Aaron Portzline looks ahead: Atlanta

Just a few things to consider upon reading your article:

1 -- Reasoner was re-signed over a week ago...June 9th, TSN had a headline for it. Since this past trade deadline Reasoner has said that he's wanted to stay in Atlanta, and that signing a contract should be no problem.

2 -- Perrin requested to be traded and was subsequently waived. I don't think such situations for pending UFA are usually followed by the player being re-signed.

3 -- Kozlov ($3.667M) had 76 points (26g-50a), Nash ($5.4M) had 79 pts, Huselius ($4.75M) 56 pts, and Umberger ($3.75M) had 46 pts. A second line playmaking winger outscored two younger and higher paid second line talents, and had similar points to a clear-cut first line goal scorer. Someone at least 7 years their senior was scoring at the same pace or higher...so, who is overpaid?

4 -- Anderson had not named a captain for the first two months claiming the captain would rise from within. In January, Kovalchuk was awarded the captaincy. The alternate captains, his peers, chose him as captain and urged the coach to make the call. One might say that him being named captain by his own teammates directly refutes the claim that 1) Kovalchuk is a malcontent, and 2) Kovalchuk is a player who plays to his own desires, not within a team concept. One could also go a bit further and say the coach's presence in the dressing room was strong enough to allow Kovalchuk to play within a team concept, and be awarded the ultimate honor by his teammates when being named captain.

5 -- Atlanta is in just as bad of shape financially as several NHL teams, some of which you failed to mention. The New York Islanders, Nashville, and Florida are all in the same boat, just to name a few. So I guess if it wasn't for the Balsillie fiasco, and if it wasn't for 4 other teams having financial woes, and if it wasn't for the Montreal owner selling his majority stake in the team, and if it wasn't for a group from Toronto unveiling a proposal for an expansion franchise to become the second NHL team in Toronto, THEN the Thrashers would be getting lots more unflattering attention this summer.

I know you're doing this for every team so I'm sure it's easy to miss a few of the key points on each team, but at least do some semblance of research for some of the finer points before you post such stuff. I'm sure neither you nor the other Blue Jacket supporters wouldn't appreciate it if one of the Atlanta hockey writers (or both of them) wrote a compelling article claiming Nash was an overpaid injury prone primadona, Modin was just another example of an overpaid aging player, and that Hitchcock was too hard on his team and divided the locker room, crippling the team. Sounds kinda goofy when someone says such things without having done any research, doesn't it?

If the lack of research you put into the Thrashers is any indication, you should probably scrap any ideas of doing a summary of every team in the NHL.

Obviously the Reasoner re-signing is one(two years at just over 1 mil/year, really tough BTW). Omitting Anssi Salmela(he is a defenseman), who was very solid down the stretch after being acquired at the deadline and was also re-signed is a miss by you as well.

Dissing Angelo Esposito is puzzling. He had a rather good season, surprising many with his two way play in the WJCs. However he had a bad knee injury at the end of the season, which probably precludes him from competing for a job at camp. Holzapfel and Crabb(if he is re-signed) are both well ahead of him in the pecking order.

Bryan Little scores 31 goals in his first full season in the NHL, and he doesn't even merit a single sentence when talking about the Thrashers? Well, since your plan was to trash the team without doing much research, why bother. And on that note, your omission of the defensively reliable, and SHG fiend Colin Stuart from the "NHL Level" Forwards was odd. The Thrashers didn't score a single SHG until he was called up around the halfway point.

But hey, you guys are a big time hockey city now you made the playoffs, go kick the southern teams like everyone else. It may not be journalism, but it passes for it in the elitist hockey rags of Canada. The job offers from up north will be rolling your way if you keep this up.

The Thrashers are built for one reason and that is to keep Don Waddell employed. How the guy can do it is beyond me he must be a great butt kisser

Yah, he missed the mark on a few things. I'm sensing on-ice is less of a worry than the off-ice ownership disinterest/battle. Does Atlanta keep the 4th pick overall or deal it for someone like Kesler? You need ways to make up ground in the southeast, not an impossible task. And you gotta keep Kovalchuk happy. But Atlanta is no different than every other southern market - if the team wins, fans turn out. If they don't, its back to college basketball/football and back of the sports pages.

The best cliche article a man could write, without knowing anything about Atlanta, the Thrashers, or its players.
As a Thrashers fan I was hoping for an objective critic. Unfortunately you have filtered all positives out. You take rumors for facts selectively, and omit facts that don't stroke with your opion.
Who are you catering to? Columbus made the playoffs, you are better right now, we get it.

your a hero buddy go fly a kite

You clearly have no clue about Atlanta. Not the city, and not the Thrashers. While the Thrashers have their issues, the bulk of that can be attributed to the idiots who own the team. But I guess your NFL, MLB and NBA teams run circles around Atlanta's.
Oh, right. My bad.
It would be nice if we could draw from TWO major metros like you do, Cleveland and Cincinnati, but then we'd have to live in Columbus, wouldn't we.

You also missed the point that the Thrashers were 16-8-1 in their last 25 games, defeating teams left and right who were battling for playoff spots.

i have no idea why thrashers blog took so much offense to this... you'd think fans of a team that bad would have a little more awareness of their situation. bill tiller, the thrashers' blogger who complained about this, doesn't really raise many points, the only one that's really valid is "we knew that already" which might be a valid argument if this were a thrashers blog.

anyway i just wanted to say i like these looks at each team around the league, and wouldn't be discouraged by this ridiculous complaining.

lol. the cbj are sooo much better than the thrash. oh wait. that's right, you have the same amount of playoff wins as us. zero. enough of the bad mouthing. do a little research before exposing the world to this drivel.

A team captain on the last year of his contract, has only been in one playoff series in his career, and still looking for his first playoff win... So how is Columbus going to keep Nash?

Hey, "Dave" there's a lot more than Bill Tiller "complaining" about this. Ya see, Atlanta is a real hockey town, with real fans, and real websites dedicated to the team. We don't have to rely on one source like you seem to be doing.

But hey, what do we know about sports? Atlanta only has an NHL team, a MLB team, an NBA team, an NFL team, a WNBA team, an ECHL team, and a NCAA team in the greater metro area. And that doesn't even count UGA or the Georgia Force. Yeah, what a horrific sports town with no fans to speak of.

Oh, and we just added a Women's Pro Soccer Team to our mix - you know, cause we're such a lousy market.

How long did it take the jackets to get to the Play-offs?

And as Atlanta being a bad Sports city? Thats prolly the stupidest thing I have ever read.

The Bengals Really?
The Indians or the reds?
and if it wasn't for lebrun nobody would care about the cavs, and when he leaves no one will ever hear about cleveland sports wise for a long time nor will they care.

The cavs may have swept the hawks but go back and watch the games when LJ was out of the game we would run all over you guys. ONe man teams don't win titles.

And as for the Thrasher yeah Don Waddells an Idiot (GM) but the last 3 months of the season we were one of the hottest teams.

I hope Valabik takes nash's head of this upcoming season. You know sometimes I'll sit down to watch the blue and be like this may be a rough game but I can honestly say I have never sat down to watch the thrash play columbus and thought this is going to be a tough one because as bad as you my think we are we think your a joke. and what does that say about you?