mikecgrimes

The college hockey season is just over a week away with exhibition games this weekend. As much as I hate them the Gophers seem to be a pretty clear preseason #1 with North Dakota St Cloud State Michigan and Wisconsin also in the top 10. If you have a full cable sports package and haven't noticed there is a lot of college hockey on TV especially once football winds down at the end of November, beyond that full season packages for both the NCHC and WCHA are available. Put it in other words if you like college hockey it's as available as any other sport at this point. My St Cloud State Huskies come in at #7 in the preseason polls although I think thats a little to high. They are lead by a junior class who has been key to winning the final WCHA title and the first NCHC title including preseason Hobey Baker candidate Johnny Brodzinski (brother of Gopher defenseman Michael Brodzinski). Key losses include Hobey finalist Nic Dowd, defenseman Kevin Gravel and goaltender Ryan Faragher, not to mention top freshman scorer Ryan Papa will miss at least the first half of the season. Sophomore goalie Charlie Lindgren looks ready to step in and more then replace Farangher, but until we see it you never know. I've heard good things about the freshman class and if the last few years are any indication that should mean at least a great player or two. The Huskies play a crazy non conference schedule including #1 Minnesota #5 Union #6 Colgate #15 Quinnipiec with the only break a road series at Bemidji State so they should be ready for a tough conference schedule. Given the schedule I could just as easily see a below .500 record as another Frozen 4 run the difference between the two will be fairly slim. My feeling is Kalle Kossila will be the key, if he's under 35 points we're in trouble, if he's over 45 we should be great.

I came here to post the exact same thing, now .327 and 14 HR's, looks like Rochester could use an upgrade at 1st as they currently are playing 31 year old Ben Nelson who is hitting .243 with 3 HR's.

I'm of the opinion that instant replay and baseball are a perfect fit, because in baseball more then any other sport replay can get 90% of bad calls fixed INSTANTLY. The system in place now of course is anything but that. There are fixes that could improve things between now and a more instant solution, but really for me I just want to see managers go nuts about bad calls again. Lets at the very least do something about the stall tactics before the start of spring training. As for the strike zone thats a simple fix if and when they want to do it although I have no doubt they will find a way to screw that up too.

This would be like a McDonalds employee drinking Pepsi.

Throw Francona out of the game my god thats three times now.

Wow that was a single Jason. I don't care if your blind and have no legs you can't make those mistakes.

At this point wouldn't the Twins be better off playing 5 infielders?

Barlett was looking for the inside the park Grand Slam on that one, I don't care if they have to put Perkins in the outfield yank him right now.

Wait why aren't they playing Crazy Train now?

Please DL at least one of them, I know what day to day means.

Nice work by the Indians audio department playing crazy train even though they called strike 3, that could get the guy ejected by some umps.

A win today would put the Twins in a tie for the 1st Wild Card spot, it's time to start scoreboard watching.

I think someones arm is falling off

Nice to see Plouffe producing without needing to hit it over the fence

Perfectly executed swinging bunt

Maybe he could try chewing gum

If Francon questions a third call without a challenge and I'm an ump I eject him

I'm all for replay to get calls right, but this manager coming out of the dugout to not challenge has to end.

Pfp

Looks like another Pitchers duel. Good thing our bullpen is solid.

If guys like Colebello Suzuki and Hicks can hit for any average at all we might be decent. I expect a lot out of Hicks the other two would be huge suprises if they hit .260. The nice thing is Colebello doesn't have to do a lot to equal what Mourneau gave us last year.

Nothing like a big season ticket base and negative expectations. It's amazing the team still sells those cheap seats knowing everyone self upgrades.

2 triples from the Santana kid. Might have a shot at the opening day roster.

If I'm a manager I don't request an instant replay all spring. I really don't want to have to worry that a challenge in a 12-2 spring game will be remembered during the season. And I really don't care about any call in a one run spring game either.

Can't wait to see the first manager go nuts following a 4 minute review. In the case of baseball no reason to review 50/50 calls. Correct the horrible calls without wasting time, this system will not accomplish that.