Canuckz.com » Injury

Not Again! Salo Reportedly Injures Achilles, Gone 3-5 Months

Tonyz Tanti — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 16:40:27 +0000

Reports out of Finland are saying that Sami Salo has injured his achilles tendon in a game of floor hockey and could be gone 3-5 months. The report has not been confirmed as of yet.

Assuming the report is true, this could be a very difficult injury for Salo, now 35, to recover from. Not only is he 35, but he has a lot of mileage on his body.

One side effect of Salo being injured may be Kevin Bieksa. The longer Salo is out, the more valuable Kevin Bieksa becomes. A long term injury also provides salary cap relief, just as Pavol Demitra’s long term injury did last season.

***Update: The report has been confirmed by the Canucks

Demitra to Play Saturday

Tonyz Tanti — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 20:39:45 +0000

Team 1040 is reporting that Pavol Demitra will likely make his season debut Saturday versus the Pittsburgh Penguins. Great news, now all they have to decide is where to put him. Has the second line of Samuelsson, Kesler, and Raymond shown enough to not get broken up? I’m not sure it has.

It appears Alain Vigneault isn’t ready to shake up his top two lines. Here’s what the lines looked like at practice today:

Sedin-Sedin-Burrows

Raymond-Kesler-Samuelsson

Demitra-Wellwood-Bernier

Hordichuk-Rypien-Glass

Jannik Hansen looks to be a healthy scratch, Ryan Johnson is still injured and Alex Bolduc is injured because he’s crazy.

*Update: It looks like Bernier re-aggravated his groin injury, so look for Jannik Hansen to take his spot on the third line.

Batter Up! Vokoun Gets Smacked in the Head and Other Great Slashes

Tonyz Tanti — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 21:26:18 +0000

What do you think Keith Ballard will say the next time he sees Tomas Vokoun? Probably going to be a little awkward I’m thinking. For those of you that missed it, here it is:

I don’t remember hearing much about this at the time, but it was very similar to this game between Slovakia and the Czech Republic with Habs goalie Jaroslav Halak in net:

Seriously, how do you miss the post by that much? Obviously they didn’t play baseball growing up, or maybe they did and took batting lessons from Rich Pilon (good thing Lemieux has Olympic caliber fencing skills):

Or maybe he got pointers from Teemu Selanne:

Now Ron Hextall, that’s who you take pointers from. He never missed his target:

Treading Water

Tonyz Tanti — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 00:52:53 +0000

At the quarter-way mark of the 2009-10 season, the Canucks have successfully treaded water. With a record of 10-10-0, you’d think that the Canucks would be disappointed, and perhaps they are. For me, this is about what we should have expected, all things considered. If they had been 100% healthy, you’d maybe expect a record of 13-7 through 20 games. Consider that Luongo has started only 13 games, Daniel Sedin has played only four games, Sami Salo has only played 12 games and Pavol Demitra has missed the entire season, not to mention the other countless missed games here and there, a 10-10 start should be considered par for the course.

With that said, there are more than a few alarming trends through the first 20 games:

Injury or no injury, Roberto Luongo hasn’t been lights-out yet. He has a very mediocre 6-7 win/loss record, 2.74 GAA and .903 SV%. Those are not Team Canada numbers. It’s also alarming that he got injured, again. He needs to stay healthy.

Offense from the D. Alex Edler (he of the minus seven rating so far), Kevin Bieksa and Sami Salo have combined for ONE, just one, goal.

Kyle Wellwood. He’s been absolutely invisible through 20 games.

Team toughness. Where is it? The Canucks were a nasty piece of business to deal with last year. Perhaps injuries have changed that a bit, but still. They’ve got to get back to that blue collar attitude.

So will the real Vancouver Canucks please stand-up? We haven’t seen them yet, and might not this season given Pavol Demitra’s status, but once they get Daniel Sedin back (and that should be soon). The excuses will be all gone. And hopefully the losing will be gone too.

The Return of Matt Pettinger and Your Daily Injury Update

Tonyz Tanti — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 00:53:07 +0000

How bad are the Canucks injury woes? Well, they’ve brought back a Tampa Bay Lightning cast-off! Yeeesh. Actually, I don’t mind this signing. Matt Pettinger was re-signed by Mike Gillis yesterday. With all their injuries at the moment, bringing a veteran NHL forward who can skate and kill penalties probably isn’t a bad idea. He’ll be here on a temporary basis in all likelihood though. The best they can hope for is a Trent Klatt effect. Klatt was sent down to the minors early in his Canucks tenure, and when he came back up was a changed man. His intensity was up considerably and he became an effective player. Surely, Pettinger will be a motivated player.

Speaking of Canucks injuries, this is getting ridiculous. In what seems like a daily injury update, Michael Grabner will be lost for six weeks with a fractured ankle. Amazing how you can be chased around at high speed by 220 lb defencemen for your career and it’s casually kicking a soccer ball that knocks you out.

After watching the following video I started to think that maybe Canuckz.com should consider spicing up its injury updates? Just a thought…

The Replacements

Tonyz Tanti — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 11:07:54 +0000

In a weird twist this season, the Canucks have all 8 of their defencemen healthy (defencemen usually are the most injury prone), and a whole whack of injuries to forward, and then of course there’s Roberto Luongo. The result has been a lot of dull hockey, with the team trying to play more defensive due to their lack of fire power. With that said, here’s a review of the replacements for Luongo, Daniel Sedin, Pavol Demitra and Ryan Johnson (as well as Kyle Wellwood and Rick Rypien here and there).

Michael Grabner:

Chicks are digging the speedy Austrian sniper, and why not? Grabner has been impressive with the big club. He has five points in his first nine NHL games and has been generating a lot of scoring chances. Unfortunately, a replacement for this replacement will be needed. Grabner was lost to an ankle injury that he suffered during the pre-game hallway warm-up. It’s been that kind of season for the Canucks (kind of reminds me of when the Canucks lost all those defencemen in the 2007-08 season and Lukas Krajicek slipped on some ice and injured himself).

Tanner Glass:

Glass has looked good thus far. Sunday’s game against Colorado was probably his best, notching a goal and hitting a crossbar. He’s been pretty reliable, finishing all of his checks and responsible in his own end.

Aaron Rome:

The Canucks’ forward (forward!? Yes, forward) has been impressive since being moved from defence. Vigneault moved him from defence to forward because of all the injuries up front, and must have sure liked him there. He lead all Canucks forwards in ice time in Friday’s game versus Anaheim. That’s clearly ridiculous, but he hasn’t looked out of place at forward (unlike Mathieu Schneider who looked completely lost in his one game at forward… Vigneault clearly hasn’t heard of not being able to teach an old dog new tricks).

Alexandre Bolduc:

Bolduc, like Grabner, has also been injured since being called-up. While healthy, he played pretty much error free, but didn’t offer anything notable.

Sergei Shirokov:

The “Pocket Russian Rocket” hasn’t been able to lift-off as of yet. In six games in the NHL, he has been unable to get a single point and is a minus four. Disappointing, sure, but even more disappointing is that he hasn’t been noticeable. He has been sent to the Moose a couple of times already, and continues to rip it up down there, but so far he hasn’t been able to translate that to the NHL level.

Andrew Raycroft:

Raycroft has played pretty well in his limited action. I thought he was unfairly pulled in the loss to Anaheim on Friday, but responded with a shutout against his old team, the Colorado Avalanche. He wasn’t tested a lot against Colorado, but still, I have more confidence in him than any back-up goalie they’ve had since Alex Auld. He should get all of the starts until Luongo comes back.

Ah oh, not Luongo! Injury Update

Tonyz Tanti — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 23:21:10 +0000

Roberto Luongo, yet again, is injured. He’ll be out at least a week with a rib injury. Whether or not it’s only a week remains to be seen, as Canucks management has been known to downplay injuries in the past. This marks the third straight season where Luongo will miss time due to an injury. Does this mean he can’t handle the ridiculously large workload the team gives him every year? Probably not, I tend to think it’s just a matter of being in the net more often gives you more opportunities to get injured.

This means that Andrew Raycroft and possibly Cory Schneider will get an opportunity to play. Raycroft looked great in preseason and his limited game action this season, but he hasn’t played for a while and would surely be rusty. We’ll see how that goes. I think he has the ability to step his game up, but we all know what usually happens to the Canucks when they’re without Luongo, nevermind when they do it with a bunch of injuries.

Here’s the rest of the injury updates:

-Ryan Johnson’s injury apparently isn’t as bad as originally reported

-Sami Salo and Daniel Sedin are ahead of schedule

-Rick Rypien is ready to go

-No news for Jannik Hansen and Pavol Demitra

The Injury Bug Strikes Again

Tonyz Tanti — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 06:57:55 +0000

It appears the injury bug has bitten the Canucks early this season. It started with lingering injuries carrying over from last season for Pavol Demitra and Mathieu Schneider. Then it was Jannik Hansen, who was injured on the last game of the preseason. Now, even worse news. The Canucks will be without iron-man Daniel Sedin and (what’s the opposite of iron man?) Sami Salo.

Daniel Sedin broke his foot after being struck by an Alex Edler slap shot, he’ll be gone 4-6 weeks. This means that Daniel Sedin will miss the most games he’s ever missed in a single season, since his NHL debut in 2000. It also means that twin brother Henrik will get a long stint on a line without Daniel for the first time in his career. How will he fare? It will be interesting to find out.

Sami Salo will also be gone for 4-6 weeks with a knee sprain suffered in their last game against Dallas. For all the joking about Salo’s injury woes, he will be sorely missed. Everyone knows about his big shot, but he is most valuable to the team with his role on the shutdown pairing with Willie Mitchell. I feel bad for the guy. He’s suffered a lot of injuries, to no fault of his own. Some guys’ bodies are just more durable than others in my view. It’s not like he runs around recklessly like Rick Rypien or anything.

Speaking of Rick Rypien, how about a little time-out to watch this again!?

So where does this leave the team? Well, luckily they have depth. Losing a top 4 defenceman a few years ago would have meant power play time for Patrick Coulombe. Luckily, Salo’s ice time can be absorbed by their other regulars. Capable reserve defenceman Aaron Rome will see his first action as a Canuck and, if you read between the lines, Mathieu Schneider should be ready to go, probably as soon as his long term injury reserve time expires on October 25th.

Daniel Sedin’s’ role will be tougher to fill. Guys like Steve Bernier, Mason Raymond and Kyle Wellwood will need to step it up, but this is the time where the Canucks really need a pleasant surprise from prospects Sergei Shirokov or Michael Grabner (though I wouldn’t hold your breath).

***Update*** Looks like Grabner will get into his first NHL game.

But the number one way the Canucks can withstand all these injuries? You guessed it: Roberto Luongo. Luongo has the ability to steal games, and he may need to do a bit of stealing coming up.

Random thought of the day:

Isn’t this an Olympic year for the NHL? Isn’t the NHL supposed to be compressing their schedule to accomodate the two-week break? If so, why on earth are the Canucks on a stretch of 1 game in 8 days this early in the season? That’s a schedule that more resembles the CFL, not the NHL. I know that there are many factors that go into the schedule, including building availability, and the NHL’s desire not to go head-to-head with MLB playoffs and the NFL, but could they please give the Canucks a bit of a break?

With the horrendous road trips the Canucks have coming due to the fact that GM Place will be occupied with pre/post Olympic use, you’d think the NHL could have thrown in a couple of road games now, instead of in February and March. For those counting, the Canucks have an eight game road trip before the Olympics and a six game road trip after the Olympics.