Saturday, September 10, 2011

POTG Weekend Headlines, News and Links: Rookies Take to the Ice All Weekend

Today, there will be live, on ice, meaningful hockey in Smashville once again. The rookies hit the ice at Centennial Sportspex as the roster of 12 forwards, 7 defensemen, and two goalies will hit the ice trying to impress the Predators coaches enough to make it to the NHL at some point in their careers.

There are a few players like Ryan Ellis, Craig Smith, Taylor Beck, and Mattias Ekholm who probably will see some time in Nashville this season. A couple of others like Taylor Aronson and Josh Shalla that want to go to Milwaukee rather than back to juniors as an over age player. The rest have their own stories and goals for the camp and season.

Go here for complete practice schedules and rosters that you can print and take with you to the rink.

Also, single game tickets are on sale now for the first half of the Preds season. Go here for details. There are donuts and big times at the Bridgestone for those stopping by.

Make the jump for the rest of the weekend news and links.

In Pred Nation...

Charlie Gillies has a great feature on the last hours of Wade Belak's life at Macleans. It is one of the most complete stories yet.

Smashville 24/7 checks out the new faces for the Preds this season.

The latest edition of the 303:30 podcast features Gus Katsaros and Paul Fenton.

Mattias Ekholm's rookie preview is up at On The Forecheck. The most popular rookie appears to be Joel Champagne. Craig Smith, Robert Slaney,  and Chet Pickard are also featured. This morning he has Jeff Foss, who is one of the older players in camp.

Predatorial speculates on who can make the jump to the Predators this season.

PredsGold takes an historical look at what happened to second round first timers the following season. This is interesting to ponder.

Pierre LeBrun talked to Pekka Rinne while he was at the NHL Media blitz in New York. Pekka's  goal is to get more assists.

Luke DeCock has a look at the battle for Atlanta fans between the Predators and Hurricanes.

Go here for the Milwaukee view of the Preds rookie camp.

The Nashville Predators are seeking owners that may be interested in placing an Arena League Football team in Bridgestone Arena next season. The original version of the Nashville Kats were fun to watch so it would be interesting to see a revival next summer.

Around the NHL...

The latest word from PHT is that the Lokomotiv team will not play this season. A quick re-draft was planned but now has been put on hold. The public memorial service drew huge crows.

Steve Staios is one of the more interesting free agents still available. At 38, I'm sure he hopes to play another year or two.

At the final day of the NHL Media Tour of New York it was revealed that the new catch phrase for the NHL Network will be "where hockey gets hockey." I can hear Pekka saying that now.

Ryan Porth has tn players that are facing make or break seasons.

A documentary about ex-hockey enforcers played at the Toronto Film Festival and is called "The Last Gladiators." It sounds like a dark film that should be interesting to see. I doubt it will make it to Nashville any time soon.

David Backes was named captain of the St. Louis Blues which was the popular choice.

Chris Conner is a player you don't hear a lot about but he is excited to be in the Detroit camp. He was in Las Vegas during the awards show and it was unclear if we were stalking him or he was stalking us. We kept running into each other repeatedly. He seems like a great guy so I hope he does well this year.

Adam Proteau feels that Eric Lindros should be vindicated by recent events involving headshots in the NHL.

Nick Cotsonika gives the opposite view of a no head shot rule.

Derek Zona examines the status of the Edmonton rebuild.

Justin Bourne checks in on the timely topic of player weight.

Craig Button will be producing a monthly series of prospect ranking for the next ten months. Here is the first edition.

Corey Perry paid tribute to the FDNY during the NHL Media tour.

A late signing is Kyle Cuminsky with Colorado came down yesterday.

Zach Parise says that the loss of Travis Zajac will be a big factor with the Devils.

Avalanche fans are having a tribute this morning for ex-Avs who have died in the past week or so.

James "Tapeleg" Gralien has a poll about hockey podcast that should yield some interesting results.

Odds and Ends...

Beetlejuice is going to be "rebooted" with another episode of the '80's classic. I'm not real clear how this will work. That movie was not really one that appeared to be ready for a sequel.

The sky will be falling, or at least will seem that way, when a 6.5 ton weather satellite makes an uncontrolled re-entry into the atmosphere in early October.

This is a different kind of service that lets you rent cars by the hour in urban areas.

More Later...

Buddy Oakes for PredsOnTheGlass

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