My WHL US Division Team

Well, the regular season came to an end tonight. So I decided to name an all-star team consisting of players in the US Division. Mainly since those are the teams I see all the time and I'm pretty familiar with all the players. I'm sure I'll leave a few guys out who you could make a good argument for being on the team. And I'm also sure some of you will complain about some of my choices. But I'm looking to build a well-rounded team here with elements that can actually win games. So here are my picks:

Goaltenders

Carey Price (Tri-City)
Bryan Bridges (Seattle)

Defensemen

Shaun Heshka (Everett)
Logan Stephenson (Tri-City)
Michael Sauer (Portland)
Thomas Hickey (Seattle)
Even Haw (Spokane)
Clayton Barthel (Seattle)

Left Wing

Brian Woolger (Portland)
Jannik Hansen (Portland)
John Lammers (Everett)
Drayson Bowman (Spokane)

Right Wing

Michael Grabner (Spokane)
Jon Bubnick (Portland)
Jason Beeman (Tri-City)
Bud Holloway (Seattle)

Center

Brandon Dubinsky (Portland)
Peter Mueller (Everett)
Ian McDonald (Tri-City)
Zach Hamill (Everett)

Those are the 20 I would want out there on the ice for me on any given night. There were a few hard cuts. So I decided to give honorable mention to a few guys. You know...they'll be the sharp-dressed lads out there on the concourse during intermission that the puckbunnies are chasing around (hahaha)

Lenny Thunderchild (Portland)
Aaron Gagnon (Seattle)
Derek Ryan (Spokane)
Torrie Wheat (Everett)
Michael Funk (Portland)

So that's the list. But there's one more quick base to cover here...

Most Valuable Player

Carey Price (Tri-City)

It's pretty obvious to most of us that follow the division closely that, without Price in net, the Americans probably would have been the worst team in the league by far. He's smooth as silk playing between the pipes. Most of the time, it looks like he's not even trying. He just sees the entire game so well. Really, the only way you can beat him is by hoping that you can get to a rebound before he covers the puck up. He rarely gets beat on the first shot. I've seen alot of good goalies come through the WHL over the years. A few of them have had decent NHL careers (Chris Osgood, Trevor Kidd, Olaf Kolzig, Brian Boucher, Steve Passmore, Jamie McLennan, Corey Schwab, Rob Tallas) and others have flamed-out for various reasons (Dan Blackburn, Cody Rudkowsky, Corey Hirsch, Brent Belecki). But I can honestly tell you that Carey Price is the best I've seen.

Oh, he probably won't even win the WHL goalie of the year (that'll probably go to Pogge in Calgary since...well...he plays in and for Calgary). But look at where Price and Pogge are in 5 years and I think you'll see the Tri goalie doing alot better.

How good is he? Well, the Montreal Canadiens traded away Jose Theodore to Colorado. Sure, he's been injured lately. But come on...does anyone really think that Huet is the long-term solution for the Habs in net? If the Americans are eliminated before the end of the NHL season, you will all get to see the true future in net for the Canadiens before the season ends.

I'll get around to writing about what all happened this weekend on either Monday or Tuesday. This was one of the better weekends around here (not counting the roadies) that I've had in a long time. There were quite a few weird, funny stories. One of which I'm still trying to figure out if I'll even write about it (lol). But I still had a blast.

One more thing. For those of you who haven't been told yet, Tom and I are headed to Salt Lake City and Boise next weekend. We had originally picked Anchorage (which was the runaway winner in that little poll I took). But due to some incidents involving Alaska Airlines around here lately, Tom didn't want to fly with them. So since I couldn't find any other airlines with schedules that fit our traveling needs, we went with the SLC/Boise trip instead.

And before I hear the obvious argument from you (well, one person specifically who will go unnamed...lol), the reason I'm not going to Anchorage alone is that the two of us haven't been on a roadie together yet this year. And since in another year Tom will be retired and off to South Carolina to live out the rest of his days, we just wanted to get a trip in this year and at least one more next season. I'll get to Anchorage sooner or later (there isn't another place on my list...after this summer's roadtrip...that I want to visit more). But the two of us want to get in as much as we can while we can. I'll still have alot of friends who are already proven good times on the road (Kristi, Jacque, Emily, Kurt). And I'm sure I'll find more. But there's only one Tom Winter.

Besides...I wanna see what happens when he's turned loose on the Mormon community (lol).