Four Reasons for Concern In Blueland

Yesterday, the outsider gave you Four Reasons The Thrashers Will Do Better This Year. Today, the other side of the coin: Four Reasons for Concern in Blueland. If you're a Thrasher fan, none of these are particularly startling revelations. In fact, some of these have become mantras of sorts for the Blueland faithful.

Four Reasons for Concern In Blueland

Chemistry. We've been down this road before, folks. Remember last year? Jason Williams was supposed to be a talented scorer that was going to center Ilya Kovalchuk to a third round playoff run. Mathieu Schneider was supposed to be not just a mentor to Zach Bogosian, but a quarterback to lead our power play out of sub-mediocrity. Erik Christensen was supposed to anchor our secondary scoring with his little dipsy-do abilities. How many of those guys even came close to fulfilling those expectations (other than Schneider's mentoring of Bogo)?

The Ilya Kovalchuk Three Ring Circus and Big Top. Every arena (but Atlanta's) will have a media mob, frothing at the mouth to disrupt the Thrashers dressing room in any way they can with trade speculation, contract questions, and general stupidity. I don't know if you've noticed, but the rest of the NHL has decided that Atlanta doesn't deserve Ilya Kovalchuk, and would love to see him in any other sweater as soon as fricken possible. If our boys can manage to tune out all of the rampant idiocy, they'll be ok; but, man, those dancing elephants in Montreal can be very distracting...

33 Shots Per Game. That's how many shots against the Thrashers averaged in the 08-09 campaign. -4.6 shots per game. That's the shot differential (per game) for last year's Thrashers (League average? Zero, strangely enough). Of course, these numbers aren't such a worry if you have a solid cut-and-dry number one goalie behind you to... oh wait...

Weasels, Ponies, and Moose, Oh My. The Thrashers goalie carousel continued it's roundabouts last year as Kari Lehtonen was felled by injuries, what, three times? Neither Ondrej Pavelec nor Johan Hedberg could provide consistent relief. Remember that dark night in December when the Bruins lit 'em up for 4 goals in about the first period? Something has to change if the Thrashers are to have any hope of a playoff run. If Atlanta fails in net again this year, it won't be for lack of trying. Check out the list of names invited to camp: Hedberg, Lehtonen, Drew Macintyre, Peter Mannino, Pavelec, and now Manny Legace. Let me say it again: Manny Legace. Some how, some way, one of those FIVE gentlemen must have enough goalkeeping ability to keep the Thrashers in any given game. Right?

Anybody?




Enough pessimism for today. If you'd like to check out some other stuff I've contributed lately, check out these links:

Illegal Curve

Puck Daddy

Goalie Connundrum

From Kevin Allen @ USA Today:

The possible deal that looks more inviting would involve No. 1 goalie Kari Lehtonen. He's a very talented goaltender, a former No. 1 pick. He's big, mobile and has big game potential.

But the Thrashers also have Ondrej Pavelec, who potentially could turn out to be as accomplished as Lehtonen.

If the Thrashers decided to deal Pavelec, he hasn't been around enough to command a hefty return. But if the Thrashers trade Lehtonen, they could probably land at least two good young players.

Wouldn't Lehtonen be a good fit with the Kings' young talent in Los Angeles? He could possibly be a good fit in Ottawa or maybe Colorado or a couple of other teams.

The point is simply that there would be a market for Lehtonen and the Thrashers could land a strong return.

That's at least something to ponder, particularly because he will be a restricted free agent after this season.

I like Kevin Allen. He's never been one to trash the Thrash just cause it's cool, and he's never suggested contracting the entire Southeast Division* - just a very even, very knowledgeable hockey writer.

But I think he's wrong here.

What if we created one of those "goalie controversies" that we hear about from other, more established franchises? What if we kept Kari, but mixed it up occasionally with Pavs? Is the Pony ready for that kind of gig? What would we then do with Moose? Hmmm....

I'm not sayin... I'm just sayin....

*I know he was just joshin.... still rankled some folks.... wasn't very nice...