The Weekly Roundup - October 4th , 2010

Flames star in: General Hospital


The line-up at the Flames infirmary ward is getting longer by the second. All that talk about being over the cap to start the season has gone out the window as the Flames will have more than enough players placed on the Long Term Injured List, making their salary void against the cap. Daymond Langkow (neck), Matt Stajan (Shoulder), Ales Kotalik (Knee), David Moss (shoulder), and Ryan Stone (Knee) are also out indefinitely and have no time table for a return.

You can also add Adam Pardy to the list temporarily as he left Sunday night’s game with an eye injury.

Once faced with too many centers, the Flames now have not enough, as only Jokinen, Backlund, Conroy, and rookie Stefan Meyer are the natural centers left on the team. With all the injuries, the thought of Meyer starting the season with the big club has become a very realistic possibility. He has impressed in camp and has the size that Jon Rheault (just sent down) does not. If Flames fans know nothing else, it’s that Sutter likes bigger players.

Side Note: How good is Backlund looking these last couple games? He centered Iggy and Tanguay on Friday night and picked up two assists, while last night, playing with Hagman and Bourque, he looked great. He is reading the play much better and you can almost see the confidence grow in his game each and every night. Could a first round pick for the Flames actually pan out the way fans and management have hoped? Fingers are crossed.

The Weekly Roundup- September 7th, 2010

From the latest news on the Flames to Americans blaming violence on hockey, here is the latest Weekly Roundup!

Giddy Up!

Langk You Very Much

• It looks like Daymond Langkow is back skating and could be ready for the start of training camp, which surprised a lot of people in Calgary. With Langkow near 100% healthy, this could axe the thought of storing his contract on the Long Term Injury Reserve, thus forcing the Flames to make a move. Ken King mentioned that he thinks they will move a defenceman. (In case you missed it, King responded to my blog on Thursday, here is the link to that blog :http://www.thesportsroundup.com/2010/09/ken-king-respondsquickly.html) This should mean that training camp will be an all out war.

• Prediction: Cory Sarich won’t be a Flame when the season begins.

The Weekly Roundup

We are introducing a new segment to The Sports Roundup entitled ‘The Weekly Roundup,’ or TWR for short. These weekly briefings will ‘roundup’ the week that was in sports and break down any stories that interest our readers. Feel free to comment, suggest, bicker, or criticize any of our posts because we want to hear from you.

So without further ado, it’s time to roundup the wagons, the horses and all of your cattle because here we go!

Giddy-up!

Old Man River


• In Flames land this week, the Flames re-signed Craig Conroy to a two way contract. An insurance deal for the Flames, for a 38, soon to be 39, year old center who scored all of three goals last season. With Langkow injured and unlikely to start the season, the move gives the Flames a veteran presence at the pivot position. He is 9 games away from reaching 1000 career NHL games. This signing gives the Flames six natural centers - Langkow, Jokinen, Stajan, Conroy, Stone, and Backlund- under contract. Stone, Backlund and Conroy are all two way deals.

The Blue Jay Way

The Toronto Blue Jays have just won three in a row and four of their last five games. They also just extended their winning streak over the worst team in baseball, the Baltimore Orioles (31-70), with their 12th consecutive ‘W’ over the hapless O’s.

The Jays lead the league in home runs with 155, 20 more than the 2nd best team; the Boston Red Sox.

Jose Bautista leads the league with 30 dingers, 4 clear of the next best challenger.

On the flip side, they rank 26th in team batting average and 3rd last in the AL, only ahead of Seattle and Cleveland. Subsequently, they rank 27th in on-base percentage.

So either the Jays are touching every base or not touching any of them at all.

They sit with an adequate record of 53-49, 12.5 games back of the division leading Yankees and 10.5 games back of the wildcard leading Rays with roughly 60 games remaining.

Playoffs are a goner, right? Not so fast.

At this time last year, the Jays were 4 games under .500 and 13.5 games back of the division lead. Even if the improvement is slight, it still is an improvement and the team is showing promise.

The Jays upcoming 2 weeks will tell the story one way or another. They face the Yankees, Red Sox, and Rays in back-to-back-to back three game sets, after playing a weekend series with the mediocre Indians. The Rays and Sox are home games for the Jays.

These are the games that are must wins for Toronto. If they ever expect to make the playoffs they will have to learn how to beat these three teams.

The division will not be re-aligned so stop the complaining about Toronto being in the toughest division in baseball. It’s like Darryl Sutter complaining that if the Flames were Eastern Conference they would have made the playoffs. Divisions and conferences will not be changed due to notes in a complaint box saying “Well they have more money than us.”
So, outwork them.

The Rays showed that it was possible through good drafting and savvy managing and they hold the 21st highest payroll in the league; Toronto is 22nd. The AL West leading Rangers are 26th in payroll, yet another example that IT can be done.

In talking about the division, the Jays are playing there key opponents reasonably well this year sporting a 20-16 record inside the East. They have a 26-20 record at the Rogers Centre. They are also 9 games over .500 against right handed pitchers. All of the probable pitchers are right-handers this weekend against the ‘Tribe.’

So if a roll was to begin, it has to start NOW!

I say this all now because, much like death, the Jays selling off their team midway through the season is inevitable. It’s the Blue Jay way; fans have just come to expect it. With the trade deadline approaching quickly, the Jays will probably trade their best hitter Jose Bautista. Ironically, he will probably be in a Red Sox or Yankees uniform if he does get shipped.
I realize that with a team like the Jays it never hurts to have some young talent coming into the system and with Bautista playing ‘out of his mind’ right now it would probably make sense to sell on a high.

I was simply hoping that the Jays brass would potentially look at the glass as half-full and not half empty and try and keep a core group of players in town for a while, allowing them to gel and form a team that could do some damage.

Former GM J.P. Riccardi made so many wrong moves (signing Alex Rios and then giving him away for extra balls is one example), it is hard I am sure for Jays current GM Alex Anthopoulos to find his way out of this never-ending mess of mediocrity.

Hopefully AA can do the job that JP never could, and Blue Jays fans won’t have to suffer much longer than they already have.

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