Peverley’s Play Dispensed Doubts

Well, WE got Peverley today, and all the Devils did was sign Brendan Shanahan.
Like I said last week – lowest rung UFAs and waiver wire cast offs. This is embarrassing.Boy… Bet #17 is thrilled that we got… What’s his name off WAIVERS!!!!!!!!!

This is another LOSER move by The Career LOSER Dumb Don Waddell… I’d felt better is Spezza was the player claimed or traded for…

Loved Waddell’s comments, ‘He’s a guy we like’… Boy that is scary, well Nashville did not like him and these waiver claims never do one DAMN thing to help the club… This circus is just sick to watch !

We just happened to be there to pick up their sloppy seconds.

My first thought after reading that the Thrashers had picked up Rich Peverley was…. who the hell is Rich Peverley? Oh, that’s right, just another Waddellicacy from the bottom-of-the-barrel buffet.

The above is merely a sampling of some of the comments made last January when the Atlanta Thrashers snatched Rich Peverley off of the waiver wire. Needless to say, his arrival here did not come with a great deal of fanfare and excitement.

At the time, Nashville was trying to make room on their roster because a couple of players were coming off injuries and they were attempting to send Peverley down to the AHL. However, according to the story I’ve been told, coach John Anderson noticed that the 26-year old had been placed on waivers and insisted that Don Waddell claim him. In doing so, the Thrashers made the waiver wire steal of the year.

Rich Peverley, (#47), helped lead Thrashers to a winning record in the second half of last season - AP photo/Gregory Smith

I have to be honest with ya…when I first heard of the Peverley pick-up, I had to scratch my head as well. In 27 games with the Preds, he had a very underwhelming 2 goals and 7 assists and the only real reason that I saw for the acquisition was to fill the roster spot being vacated by the departing Jason Williams.

Seriously, raise your hand if you leapt from your seats after learning that the Thrashers had just claimed him off of the wire.

Uh-huh, yeah…that’s what I thought.

Of course, Thrashers fans were a very testy bunch that day. We had just watched as the Panthers built a snowman on Atlanta’s defense, beating them 8-4 during a Saturday matinee game in south Florida to drop the Thrashers’ record to 14-24-5…33 points after 43 games played. But ya know, it just didn’t take the Peever very long to cause the residents of Thrasherville to separate their fannies from the seats in Philips Arena… jumping up and down, roaring their approval of this player who had gone completely unnoticed in his short NHL career.

In just his second game in a Thrashers uniform, he played a major role in one of Atlanta’s most thrilling come-from-behind wins. Down 3-0 to the Toronto Maple Leafs after one period of play, Peverley and the then recently-named-captain Ilya Kovalchuk road a wave of energy provided by the Thrashers’ lower lines and beat the Leafs 4-3 in overtime.

Peverley assisted on two goals, including Kovalchuk’s game-tier with 4:52 remaining in the third. Pevs then finished off the comeback with the game-winner with but 69 seconds left before a shootout would have been required to decide matters.

The very next night, Peverley and his new teammates traveled up the road and preyed upon his former team, the Predators. In the 7-2 Thrashers victory, Peverley assisted on three goals to give him a total of five assists for the weekend…all in just the second and third games played for his new team. Add to that count the overtime goal, and fans started to pay the man some attention.

Where is arrival was met with much pessimism, his play quickly dispensed of such.

The Pevs Dispenser (Courtesy The Blueland Chronicle)

His ability to set up scores for his line mates earned him the nickname The Pevs Dispenser and the new top line formation of Kovy-Peverley-Armstrong was dubbed the AK-47 line… given the #47 worn on Peverley’s jersey. As things progressed, he continued to be a main part in Atlanta’s strong play and winning record from the time he joined the team to the end of the season.

Peverley wound up scoring 13 goals and 22 assists in 39 games and was a +16 as a Thrasher. Five of his goals were game winners.

As impressive as he was on the offensive side of the ice, he was equally strong on the other end where he played a very smart and responsible defensive game. This was something he brought with him from his days playing on Nashville’s third line…where you played well on defense or, as he put it, you were gone. It was also a style of play not common in these parts…which is why it stood out to so many.

Now the question is…can he build on that success and perform to such a level during a full season? If he does, it’ll make for quite a fine year.

If you take is numbers from last year with the Thrashers and project it over the course of 82 games, it equates to 27 goals and 46 assists. His +16 would…if simply projecting out for a full season’s play…amount to a +34. To place that in proper prospective, those 73 points would have been good enough to tie Todd White for third-highest on last year’s team.

That wouldn’t be too bad, especially considering that the Thrashers organization will only be playing $487,500 for his services this season…quite the bargain, eh?