Greetings from Sunrise, Fla., dear readers. I had Sunday to say my piece about the MVP race at the quarter pole: http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/sports/penguins/s_710372.html. Thing is, some emails received today suggest quite a few people don’t seem to agree with me about the guy who got my vote in this week’s USA Today team/player rankings. (Oh, to be loved/loathed.)Speaking of which… those rankings, and my ballot are below; so send the shots my way:
= USA Today’s bi-weekly rankings: http://www.usatoday.com/sports/hockey/nhl/2010-11-22-power-rankings_N.htm
= Rossi’s ballot, sent Monday morning:
1 – DET 2 – WSH 3 – BOS 4 – LAK 5 – PHI 6 – MTL 7 – VAN 8 – STL 9 – PIT 10 – CLB 11 – COL 12 – SAN 13 – PHX 14 – TMP 15 – DAL 16 – ANA 17 – CHI 18 – NSH 19 – MIN 20 – NYR 21 – ATL 22 – CAR
23 – OTT 24 – BUF 25 – FLA 26 – TOR 27 – CGY 28 – EDM 29 – NJD 30 – NYI
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MVP
1 – Sidney Crosby, PIT
2 – Steven Stamkos, TMP
3 – Tim Thomas, BOS
4 – Nicklas Lidstrom, DET
5 – Daniel Sedin, VAN
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GOALIES
1 – Tim Thomas, BOS
2 – Carey Price, MTL
3 – Jonathan Quick, LAK
4 – Sergei Bobrovsky, PHI
5 – Niklas Backstrom, MIN
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DEFENSEMEN
1 – Nicklas Lidstrom, DET
2 – Kris Letang, PIT
3 – John-Michael Liles, COL
4 – Dan Boyle, SJS
5 – Mike Green, WSH
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ROOKIES
1 – Jeff Skinner, CAR
2 – Tyler Ennis, BUF
3 – Logan Couture, SJS
4 – John Carlson, WSH
5 – Jordan Eberle, EDM
Mike Green for defensemen MVP?
Are you a fan of his website or something? ha
USA Today Rankings lost all respect with this weeks MVP vote. How can folks on the panel vote for Ovechkin for MVP when he is not performing and is being outplayed/scored by Semin and his team has just gotten KO’ by Atlanta and Philly with Ovechkin scoreless????
The best they can quote as reasons for vote is Ovie has 3 game winning goals???? A quick check of the stats on NHL.com suggests that as of 11/23/2010 three players had 4 game winners (Stamkos, Rick Nash and Dustin Byfuglin {who would be a MVP for Atlanta]) and 13 others had 3 game winners. Yeah…that stat really makes Ovechkin stand out. lol. Major FAIL USA today.
Rob,
I loved your piece on Crosby the other day. I said after last year that he is consistently underrated. I’m not sure if you saw, but on puckdaddy.com Ryan Lambert wrote an article which was a response to your article basically claiming you were insane for making this claim.
On my blog (www.blackandblueandgold.com) I wrote a response to Lambert’s article using objective statistics to refute his claim and agree with your original article. I know your busy, but check it out if you get a chance.
I love the blog and check it out daily–keep up the good work