Poor, Poor Hannu

I personally don’t see why the Blues don’t bring Toivu back for next season if he pulls his shit together for the remainder of this one. Is he a RFA after this season? What are the Blues options, just hoping someone else signs him and getting compensated or trying to trade him? Someone enlighten me.

I too think Ears deserves another look. His confidence has apparently been shot to hell, but if he can pull it together here in the end, I see no reason to just dump him. He’s still very young. Most goalies doesn’t “get into their own” before they’re 25-27 or thereabouts.

this is a tough one. but after watching bishop’s first game i’m all for keeping hannu. he’s shaken. is he shaken as bad as ankiel was after he started imatating a freakin’ movie character? that’s the big question. maybe it’s wamsley? after all, his protege in columbus started playing better after he left comlumbus. but definitely the blues have played most of the season without much confidence in this kid since the colorado game. hell, how many future hall fame goal scorers with great wrist shots and snap shots were left wide open in the low slot that game?

all in all he’s got size, quickness and agility. so he has those tools. he does not have yet the mental tool. he has odd points of weaknesses and one of the more frustrating ones to me for big goalies is giving up the short side because they go down. personally i think bigger goalies should use their size more to their advantage and lessen the butterfly to different situations.

all of that said, sign him if you can to a cheap two-way three year contract. if that’s still possible then you might win out. if not bury him in alaska. the same goes for merek. if for the second year in the row the kid’s not going to play the majority of the games send him down another level and let him get regualr starting goaltending time.

bishop, well i saw his first start so maybe that doesn’t count so much, i mean the kid had to be nervous as hell.

I don’t see any reason to just dump Ears. There’s no way he’ll ask for big money on his next contract, so the Blues should be able to get him back on the cheap.

Chris makes an interesting point about Wamsley. It’s something to think about, anyway…

B.

My only comment is about his first name. Hannu is it? That just seems like something you’d name your pet female dolphin. Start him the rest of the year? Sure, why not. Sit him on the bench the rest of the year? That too is OK with me.

http://msn.foxsports.com/nhl/story/7931058/Blues-will-need-to-rebuild-in-off-season

pretty much stuff everyone knows but…

Legace is signed through next season, but Toivonen is a restricted free agent and management has to decide if they should gamble on the latter, find a more suitable backup or perhaps shop for a more capable starter

um. we are thinking about replacing a signed legace with someone better?!? like…….. um who would be avaialbale hasek?!?

side note, im not sure about the ears love. he has positional problems, 5 hold problems (mostly due to crappy stick work) glove hand problems, and now confidence problem. that is a lot to resign just o hope gets fixed.

Please tell me more about Bish’s pro debut!

The risk is if Manny gets hurt for any significant length of time in 08-09.
The limitation is the fact that my expectations for next year mirror those I brought into this year — hover near the 8th playoff spot and maybe squeak in and maybe steal a round.

Let’s be frank – we aren’t hoisting next year.

I’m comfy with whatever the braintrust decides — keep/jettison Hannu, extend Manny, use the Schwartz as a backup – has he really washed-out? – even Becks-Tsu. If I were to decide, I’d make a qualifying offer to HT.

I loved the “Don’t bother me, I’m resting” caption.

Poor Ears.

i’ll reserve judgement on toivonen’s abilities in game until we put an nhl caliber team on the ice in front of him. Only for the fact that manny has played like a vezina candiate for most of the season did we even look like a borderline playoff team. It’s not hannu’s fault this team and its coach are terrible. I can tell you from my limited time watching schwarz, that I am much more comfortable with hannu’s talent level in net than schwarz’s.

it’s a good idea to go ahead and start Ears most of the remaining games if not all, and see if he can get his shit together. he did relatively well against Ottawa’s superoffense considering what he’s done (or lack thereof) against lesser skilled teams.
if he does relatively well, then keep him on for next year.
if he crumbles again, let him go. he would probably be better off going back to Finland and playing in a league there.

Good God. Those pictures just tell me Hannu gets scored on more then Phyllis on “Backdoor Saturdays”. Yikes!

I agree, put Manny on the shelf for the rest of the season, maybe get a head start on that surgery that he may or may not have, and start Ears for the rest of the season. I’d like to see him start the next game for sure. He played pretty well over all, and it would be a good idea to see how he “bounces back” after a loss.