Tom Benjamin, on the Hemsky situation.

Edmonton Oil Kings forward / Edmonton Oilers draft pick Kristians Pelss last Friday, just a few minutes of real time after his hit from behind late in the third period that had earned him five and a game. Today word came down that Pelss was suspended three games for this action.

I saw the hit and thought other buddy (whose name escapes me at the moment) had turned away just as Pelss arrived, maximizing the severity of the impact. It was nonetheless a reckless hit well worthy of the major and misconduct, and I wasn't surprised when Red Deer's Chad Robinson instigated an immediate fight with Pelss (who fared rather well, all things considered). I'm slightly surprised that he got as many as three additional games, I thought maybe one at most although I am not that familiar with the relative severity of league discipline in the WHL.

Firley, a commenter at mc79hockey finally took the red pill last night.

Compare Pat from Black Dog Hates Skunks comments to that of our guy Triumph. Pat's take is a wee bit different.

That's Ales Hemsky talking to Jason Gregor. The quote comes in the middle of a highly critical article from Gregor that's awfully tough to disagree with. A month away from the deadline and the Oilers, seemingly, still don't know how far apart they are on a contract.

Bob Stauffer, ladies and gentlemen. The Edmonton media will do everything and anything to not blame the existing management structure for mistakes. How they sleep at night without the demons of dishonesty haunting their every moment is beyond me.

That comes to you from Earl Sleek of the Battle of California. That site is usually golden because of cartoons and comedy, but in this case, it's golden because of Earl's thought-provoking work on some of the financial implications of the realignment proposed by the NHL.

On Saturday night a fan behind me yelled, more than a few times, "Lets trade Hemsky" presumably thinking that other fans would join in and create a deafening chant that Steve Tambellini could not ignore. The fans never did join in but to his credit he never gave up.

Late in the second period my wife, now tired of listening to him leaned over to me and said "I'd love to stand up and shout back 'Lets rebuild for 28 more years' but it just doesn't have the same ring to it." Ring or not, I wish she had.

Tom Renney knows what he's got with this roster. The comment above was tongue in cheek... but not really.

That's from Elliotte Friedman's "Thirty Thoughts" and shows just how difficult it is to deal with concussions. I'd imagine that this is especially true for players on the margins where there's an awful lot of money at stake. Alex Plante, for example, was injured while with the Oilers and earned over $130,000 for the twenty-three days he spent on the roster, most of them on injured reserve. Once he was cleared, it's back to the minors where he earns less than that over a full season. In situations like that, there's bound to be at least a little bit of skepticism on both sides.