It Gets Old Fast

(MONDAY evening updated Midnight)
Call him the show stealer by 2011 2nd rd NYI Scott Mayfield 2 assists including on game winner to help USA (White) to a come from behind 5-3 win over Finland. NYR 2011 1st JT Miller and NYR 2011 5th Shane McColgan scoreless but good accounting)

I was wondering when Paul Kelly the head of College Hockey, Inc would show up for his annual "The CHL pays players" tirade. And once again Kelly did not disappoint us with his always expected accusation against the 3 CHL leagues.

During July, 9 prospect/players who had originally planned on attending an NCAA college backed out to play instead in the Canadian juniors. Is it right or is it wrong is going to depend on which side you want to believe.

Neate Sager over at Buzzing the Net sums it up best when he writes:

No doubt this has been said before on BTN, but the endless blame game doesn't really serve College Hockey, Inc.'s cause. That's not meant to let anyone in junior hockey off the hook, but let's be realistic and admit recruiting is cutthroat.

And it doesn't when Paul Kelly pulls this tirade out:

“As much as the CHL denies it, there are still instances where money is being paid to the family to lure kids away and de-commit from colleges,’’ Kelly said. “It’s off the books, under the table, whatever you want to call it. If your dad is a fisherman, an out-of-work machinist, or a farmer, and a CHL program comes along and offers you $300,000 in cash, it’s tough for these families not to accept that type of proposal.’’

OK if you want to make the accusation then show us an example of who is taking under the table money. Really if this is happening then the IRS or it's Canadian counterpart would love to know who is cheating on their taxes.

See we hear this accusation on almost every single occasion when Paul Kelly speaks but we are still waiting to see some actual proof. In the meantime, it is rather funny to hear someone representing NCAA hockey crying about under the table money when in NCAA basketball as well as NCAA football have a couple of highly ranked programs (like the school right down the road from us Oregon) find themselves under investigation for possibly paying for football recruits.

Now if we can discover NCAA programs that are suspected of cheating how come nobody seems to be able to find the CHL teams that are? I would love to see which CHL team can afford to pay one player 300,000 to play for them.

This is not the NHL where you can see teams playing in front of 15-20 thousand fans a night but rather 2-3 thousand for most CHL teams. Not to mention that if 1 player is getting money it would be hard to hide it from the rest of his teammates who would also be wanting money to play there.

If you want to tell us that summer time defections are hurting college hockey then yes we can see that and can sympathize as we are not 100% cool with it either. As we have said before the system is broken and yet all Paul Kelly can do is blame the CHL and not offer up any possible solutions to this problem.

And can we ask how come Paul Kelly is all over the CHL for supposedly paying players under the table and yet he is not saying word 1 about the NHL? Like why is recruits turning their backs on letters of intent a problem and early departures of experienced players is not?

Seriously Paul why are you not trashing the New York Rangers for giving their 2011 first round pick JT Miller a contract less than a month after he turned his back on North Dakota to play in the OHL. Miller's entry level deal according to CapGeek shows no performance bonus for his first year but salary/signing bonuses of 92,500 a year.

Now see there you can possibly make a case that Miller is being paid by the Rangers to play in the OHL but that is not who Kelly is accusing of wrong doing. Matter of fact you almost never seen anyone upset with the NHL for luring college players out of school early.

In this article on Wisconsin Badger hockey's battle to keep their players from jumping to the CHL that nobody says word one about the NHL. Wisconsin losing recruits to the CHL is one thing but the Rangers lured not only Ryan McDonagh (scheduled to be team captain) but Derek Stepan too.

McDonagh was going to be Wisconsin's captain if he had returned for his senior year and Stepan was Wisconsin's leading scorer. Silly us but we kind of think that losing McDonagh and Stepan would be hurt much more than losing freshmen.

Yes the system is broke but Paul Kelly what you should be doing rather than screaming about CHL paying under the table (unless you wish to offer proof) is getting the NCAA to change their rules that are a big part in why NHL teams (supposedly) do not want their players attending.

Change the rules so a 16 year old kid who plays all of 20 minutes in an exhibition game have his scholarship pulled but also lose an entire year of eligibility. See that Paul to us is a big reason why the CHL can lure kids to play up there not those 300G payments.

Game Action

As this is being written Team USA's White team with Ranger prospect JT Miller and Shane McColgan were taking on Finland in an exhibition game up at Lake Placid. Both Ranger prospects have had good showings during this summer evaluation camp.

Miller has 2 goals during the inter-squad scrimmages and it was McColgan's shoot out goal which won the series for their Team White.

We will update this post game if either player does something that stands out.

Cross Off Pashnin

Laurie Carr of Beyond the Blueshirts reports that CSKA Moscow has resigned 2009 7th round pick Mikhail Pashnin to a reported 2 year extension.

Not a huge loss for the Rangers but can understand Pashnin counting the number of defensemen in the Ranger system and choosing to remain in Russia.

But the difference between a good blogger and a bad blogger is that if someone has a story posted out first that person deserves their rightful due as Ms Carr does. It is not at all cool for someone to almost word for word copy what was posted and not give the author credit.

That kind of stuff makes it harder for all bloggers to be taken seriously and gain media credentials. Sorry it is a serious breach of journalism etiquette that goes on way too much.


(Miller courtesy of NHL Media)