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Puck Daddy Power Rankings: John Scott, John Moore and Kings' cap planning

San Jose Sharks' John Scott, top, fights with Anaheim Ducks' Tim Jackman during the first period of an NHL hockey game Sunday, Oct. 26, 2014, in Anaheim, Calif. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)
San Jose Sharks' John Scott, top, fights with Anaheim Ducks' Tim Jackman during the first period of an NHL hockey game Sunday, Oct. 26, 2014, in Anaheim, Calif. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

[Author's note: Power rankings are usually three things: Bad, wrong, and boring. You typically know just as well as the authors which teams won what games against who and what it all means, so our moving the Red Wings up four spots or whatever really doesn't tell you anything you didn't know. Who's hot, who's not, who cares? For this reason, we're doing a power ranking of things that are usually not teams. You'll see what I mean.]  

8. “Look how well-behaved everyone has been!”

Around this time last week it seemed like everyone kind of climbed to the top of the nearest hill, surveyed the beautiful autumn landscape stretched before them, and with hands on hips, inhaled deeply and said with great relish, “Player Safety has really done its job.”

Not a single suspension through 20 or so days of the season. That's a lot of games, and no one tried to kill anyone. Were there a few borderline incidents? Sure, but who can really remember them? For the most part, everyone was skating around out there like Brendan Shanahan was still in his real gun-slinging days from his first preseason. No one, it seemed, wanted to incur the wrath of new guy Stephane Quintal.

But there must have been a sub in charge of the Department of Player Safety the last few days, because the NHL has turned into a madhouse. The San Jose/Anaheim game was insanity, and there were not one but two hits that should have resulted in suspensions on the part of the Rangers on Monday.

I don't want to say everyone jinxed it, but everyone 100 percent for-sure jinxed it.

7. John Scott

So let's talk about the first of these suspensions that happened this week. Boy it seems like only yesterday we were talking about John Scott trying to kill Loui Eriksson on the ice with the qualifier, “But he's never done anything like this before! He's never even been suspended!” And now here we are about a year later and he's got two suspensions under his belt. Super-hard to believe that about a guy like Scott, isn't it?

The league didn't like Scott kinda-sorta leaving the bench to fight — they say it was a legal line change but not, like, super-legal — and so they suspended him two games.

Fair enough. That game was a mess and someone has to pay for it. Might as well be the guy who can barely skate, hey?

But then, as happens with just about any suspension for a borderline play, we had to sit through all the, “Well I disagree with the league's decision but I have to respect it,” pap we usually get. Scott blamed the referees, Scott blamed Tim Jackman. Scott questioned the league's mindset. Scott said he was just doing his job.

That's the thing, though, right? If John Scott's job is “come off the bench to fight someone after having already fought him,” then really, what purpose does Scott serve in this league? (Spoiler alert: No purpose.) Like, okay, the conventional wisdom on no-talent enforcers like Scott is that they “calm things down” and “prevent cheap play.” Watch that Anaheim/San Jose game and tell anyone, with a straight face, that Scott and equally useless Tim Jackman served as any kind of deterrent. That game was a mess and a disgrace. And only people as dumb as Jim Carr would continue to yell, “THIS IS HOCKEY!!!!” over the lowlights of that turdfest.

The fewer games John Scott plays in this league, the better off we all are. Period.

6. John Moore

The fact that John Moore is getting an in-person hearing for his headshot on Erik Haula makes a lot of sense. It couldn't have been more textbook if Moore had hit him with a copy of the NHL rulebook. It was eerily reminiscent of the Matt Cooke hit on Marc Savard for one thing, and Haula was held of out Minnesota's game against Boston last night as a precaution. Wisely so.

I was appalled to see people actually trying to argue that something other than Haula's head was the principal point of contact. Anyone who watched the various angles could have said Moore first made contact with the fourth moon of Jupiter and have preserved as much credibility as those arguing Moore hit shoulder first.

But hey, it's not like Moore ever made this exact hit before just kidding it was like five months ago.

Players who make this kind of hit in 2014 don't belong in the league. At this point it's fair to say that Moore obviously plays with a blatant disregard for his opponents' safety, and that can't be explained away or forgiven. By the time you read this, the decision on Moore might have come down, and boy do I hope it's about a million games (it'll probably be closer to six).

5. Already soft, eh?

However, the NHL wasn't about to just go ahead and start throwing the book at everyone or anything like that. Chris Kreider was judged to have “won a physical battle” with Jonas Brodin.

What actually happened on the play was Brodin held up to possibly initiate contact, which Kreider was more than happy to accommodate a good 10 feet from the endboards. That's DOPS's view of it, anyway. But if you watch the video, you can see that Mats Zuccarello dumps the puck into the corner and it starts to rim around. Brodin looks to see if he's the one that's supposed to go get it (the look to his right at Marco Scandella is telling here).

Brodin should have no reasonable expectation that he's going to be run that hard from the goal line. That far out from the boards, any contact should be minimal at best, especially because the puck is likewise a good five feet out of his reach and moving away from him.

Here's the thing, and it's the worst part about the league's standards on this kind of hit: Brodin returned to the game, so Kreider was basically off the hook. The league felt the game misconduct was a just punishment at the time, and that nothing further was required. But if Brodin had missed the rest of the night, or any further games beyond that, you can bet Kreider would be at least getting a fine out of this.

It's weird. I'm all for suspending to the injury's severity, but only when it would lengthen a suspension. Not-suspending Kreider because Brodin didn't get a concussion is silly; that's a stroke of good luck that came from a reckless play. Letting Kreider skate on it only encourages more hits like that, and next time the guy on the receiving end might not be as lucky as Brodin was Monday night.

4. Lysol

The two hits in the Ranger game were just two more strokes of bad luck for a Wild club that already had the bad luck of going through Los Angeles and Anaheim, and coming out with some sort of infectious disease.

This is also true of the St. Louis Blues, who are likewise being hit hard by this illness, not to mention a slew of other injuries.

So just as a precaution, let's give all every player and team employee in the league one of those hazmat-suit showers from 12 Monkeys. Can't be too careful these days. (Judging by the news lately I think it's probably Ebola???)

3. The American dollar

The last several years have not been good ones for the American economy, but things are finally starting to get back to pre-recession norms in a lot of different ways. One of those ways? The devaluing of the Canadian dollar.

There was a brief period a year or three ago now when the CAD was running neck-and-neck with the USD in terms of value, and that was good news for Canadian NHL teams. See, they do a lot of their business in Canadian dollars, as you'd expect, but they have to pay their players in US dollars, as per the CBA. Meaning that it's getting more expensive for Canadian teams to do business.

The problem isn't so bad right now, but the US dollar is only going to gain ground or, put another way, the Canadian dollar is going to lose it. Projections show the CAD could be worth as little as 82 cents US before the season ends. Which is B-A-D, especially for teams that don't do as well at the box office as some other Canadian clubs (like, say, the Senators).

It's also bad for the league overall, because the rate at which revenues have been growing in the past few years have been driven by both growing popularity in the US but also the strength of the Canadian dollar. When it takes a step back, so too do overall revenue figures.

And who else is that bad for? Players. If there's not as much money to increase the cap by a certain percentage every year, they don't get as much money for themselves. Doesn't affect guys who have already been extended of course, but guys who will be UFAs in the next year or two can't be too happy. Who else isn't going to be too happy? Teams that signed players long-term for big money (say, Chicago and Boston and Montreal, to name a few) but are now living with the possibility that the cap won't go up to that mythic $80 million number many were projecting several months ago.

Maybe it's all overblown, of course. Maybe the popularity in the US just keeps growing and growing and revenues are fine and the cap keeps rising and everyone's happy. But this at least makes things a lot harder. On just about everyone.

2. Being the Oilers all of a sudden

Look at all these wins the Oilers have. Look how well Ben Scrivens is doing. Look at what the offense is producing. Why it's almost like their horrible luck at the start of the season was totally unsustainable. So weird, right?!

Keeping Leon Draisaitl up with the big club for his 10th game sure seems dumb though. Nothing gold can stay.

1. Cap planning

Far be it for me to start casting aspersions on the job Dean Lombardi has done in building the Kings roster to fit under the salary cap — how could he have foreseen one of his defensemen getting suspended for maybe-maybe-not beating up his wife? — but boy does it ever stink having to play a man down.

Poor Anze Kopitar. Not being able to play last night must have been awful for him because his team only got to dress 19 people. I remember the last time that happened, and the Flames (who at the time, back in 2008-09, were GMed by the current Kings coach) got slaughtered. And the Flames actually did it on multiple occasions, because Darryl Sutter took on too much salary at the deadline and then everyone got hurt.

From April 3-11, 2009, the Flames played five (FIVE!!!!!) games with at least one player missing from the roster. On April 3, they dressed 16 of 18 skaters at Minnesota, and lost 4-0. On April 6, they used 17 skaters when hosting the Kings and actually won 4-1. The next night at Vancouver they got smoked 4-1 with 17 guys. April 10 rolled around and they were pummeled at Edmonton 5-1 because they used only 15 skaters, which seems impossible. And the next night, to close the regular season, they beat the Oilers 4-1 at the Saddledome, once again using just 15 skaters. Soon thereafter the Flames made the last playoff appearances in team history.

That's not what's going to happen in Los Angeles, of course, because these Kings are better than those Flames could have ever hoped to be, even down a man. And also because Sutter isn't in charge of putting the roster together any more. That helps too.

(Not ranked this week: Tumors.

Get well soon to Olli Maata, who's really great. His doctors were like, “Hey bud, you have a tumor in your neck,” and he said, “Okay,” then played really well for a month. Now he's having it removed and he's gonna be fine. He's 20 years old, but he neither plays nor acts like it.

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