Tanner Glass Won the Trade Deadline

Every year, the pundits analyze the winners and losers of the NHL trade deadline, reflecting on the moves made and pointing to organizations that got stronger or weaker, as a result. This convention is valuable, to an extent, but it ignores the smaller effects these trades have on individual dressing rooms. Here in Vancouver, for example, we had a brief look at the impact Maxim Lapierre won't have as a member of the Vancouver Canucks, but the impact he will have remains to be examined. Even within the locker room, these small moves have created winners and losers.

But who, exactly, are they? We ask you (rhetorically, as we already have an answer ready), who's the winner?

Tanner Glass.

Glass deserves a win too (especially after his recent public defeat at the hands of a blogger who will remain nameless... and sexy). All year long, Glass has been the only regular on the 4th line, a line that's shuffled young, inexperienced players in and out, with a focus on development. Its been good for the prospects, but the lack of consistent linemates has foisted leadership and defensive responsibilities onto Glass that, while welcome, have mitigated his individual game and his icetime.

Sure, he continues to get penalty kill time, but when your coach doesn't really trust your linemates in tight game situations, you're not jumping the boards too often at even-strength unless it's a blowout. Glass recently admitted playing with the inexperienced Cody Hodgson could be nerve-wracking, and you have to think that, if he felt this way, coach Vigneault felt similarly. As a result, the 4th line saw sheltered and sparing minutes during Hodgson's brief stint with the big club.

Things changed at the deadline, however, when Gillis went out and, effectively, bought Glass a complete line. The acquisitions of Chris Higgins and Maxim Lapierre give Glass two NHL-calibre players to play with. They push the Canucks to 12 deep at the forward spot, and allow them the option to roll four lines. That should mean more minutes for Glass and less time covering for inexperienced linemates.

The evidence is already showing. In Lapierre's second game with the Canucks, Glass skated for over ten minutes, nearly double what he got during Cody Hodgson's three-game pre-deadline stint.

Glass would never say it, but I suspect he's pumped.

Plus, if Lapierre's as big a douche as some say he is, Glass is going to have to fight for him. Said Glass, "Hopefully, he chirps a bunch and I can get in more fights." More fights with humans? This can only be a plus. I have to imagine recreational bare-knuckle bear boxing is probably not a Canuck-approved activity.

Canucks 10K: Honouring the One-Goal Guys

Without Yannick Tremblay's one goal, the Canucks would still sit at 9999.

In case you missed it, Daniel Sedin's third period goal Wednesday against the Calgary Flames was the 10,000th regular-season goal in Canucks' history. These 10,000 goals were scored by 354 different players over the Canucks' forty-year history, and I'm sure we can name more than a few of the guys. Markus Naslund. Trevor Linden. Stan Smyl. Thomas Gradin. You know, the stars.

But any stat sheet, let alone a list of goalscorers, is incomplete without a perusal of the cellar-dwellers. In this case, the one-goal guys. Some might say they're not important, but that's crazy talk. Without the one-goal guys, the Canucks would be sitting at 9,957.

That's right. Of the 10,000 goals, 43 have been scored by guys who only got one. Today we honour them. It's not exactly a who's who (more of a "who?"), but there are some interesting names on this list. Some remain active NHLers. Some are memorable. Some are long forgotten. Some will surprise you. Here they are, the one-goal guys, in alphabetical order:

Living Up to History

Here are a few ridiculous superstitions in which I firmly believe: If you suck out on someone in poker, you will be rightly punished with bad card luck for a while; Hiccups can be cured by asking the person if they own a white horse, and their answering "no," but only if they know that doing so is a cure for the hiccups; The Goo Goo Dolls cover of the song "Give a Little Bit," when played in the car loudly, dispels traffic jams; and, all NHL teams have a historical character that, if honored, will bring success, and if abused, will act as a curse. This last, I credit with much of the recent success of Mike Gillis's Vancouver Canucks.

The idea of historical recognition being important to success seems silly, but like most superstitions, it can be justified with what Dogbert called the best evidence of all -- anecdotal evidence. The Pittsburgh Penguins -- the team of Lemieux and Jagr -- weren't successful again until they brought in some flashy superstars in Crosby and Malkin. The Flyers of late weren't a force until they became the Broad Street Bullies again. Recall that they were the most oft-suspended team in their comeback season. The Devils' adding Kovalchuk shouldn't have hurt the team at all on paper. Even in the worst-case scenario of his being a horrible player spending all his time on the fourth line, the team is still deep enough that they should be in playoff contention. Still, they've got a strong belief in New Jersey that the team is bigger than the individual, and Kovalchuk's contract and lazy defensive play fly so in the face of that idea that the team doesn't have an identity anymore. The same thing happened with the Dallas Stars when they signed Sean Avery. The same thing, honestly, happened to the Canucks when they brought in some guys who were more about themselves than they were about Vancouver.