July 30, 2014
Dobber
2014-07-30
The third annual Fantasy Football Guide is now out. Pick it up and enjoy – or buy it here if you haven’t yet. Just $5.99 for another week or so.
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I’m pretty confident in saying that the nightmare is over. The site is up, the database changes that were needed are in, and I have contacts among the experts in various fields (web programming, database, etc) who I can contact quickly if something goes wrong. There were some settings on the server that were not ready for the upgrade that I did last week, and I also made a small adjustment that I shouldn’t have. Live and learn. But we’re full steam ahead now with all sites. Still some minor stuff (such as the ‘view full site’ text in the mobile platform is unclickable – and the main page is not putting the headlines in the right order), but I’ll chip away at that stuff after the Fantasy Guide is out.
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The DobberHockey event Tuesday night was a lot of fun. I got to meet a handful of readers, and it was also nice to meet Justin Goldman in person after seven years of phone/ Skype/email conversations. I didn’t get too many pictures, but I was able to grab a couple that you can see here.
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One thing I learned from Goldman (among many) – Keith Primeau‘s son is one of the best ’99 goalies in the country (U.S.A.)
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Jake Gardiner signed a big five-year deal worth $20.25 million. That’s an “I’ll never scratch you again” deal. That’s an “I’ll never play you less than 18 minutes again” deal. We’re going to see a lot of Gardiner this season and it’s going to equate to 40+ points.
That was also a “We’re trading Cody Franson ASAP” deal.
Would Gardiner’s old partner from college (Justin Schultz) get a similar deal? More? Less?
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Peter Mueller is back in the NHL! Or so says his agent. What Dobber says is “Peter Mueller is going to the AHL!”
Why he signed for a two-way deal with St. Louis is beyond me. I would have signed back in Switzerland if I were him. As I noted on Twitter yesterday, if we assume that there are 11 “locks” on the Blues (and that includes names like Reaves and Lapierre), then there are four players looking for those last two spots – Mueller, Magnus Paajarvi, Joakim Lindstrom (who is on a one-way deal), Chris Porter and Dmitrij Jaskin. Does Mueller stand a chance? Yes – if four forwards get injured.
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Mikael Samuelsson has decided to wind down his career back home, signing a contract to play in Sweden. NHL teams weren’t really knocking on his door, unless it was to sell him season tickets.
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Jerry D’Amigo signed a one year two-way deal with Columbus. I think he’s capable of working a checking line at the NHL level, but with Columbus he is on the outside looking in.
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As I noted Monday, Jimmy Hayes has no leverage. He was wise to sign a cheap contract with Florida, just to ensure that it’s a one-way deal. He signed for $925,000. I don’t expect much from him this season on this deep team.
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The Wild signed their checking line player Justin Fontaine to a two-year contract. Despite decent AHL numbers, he has no future as an NHL points producer.
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The Jets signed Michael Frolik to a one-year contract worth $3.3 million. After this season, he becomes an unrestricted free agent. So lots on the line for him to put up big numbers. And Coach Paul Maurice is under a bit of pressure to play him on the second line, given that contract. I like his outlook for a five or 10-point improvement this season.
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If I’m Devin Setoguchi‘s agent, and my I.Q. was higher than 60, I would crawl into the office of Pittsburgh GM Jim Rutherford and beg him to offer a contract for the NHL minimum. If you want a giant contract in the future, this would be the only way to get it. Play with Sid or Gino.
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Did you see this from Tomas Jurco?
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The Top 10 assists of all time