Ben Eager. Meh. Image via Dinur/Flickr
Beastly efforts are quite awesome. What the St. Louis Blues displayed on Monday can qualify as a beastly effort. The 3-1 victory over the Calgary Flames did well to boost the team’s confidence in the middle of a long western road swing. And yes, there was a fight! Guillaume Desbiens went at it with BJ Crombeen, and while I thought it was a draw, the voters thought differently and gave Desbiens a victory on points, apparently (the fight was horrible, as you’ll see from this Fight Card piece). Whatever. The Blues now are 10th by themselves in the National Hockey League in fights with 30 on the season. With the loss, the Blues’ fight record drops to 13-6-11.
Now, the Blues go north to central Alberta to face the Edmonton Oilers. If it weren’t for the Columbus Blue Jackets being the worst team in the NHL, the Oilers would at least be the worst team in the Western Conference. Alas, for this season, they are trumped. But watch out for these guys in a few years, as with all the talent they’ve collected by being one of the worst teams in the league year-in and year-out, they should be a force to reckon with soon. This is the fourth and final meeting between the Blues and Oilers this year, so we’ve covered them three times already here (October 30th, January 5th and January 19th). For a team that is bad, the Oilers do not fight much . . . thus far, only 21 fighting majors have been assessed to this team, good for a tie for 22nd in the league with the Toronto Maple Leafs in that category. Their fight record is average at 8-5-8.
The Oilers are led in fights by veteran Darcy Hordichuk (6’1”, 212lbs, 3-2-1) with six fights, followed by Andy “Are You An Expert?” Sutton (6’6”, 245lbs, 0-0-4, and I will never tire of re-posting that YouTube clip . . . EVER) and former Blackhawk Ben Eager (6’2”, 240lbs, 2-2-0 including a Loss to Crombeen) with four fights each. Following them are tough younger brawler Theo Peckham (6’2”, 235lbs, 1-0-1, on IR with a facial injury) and “Mister Eight Points”, Sam Gagner (5’11”, 195lbs, 0-1-1) with two each. Solo fighters include Lennart Petrell (6’3”, 198lbs, Win), Ryan Jones (6’1”, 205lbs, Win) and Josh Green (6’3”, 218lbs, Draw, currently with Oklahoma City of the AHL).
It’d be easy to pick an Eager-Crombeen rematch, but I will not go that direction. Instead, what happens if little Scott Nichol gets into Gagner’s ear? Nichol is an agitator, after all. If Gagner gets agitated enough, I think a good fight would follow.
Time for the Blues to “Leap” into another win, I say. (God, that was a horrible joke. But I don’t apologize.)
LET’S GO BLUES!!!!!
Information obtained via the incomparable Fried Chicken’s Hockey Fights