. If he went down in the butterfly, 3/4ths of the net would be open.

I believe Douple didn't have much stake in it either way BUT.... by sticking his nose into this, he gets him and his league into the news, even if it is on a small scale. His name is now attached to this event. It's a power and fame thing. He can now say he was part of something "big"

82 - Thanks for the perspective. However, it wasn't "my poll." It was a poll put on by some joker on ESPN Radio. And it is just a backup QB, but a backup QB is just 1 hit away from becoming the #1 for a period of time. You may not feel the same way, but I'd feel much better with Sage backing up Brett than TSuck. Regardless, though, this whole season is looking to Brett. The Vikings are NOT deep. Vincent Jackson is a pipedream. He is too expensive for what you get for him and I didn't realize that there was the extra 3 weeks in there (I knew about the initial one). Oh well. MadScout - I don't know how true it is, but the jokers at ESPN Radio called him raw. In fact, my quote was almost word for word with what they said. Watched the game from start to end and here's my observations: 1. Any Vikings fan should love the last 2 minutes of the game. The commentators spend the entire time giving excuses as to why the Vikings lost this game. To counter here's my excuses: Had that WR caught the ball, had the Saints had a kicker, the score would have been higher by 13 points in favor of the Saints. So.... apart from a blown point after and I believe one errant TD pass, the Saints would have won regardless. 2. The Saints offensive line is good. 3. The Saints playbook was weak. They exploited the weak secondary of the Vikings at will in the opening possession and then simply stopped. They changed to a short game there after and didn't really do much to try to stretch the field again. 4. The pass secondary was awful for the Vikings. If that's what to expect, then they're going to need special performances by the D-Line to not get themselves big pass played into oblivion. 5. Favre looked mediocre. This is mostly because Favre is an old flake. Had he reported to camp earlier (ankle truly allowed rather than speculatively), this may not have been such a problem. 6. I'd like to say they missed Sidney Rice but look: They're only down one WR and are otherwise healthy on offense. They weren't as crippled as the commentators made them out to be. 7. Peterson did a pretty decent job overall. 8. Not impressed with Berrian (MIN) or Bush (NO) 9. That Thomas kid on New Orleans is pretty good. Not great, but good. 10. Some hilarious calls during the game. Maybe I don't understand offensive pass inteference, but Shankoe (sp?) didn't really interfere with the NO player when the ball was no where near where the infraction took place. Also, the false start call on Brees was hilarious. He did the exact same thing every single snap and the official decided to call him for it on one of them. 11. The Saints won't repeat if they continue to play like this. They'll make the postseason for sure, but they won't repeat. 12. The Vikings will hold a winning record but otherwise won't do anything special at this rate. They still may make the postseason because apart from Green Bay, the NFC North looks pathetic again. Flame away.

I found a nice review of NHL 2011 here.

Rosenfels didn't do too badly this preseason (albeit most of it against STL) but they traded him to the Giants for whatever... draft picks. TSuck got booed at times this preseason...as he should. He was mediocre at best. Looking purely at numbers (so it is flawed but bear with me), Rosenfels played better. In the useless stat poll (the same one from a different source that ranked Kevin McHale as the NBA's #1 best GM a few years back), ESPN radio reported that, of all the Backup QBs in at least modern NFL history (and the commentator perhaps it was Mike&Mike or Mass of Bovines (aka Cowherd)) Rosenfels ranks #3 behind Jim Kelly's backup and the backup that played for the Dolphins in the 70s. Worthless, but who cares. In any case, it was clear to see that the three QBs for the Vikings are thus: 1. Favre - ESPN's God QB (until heir apparent Tim Tebow takes over for the Broncos) 2. TSuck - Chilly's boy 3. Webb - Was described by analysts as "a raw project that doesn't know up from down yet as far as the NFL is concerned" Let's just hope Favre doesn't get injured. Well... truth is... even with Rosenfels where he should be (#2 behind Favre), it doesn't matter. If Favre goes down the season's pretty much over anyways. Since their WR Corp is so stellar with Harvin's head hurting and Rice out with a bad hip, the Vikings also decided that paying TJ Housmenzadah $855K was too pricey. Especially for a WR that averages about 75-80 catches a year. No, he's not a #1 WR, true, but someone that would have looked good in Purple. Will they shove their noses in the air towards Vincent Jackson too? Jackson will be unquestionably more expensive than TJ. He's a big target and a deep threat as well. Kindof intriguing. My point is: For $855,000 and with 1 WR on the shelf and another not at 100%, what's to lose? He's not looking for 10 years $100 million. Feel free to ignore. I don't care. I just find this amusing that's all.

This kids' dad produces tv shows. Could be Brad Miller Time's big break.

DOH! Forgot about their football affiliation. Hmmmm... then the CCHA would need another team to round things out.

Sorry about my earlier scenario. I forgot to say that I assumed Notre Dame would be allowed into the BTHC Despite Delaney's shenanigans. I guess that's not likely to happen. I think it would be neat to have a conference, should the BTHC exist that includes: UND DU CC UMD UNO Notre Dame Miami SCSU Reform the CCHA into: NMU WMU MTU BSU FSU LSSU BGSU MSUM UAA UAF OSU UAH Though I might be forgetting someone... And I admit that the idea is probably more hair brained than my original wild idea.

I don't know why I have this feeling, but when Ebert's name came up and I started reading about him (what I could find anyways), it seemed to me that it was going to be OHL for Ebert... the only way he'd not go is if he didn't like the team that drafted him and even then, it's possible that he could be traded to an OHL team that he did like. I'd love to have Ebert but if he does go OHL, I won't be surprised.

How's this wild idea: BTHC is formed and UMN and UW bolt for it. CCHA starts sinking and teams start looking elsewhere. NMU applies to rejoin the WCHA. Then again, which would be the other school to apply? I think it would be "nice" (if such a wild hair-brained idea should occur) to see if we could nab Miami-Ohio despite the geography issue it would entail. And I think Miami would be responsive to it so they could be in a conference that was still relevant. Anyways, is this wild idea even feasible?

The Big Ten Hockey Conference would hurt the WCHA fairly badly but you're right, it would kill the CCHA. In fact, they might as well drop the first C and reform the CHA from the ruins. HEH. And STILL they'd probably reject UAH.

How much ya wanna bet he goes Major junior? I wouldn't bet on the NCAA. He has major junior written all over him at this point. Is he good enough to go straight from High School/ Elite League to DI?

Is it completion of school work or is it grades? Wasn't Weslosky on the outs because of grades? BTW what ever happened to him?

Funny.... I immediately laughed too. And with the lookers Minnesota gets to play hockey there... Whoooo, I'd buy season tickets too under Rick's scenario.

Hmmm... I could vote for both in this poll....

Geographically and otherwise this makes sense. MSU Moorhead is much better located than Huntsville, AL and has a much more established program... .no wait. Nevermind.

Bowman's on record as saying they had no issues with UMTC. I would if I saw Hill's track record though.

Garth Snow is the only moron.. I mean GM that would do such a thing. I think Leddy was signed for three reasons: 1. Had a great prospect camp 2. Hawks need young talented D in the system asap due to projected salary increases and their current cap situation 3. Leddy is cheap compared to comparable players (playing style wise) already on the market.

Ok, that leads me to this question: What would entice one to go the BCHL route over the USHL route? Is there an advantage to doing so assuming the playing time would be roughly equal?

MPLSBison is sort of like that, but different. MPLSBison comes on here just to rile us up. He may believe what he says, but that's irrelevant. He knows we are an emotional, passionate, fanbase when it comes to this issue (among others) and uses that to gather entertainment. If we posted how our eyes fool us into believing that the sky is blue and it really is, in fact, green, MPLSBison will go on how it is actually more purple simply because it would aggravate us. He's a bully, in effect, without really using personal attacks. He can get away with it because, in a black and white context, he really hasn't violated any of the rules of the board. Doing what he's doing here makes him happy. In a way, he could use it for bragging rights. Talking about how trolls like GrahamKracker have come on this board (among others) but couldn't stay unbanned while accomplishing what he has accomplished. He has posters here ready to quit the board over him. For a bully, that's a big success. I'm sure, if there was a legal way for him to convince us that, by rooting for the Sioux, we are all morons and should all go play in I29 traffic, he'd go ahead and do it, claiming that his purpose was enlightenment and not animosity. The proverbial trying to shake our hands with one hand and flipping us off with the other. The reality is this: The Nickname is changing. Once the nickname has changed, UND's non-hockey sports will be in a conference. Once that happens, a need for this part of the forum goes away.... and MPLSBison is left without a venue for his statements. The key really is to ignore him. And I admit I haven't done an especially good job of it. And I admit it also is very hard to do so. But everyone who leaves because of him, puts down JimDahl over him, and argues with him, basically fuels MPLSBison's happiness. He's a sad man in the fact that he so enjoys coming on here and acting in such a way. But he's found a loophole and he's exploiting it.