It's pretty interesting how the Avalanche have slowly evolved their off-season strategy. They used to spend their time going after elite defensemen. Last season they started stockpiling forwards, picking up Paul Kariya and Teemu Selanne. This year, they picked up Vincent Damphousse from San Jose.
Damphousse is a pretty good pick-up, though. He's gritty, durable, and consistent. In other words, the anti-Kariya/Selanne. It would have been a pretty hot combination if the Avs could have held on to Matthew Barnaby, too. I have a feeling a Damphousse/Barnaby line would be pretty tough to play against.
I'm kind of wondering how Damphousse will adapt to not being the team leader, though. I wouldn't want to try and compete with Joe Sakic for a team's attention.
And look at the Sharks. They keep finding talent to shed. It's amazing. Just when you think they're out of players, they find someone else of quality to unload. And magically, it never seems to negatively impact the team. Check out their 2002-2003 roster. Now, check out their current roster. Not a ton of overlap, eh?

Am I the only one who thinks the only reason Petr Nedved is about to re-sign with the Oilers is so the press will stop accusing him of being whipped by his supermodel wife?
Whatever the reason Nedved decided to abandon his stated wish of playing for an urban team (but confusingly ruling out the New York Rangers), it's a great break for the Oilers. Nedved is streaky and often defensively lax, but when he's on, he's on. It's nice to see a talented player coming to Edmonton instead of leaving.
And on a not-too-related note, the Register-News of who-knows-where has a relatively interesting piece comparing the 1980 Soviet hockey team to the current US Olympic basketball team. Basically, the moral of the story is dynasties grow complacent.

So last summer the Tampa Bay Lightning saw Vaclav Prospal abruptly split for the Mighty Ducks. He left so quickly, no one was even sure where he went.
Now, about a year or so later, he's just as suddenly back in the Tampa fold (l:aphotoaday;p:aphotoaday).
The Ducks traded him back to Tampa for a second round draft pick. So the Ducks get to shed salary and Tampa gets to shed Cory Stillman, who Tampa brought in to replace Prospal.
Prospal was a powerhouse with Tampa. I never understood why he left so quickly. The only possible downside to his homecoming is that Tampa won the Cup without him. They ain't broken, yet this seems to be a form of fixing. I can't imagine Prospal will have any kind of negative impact on the team, though. Plus, Prospal took less money from Anaheim for a big signing bonus. So Tampa is getting him for less than they were willing to pay him last year with no signing bonus.
I feel bad for Stillman, though. Now he's suddenly teamless.

I have no idea how to respond to the Original Stars Hockey League, which seems all set to roll when the NHL lockout begins. The Original Stars will have teams of NHL players (guys like Mike Ricci, Mike Comrie, and Dave Andreychuk) playing four-on-four with no center red line and lots of penalty shots. The teams will be based on the original six cities, but the games will be played around Canada.
It's so weird because if the NHL came to the players and asked to make the league like this, the players would never agree. They'd complain about the lost jobs and the no-touch icing, and the high scoring. But left to their own devices, this is what the players create for a league of their own.
Also weird, despite the fact that the league will have six teams, they seem to have lined up a few hundred goalies. Seriously. They say they have commitments from Roberto Luongo, Dominik Hasek (who sort of made a big deal out of not playing for an original six team this season), Dan Cloutier, Chris Osgood, Patrick Lalime, Manny Fernandez, Dwayne Roloson, and Mathieu Garon. So, so far, that's eight goalies for six teams. Although looking over the TSN article, it seems the league's draft will only involve six goalies. So, rather sadly, some NHL goalies will actually be cut from the Original Stars Hockey League. That is sure to give birth to the Cut Stars Hockey League.

So how did Mario Lemieux spend his summer?
Working out like crazy.
Seriously. He was out in California working out with Detroit's Chris Chelios, Mathieu Schneider, and Sidney Crosby, who apparently is already hanging out with the NHL elite despite not even being drafted yet. Lemieux was trained by T.R. Goodman, who runs this intense boot camp a lot of players (in hockey and in other sports) seem to dig. It sounds like hell to me, but I'm pretty lazy.
The funny thing is, Lemieux is doing this super-training with some of the NHL's best players, and then, back home in Pittsburgh, he's training with goalie Greg Szazynski, the self-proclaimed "best beer-league goalie" in Pittsburgh.
Now that's what I call cross-training.

I'm not sure I get Devils defenseman Scott Niedermayer's arbitration settlement.
He wanted $9 million a year for five years and the Devils were reportedly stuck on $8 million a year for five years.
So he ended up with $7 million?
I don't know if the arbitrators are privy to the numbers teams are knocking around with players, but it seems really weird that they would come in below what a team is willing to pay. I guess in Niedermayer's case the compromise is he's getting less money than he wanted but the right to go on the free agent market next season, whenever that is. And it sounds like he's pretty serious about leaving the team as soon as he contractually can.
So as near as I can tell, the only Devil to ever leave arbitration happily is Scott Gomez, who just got $2.9 million for next season.

The big non-story of the week is shaping up to be Jeremy Roenick and his admitting he bet on sports, but not hockey (login info.).
The Philadelphia Inquirer article on it is excruciatingly long and doesn't reveal much of interest. Basically, Roenick used to gamble and then he stopped.
Honestly, I think he took way more of a gamble coming back from that broken jaw.