News Spray

Let's keep this going, yeah?

- ESPN feller and Byron Young patient E.J. Hradek says that a new World Cup tournament could be just around the corner. It would certainly be bitchin'.

- Mikka Kiprusoff is on pace for 50 wins. This season, that is.

- Bryan Murray has no idea what to do with the Senators. Might as well just sell them all to sex traffickers in Romania.

- The Phoenix Coyotes are in almost as much financial trouble as the people who make shitty American cars, and they've imposed a few "austerity measures" on their employees. For example: Coyotes' scouts' travel fun has been reduced. That sucks, man.

I don't see anything happening to hockey in the desert, though. The Coyotes are here to stay, whether or not Winnipeg gets another franchise, and to any pissed-off Coyotes fans who might be reading: I feel your pain. Keep the faith, my friends.

- NHL.com has posted a mid-season report on which players seem likely to win all those shiny trophies at the end of the season. Predictable stuff. Why no Patty Marleau for the Lady Byng or the Hart? And for God's sake, as great as Lidstrom is, I don't think he deserves the Norris this year. There are at least five defensemen who deserve it more than him...who, you ask? Off the top of my head: Duncan Keith, Zdeno Chara, Dan Boyle, Shea Weber, his teammate Brian Rafalski...

- Your Chronicle editor heartily endorses the Buffalo Beast's list of the 50 Most Loathsome People in America, 2008. Your editor's favorite President is number 50.