The Freakonomics blog, which I read on an irregular basis had a Sports Economics Q&A on the 30th of April.  Of course, this being part of the online arm of a major newspaper there was little of interest to hockey fans, and not a lot of interest to people immersed in Sports Econ/Stats either as the questions mostly either revolved around the book that was being promoted or 'general interest questions'.  Heck, the guys dodged one NHL question component completely.  However, on the topic of playoffs and randomness there was something on the NHL, and I think they go it wrong, but I'm curious to see what others think of their answers.  Full Q and A text for the question after the jump.  Hockey relevant topic in italics.

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This via the convoluted route of Mudcrutch and The Hockey Symposium.  This is a quote from Gare Joyce on the HF boards commenting on why Schroeder dropped to #22 in the draft.  The context and the post.

Gare Joyce responding to another poster:

Asked what his weaknesses were, he said he didn't have any. Said he couldn't really think of anything he needed to work on. Straight-faced.
Asked who was going to be on his line at UMinn next season, he said that he had already told the coach who he'd play with.
He was critical of team-mates and coaches and blamed the U.S.'s failure to win at the under-20s on everyone else except himself.
Those are just a few examples. I could go on but won't. If you don't get the idea, then you never will.

If this is accurate, and Mr. Joyce has an excellent rep, it doesn't invalidate Gillis' choice at #22, but should raise some flags with respect to our expectations.  It also places his drop out of the top 10 or 15 in a very clear perspective.

HT: Mc79hockey, The Hockey Symposium

Edit: Hate to do this to a Fan Post, but Bobby Canuck posted a quote from Schroeder's coach today:

"I am shocked to hear these rumors about Jordan. He is a great young man who always put his team first. He played with Ryan Stoa last year and they had great chemistry and at the end of the year meeting I asked Jordan who he would like to play with next year. I ask a lot of our returning players this question to see who they think they might want as line-mates. Jordan answered my question and was open to many options next year. Jordan does not have an ego and is a joy to coach. I think he will be a leader on our team next year. He works hard and is driven to be an elite player. Vancouver drafted a winner in him."

So keep an open mind to this conversation. BobbyCanuck, if you have a link to this please post it in the comments section.

I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around this one, and did a double take when I read his name in photo caption on a post from E3.  It would seem our old Captain is up to some good old fashioned marketing these days, although why they invited him (this year) is just odd.

Check out the last paragraph here.

And the second entry here.

I would have thought they could have gotten someone a bit more high-profile for this.  And seeing Ali and Naslund in the same sentence... well, certainly a first for me.