He arrived in Washington for the first time this week (”It’s hot here” he complained to me), and from the opening moments of Wednesday’s opening scrimmage he displayed an elite game of deft playmaking, unrivaled puck control, and superb instincts. He scored two goals that night, and he sent flat accurate passes to teammates in every scoring sector.

Along the boards, where you might think him most vulnerable and overmatched, he actually excels, drawing defenders to him to create open space for his linemates. He wins most of his draws, many quite cleanly. He is in constant motion in the offensive zone.

But outlandish offensive numbers and hardware almost as tall as he is bear no relationship to Perreault’s shy and soft-spoken demeanor off the ice. He was frank in acknowledging how even he had no idea he was in store for an MVP quality CHL season.

He told me that last season was so spectacular that he is at pains to identify specific goals to better this season. Instead, he will focus on “improving my strength, [gaining] more speed . . . more speed.”

From McPhee’s midseason assessment to this week’s dynamic display I made a point of trying to press the GM for a bold forecast for Perreault. I didn’t want to know if McPhee thought Perreault simply NHL-destined but rather if once there he’d be an impact player.

“He’s a good player,” McPhee told me after Friday’s scrimmage. But what about an impact NHLer? “I wouldn’t be surprised at all,” he added.

NHL hockey will always have places for the undersized and overskilled and determined. Martin St. Louis or Steve Sullivan or Daniel Briere would score goals in any era. It’s too early yet to tell if Perreault’s on that kind of development arc, but he possesses in abundance hockey’s most coveted quality — game-dictating instincts and skills.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eN3CdfYIxwo

Filed in CHL, Capitals Report, Development Camp, George McPhee, Mathieu Perreault, OFB, OFB Interviews, Player Profiles, Prospects, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (3)

OFB on The Capitals Report

By Gustafsson
Friday, May 11, 2007

The Capitals Report was broadcast live from Moscow today (11 May, 2007). Mike Vogel and Spike Parker were joined by OrderedChaos and pucksandbooks as they all continued their coverage of the World Championship. If you missed the broadcast, you can find the podcast version here.

Filed in Capitals Report, IIHF, Mike Vogel, OFB in Russia, Spike Parker, Washington Capitals, World Championships| Permalink| Comments (0)

Update: SweaterGate

By pucksandbooks
Thursday, November 23, 2006

Insidehockey.com’s Jeremy Milks has authored what I believe is the best summary of SweaterGate — the NHL’s inexplicable and indefensible tomfoolery with its iconic fashion, to be debuted at this season’s All Star Game and then rolled out en masse beginning next season.

Milks makes a vital and brilliant observation about the fallout from radically altering the look of the existing NHL hockey sweater: the distinction of the league’s Original Six, who collectively skate in sweaters virtually identical in the colors, design, and logos that debuted in the league generations ago, becomes obliterated by Gary Bettman’s latest marketing scheme.

It means that teams like the Chicago Blackhawks, New York Rangers, Toronto Maple Leafs and Montreal Canadiens will have to eliminate their horizontal striping on the bottoms of their jerseys, virtually bringing an end to a historical visual style and making 20 of the NHL’s current jerseys a retro-sweater,” Milks observes.

The Hockey Sweater - Story by Roch Carrier / Illustrations by Sheldon Cohen

The redesign topic was freshly discussed on yesterday’s CapsReport, where Mike Vogel urged listener’s to peruse OFB’s coverage of the matter and, commendably, sign an online petition of protest against the sacrilege. We have signed it and we hope you will, too.

A clip of The Capitals Report talking about OFB can be found here:

At OFB we will never relent in this cause to preserve a basic staple of hockey’s heritage. We echo Vogel’s outrage and will regularly renew his call to marshall the grassroots masses against the mischief of Madison Avenue.

Filed in Capitals Report, Mike Vogel, National Hockey League, Sweaters| Permalink| Comments (5)

Thanks to Mike Vogel, Spike Parker and The Capitals Report

By Gustafsson
Thursday, October 12, 2006

Many thanks going out to Mike Vogel, Spike Parker and everyone at The Capitals Report. They had some very kind words for us on their weekly broadcast yesterday. EmptyMaybe and pucksandbooks are regular listeners and “callers” while the rest of us have the broadcast blocked by firewalls and listen to the podcast later. A clip of The Capitals Report talking about OFB can be found here:

Continue reading ›

Filed in Capitals Report, Hockey, Mike Vogel, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (1)