POTG Returns Home After 16 Day Journey

Selling Out to Baseball at the Giants-Dodgers Game

We finally made it home ofter our 16 day journey through Las Vegas and California. After the draft ended last Saturday, we had very limited access to the Internet and received most of the hockey news in bits and pieces from Twitter, XM Home Ice, and texts and calls from Ryan Porth of The Red Light District.

The Awards Show and the Draft were great experiences where we met a ton of folks and saw many other old friends. I would try to list everyone but that would be dangerous because I know I would fail to mention someone. We have a whole bunch of videos from both events that we will be posting over the next few weeks.

One thing that I would recommend that everyone do is check out the Award Show videos from Launy and Dahlia of Hockey54.com. Launy is involved in the Drafted 2 competition at The Score in Canada and should be the hands down winner. His style is unusual and he entertains his interviewees like no one I've ever seen. His Barry Trotz video that will be up soon is one not to be missed.

In Pred Nation...

I have to admit that I feel fairly far removed from much of the local goings on and will work diligently to get back up to speed in the next couple of days.

The Predators Development Camp opens today and has a great roster of prospects and players participating. Many are returning from prior years but we also will get to see the players drafted in Los Angeles on the ice for the first time in Nashville. On ice sessions will be open to the public so it will be a great opportunity for a mid-summer hockey fix.

On Thursday, the annual Skate of the Union will be held at the Bridgestone Arena from 4-8 p.m. There will be several activities including a panel discussion and player autographs.

Another item worth noting is that the deadline for filing for arbitration passed yesterday with no Predator players requesting a hearing. That is a positive sign that the Preds are making progress in signing Patric Hornqvist.

Around the NHL...

The unexpected death of Bob Probert yesterday was a shock to the entire hockey community. Adrian Dater spoke with Stu Grimson and reports at Versus. Condolences to the Probert family in their loss.

Free Agent frenzy continues with a bunch of rumors about Ilya Kovalchuk making an announcement on where he will play on Monday. It all came to a halt with this tweet from @Jay_Grossman Ilya Kovalchuk choices have been narrowed down, details to be finalized but no announcement tonight.... Maybe we will hear today.

More Later...

Buddy Oakes for PredsOnTheGlass