Newman

Calgary, AB • Canada • 29 Years Old • Male

Goons "R" Us

Raitis Ivanans and Tim Jackman.

When Sutter made these signings I couldn’t help but scratch my head.

Jackman is 6’4” and 210lbs.
Ivanans is 6’4” and 240-256 lbs, depending on which website you look at.

Jackman had 98 PIM, 4 goals, and 5 assists last year in 54 games, while Ivanans had 136 PIM, 0 goals, and 0 assists in 61 games last season.

Both were signed to one-way contracts; Ivanans received $600,000 and Jackman is making $550,000.

Ivanans has played in every single league imaginable on his way into the NHL; The MetJHL, UHL, CHL, ECHL, AHL, UHL, ECHL x2, UHL again, AHL again, back to the UHL, and then finally landing in Los Angeles with the Kings. His persistence must be congratulated. Jackman, on the other hand, was drafted in the 2nd round by the Blue Jackets in 2001. He has bounced around between the AHL and NHL his whole career before spending the past two seasons on the Island.

The question I pose to you is this: How many teams carry more than one goon?
Better yet, how many teams carry even one goon? Not many nowadays.
The days of teams using goons have long since gone away and many teams use the agitator/playmaker/grinder approach now. The Steve Ott, Sean Avery, Alex Burrows type of player is a way more effective way to rattle the cages of the opposing team.

Sutter is out to lunch on these two signings in my humble opinion.

However, ss a Flames fan you get used to seeing one spot on the roster dedicated to the fighter as they have been notorious for always including one on their team every single year.

Brian McGrattan, Andre Roy, Eric Godard, Krzysztof Oliwa, Sandy McCarthy, Sasha Lakovic, and so on and so on.

Isn’t it going a little overboard with having two of them on your roster? Why not free up the room for a young rookie to try and break into the NHL?

Both Ivanans and Jackman are interchangeable. Hopefully, Sutter’s master plan was to have a tryout as to see who is more serviceable and then send the other one down to the minors; not caring of course if another team snags them up when trying to clear waivers.

Watching them both play in the Red vs. White game yesterday, I couldn’t really notice a difference between the two. They are both big and both look mean. I guess it will come down to who chucks haymakers the best. Why don’t they just have a scrap in practice, best of 3, and the winner stays and the loser gets waived. Either way, the winner is playing a maximum five minutes a night and will rarely have any sort of effect on the outcome of the game.

If not, and the Flames decide to keep both players on their roster, then Calgary will have the most feared 4th line in the game. It will be like Slapshot version 3.0.


Newman
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