Stuart and Primeau Are Flames

Dang. I didn't see this one coming.

I was hoping for an Oilers/Bruins trade for selfish reasons- I like all the players involved and wanted to keep rooting for them. Now that's over and done with. I can no longer love Brad Stuart, and my sister Liz has lost her favorite player, Wayne "Vince Vaughn" Primeau (and yes, that is why she loves him). In addition to that, this was another pretty bad trade for the Bruins. It wasn't horrible, but they could have done a lot better. People are saying that Andrew Ference will replace Brad Stuart, and at the same time saying that Calgary has improved its defense. Stuart is better than Ference. While Ference is signed for a while (the most redeemable part of this trade), he is not equal to Stuart, and this fact causes the trade to make less sense. To equalize things, Chuck Kobasew would have to be a large upgrade over Vince Primeau. There are a few reasons why I don't think that's the case. The first is that Vince is more valuable than people realize. He kills penalties and is excellent defensively, but the Bruins have also occasionally had him out on the power play, standing in front of the net. And you know what? He was good there. He had success on the power play. Vince has shown flashes of being able to do more offensively than he has, which leads me to believe that, to help his defensive game, he curtails his offense. I'm not saying he could lead the league in scoring "if only", but he isn't just a spare part.

Another reason is that Kobasew is an underachiever. He has the ability to be much better than Primeau and to make the Bruins look a little smarter about this trade, but I don't know if I see that happening. The Bruins are not the New England Patriots. They do not spin gold from straw (or leading receivers from non-starters). If anything, the Bruins are the opposite of the Patriots. Even more than sudden All-Star Brian Rolston, you can look at Joe Thornton, who has been brought up a lot with this trade. While that was a unanimously terrible trade, what people are forgetting is that the Joe Thornton we're seeing now is not the Joe Thornton we saw for years here in Boston. He was always good for us (three times an All-Star) but he was never Hart good. And if you ask anyone in Boston, they'll tell you that he never would have been. Whether the environment was too stifling or if he just needed a kick in the ass, no Bostonian believes that he would have ever gotten to this point on the Bruins. The Bruins breed mediocrity, and Kobasew will not be exempt from that. (By the way, this makes Marc Savard even more surprising. A career underacheiver who had one good season with great linemates? We were all waiting for him to suck. Touche, Marc.)

People will disagree that Vince is more valuable than Kobasew, but have you heard any Flames fans upset about losing him? I haven't heard one fan say, "Oh man, we lost Kobasew! Damn, I really liked that guy." What I've heard them say is, basically, "Fine, take him. Let's see if he scores with you." But people in Boston are upset to lose Vince. He came out every night with hits and energy. He was constantly trying to give some life to his anemic team and chronically disappointed fans. While we acknowledged his limitations, we appreciated the spark he tried to bring. I know I'm going to miss his presence on the ice. So really, who's more valuable?

Of course I haven't mentioned that Primeau is a UFA and Kobasew is signed through next year, but that fact can be cancelled out by the conditional draft pick that the Bruins threw in. I don't know what the conditions are for it, and I don't care. That was stupid. There's also the difference in salaries (the Bruins save $1.6 million), but to the fans here who had to endure Harry Sinden this is only a sign that the Bruins haven't changed. I overheard my mother talking to my uncle on the phone about the trade. She said, "So they're below the cap, and they're still cheating? *sigh* Oh god."

One last thing about the trade- I actually like Andrew Ference coming to the B's. He's a good defenseman and I don't get the feeling that he's going to suck. I just wish that Chiarelli could have done a better job with this.

To stop bashing the B's for a bit, they actually won last night. I missed the game because I was out, but my parents were there and said it was awesome. The shootout went into nine rounds, with Chara eventually winning it. My parents called me and told me while I was trying on this shirt. I freaked out, because just the other night I had wondered wistfully if the Bruins would ever go far enough into a shootout to have to use Andrew Alberts. Unfortunately, this wasn't the night, but it must have come damn close. Anyway, glad to see them win, though they haven't won in regulation since January 6th against the Flyers, and haven't won in regulation against a decent team since they beat Montreal on December 23rd. This is too depressing.

I have tickets to the B's/Oilers game on Tuesday. I have openly admitted this- I'm rooting for the Oil. I'm not going to be upset if the B's win, but I'm very quickly losing all hope in the Bruins' season, while the Oilers, with a little bit of shaking up, can still salvage something. This is too depressing.

Yesterday we lost to Wakefield. We need a tie to make the tournament and only have one game left, against Woburn (better than Wakefield). We were tied 1-1 going into the 3rd period, but due to horrible officiating and shaky goaltending we ended up losing 3-1. Our freshman Lauren, whose nickname should really be "Target" at this point, got hit hard. Upset, she got up and hit the girl back, not as hard and after going for the puck as well. She got called and they got a power play goal to go ahead. I have an intense, bitter hatred for all refs, stemming back to a bad experience I had at age 10. At one point I got cross-checked in the neck and they didn't call it. The girl wouldn't have gotten a penalty at all if she didn't also decide to slap me across the face with her stick. I got my ass kicked a lot. A girl helped me into our net, ribs first. Later, I was down during a scramble in our crease and someone landed on my leg, and now my ankle really hurts. If we don't win our next game, I at least hope I break something or get knocked unconscious, just to add injury to insult. This is too depressing.

Today's games: 3:30 PM-- Avs vs. Stars
8:30 PM-- Oilers vs. Thrashers