Micheal Haley

Devils sign Cam Janssen to two-way contract

By James O'BrienJul 8, 2013, 11:32 PM EDT

Whether he’s at the NHL or AHL level for most of next season, Cam Janssen will fight a lot in 2013-14. The New Jersey Devils helped to make that possible by signing him to a one-year, two-way contract on Monday, according to the Bergen Record.

Janssen’s deal is worth the league minimum ($550K) at the NHL level. He played in just four games for New Jersey this past season and surprisingly only drew one minor penalty. Don’t worry about him “going soft” or anything, though; he fought nine times in the AHL, by Hockey Fights’ count.

“I’m really excited to be back,” Janssen said. “I love that organization. I got a chance to play some hockey in Albany, which at the beginning was kind of scary. Getting sent down was a little tough mentally on you because of the fact I hadn’t been down in the minors in a long time.

“Once I got down there and got some minutes and played, it was great.”

The 29-year-old pugilist has spent parts of four seasons with the Devils. Some of his most memorable fights have come against the Devils’ local rivals.

One of those moments included this game-opening line brawl against the New York Rangers in March 2012:

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New York Islanders fans shouldn’t feel left out, as this fight with Micheal Haley can attest:

Kreider recalled by Rangers

By Jason BroughMar 20, 2013, 2:54 PM EDT

6 Comments

The New York Rangers have recalled forward Chris Kreider from AHL Connecticut.

Based on what coach John Tortorealla said recently, the decision to bring Kreider back up again won’t have been made lightly.

“We don’t want to keep on knee jerking him back and forth, we want to make sure if we do (call him up), we feel he’s ready to play,” Tortorella said.

Kreider, 21, has already played 11 games for the Rangers this season, scoring once and adding an assist. But like many young players, he’s struggled with consistency at the NHL level.

To make room for Kreider — who, by the way, has been lighting it up for the Whale — forward Micheal Haley has been sent down to the farm.

Winners of two straight, the Rangers host Florida Thursday.

PHT Morning Skate: Where the Caps get the Ricky Bobby treatment

By Joe YerdonDec 27, 2011, 7:00 AM EDT

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PHT’s Morning Skate takes a look around the world of hockey to see what’s happening and what we’ll be talking about around the NHL world and beyond.

CSNWashington’s Joe Beninati comes up with the only appropriate character to describe the Caps’ funk right now. If you ain’t first, you’re last, Alex Ovechkin. Shake and bake! (CSNWashington.com)

Kings forward Simon Gagne may have had his inevitable season-interrupting injury last night against Phoenix. (L.A. Kings Insider)

Make it seven losses in a row for the Minnesota Wild. Uh oh… (Russo’s Rants)

Eric Lindros continues to say all the right things about putting his rocky past with the Flyers behind him. (Philly.com)

Tyler Bozak’s turnaround season has the Leafs pleasantly surprised. (TSN)

Coyotes goalie Mike Smith is on IR. Welcome back to the show Curtis McElhinney. (Sportsnet)

It’s looking like Philly native Patti LaBelle will sing the National Anthem at the Winter Classic. (Delaware County Daily Times)

New Jersey’s Ryan Carter might be getting a short vacation thanks to his hit on Jaroslav Spacek. (Fire & Ice)

Finally, check out this fight four seconds into last night’s Rangers-Isles game between Stu Bickel and Micheal Haley. Haley got kicked out for instigating and left Bickel really feeling it. (YouTube)

Islanders ask MSG not to show February brawlfest for Friday watch party

By Joe YerdonAug 18, 2011, 12:45 PM EDT

37 Comments

It turns out the Islanders can do the smart thing after all.

Plans to hold a team-sponsored watch party this Friday for the re-airing of the Islanders’ 9-3 win over the Penguins from February 11th that saw 342 penalty minutes handed out have been changed. The party is still on, however the Islanders are asking their broadcast partner, MSG Network, to change which game they’re showing.

A statement from the Isles makes their point for them.

“The New York Islanders have requested that MSG Networks change the originally scheduled game to be viewed at the Friday, Aug. 19 meetup. As a part of MSG Plus’ Summer Ice programming, the schedule had the Islanders game from Friday, Feb. 11 against the Pittsburgh Penguins set to air at 7 p.m. Instead MSG Plus will air the Islanders 7-6 overtime victory on Sunday, Feb. 13 over the Buffalo Sabres.”

This decision comes on the heels of NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly saying that he didn’t approve of the game being used in this light.

PHT pointed out that their original plans to celebrate the February 11 game seemed to be crass given what happened throughout that game and the bloodbath that erupted throughout it as well as the fact the Islanders organization was fined $100,000 for their actions as well. Islanders fans have more than let their feelings be known about how they feel about our opinion on things and we’re happy to see the passion of the Islanders fans still exists.

There’s nothing wrong with having pride in your team, something which Islanders fans seem to think was our point in questioning their plans to show this game and throw a party over it. Celebrate your wins, celebrate that game if you’d like to, that’s fine. Our issue came with the team, not the fans, supporting it in such a public way. Fans can and will do whatever they want to and that’s their beautiful right as an American (or Canadian). Teams and organizations are held to a higher standard, however.

When a team decides to celebrate a game like this that saw the NHL find enough negligence going on that they fined the organization, that’s wrong and that’s been our contention from the get-go. Teams have to have the stiff upper lip in the public’s eyes and given the Penguins’ ill feelings over the game and the NHL’s reaction to the Islanders, erring on the side of caution would’ve been the right move.

We get that Isles fans hate every bit of this and think we’re jerks. That’s fine. Embrace your renegade side and rage against “the man.” While the game was important for the Islanders to rally as a fan base it didn’t do much for the team as a rallying point as they went 11-10-6 after that 9-3 win.

The Islanders are a team on the rise and while Trevor Gillies’ presence on their roster is always going to provide a lightning rod for controversy given his role in that February 11 game, we’re hoping that the fans will have more to rally around with their young and rising talent like John Tavares, Matt Moulson, Michael Grabner and others rather than with the likes of Gillies and Micheal Haley.

Celebrating madness? Islanders holding watch party for replay of fight-filled February game vs. Pittsburgh

By Joe YerdonAug 13, 2011, 10:58 AM EDT

39 Comments

Life for Islanders fans this summer hasn’t exactly been too fun. They’ve seen a referendum for a new arena get voted down by Nassau County voters, the team hasn’t made a big splash in free agency to make a big move towards improving in the Eastern Conference, and they’ve still got the Evgeni Nabokov situation to deal with. With that kind of action going on, you might get a little anxious for the season to start too.

The Isles are doing something good for their fans and hosting a watch party for the re-airing of one of their more notorious games from the past season: the February 11 9-3 win over Pittsburgh.

Wait… The Islanders are hosting a watch party for this game?

In case you’d forgotten, that game featured 342 combined penalty minutes including seeing Islanders goon forward Trevor Gillies fighting once early in the game and later elbowing Pens forward Eric Tangradi into oblivion. There was also the matter of Isles forward Micheal Haley dropping the gloves with Pens goalie Brent Johnson only to get interrupted by Pens forward Eric Godard who came off the bench to stand up for Johnson.

The end result of everything saw Gillies get suspended for nine games while Godard got the mandatory 10 game suspension for leaving the bench while the Islanders were fined $100,000 for the whole fiasco. Meanwhile, Penguins owner Mario Lemieux sounded off about the actions of the Islanders to the NHL and declared the whole thing to be its own disaster area.

Suffice to say, some Penguins fans are a bit annoyed about this whole thing. Enter the boys from The PensBlog. The PensBlog guys have made it their own mission to rip Gillies and the entire Islanders organization since this game and this Islanders watch party is in their sights as well.

Just a heads up, some of their language is a little “colorful” so if you’ve got delicate sensibilities, this is your warning.

Now, this kind of viewing-party idea is kind of cool in general. And we’d actual tip our hats to the Isles organization for using social media to bring fans closer if it wasn’t to celebrate lunacy. If they’re gonna circle-jerk to a run-of-the-mill 9-3 drubbing, we’d be all for it and not dip our toe into the water.

But celebrating the blatant attempts to injure in this game isn’t gonna fly.
And for the Islanders to be promoting it right on their website is beyond words.

As much as The PensBlog guys might upset you sometimes, they’re dead on about this. We understand that this game was a big, important moment for Islanders fans. They were sick of seeing their team getting pushed around and taken advantage of by the league for other, apparent misgivings and the Penguins (and officials) pushed the right buttons that night to send the team over the edge. This game was the fans’ “Network” moment where they say “they’re mad as hell and they’re not going to take this anymore.”

Celebrating your team taking a stand is fine and it’s not the only time we’ve seen teams and fans take pride in an all-out bloodbath. These kinds of moments can unite fans with their teams. That said, you can’t help but feel this is a 1,000 different kinds of awkward given the circumstances. Tangradi suffered a concussion thanks to Gillies’ elbow while Gillies’ reputation in the league was destroyed after this incident and Brent Johnson served notice to the Islanders that he’s not to be trifled with.

Given the Islanders’ role in the brawl and the fact they were slapped with a huge fine for what went down, it seems wrong that they’re going along with hosting a party to re-watch the game. I understand why the Islanders are doing it and I understand why Penguins fans would be really annoyed about it… But this just feels uncomfortable.