Dustin Brown Olympic Sized Observations of our misunderstood Friend

Watching the US Olympic team, mostly on tape delay or Tivo’d, has given me a bit of extra time to focus specifically on Dustin Brown and what he brings to a team and what he brings as a player.

Often criticized for not scoring enough or not being a true leader, watching Browns Olympic play has made me realize that while not being the scoring machine we would have hoped for-Brown has a couple of assets that while often misunderstood are invaluable to any team he plays. While not putting up big numbers during the Olympics it would be a falsehood to say he’s been invisible or not contributing. Here is what I have noticed in the Olympics and how it relates to Browns play in the NHL.

1) Skating Ability/Fundamental Play
2) Clean Hard Play Draws Penalties
3) Willingness to Drive the Net

Skating Ability/Fundamental Play

There are critical times during a game where simply being able to corral the puck, skate it up and dump it in could be the difference between winning and losing. This is the combination of skill set and hockey smarts that pay dividends when the game is on the line. While Brown will never be described as a world class skater like a Doughty or Niedermayer, he has the speed, power, and moves needed to deke when he needs to and power through when called for as well. How many times late in the game in both the NHL and the Olympics have we seen Brown take the pass from a Dman, find the open lane and either attempt to take the puck deep in the zone or simply dump the puck deep all the while maintaining control without the risk of a bad pass or risky play.

To me-this skill is a lot like having a good strong Dman on the PK who can consistently clear the puck. Think Matt Greene-on the PK he is strong enough to muscle players off the puck and 9 times out of 10 when he gets a chance to clear he can bet the puck will be cleared. Brown brings that same type of philosophy in that late in the 3rd defending a lead he as a forward can be counted on to consistently get the puck into the opponents zone-invaluable asset.

Clean Hard Play Draws Penalties

There have been all types of debates whether Browns hard hitting style should be backed up by dropping the gloves more often and getting more chippy in his approach to the game. I understand the argument but disagree.

Brown’s clean, but hard play means he is not going to be assessed the borderline penalty the way a Jerome Iginla or Corey Perry would and to a more brutal extent Sean Avery. Think about it-Brown is not known for dropping the gloves and he is not known for taking a stupid minor penalty when the whistle is blown. You don’t see talking trash, you don’t see him giving a facewash, you don’t see him going out of his way to shove someone with his stick.

Now while I find all of those things entertaining-Brown not taking part in these type of extracurricular acts mean that Officials will often give Brown the benefit of the doubt they would never give other players associated with that type of play. How many times on the Kings did Avery get called for a borderline penalty or given the second penalty to make matching minors even on the rare occasion he didn’t take a penalty? Like it or not Refs know players and players have reputations. Browns hit are for the most part clean-and we would see earlier in his career where he may have been assessed a charging penalty that we really don’t see as much.

Once again, it’s reputation-think Scott Stevens in his last couple of seasons. He was known as a clean, hard players who generally always got the benefit of the doubt as opposed to a player like Chris Pronger who is the polar opposite in the minds of officials. Not to say Brown is without his faults-his penchant for the occasional dive will work against him the same way for the same reasons.

Willingness to Drive the Net

We saw it during the first US-Canada matchup when Brown made a nice move on Doughty and tried to bring it strong to the net. Brown has just enough skill to make the move and give opposing Dmen something to think about while at the same time not going to the well with it every time in which the Dmen are expecting it. For comparison-think how many skilled players will bring the puck over the line and instead of driving to the net, opt for a curl move and wait for the forwards to catch up with the play. Think how many players will enter the zone and simply stay on the boards only to get rubbed out and cough the puck up to opposing team.

Having the ability and skill to go either way makes Brown unpredictable. Using Frolov as a comparison-we all remember Frolov’s sweet backhanded wraparound in the 2002 or 2003 Frozen Fury that beat Roy. We loved it, we thought it was great. Sadly, that was Frolov’s sole move for the nesxt couple of seasons that was so predictable Bob Miller called it regularly well before Frolov even tried it. I’m not criticizing Frolov, simply pointing out having a couple of different tricks up your sleeve and using them randomly is a valuable tool in itself.

As for the Olympics-Brown is his lines token goalie disturber. We have seen it before on the Kings, not to the extent of Ryan Smyth, but we know Brown will stand in front of the goalie and take abuse in attempting to distract the goalie. While Brown was held off the score sheet I counted at least 2 goals that he directly aided and abetted for lack of a better term.

In Summary, while Brown doesn’t bring the high flying skill set and point prowess of a consistent All Star, while Brown doesn’t have the true power forward build and willingness to fight aka Brendan Shanahan, and while Brown doesn’t have elite credentials and hockey smarts like a Pavel Datsyuk; Brown has a combination of all of the above that makes him an invaluable player and more importantly; a key contributor to any teams success.

Kings Outclassed in Goal-Fall 4-2 to Rags

Watched most of tonights game sans the stretch of the 1st period that wasnt shown due to technical difficulties. Here are some thoughts and some breakdown/recaps of the goals and assorted player thoughts.

Rangers 1st goal-just a good solid deflection. A great low shot perfectly deflected. Cant really blame anyone here but perhaps OD could have taken the shooter out of the play or tied his stick up or something. Still small potatoes in the big picture. There are the types of goals scored at the NHL level and barring the goalie making a spectacular save there isnt much you can do about it. Ironically the Kings 1st goal wasn't too all different then the Rangers in a top notch deflection by a skilled forward. I thought Drewiske played very well in the 1st Period.

Rangers 2nd goal was pure unadulterated slop. Ersberg was off all night and this really was the harbinger of things to come. HUG THE POST! After all it's only one of the goalies fundamental plays in those situations. Some could probably quibble about the legality of the review but to me it was a good goal and had it been waived off would have been a huge break for the Kings; that in the end they would have needed but in this case didnt deserve as it looked very much like a good goal to me. Boyle's goal was yet another that should have been stopped. You can of new he was going to score though and if I'm not mistaken that goal turned out to be the game winner. Ironically, Boyle took a lazy hooking penalty that we saw a lot in his couple of cups of coffee with the team and I couldn't but think how humorous it could be had Torterella sent Boyle to the AHL for that play in spite of his GWG.

Jack Johnson showed some amazing skill for the Kings 2nd and final goal of the game. You could see his skating and puck handling skills as he straddled the blue line before launching the shot, but what really showed some NHL moxie was the replay clearly shows before he takes the shot he looks over to a teammate to give the opposing teams players the idea that he is going to pass or at least thinking about. When they talk about player intangibles-well there is one heck of an example. Goal went to Handzus, who was really in the right place right time more then anything else, and I will get into that a bit later.

The Rangers final goal really was the back breaker. Gaborik fires off a nice shot but is from a horrible shooting angle that Ersberg should have had all the way. The Rangers final 3 goals were all pretty much stoppable IMO, and if one had to summarize the game it pretty much came down to skilled Lundqvist outplaying his lee talented Swedish counterpart in Ersberg, and the shot totals back that assertion.

Some player and general thoughts.

Apart from Ivanans bad penalty in the 1st, the 4th line played very well. When your 4th line can keep the play in the opposing teams end for a prolonged period of time regularly-you have to figure the Coach was pretty happy with the effort. Richardson and Harrold both played well and for their roles-did an outstanding job. Shout out to Terry Murray who put Simmonds on this line late in the 3rd to generate more offense.

Ersberg-just looked sloppy and out of control for the whole game. I felt more secure with Jack Johnson defending the empty net then anytime with Ersberg in goal. Granted we may cut a bit of slack being his first game and all but a couple of more performances like this means the Kings should prepare to get Zatkoff or Bernier a try; or if they the Monarchs Tandem to get extra time trade for an established NHL backup.

Handzus- he got lucky with his right place right time goal but all in all he looked very sluggish to me the whole game. There was no jump in his step at all and he looked very timid in his decision making. Not blaming the loss on him by any stretch-but he certainly wasnt one of the more noticable Kings forwards in spite of the fact he scored.

Jack Johnson-Fantastic game. So far this season I think one could argue that he has outplayed Doughty. He was pretty much everywhere and played pretty solidly IMO sans a couple of miscues on the PP. See Next Item.

OD- he was the defensive equivalent of Handzus tonight. He looked like he was having a hard time picking up the puck and wasn't really on his game in terms of puck awareness. One can argue that's not really his game but he along with some others just looked like they couldn't find or anticipate the puck or the play very well.

Simmonds- He has got to step it up a bit. There are players like Scuderi when you dont notice them, figure they are doing their job-but Simmonds is not afforded that luxury. If he is not scoring, he needs to be hitting, if he is not hitting he needs to be driving the net-games in which we don't notice Simmonds does not reflect well on players in his role. Frolov made a very strong power move to the goal in the 1st-and while he didn't score and sadly didn't do it the rest of the game this is something I think Simmonds needs to do more of.

Dustin Brown-Played very well. Looks like he is stepping his game up and was much more noticeable then previous games. There was a shift in the first were he threw 3 hits and then made a beeline to the Rangers goalmouth to set the screen. It didn't payoff but you could see the Rangers dmen were having a hard time keeping Brown out of the play. For a guy who ended the game with no points, to me it looked like Brown and his team leading 5 shots on goal was the hungriest forward tonight.

Kings PP looked out of sync to me and all in all the team passed up many opportunities to get shots on goal from the prime scoring areas and decided to pass it off or make the one extra ill advised move that stopped the momentum. Not saying they are horrible-just maybe not the best shot selection or hunger around the net. Will say on the PPs defense that there was a horrible non call on a blatant interference against Smyth. Blatant penalty IMO that would have given the Kings a 5 on 3 with plenty of time. A case of would have, could have, should have without question though and its conjecture anyhow.

Overall in spite of some criticisms, I thought the team for the most part played pretty well out shooting the Rags 36-21 in spite of at least 5 more chances passed up in the prime scoring areas. Really came down to Lundqvist making the big saves when he had too and using his calming influence to settle down the Rangers players in spite of the fact they only had one shot on goal in the 3rd. With a lesser goalie in net this is a game the Kings would have won, with a better goalie in net for the Kings this is a game the Kings could have won. Rangers got the goaltending, Kings didn't. And on this night the 14th of October-that is exactly how history will remember how this game went down.

I would also be remiss if I didn't mention the 3 Stars of the Week graphic with Heatley, Quick, and Sedin. Surely I wasn't the only who looked at the pics and thought "Wow, 2 hockey players and someones little brother."

Next Up Detroit. If the Kings play like they did tonight as far as applying offensive pressure, getting solid play from all forward lines, and Quick can play as well as he has of late-there is no reason the Kings cant get at least a point out of tomorrows game. Detroit only has 2 wins on the season and Osgood's GAA is over 3.60 so if the effort of tonight's game is there tomorrow I don't think it's unreasonable that the team will score more then 2 goals.

As always look forward to your thoughts and hopefully will have the time to do a recap/opinion piece after tomorrow night's game.

Post Game Thoughts-the Avs Edition

Going to keep this short and sweet as Ive got cinnamon rolls in the oven.

Basically this was a game the Kings should have lost. Let's face it they looked terrible. As many times as they had opportunity to clear the puck out of the zone and failed to do so I amazed they walked away with a point. This is a game they certainly would have lost last season. I guess it can be considered progress when you are at least getting points in game you should be losing outright.

The Zeiler Incident- What I find funny about this was the fact the Ref was not going to call a penalty at all until the ensuing scrum and then throws Zeiler out of the game. If it was indeed a major penalty-why was it not called at the time it actually happened? For those with center ice there was a similar play earlier during the Hawks/Leafs game with Ben Eager. You never like to see anyone hurt but short of it happening to Ryan Smythe, Adam Foote is not a bad choice. That said-I always felt come crunch time I would rather have Adam Foote then the guy who used to wear #4 for us.

Doughty is still a prodigy in spite of his -1 on the night. From the "GO Figure" dept Matt Greene was a +2.

Ersberg certainly didn't have his best game though I wont blame his as most of the team as a whole wasn't playing the smart hockey they need to play in order to win games.He is still clearly better then LaBarbara but the GAA is starting to rise and Sv% is starting to dip for what its worth.

Dustin Brown is getting better and better. His one on one moves are impressive for sure and looks like he gets more and more confidence every game. Kopitar looks like he's stepping it up a bit as well. When we can finally land a bonafide 2nd line Center(or a bonafide 2nd line for that matter) it is going to be very tough for teams to key in on our top line. Not saying our current crew sucks-but upgrades in this area will be key to future success.

With this Shoot Out win, the Avs have now won 8 Shoot Outs in a row. They certainly looked confident for sure.

I still like Lappy, His face looks like its been sandblasted and then used as a Dart Board but he does what a good character guy does-more importantly he does it consistently. Ive got a tons of respect for him-is there a harder role in the NHL that the role Lappy plays?

I am not going to got hating on the New Jerseys. They are what they are-the Fashion Show idea is one that should never be brought back and if not for Flaming Wild Wing would go down as one of the worst all time promos.

Anyhow my rolls are done, and Im drinking Coffee with Baileys and still need to check my fantasy football lineups so that's it for now. Piece Out!

Kings/Caps Recap and 11/21 Matchups

Back at the .500 mark and oh what a feeling! For you fans of other NHL teams reading this you have to understand that after years of being perpetually kicked in the nuts by this franchise us Kings fans have to take pride in the little things and get our kicks where we can.

Game Thoughts

I cant say any better then Dustin Brown did at the post game interview that when the Kings play with energy and stick to their game plan they can beat anyone. To play the Devils Advocate though I cant only help think what might have been had the Caps not played the not before and had a full squad. Ovechkin is a monster. And while I thought his hit on Brown was cheap I guess the gods of hockey Karma prevailed. At this point as well I don't think we need to be talking about Brown's ability to take a hit as he was absolutely leveled. Wish I could post a clip...I'll try and get one later.

Yet another game the Kings held their opponent to under 24 shots. With Ersberg in net and provided we get consistent scoring there is no reason that if that stat holds the Kings could be in the playoff hunt. On that same Ersberg related note- 1.96GAA and .909SV%.

Player Thoughts-

Doughty-The great players tend to make things look easy and seem to get breaks other players dont. His shot and his play overall is a great example of this. If it were Denis Gauthier taking the same exact shot the puck would have hit Ovechkins stick, landed perfectly flat on Ovechkins blade and allowed him to move up ice ending up in an outnumbered attack. But with Doughty-hits Ovechkin's stick and changed trajectory just enough to miss the Goalies Glove hand by an inch or so. Doughty finished the game at +2 and is now a +8 on the season and on pace for a 13 goal 31 point season.
The Ray Bourque comparisons continue to scream. The +8 is amazing as well in that it's not like Doughty is being spotted situational ice time or getting cherry picked spots. When your 18 year old Rookie can stop Ovechkin on a one on one speaks volumes. Granted he got beat by Ovechkin once as well but at the same time did force Ovechkin to a bad angle. Cant say enough about this kid. He's a future Superstar.

Zeiler- Call me crazy but I thought that line played very well. Zeiler does exactly what you want your 4th line winger to do-he brings tons on energy and tried to finish consistently. I noticed as well that his ability to cycle the puck game Ivanans a couple of chances to throw his weight around as well.

Boyle-While I think Boyle is being misused on this line getting him in the lineup and finding a role to contribute day to day isn't the worst thing that could happen. He has quietly created a couple of scoring chances for himself the last couple of games as well.

Simmonds- I like the kid but I cant help but think Armstrong's veteran Savvy would be better served in Simmonds role and getting quality ice time in Manchester will be a great thing for Simmonds development in the long run. Remember Manny Malholtra? He probably could have been a much higher caliber NHL player had he been able to cut his teeth at the AHL level as opposed to being thrown to the wolves.

Brad Richardson- I don't know what is going on behind the scenes but when Zeiler gets bumped in front of the line ahead of you is never a good thing. I'd like to see Richardson get a chance but for whatever reason it aint happening. Maybe he doesn't bust his ass in practice? Maybe he's an ahole? I do not know but once again he has managed to lose his spot to Moller(no shame in that), Simmonds(moderate shame), and Zeiler(great profound shame in that). Reminds me a bit of Pavel Rosa years ago who scored in almost every NHL game he played in but was a routine scratch. When 3 coaches all say the same thing about work ethic what else can you think but there must be an issue with work ethic?

Finally, was it me or did the broadcast almost seem like a Washington Caps telecast? They certainly went out of their way to feature a lot more Caps related stories then when other teams. It was cool to see and I am not complaining just something I found a bit unusual. On a similar note-getting inter conference play again is refreshing. I wasn't at the game but watching on TV seemed like there was a bit of a different vibe. And not that I am picking on Bettmann but who decided that fans wanted to see more conference and divisional games? I am glad they went back to what worked but think this could have been a game that we would have been playing the Columbus Blue Jackets.

Games of the Night

Looks like it could be a slow night so truth be told I will probably be watching Kung Fu Panda with my 5 year old and Tropic Thunder once he goes to bed. A couple of matches with some promise though.

Philadelphia Flyers at Buffalo Sabres- 26 combined FMs. Looks like Flyers Heavy Riley Cote is injured so that really minimizes odds for a scrap.

Anaheim Ducks at St. Louis Blues -For Rough and Tumble hockey the Ducks are always a must watch. Cam Janssen is always willing to go as well so this probably will be the best bet for the night.

Thoughts?