Boston Shamrocks News

After the first day of drafting the Shamrocks are happy to announce the acquistions of Ryan Miller, Joe Thornton, Stephen Weiss, Simon Gagne, Jason Arnott and Mark Streit. The management is also happy to announce that the team captain will be Mark Streit and Joe Thornton will take one of the assistant spots.

There were significant rumours before hand to suggest that Ryan Miller if available would be the team's 1st round pick. There was some dissapointment at missing out on David Krecji however the management are rumoured to be happy with the current roster and they look forward to future rounds.

The Shamrocks are happy to announce the aquisition of youngsters Dan Sexton and Anton Volchenkov. Earlier today the club GM spoke to the media;

"We are very happy with our 7th and 8th round picks... after the first day of drafting the management felt the roster was missing some young enthusiam that problem has been solved with the latest picks."

Rumours suggest that the Shamrocks immediate drafting strategy is now focused on high quality backup for Ryan Miller and a scoring right winger.

On the eve of the start of the season the Shamrocks GM took some time to talk to the media.

"We are incredibly happy how the draft turned out we feel we have a team that can challenge across the league and particularly in our division. Barry Trotz will hopefully ensure the team's phyiscality and defence is strong and let the stars get the job done in front of the net. The pre-season shows that Ryan Miller will continue to be a pillar in goal infront of which our forwards will get the job done.

While we are happy with the team we have currently, that does not mean we wouldnt be willing to make changes if the right offer is presented there are definitely areas in which we could strengthen."

After the high scoring spectacular between the Capitals and Shamrocks at Emerald Hockey Place the Shamrocks GM talked to the media.

How happy are you with the backup goalie situation behind star Ryan Miller?

"We took a surprising risk tonight leaving Sabby (Dany Sabourin) in back to back we felt he needed tested at this level and he stood up well tonight. However we have a great depth of roster and some goalies in Matlock areitching for a go at the big time. With the form Paddy (Lalime) has been on lately he will be given a chance next time Ryan is rested."

How do you feel about the form of youngster Dan Sexton?
"Danny has been playing great, he's a spectacular kid. He came out of the draft as an unknown pick but has been firing on all cylinders since he came here we couldnt ask for more. He has been working well on the line with Stevie(Weiss) and we hate to separate them but Danny will be moving up to join Joe(Thorton) and Gag(Simon Gagne). Jay(Jason Arnott) has struggled with that partnership so we are mixing things up for the next game.

With Stevie and Kozz(Vyachslav Kozlov) creating a lot hopefully Jay can continue Dannys job and get some more goals out of that line to even out the work."

The league has been pretty active on trading so far, are the Shamrocks looking to make any moves in the market?
"Of course we are always looking for an opportunity, we'd love to add some more defense to the lower lines but as far as the main guys go everyone is fitting in well so we dont foresee any huge moves unless something appropriate is put before us.

We were considering a move for an OFD but Matty(Matieu Schnedier) has been on some great form in Matlock hopefully he can get rolling here and we will have solved that problem without going into the market."

There have been rumours that you have fallen out with Simon Gagne over his previous links to the Philedelphia Flyers.
"Look this is a different league and a different time whats in the past is in the past. Right now Gag is getting the job done for us, just like he did for the Flyers. I hope that when we get around to the playoffs he will be as strong as he was for the Flyers. Especially as the teams in this league can remember to play physical hockey for more than 20 minutes"

GM Paddywan was jubilant when talking to the media after a 5-0 Win in the Cillit Bang Arena.

The Shamrocks are now 4-1-1 in division 4 how happy are you with the teams performance so far this season?

"Obviously things are going better than expected, we started the season with the last pick and were expecting a tough year. Still we are 1st in our division 2 in the conferance and 3rd overall its an incredible place to be. Obviously 10 games there is still alot of hockey to be played right now we are looking to the few games. We have alot of back to backs coming up and want to come out ontop to add to our point advantage as the games played evens out."

You made some trading moves before the trip to Watford how do the new guys look so far

"They've fit into our system very well, all the guys are still getting used to each other anyway so its not that difficult this early on to change things up. We felt that having Todd White on the 3rd line was a waste of his ability creatively and really wanted to strengthen there with a more robust player, OJ (Olli Jokinen) is showing already he was a smart pickup, we shut out and the 3rd line got on the board which is exactly what we wanted.

Ethan (Moreau) fits in well with that line aswell we just felt the 3rd line needed more defensive strength. Also with the Hall (Gill) coming in on the 3rd D rotation we've added strength overall which right now was the teams only real weakness."

How happy are you with the team overall, having such a low pick it was always going to be difficult but the acquistions made Miller and Weiss particularly seem to be doing their job better than players who went earlier"

"Abosolutely the teams plan from the start was to try and get Light (Miller) and we were lucky that he didnt get picked up. His stats speak for themselves, I mean he's played less games than other goalies but right now he's shut out more games than he hasn't it's an incredible statistic and we can't expect it to continue but Light is one of the, if not the best goalie in the league.

Vannilla (Weiss) was obviously a lower pick but we planned to have strength at center and it turned out well. Vanilla is performing beyond expectation at the moment hopefully he can keep it up, with the team still settling he could be in for more minutes in the future.

The only issue right now is Joe, he's been a little light on points so far but he had some problem getting his chemistry going with his line mates thankfully now its solved. For a guy of his ability we'd expect more points to be coming in, some people have suggested with the frequency of moves currently in the league he could be on his way to another team but there has been no talk of it within the team as of yet. "

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In other news as is customary through the hockey season EA Sports NHL 10 has been used to try and predict some of the outcomes for the big matchups throughout the season. In the most reason games a possible Conferance Final was simulated between the Shamrocks and their neighbours the Nottingham Penguins.

The series turned out to be a classic with the Penguins starting well but later falling to a 10-1 blowout in the Emerald Hockey Place, followed by 2 straight defeats thanks Ryan Miller who at times seemed to defy the laws of physics.

At the halfway point in the season the Shamrocks GM took some time to talk to the media.

How happy are you with the team so far? Are there any changes planned to keep the great form the team has been in going?
Obviously we are performing much better than expected, we have a good lead on our division rivals and are battling at the top of not only the conference but the entire league. It's certainly not where we expected to be after having the last pick in the draft but thanks to the hard work of everyone particularly the kids we are up there in the fight. As far as changes go we are always looking to improve we adjusted tactics lately and have gone 4-1-0 since then but need to get some games going again before we see the benefit. We have some big challenges ahead alot of back to backs against divison and league opposition but hopefully we can keep our form hold off the Penguins and at the least take the division. There are no specific moves for players planned yet theres alot of talk around Big Joe and Jason they havent had great seasons but we have to have faith that they will hit their form soon they are both top class experienced players. We are also looking into switching things up in the lower lines some of the defencemen are moving around Matty(Hunwick) has came up from the Leprachauns again and Brian(Pothier) has gone the other way its all just trying to find that balance between the lines and matchups.

With the season beginning to wind down the shamrocks GM took some time to talk to the media.

How do you feel about the season has the first season in charge turned out as you expected?
Defeinitely not no, I mean we knew we had a good chance with the stars we have. But when you have a guy like Light(Ryan Miller) between the posts you can really build from there and that's what we have done. We've got some great performers in the team and when kids like Vanilla(Weiss) and Danny(Sexton) are playing like they are around the old heads in the team you really get something positive. Currently we are at the top of the league albeit through games played but we expect to be in and around there by the end of the season. It certainly looks like we've sealed the conference and our playoff spot but anything can happen. We just want to focus on the next few games and ensure get to the post-season and maybe make some changes to try and get the most of out that too. It would be a dream to win the cup but we are managing expectations currently, we went into the season with the last pick and had a slow start but we have something great to build on so as long as we are close this year everyone will be very happy im sure.

First press conference of the year for the Shamrocks and the GM has a huge annoucement to make.

It's been a relatively quiet pre-season so far what has been happening that we possibly havent heard about yet?

Well there are rumours out there now that Joe Thornton has been traded, we would like to confirm now that they are true. We sat down with Joe at the end of the season and came to the conclusion that we needed to try something different. His numbers weren't where we wanted them last season and they heavily impacted upon our regular season performance. He also wasn't playing to his standard in the post-season which again impacted our playoff performance. He was our first skater picked in the draft last season and when you look around the league at the guys who went that early they just seemed to fit with their teams better. So we decided it was time to try something new.

He has been traded to the Schmucks they were looking for to shake up their team after last season and we felt with Stephen Weiss already pushing for a top line spot we could cash in and reshuffle the team to our advantage. The complete details of the trade are Joe and David Jones along with our 18th overall pick going to the Schmucks and in return are getting Joe Pavelski, Colby Armstrong and along with their 5th overall and a 4th round pick. We are very happy with the trade and feel that Pavelski and Armstrong fill gaps we had in our roster last year. Obviously losing Joe's production will hurt but we still feel we have enough to cover the loss and have created some more cap space to strengthen the roster in free agency.

The wait is over. The newest member of the Boston Shamrocks is Tyler Seguin. And after the first round of the 2010 606 Entry Draft, the S's General Manager was very pleased to talk about his new forward.

Seguin
"Well, he's a terrific player, He has a terrific skill set. He’s still growing.

"His improvement has been tremendous over one year to the next to the next.

"[He's] very smart, terrific hockey sense, vision, good stick, very underrated wrist shot. He’s got the whole package," he said.

The Shamrocks meetings with the prospect helped the club discern the young man's personality.

"I thought he was very confident," said Paddywan of Seguin. "He was very focused. He was very goal oriented. He really had a direct, definitive [list of] things he wanted to do.

"I talked to a bunch of the people that were at the combine and I think you people [journalists] were impressed too. He's an impressive young man."

After listening to Seguin talk about how much he wants to become a better "two-way" player, there's no doubt that the S's coaching staff will be impressed, too.

"He already is a good two-way player and the fact that [he wants to improve] speaks to his hockey sense and his smarts," said Paddywan. "For a player that is responsible like that at that age, especially with that skill package, that’s pretty impressive."

Paddywan was asked what he expects from Seguin during the 2010-11 season.

"Well one, he has to make the team," said Paddywan. "I expect that he will make the team but you never know. He has to make the team and that will be a decision in the fall.

"If you remember some of the fellows in the past [of] his age, body type and a guy like [Canterbury Crusaders forward Steven] Stamkos, it took him a while to get used to [playing in the 606HL]. It took him a while to get his confidence and his strength so I would anticipate that line of improvement and progress as far as getting acclimated to the league."

It's been a busy 24 hours of negotiations for the Boston Shamrocks, with Free Agency settling down GM Paddywan took some time to talk to the Boston media.

You've had a busy day today 4 new signings with most reporters suggesting a fifth can you tell us the impact of the moves made in the frenzy today?

"It's been hectic I don't think any of the front office staff have slept much but we are incredibly happy with how today has went. I was saying well before the play-off's that we would be looking for a strong presence in free agency this season. Thankfully we were able to achieve that with 2 move's we were always planning the 3r'd planned move is in the pipeline currently and should be announced shortly. We also were able to pick up a huge surprise that we didn't see coming but are incredibly happy about.

We can announce the signings of Derek Morris and Andrej Meszaros which we feel will strengthen our D to the point where we can challenge for the cup this season and possibly have more flexibility with line combinations and possible moves in the future.

We also expect the announcement shortly that we have signed Eric Perrin to a 3 year deal which will fill the gaps in our 3rd line that were very apparent last season.

Finally we can announce the signing of Veteran goal tender Marty Turco to a 2 year deal. It was a huge surprise to see him going for such an affordable price and we feel this year will be much harder than last on the goal tenders so having such a high quality backup can only help our push for top honours.

We are building a system here and it is based on defence first scoring second the most important number on the board is 0, meaning shut out. If we don't concede we only need a goal for the W and with the proven offense we have that should be easily achievable.

Obviously with such significant moves a lot of guys will find themselves out of place we can only be thankful by the jobs done last season but we needed to strengthen as a team in order to ensure we are still at the top this season and as such some guys have to lose out. With that in mind we are putting quite a few players on the block, not because we don't value their services, simply because we do not have space on either roster.

We made the first of what we hope to be many trades for these kinds of players today when we dealt Thomas Plihal to Stevenage for a 4th round pick. Our message to the league is come and get the players they are here and with our focus on youth on the affiliate draft picks are the only currency we want to deal in.

All in all we are incredibly happy with how today turned out, but expect this season to involve much more shifting than last we still have some moves to make to get the roster in a state that it can challenge for the cup year in year out but this is a club of high ambition and after proving that last pick wasn't a handicap last year we want to show the league just how far a team of forgotten players can go. "

The last few days in the Shamrocks organisation have been quite hectic, after a top class season so far the Shamrocks play was beginning to drop of just before the trade deadline. This prompted the GM into action in the market and two important moves were made.

Firstly sin bin regular Cory Sarich and the aging Miroslav Satan along with the Shamrocks 2nd round pick are going to the Penguins in return for the veteran power forward Shane Doan. While Sarich and Satan were essential to the Bruins league success last season, when Andrej Mesazaros and Derek Morris came in at the start of the season someone was always going to be left out. With a permanent place on the league PIM leaders board and a significant drop in performance when Sarich was moved from the top line with stalwart Mark Streit it was almost inevitable his 3.8mil cap hit would be shifted before the deadline. Along with Satan who played a bit part in the team this season and the teams 2nd round pick which would fall late in the round anyway a sufficient package was created to tempt Doan from the Penguins.

Alongside the move for Doan came a surprising transaction between the Shamrocks and the Chops. Last season's Bobby Hull winner Dan Sexton along with a 4th rounder was traded for Patrick Berglund a young but solid defensive center and the Chops 2nd round pick. While Sexton is obviously a great product for the future he has had injury troubles this season and his production was much lower than the Shamrocks management had expected from him. The move also helps replace the 2nd rounder lost in the Doan trade and thanks to the chops draft position should bring a much better prospect than the Shamrocks could have hoped for with their own pick.

All in all the trades help even out the Shamrocks lines, Sexton was well behind his linemates in production and never really got going on the powerplay. Doan did have struggles in production with the Penguins but with the Shamrocks shot totals the management is hoping he can get the job done in Boston. He can also help add some depth to the special teams which should take the pressure off the other forwards who while in great form offensively could be even more successful without the burden of time spent killing penalties.

While the Shamrocks had hoped to move up the draft standings in the first round, the draft class this year is incredibly strong and great prospects are available in the first 3 rounds while the later players should be much more solid than last year. All in all the week before the deadline has been kind to the Shamrocks, they moved who they wanted and helped filled some gaps as a result. If the new players can acclimatise quickly to the teams system, the race for top spot within the league could take a new twist. At the very least the teams almost inevitable play-off run will surely benefit from the new acquisitions.

We are ten games into the regular season and the Shamrocks are looking like they plan to continue where they left off last season, they are 9-2-0 after the first 11 games of the season. While they haven't really gotten things going at home just yet their away form has been stellar. The team is 8-0-0 away so far this year largely thanks to Ryan Miller, who appears to have returned to his season 1 form after a difficult year last season.

Miller was forced to sit and watch as UFA signing Marty Turco lead the Shamrocks to the cup. Yet the Shamrocks GM gave them equal opportunity in the pre-season and Miller came out on top. The GM was recently asked about the goal-tending situation and had this to say.

"As far as I'm concerned it's a form issue, we have two of the top goal-tenders in the league here and we can only let one of them play at a time. Ryan had some difficulty in the playoff's last season but he's still one of the best guys in this league, it wasn't a question of if he would regain his form it was when. Marty obviously was great in the playoffs last year but Ryan was putting in most of the work in the regular season, we were fortunate that we had the option of replacing Ryan but that's why we picked up Marty in the first place.

If Marty can get some form again he can try and take the spot from Ryan we enjoy the competition it keeps both of them on their toes and if our goal-tenders are on form our system works and the win's follow"

While a similar start to the season would be enough for both GM's the Shamrocks decided that the roster still needed some work so once again turned to trading to fill some gaps in the team.

They picked up Jeff Woywitka from the Rex and surprisingly traded Shane Doan to the Beef's for Marc Savard. With Doan only coming to the team last season the move naturally attracted much media attention, yet the Shamrocks GM was quick to justify the move.

"It's an unfortunate situation, everyone here is grateful for what Shane did for us last season, he came in and really did a huge job in helping us towards the cup particularly in the early rounds. However he had real struggles coming to grips with our system, even though he led the playoffs in scoring he only just came out a + player. He certainly helped our offensive game but he was too used to being aggressive on the defensive side of the game and it meant he was sitting in the box a lot more than we would expect from a top line guy.

We focus on 5on5 hockey and with the trend continuing we just couldn't afford the short handed time. Still I think with Savvy coming in he will help us get more production out of that second line and shift the roster a bit for the future. We wanted to see more out of Joe and he wasn't really a good fit for that second line. So Savvy coming in lets Joe play a role on our first line role and then we'll have two of the best passers in the league for Jason to do his thing with."

After an eventful draft day and other blockbuster trades in the week before the Shamrocks GM took some time to talk to the media.The Shamrocks team has changed quite a lot in the last week after such a strong showing last season what prompted the changes?

"It was a number of things, we came so close last year but in reality we were underdog's the whole way through the play-offs. While it feels great to win in that scenario it's not a position we expect to be in. We aim to win in this league and the team needed adjusted to do that. Unfortunately you have to make big moves to get anywhere in this league and that's exactly what we did. "

The Shamrocks moves started with a trade that fan's had been calling for, for awhile. Meszaros who had been under-performing, Perrin who's major ice time was limited to the PK and Winnik, who had a role with the Leprechauns were moved for Kubina and Horcoff. Last week the GM explained his intention for the deal.

"I think what you saw was a deal involving some guys who had stagnated, they didn't look like reaching the heights we expected with the franchise so it made sense to give them a different opportunity. Shawn (Horcoff) was brought in to strengthen the Leprechaun's and Kubina was here to fill a gap that had been talked about a lot. People felt we needed more strength at D with Mark (Streit) aging at the kids struggling a bit."

Yet only a week later Kubina was out the door, alongside failed prospects Charlie Coyle and Emerson Etem. In return the Shamrocks got the 2nd pick in this years draft and Jay Bouwmester. Alongside that deal was a deal seeing Patrick Berglund for a second rounder. Fan's were outraged with the Kubina deal but the GM was quick to silence them.

"Quite frankly, we were happy with what we got from Kubina. It filled a hole and that was good. However to suggest that D is our main fault is ridiculous. We won the cup with only Mark and James (Wisniewski) as our "elite" D guys. Quite frankly the only guy I think we haven't replaced from that team is Anton (Volchenkov). Nevertheless we don't make a habit of trading guys we've just acquired but getting the 2nd pick again was too good to give up. We drafted a superstar in Ty (Seguin) last time we think we've done that again this year. We also picked up a guy who can play a role with the Leprechauns. J-Bo is a victim of his own past success, he's laden with this contract that makes him unplayable. We felt with our turnover from the last two year's he could be an elite defence-man with the farm and really help JR(Ram) develop into the superstar he's projected to be. The Bergy deal again like the original Kubina one was a bad fit and missed potential. We were expecting Bergy (Berglund) to step up to the 2nd line but he didn't seem settled at anything other than C and he simply wouldn't fit in that role. Getting a high 2nd rounder for him was a good deal for both sides."

Finally today saw another blockbuster. With Paul Stasny and Andrew Ladd arriving for Joe Pavelski and Marc Savard alongside two second rounders going the other way.

"With us picking up the 1st and 2nd rounders we felt we didn't need the two we had acquired earlier in the year. Again Joe and Savvy just weren't fitting in where we needed them too. Probably Savvy more than Joe but as I said earlier you have to make big moves to get anywhere. We brought in two younger guys, who can pitch in on the PK and will hopefully stabilise the second line which had some troubles defensively last year. The two picks were a good trade-off to get what we wanted and get some more youth into the roster. It's been a good day with the trade and the draft as a whole. We got a future superstar in Ryan(Strome) and some other solid draft picks. It was a pleasure to pick-up Han(Dell) the leagues first Irish player. We feel the farm is finally getting to where it needs to be it took us a year to get sorted but we were in the play-offs last year and intend to go further in them this year.Now it's time to press on and get on with free agency, we have a few gaps to fill. I would expect us to be active in the FA market and maybe make a few other moves to get to where we want to be to challenge for top honours again."

After another hectic day amidst the free agent frenzy the Shamrocks were active both in the FA market and also the trade market. Alongside the free agent signings of Daymond Langkow, Wade Redden, Paul Scorer. The Shamrocks completed a deal with Alexander Frolov and Jay Bouwmeester going to the Spirit and Rich Peverly, Colby Armstrong, David Drewiskie and a 1st round pick coming the other way. Alongside the player acquistions with coach Trotz and Lemaire leaving the organisation and the rookie coach Nicklas Lindstrom and veteran Lindy Ruff joining. The Shamrock's GM took some time to address the media;

"Once again I'm standing here explaining why a recent signing is moving on. Jay was going to be a corner-stone of the Leprechauns D but he just didn't feel happy with the role. We had a chance to get a deal with one of our preferred trading partners that solved our problems on the 3rd line and move us up in next years draft and we took it. Quite frankly i've missed having colby on that 3rd line since he left, it didn't show so much on the stat sheet but he was a big part of our success due to his role on that line. Obviously we didn't to lose Alex but we were restricted in what we could include in a deal, we have a group of core guys we don't want to loose and Alex was either out or on the fringes of that group. It's obviously weakened our scoring a bit but we feel that it's improved our depth which was a problem in the play-off's last year. It's also helped us focus on looking to the future with what will hopefully be another early pick."

Get me, I'm a 'preferred trading partner'...or is that just polite speak for 'gullible twat'

Of course not, 2 big trades in one-off season there's more love coming from you than Brian Burke has for Boston

Driz you're one of my preferred trading partners too

GM Paddywan was at it again this week, while the Shamrocks sat watching the rest of the league start their seasons trade rumours were flying. Not for the first time in the early stages of season 4, were many players wondering whether they'd be suiting up for the Shamrocks for the season opener. Once again some of the newer additions to the roster were finding themselves moving on, the Shamrocks are quickly becoming a half way house for journeymen players.

Veteran and long-term D-man Derek Morris alongside new recruit Davis Drewiske were bound for new pastures with the Buttercups. In return the Shamrocks received Josh Gorges which filled the gap left by the departure of Anton Volchenkov way back in season 3.

However that wasn't the end of trading for the Shamrocks and rumours spread that a blockbuster was in the works. With 3 team's vying for his services it was announced (subject to league approval) that recently acquired star C Paul Stasny alongside Rich Peverly and Johnny Boychuck would be leaving the Shamrocks to join The Flaming Ducks. The Shamrocks also gave up their year 6 1st rounder in the deal in return for Travis Zajac , Chris Butler, Dustin Boyd, Dougie Hamilton and the MKG year 5 1st rounder.

"It's a deal we have been trying to work since the end of last season" said GM Paddywan when talking to the media today. "We came so close last year but one of our problems was our second line. Stasny was picked up to be the solution to those problems. However he just couldn't carry the new line by himself so we had to reshuffle again. The two deals helped us strengthen our D and add some stability to that 2nd line.

We were competitive last year and we hope to be even more so with the depth we have at D. Still one of our focuses was acquiring high pick's this year. We want to build a core team of youth for the Leprechauns rather than having one star come up each year. With some picks this year we can focus on that and we envisage a cycle which will allow us to trade picks while the Leprechauns are strong and acquire them as the kids get promoted. Our intention is to keep stability in the pro team while still gathering top level talent for the future."