We like you! We really like you!

Break out the tuxes gentlemen! Write your acceptance speeches! We are giving out awards here at the Siren to the best and the worst of the Carolina Hurricanes!

Ok so this is a little low rent and there won't be any actual trophies given away, not even the mini ones the NHL gives out. And we certainly aren't lucky enough to have Chaka Khan or Robin Thicke entertain us, but we did manage to convince (read blackmailed) Kris Versteeg to sing Fergie!

:wipes away a tear of laughter: No one tell him this is the Hurricanes' awards ceremony ok? I'd hate to clean up the green room after he realizes what just happened.

Let's get started shall we? The first award tonight is in the Best Post-Game Quotes category. This award is given to the player or coach who best exemplifies humility, humor and self-deprecation to the point of hilarity during a post-game media scrum. Previous winners include Tim Gleason and well...Tim Gleason. This year, however, we are pleased to announce that Manny Legace takes the hardware back to the Shire. Quotes like: "oh yeah I got hit right in the love pillows" and "Well, when you're five foot nothing, you have to use all of your assests" made him the clear favorite from the moment he stepped foot on NC soil. Congratulations Manny!

The Toughest Player award is given to the player that is well...the toughest (sometimes a donkey is just a donkey people). We've been witness to some remarkable moments of strength this season, but one night in Washington, D.C. will always stand out to Hurricanes' fans.

Tim Gleason, we salute you and are proud to give you the Toughest Player award!

Sometimes things happen to force fate's hand. Perhaps we would have added this award anyway, but it'd be hard to argue that the winner didn't help things along. So without further ado, I present the award for Best Facial Expression. The winner showed a dedication and determination to strange and awkward facial expressions, but Eric Staal's baby bird face from the Olympics sealed the deal for him:

Without a goalie where would any hockey team be? This award salutes those few men crazy enough to strap on a pillow and block 100 mph shots with their bodies. The award for Best Save has previously been won by Michael Leighton and Cam Ward. I am pleased to announce that our Campion Wardolie is a repeat winner this year for this Camtastic save on Billy Guerin:

Honorable mention goes to this pinwheel save on Brian Gionta.

Speaking of netminders, it's time to present quite possibly the most frightening award of the evening. The Best Tripp Tracy Moment category always has great entries and this year was no exception. In fact it was so full of Tripp awesomeness that we almost had to name two winners, but after some careful thought and consideration of all that is Tripp we are pleased to announce that Tripp and Zach Boychuk's intermission exchange during a game against Pittsburgh wins the category.

Tripp: Having been selected 15th in the entry draft...
Zach: 14th Tripp.
Tripp: Blah blah blah
Zach: It was 14th Tripp.
Tripp: Err ummm what? Oh yes, 14th.

Thank you for that moment young Zach. I sense that many more great Tripp Tracy interactions are ahead of you. Godspeed Zach.

The Best New Regular award is for the player we can no longer imagine our team without. This player can come to us through trade or as a call-up from the AHL. This year, it was the latter. When you are called "the defining player in our lineup" by your coach, wear the A, and basically become the top defensive forward all while racking up only 2 PIMs at 21 years old, you've pretty much locked this award up. Congratulations to Brandon Sutter for his outstanding season!

The next award is the highly coveted Best Goal award presented to the player whose moment of offensive brillance left us breathless and left the opposing goalie sputtering in disbelief. We've had some really great goals this season, but there is one that stands out above all the rest. Please congratulate Chad LaRose on his mid-air goal against the Montreal Canadiens.

You have a gift my little friend.

You can't score a goal without a little help from your friends and sometimes those assists are prettier than the actual goal. The Best Assist category is intended for just those moments. This year's winner showed that you don't have to be 22 years old to have sick moves.

Yeah Brandon. WOW is right. Rock on little mighty mite.

We were lucky enough to get a glimpse of the future of the Carolina Hurricanes and let me say that the future is so bright we're going to need shades. And with that really corny intro, I am pleased to announce the winner of the Brightest Future award is....Jamie McBain. The 22 year old Minnesota born D-man definitely made a lasting impression on fans around the league with his defensive poise and offensive abilities. He is going to be pleasure to watch for a long time.

For some reason hockey and fighting go hand in hand. There's nothing like a good fight to bring a crowd back to life or swing the momentum in a game. It's for this reason that we present the Best Fighter award every year. Previous winners have pretty much only ever been Tim Gleason. And this year is no exception. Check out this beauty:

Our final two awards are perhaps the most highly anticipated thing since Martin Brodeur's post game extra large pizza. :pause for ripples of awkward laughter:

Alrighty then...the Fan Favorite award goes to the player whose personality off the ice and play on the ice inspires fans to chant his name, buy his jersey and support him at all times. There was really only ever going to be one nominee for this award, but like the Edmonton Oilers, we still had to go through the motions of the entire season. Please join me in congratulating Tuomo Ruutu for his efforts this season!!! The smiley Finn always managed to put on a brave face for the media and fans, but really even if he wasn't smiling, listening to him speak made us smile. His refusal to give anything less than 100% inspired his teammates and his fans. The RBC Center has been Ruu-ing since he arrived in Raleigh and we don't want to stop anytime soon.

Last, but certainly not least, is the Team MVP award which goes to a player who has been deemed to make the most significant contributions to his team. Past winners have included Cam Ward and Ray Whitney. This year, a first time nominee is bringing home the honor. I am pleased to announce that our winner, with a career high 65 points and an unmatched ability to mesh with anyone and everyone, is Jussi Jokinen!!!!
That does it for the ceremony and like all of the best awards shows, we only ran 45 minutes late and had just 2 awkward moments. Congratulations to all winners this evening and remember that while only some of you are leaving with imaginary trophies, there really are no losers here. Well except for A.Ward who is probably still waiting for his invitation to come in the mail. Ok so make that three awkward moments.

The Wizard Wins It

It's official people-everyone loves Raymond! Everyone's favorite mighty mite (or munchkin) notched two goals and that was all the Canes would need to hold on for a 2-1 win over the Colorado Avalanche. By the way, this puts the Canes at over .500 in 2010! Whoop whoop!

Tonight was a fairly decent game for the entire team once they stopped the endless procession to the penalty box. 9 first period penalties including 2 fighting majors (TKO who is still "0 for" in his career and Ruutu) isn't going to get you a win very often. Overall discipline needs to be better no matter what the other team is trying to pull because at some point the opponent is going to capitalize on those freebie chances.

The Six Pack of Rats played with passion and heart which is all you can really ask for at this point in the season. Rod had an assist on the first Whitney goal and A.Ward had one on the second so that's a step in the right direction.

Major props goes to our Campion Wardolie for stopping 29 out of 30 shots while his team managed to only get 20 on Peter Budaj. That's another thing that needs to get fixed and quickly. In the past 4 games, they've only averaged around 23 SOG and have gotten out shot in every single one. That's asking for too much from your defense and goalie. Please guys, shoot the puck. Just do it.

Insane props goes to the Wizard for scoring quite possibly the most beautiful goal of the season:

Holy crap Ray. I didn't even know you still had moves like that (and apparently neither did Colorado)! Keep it up little man.

Ok so as is the case with just about anything, and especially the Canes this season, every yin has a yang. Tonight's yang? Tuomo Ruutu. After sticking up for himself against Darcy Tucker early in the first period, the fabulous Finn left the game with an upper body injury. From the sound of things he'll be out a while. I hope he's back sooner rather than later because we are running out of Rats up there in Albany. Jeff Daniels must just cringe everytime the phone rings.

Ok one last thing before we call it a night. The Emperor got into a fight tonight (yeah I know-NOT THE FACE) and things didn't really...well they didn't go as well as he had probably hoped:
Oh Timmy, maybe next time you could just pull your arms in and slip out of your jersey? You're a tough man no doubt about it, but it's hard to take you seriously when your look is less snarl and more...
Thanks to Jenniwa30 for pointing out the likeness.

The Canes have one day to enjoy their win and heal any minor bumps and bruises before Ottawa and the newly engaged Mike Fisher come to town. Let's make it 3 wins in four games eh?

Holy Moly What Do We Do Without Our Goalie?!

In probably the least surprising moment of the year thus far, the Canes dropped their 12th in a row to Columbus last night. But no one is talking about that today. Instead everyone is insanely concerned about the fate of our Campion Wardolie who was taken to the hospital after getting cut by Rick Nash's skate. Calamity Cam remains in the hospital and is out for, as JR put it, a "fairly long period of time." Ouch. My heart hurts.

Let us all take a moment to offer a prayer to the hockey gods (or the diety of your choice) for Cam's speedy recovery.

Ahem
Dear merciful and benevolent hockey gods,
I would like to apologize on behalf of all Canes' fans for our blatant disregard of your power and excellence. We shouldn't have cursed you when things didn't go our team's way. We had no right to complain when we lost guys to injury and suspension. How dare we assume we were going to excel this year? That is for you and you alone to decide. We admit we've sinned and we will do anything to repent for these mistakes. If there is anything I can do personally to right this wrong, just send me a sign. I will no longer make fun of E.Staal. I will call Creepie by his real name. I will stop making suggestive comments about Tripp's preferences. But please for the love of Gretzky, give us Cam back. We will never again take him for granted nor shall we question your power over the hockey world if you will give us this one small bit of hope. Amen.

As bad as the Cam in the hospital thing is, what may be even worse is that the fate of goaltending for the Carolina Hurricanes is in the hands of one Michael Leighton. Dear god. Is it too early to cue the locusts and the 7 horsemen? No? Ok I didn't think so. Now to be fair to Leights, he did do admirably well during Cam's absence last season, but that was a much shorter period of time and with a much less fragile hockey club. This is a horse of a different color and it's an ugly one. Leighton is inheriting a mess of a team that usually looks to Cam to be their saving grace. Sadly, I'm not entirely convinced that Leighton has the ability to deal with that situation. And neither Justin Peters nor Mike Murphy are ready to make the leap to NHL level goalie.

So, other than crying (and possibly some heavy drinking-NOTE I am not condoning alcoholism!) what do we do? Should Tripper come out of the press box and mind the nets again? Because I don't know if you knew this, but Tripp used to be a goaltender. Yup that's right, The Hurricane Siren-breaking news first. ;) Should Tommy B. come out of retirement and trade designer suits for Nike-Bauer pads? As fun as both of those options would be, I don't think they're all that realistic. And it's a shame because I had even figured out the perfect tagline John could use when Tripp made a big save-"and the little leprechaun snatches back his lucky charms!" Hehehe. Err...Tripp, I apologize, that was mean and largely uncalled for.

So back to the real world here...I could see one of two things happening.
Option 1-JR could do nothing and let Leighton fend for himself with guest appearances from Peters and Murphy as needed. This idea has some merit to it. The season is all but done (let's be honest here people-a MIRACLE would need to occur for this team to pull themselves out of the basement and we may have used up all of our miracles last season) and to make a desperate move to lock up a goaltender may do more harm than good. Why not let Leights earn his paycheck and prove whether he should be resigned next year or not? Is it really going to hurt our standings that much? FYI-we are in dead bang last so the answer is probably NO.

Option 2-JR could make one last ditch effort to get this team together and start their push for...29th? Ahhh...this appeasing the hockey gods thing isn't working so well for me today. He could trade for a current NHL goalie or bring someone in who doesn't have a team right now. Some suggestions-Manny Legace, Manny Fernandez or Kevin Weekes (JR LOVES TO RECYCLE!). I would still expect someone to get traded even if JR signed an out of work goalie. We are so close to the cap as it is that I don't think there would be room for anyone else (unless they are willing to work for delicious RBCC hotdogs and pulled pork sandwiches in which case-get them to Raleigh NOW).

Regardless of what happens with the goalie situation (Cam-heal like you've never healed before please) the rest of the team is going to need to step it up starting with the d-men. Cam will no longer be there to save their collective hineys and they cannot leave Leights hanging out to dry because he will fold like well...like wet laundry. And I think the D core goes the way of Timmy Gleason which leads me to my final thought for the day. I would like to officially endorse the Tim Gleason for Emperor campaign. Give that man a permanent A. Put him on the fast track for Captain. Heck maybe he and Sutter can co-coach the team while they're at it. (Thanks to Jenniwa30 for the picture.)