I hate official team sites. Can you imagine a more biased source of news? I suppose a site like mapleleafs.com would be fine if you were just looking for a schedule or to purchase tickets, but if you're looking for team news and insight, the official site is the last place I go.
On the web, I've witnessed the birth of the Barilkosphere the past few years. There's a solid collection of Maple Leaf blogs run by smart, passionate Leaf fans that simply didn't exist when I started blogging. I didn't coin the term Barilkosphere, but I'm still very, very proud of my Google ranking for Bill Barilko (currently #2 after Wikipedia) and I won't attend a Leafs game (or non-summer Hip concert) without my custom made #5 Bill Barilko jersey, but I digress...
One site in the Barilkosphere is Pension Plan Puppets. They posted the Toronto Maple Leafs 2009 training camp roster, so I'm going to borrow their HTML, throw in a little of my CSS and put it here for y'all.
Forwards DefenceGoaltendersJason AllisonDale MitchellFrancois BeaucheminJuraj MikusAndrew Engelage Alex BerryJohn MitchellJesse BlackerPhil OreskovicBeau EricksonJason BlakeBen Ondrus Josh EngelTodd PerryJonas GustavssonDarryl BoyceColton OrrGarnet ExelbyAndry RogersJoey MacDonald Tyler BozakAlexei PonikarovskyJeff FingerJoe RyanJames ReimerTim BrentWayne Primeau Jonas FrogrenLuke SchennVesa ToskalaJoel ChampagneKyle RogersCarl GunnarsonBarron Smith Jamie DevaneJay RosehillTomas KaberleJuha Uotila Andre DeveauxGreg Scott Mike KomisarekMike Van Ryn Alex FosterRobert SlaneyBrandon ManningIan White Stefano GiliatiViktor Stalberg Mikhail GrabovskiMatt Stajan Richard GreenopMikhail Stefanovich Niklas HagmanLee Stempniak Ryan HamiltonJiri Tlusty Christian HansonRickard Wallin Nazem KadriJohn Kurtz Nikolai KuleminJamal Mayers
19 days, 10 hours, 10 minutes, and 42 seconds from now, that list has to be down to 23 players. The goalies will be Tosky and The Monster, but nothing else is certain. Here's my two cents on the above list.
- Is Jason Allison's invitation some kind of joke? If he was that slow last time, there's simply no chance of him making this team. I realize we're lacking scoring up front, but Jason Allison is not the answer.
- The Marlies look to have a solid defense this season, because there's a serious glut of NHL-calibre defensemen coming to camp. If we agree the top six is Kaberle, Schenn, Komisarek, Finger, Beauchemin and White, we're forgetting about Van Ryn, Exelby, Oreskovic and Frogren. Will White start up front?
- Who's going to score on this team? Please don't tell me that's Blake's job... I'll bet Tlusty and Kadri are playing October 1.
- What time is it? Can I add Phil Kessel yet?
- Two final words: Viktor Stalberg. That is all.
Go Leafs go!
