Team Canada and the various World Cup of Hockey teams named the rest of their rosters today.
For Oilers fans, there was good and bad news.
The Mighty Nuge
The good news? RNH was named to Team North America. The Nuge did not have a good year last year, but as a defensively responsible centre on the verge of regaining the offensive prowess he showed as a rookie, I think this is a great add. I’m not overoptimistic or biased at all, nope.
As an added bonus, we now get to see RNH with McDavid, Eichel, and Auston Matthews. That he’s on the team with those guys is a good reminder of just how young he still is!
Team North America just became my ‘cheer for’ team! How about you?
I’ve Hallen and I Can’t Get Up!
The other side of the coin is that P. K. Subban, Taylor Hall, Kris Letang, and Corey Perry were not named to Team Canada. Instead, Giroux (after surgery and a lousy playoff campaign), Duchene, Muzzin, Pietrangelo, and Marchand got the nod.
In Hall’s case, despite this:
— zach laing (@Loweded) 27 May 2016
And this:
Oh well. I guess consistently being among the top two or three players on the last two gold medal winning Team Canada World Championship teams isn’t enough to overcome the ‘bad in the room’ label, or whatever the hell it was this time.
I mean (as an example), Marchand had a great season, but
Hall has scored 73 points more than him, in 40 fewer games (tweet by @tsimpson76).
Or perhaps it’s because Marchand is better defensively. Or is he? Are you sure about that?
Last 3 years:
With Bergeron 59.3% CF
W/Out Bergeron 47.6% CF(tweet by @Archaeologuy)
Silver lining: Hall will be fresher and healthier for the regular season, and it’s going to be an important one. But still, if I were him, I’d be pissed.
And P. K. Subban left off the team? Not sure there’s a better right handed D in the game today, but hey … prima donna or whatever the excuse was, right?
Interesting factoid: every Team Canada defenseman is from the Western Conference.
USA! USA! IN DEAD LAST! USA!
Honestly though, both of those pale in comparison to leaving Phil Kessel off the Team USA roster. Bad hot dog influence was it?
If Team Canada’s roster was seemingly the work of chimps, the US looks to have hired a group of Kakapos*.
Would it surprise anyone if they finish in dead last? Well, probably. But they’re not very good, that’s for sure.
The Best of the West for the Rest (or something like that)
In other news, I’m happy for Ales Hemsky, who was named to the Czech team. And still scratching my head over Korpi for the Finns.
You can find the full list of rosters here: http://www.tsn.ca/2016-world-cup-of-hockey-rosters-1.446950
As for these often strange roster decisions overall, I like Manny Elk’s summary on this one:
This has been your seemingly daily reminder that “as smart as an NHL exec” is a low bar.
— Emmanuel Perry (@MannyElk) 27 May 2016
Feel free to voice your outrage (or your approval) in the comments section!
About the Kakapo … I have no idea if this is true (it’s hardly a reliable source), but it’s a hilarious description:
These flightless parrots are absolutely adorable, but because they evolved in an area with no predators and ample food, they had no reason at all to develop their brains. Without a reason to work on a defense strategy, the kakapo has defaulted to an absolutely horrible method of defense. If you scare it, it will either hold completely still, or climb up a tree and then jump out –but since it can’t fly, it merely lands in a pathetic heap on the ground.
(from http://www.neatorama.com/2012/09/26/Four-of-the-Worlds-Dumbest-Animals)
I think Armstrong has made a lot of mistakes in his choices and predict that Team North America with all the Kids will do better then Team Canada AND they will beat Canada in the round robin
I hear ya BC! I’d love to see that.