Re-Nerding The League

James over at Cycle Like the Sedins came up with a great summer idea. What if a select group of bloggers got a chance to play GM and re-draft the league? So instead of wasting the summer away by going outside to the beach or playing frisbee golf with friends (okay, I would never do that in the summer or winter) we will be spending the next few weeks putting together our NHL dream team, with salary cap and all.

Now of course, I was hoping to be the virtual Dean Lombardi of the virtual Kings. But the great Rudy Kelly over at BoC beat me to it. So James gave me the sloppy seconds of being the GM of the Minnesota Wild. And my first order of duty as the new GM and President... a return to the glory years:

When all with the NHL was right.

That's right, we are ditching the abstract bear logo and going with what screams toughness in today's NHL... Lime Green and Gold! I actually got a chance to see the Minnesota North Stars play in Minnesota at the Met Center before they headed south to Dallas to torment the Kings. Unfortunately it was after they dumped the pointed N and switched to the Stars logo that they still wear today.

Before.

After.

Seeing the North Stars at the Met Center was one of my coolest early hockey memories... the place was so compact and you really felt like you were on top of the ice at the highest point. And the crowd screamed the entire game. It was an arena built for hockey and up until that point I had only seen professional hockey at the Forum in LA.

But enough daydreaming about my hockey past. For the #18th pick, I was hoping to grab Jeff Carter. He has a decent enough cap hit at only 5 million a year and he's a complete stud. But Rudy Kelly and the virtual Kings snagged him before I could.

So I went with the 2nd best option... Carter's teammate, Mike Richards.


A bit more of a cap hit at 5.75 million, but maybe a better all around player.. a Captain that you would look to build a team around. Plus he is a hit with the ladies.

That's why he is the Captain.

The only other player I considered at this position was Rick Nash. Nash had 79 points last season and Richards 80. But I like that Richards is a playmaker and a scorer. This draft is far from over as putting together a full NHL team will probably take much longer than James and the rest of the bloggers could have imagined. But the Minnesota New North Stars will be a team to watch in the NHBL. (The Nerd Blogger Hockey League as Rudy Kelly named it)