In the orgy of sports coverage that has enveloped those of us of the hockey persuasion, there has been a veritable feast of things to follow these last couple days. Starting with a somewhat underreported story of an NHL goalie and his President, (when is the last time the NHL got in the Christian Science Monitor?) and basically gathering steam, its been glorious for hockey fanatics.

There have been a few things to come out of media day today. Ryan Suter stating on the record for the first time that he was not going to talk contract and play hockey at the same time was fuel for rostabatory fantasies in many a market. ( though, in a classic case of burying the lede was the news that the Ying to Suter's Yang Shea Weber had basically said the same thing a long time ago...being an RFA its slightly different, but he also will not be talking about $$$ and sense during a stretch run. )

There's Gary and his views, Big Bad Don and his "getting to know you" meeting with 28 superstars of the game. It is a corporate event, after all. When you get everyone together and every puck media person from across North America, its expected.

But buried in all that was a very solid interview with one Daniel Sedin by James Cybulski and Co on TSN Radio Toronto. More on that ( and more!) after the break.

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The speculation is over, and the Sedins and Edler will play on the same team for the ASG, along with fellow countrymen Daniel Alfredsson, Henrik Lundqvist and Erik Karlsson. Hank had a great quip when asked what it was like to play against Daniel last year:

"It was nice to play with some good players last year, finally."

If they're going to start chirping each other, I don't imagine Daniel will let him forget how much earlier he was taken in the draft.

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5:00 pm PST, TSN (just for tonight though, CBC will have the skills competition on Saturday and the game on Sunday)

So, here we are again: facing another All-Star weekend. This year, the stars gather in Ottawa for the publicity stunt that is a draft, skills competition, and 20-goal game. While some fans find this stuff fascinating (I'll admit, adding the draft last year was definitely interesting), most fans will just avoid it at all costs. Apparently, drinking games are being created, and I highly encourage them if you're stuck on your couch watching all this stuff over the weekend.

Anyways, tonight is the draft, which I am sure the TSN commenting crew is going to overanalyze again. (Reference: the players were forced to listen to the TSN panel analyze everything last year between picks. Twas pretty sad.). The format has the two captains flip a coin for first pick. The rules are that all the goalies have to be picked by the end of round 10, and all the defencemen by the end of round 15. Also, apparently there is 1 trade allowed this year. Here are all the players to be picked:

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(Poor Ballard. Not even the Swedes want him.)

The NHL Trade Deadline is February 27, but as you know several trades happen days and even weeks before that date. So I figured I would post this now and as this is a FanPost, please "rec" it to keep it on top of the FanPost section on the right sidebar of the main page for the month of February. That way it will be easier to see and access.

I will buy a nice warm Canucks hoody for anyone who guesses a trade correctly. If a tie occurs, the person who has commented on this site the most will be awarded the prize. If you guess Mike Gillis does nothing and Mike Gillis actually does nothing.....you get nothing. A trade must occur.

Rosterbation, which we more or less define as (most of the time unrealistically) creating a dream Canucks team via trade or signing to make it the best experience possible, has been rampant already all over the League via mainstream media, blogs, Twitter, Forums, etc. What I am trying to do with this thread is to provide a hub for that kind of conversation for our NM Community, commenters and lurkers alike. A place for you to voice your opinion on what you'd like to see Mike Gillis do. But first, I am going to provide a bunch of information and get the conversation going. Lots after the jump.

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Again, a pretty short post today. I'm dealing with a lot of office/administrative issues this week which has cut a lot of time out of my writing, so I'll make a couple of points today about penalties.

I think the Canucks online community, particularly what we find at Nucks Misconduct (as with every SB Nation site) is a collection of diehard fans who also appreciate all aspects of the game, whether it's defense or the finer points of the game. This isn't a slight on the guys who call in to Team 1040 or post on the Canucks message boards; I just kind of think that they're stupid. When I'm looking for an educated fan's take on an event, I'll typically go to that team's SB Nation page and check the comments section.

So, a recurring theme around here, I've noticed, is the amount of penalties the Sedins take in the offensive zone. This happens for two reasons:

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It's Wayne Gretzky's birthday today, and there are no games scheduled in the NHL. There are, however, a surprising number of links to pass along considering it is now the All-Star break and there was one game in the NHL last night. Enjoy while you can, because tomorrow this post could resemble Christian Bale in The Machinist.

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If I had limitless time, I would go back and compile a video of all of Dan Hamhuis' (sorry, Han Damhuis') best breakout passes from this season. He's the best on the blueline at it. He's such a smooth skater, and always has his head up in his own zone. We saw it on Cody Hodgson's now-classic goal against Tim Thomas, and we saw it on David Booth's goal last night:

What a thing of beauty. News and links after the jump.

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