Comments (1)

By Mark D, March 17, 2011 10:32 pm

Look, maybe I’m a bit obsessive, but I can’t stand Mike Milbury. Obviously if you’ve read this blog before you’ve heard his name mentioned a few times before. I’ve reviewed his bumbling of draft after draft, his waste of high draft picks and reviewed every trade he ever made. The guy made just about every mistake in the book, even if you excuse him for the trades he was forced to make to cut salary.

To make matters even worse, with the recent purchase of NBC by Comcast, the decision was made to move some of the NBC commentators to VS. God only knows why, considering that Comcast owns VS and bought out NBC, you would think replacing the NBC guys with VS guys would make more sense. So now Milbury is commentating on VS. Meaning every time I see his ugly mug I want to throw a loafer at the TV.

It wouldn’t be a problem though if he didn’t keep popping up EVERYWHERE. Now he’s on NBC’s Pro Hockey Talk. I actually enjoy it. I like most of the writers and they keep it short and simple. There’s just one little problem, on every page you get to see this picture:

First off one of his columns as I searched the site for his name (they don’t have a column with all his videos in one place) is called “Ask The Expert” May I dare ask what Milbury is an expert on? He was a marginal defenseman on a good team who clutched and grabbed when he couldn’t legally stop better players. His most famous on ice moment? Going into the crowd and beating a fan with the fans own loafer. He coached a great Boston team (an early Bruce Bordeau?) to two good seasons before taking the Assistant GM job and then moving on to destroy the Islanders. Quite the Expert.

Even worse is that his partner in crime in a lot of these videos is much maligned Pierre McGuire. Even my roommate who is much more of a casual fan (and we don’t watch games together because she’s a Flyer fan and I’m an Isles fan) then me hates all the NBC guys. Without me even prodding her about it one night she went into a 5 minute rant because the Flyers game was on NBC instead of Comcast Sports Net Philly. The NBC analysts (except for Roenick, who I enjoy) talk down to hockey fans, taking the time to explain such complicated ideas as Icing and Offsides. Plus it’s obvious that Milbury has absolutely no connection to this generation of hockey players.

To piss me off even more, one of the first times I saw that Milbury had a video anywhere, it was him and McGuire bashing the Islanders for going too far against the Penguins. Yes, that’s right the guy who ran into the crowd after a game at MSG said that the Islanders went too far. Let’s not forget this is someone who forced the league to change how it picked All Star teams after he loaded the team up with Goons.

I’m going to beg now. Please Milbury, say something so insane or so offensive without realizing it that you get fired. You say so many stupid things, one of these days you have to say something so insensitive that the networks dump your ass. Plus why does NBC hire the dumbest former managers? Also working on the football side of things for them is Matt Millen of all people. Go say Matt Millen in Detroit and see how quickly you get stabbed.

Comments (0)

By Mark D, November 17, 2010 12:04 pm

So I can’t draw. Whatsoever at all. I have an upcoming story for LHH and couldn’t use the picture I wanted to with it. So last night I figured I’d break out the MSPaint and try to capture the picture in MSPaint form. Did I mention I can’t draw, even moreso with MSPaint. So I found out I could use the pic I wanted, and figured after spending a good hour on this might as well share it. Oh and I realize Chris Simon was never convicted of anything, I just thought it looked funnier with three people in it.

20 years of Futility

Feel free to join the fun if you want, email me your Islanders MSPaint (every windows program has MSPaint in the accessories folder from the start menu) or post a link to it in the comments. Of course you could just laugh at mine, it looks awful and there’s no way I’m using it for anything.

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By admin, September 9, 2009 9:48 am

So a lot of people defend Milbury saying that once he got money the team improved. I still think that even the players he did spend money on weren’t worth it.  With this chart I ignored his first season (blaming Maloney for that mess) and added in all of his last season (he had been replaced as GM in Jan 2006).

[table id=6 /]

So I want to do this with 3 or 4 other teams from the same period. So if you can think of a team that had just as bad a run during this 10 year period. Here’s my thoughts for possible contenders

Chicago Blackhawks
Montreal Canadians
Boston Bruins
Whalers/Canes
Tampa Bay Lightning
LA Kings

Right now its looking like the Blackhawks and Kings are my two choices to possibly have worse records during the same period. I’ll take the three or four best choices and write a new post later.

Comments (0)

By Mark D, December 9, 2008 2:29 am

Let me first get this out of the way. Mike Milbury is easily one of the guys I hate the most in hockey. He coached the Bruins for two years in the 90s and also worked as an assistant GM for boston before becoming a commentator on ESPN. I must admit, I liked Mike Milbury on ESPN. When he got hired as coach of the Islanders it was obvious that he was to take the place of Don Maloney as GM. About three months in and Maloney unable to trade Kirk Miller it became Mad Mike’s job. He promised us a cup in five years, with a long term plan to rebuild the team. There have been far too many people who apologize for Milbury’s early years as GM, blaming poor ownership and no money. Yet a large number of teams during the same time period went from being horrible teams to at the very least perrinal playoff teams and the Ottawa Senators had bad ownership and no money.

In the end, Milbury had no eye for talent. Players would end up in his doghouse for no reason and would find themselves bumped back and forth between the NHL and AHL. They’d put up good AHL numbers, and when they failed after 15 games to do anything in the NHL Mike would send them back down. Or he wouldn’t like a player and would trade him for almost nothing. If you look at his first round draft selections from 1996 to 2005 you will see why Mike shouldn’t be allowed to talk about hockey.

1996 Draft

#3 Overall – Jean-Pierre Dumont: Dumont ended up never playing for the Islanders. Milbury had trouble signing him and ended up trading his rights to Chicago for Dimitri Nabokov. Nabokov was already a bust at the time and proceeded to only play 30 games for the Islanders before returning to Russia where he has been since. JP Took a few years to develop, but has become a 40-60 points a year player for the Sabres and now the Predators.

1997 Draft

#4 Overall – Roberto Luongo: Today considered one of the greatest Goalies in the league. Unfortunately Milbury traded him after drafting Dipietro.  Read more by Clicking Here

#5 Overall – Eric Brewer: Another player who was traded away after playing parts of two seasons. He was traded as a part of the Roman Hamrlik deal. Although Roman is a better offensive defenseman, Hamrlik continues to today to be seen as a player who wasted a lot of potential. Brewer meanwhile has become the captain of the St Louis Blues.

1998 Draft

#9 Overall – Micheal Rupp: One of the biggest busts of Milbury’s drafts. Rupp was drafted out of right field, a surprise to everyone in attendance, and then the Islanders never signed him. He returned to the draft two years later and was taken by the Islanders in the third round. Not enough people bring up this draft pick, which has to be one of the most non-sensical in recent history.

1999 Draft

#5 Overall – Tim Conolly: After two respectful seasons with the Islanders, he was traded with Taylor Pyatt for Mike Peca. A lot of good can be said about Peca, and given Conolly’s injury troubles lately, it might be the closest to a fair deal Milbury got for someone.

#8 Overall- Taylor Pyatt: Played one season with the Islanders before being traded with Conolly. His career high season in points and goals has been largely due to his playing with the Sedin twins in Vancouver.

#10 Overall – Branislav Mezei: Never played more then 60 games in a season and only came close once at 57 games. Played two seasons for the Islanders before being traded for Jason Weimer, Is now out of the NHL: playing for the KHL.

#28 Overall – Kristián Kudroč: Traded with Kevin Weekes for a First round pick that became Raffi Torres.  He never played more then a handful of NHL games and has been playing in Europe since 2004.

2000 Draft

#1 Overall: Rick Dipietro: For my view on him Click Here.

#5 Overall: Raffi Torres: Traded for Janne Ninimaa. Ninimaa had one good season in Long Island, and was traded two years after he was acquired from the Oilers. It should be noted that Torres was the throw away part of the deal, as the Oilers really wanted Brad Isbister. Torres has been good for 30-40 points a year but has been injuried lately.

2001 Draft

No First round pick. First round pick was traded to the Senators along with Bill Muckalt and Zdeno Chara for Alexei Yashin. Senators picked Spezza with the pick, which is widley considered completley lopsided.

2002 Draft

#22 Overall – Sean Bergenheim: Is still with the Islanders, and after a few years of development seems to have become a steady player, nothing spectacular.

2003 Draft

#15 Overall – Robert Nilsson: Was traded by Garth Snow in the Ryan Smyth deal. At the very least it should be pointed out that Smyth ended up not re-signing for the Islanders.

2004 Draft

#16 Overall – Petteri Nokelaine: Traded by Garth Snow for a second round pick. Has had injury trouble.

2005 Draft

#15 Overall – Ryan O’Marra: Traded by Garth Snow in the Ryan Smyth deal. Recently has fallen so far to spend some time playing in the ECHL, has been unable to crack a NHL lineup.

2006 Draft

#7 Overall – Kyle Okposo: The only first overall selection still with the Islanders other then DiPietro and Bergenheim. Has a lot of promise and was good enough this season to make the Islanders while still Junior Eligible.

So that means as of 2008 with 16 first round selections, three are currently with the Islanders. If I went through and broke down what happened to in all the trades and who the Islanders evantully ended up with I’d say its possible he traded away half his first round picks for players who in 2008 are not even playing in the NHL. This is the biggest reason why the Islanders are in the Mess they are now. You shouldn’t go 16 first round picks and not get one star. During the same time the Senators drafted Spezza, Philips, Redden among others. But right there is three players who managed to become all-stars for the team that drafted them. I can’t be the only person who laughs when Milbury opens up his mouth about anyones talent in the NHL