Caps defenseman Mike Green is a Norris Trophy finalist for the second year in a row. Hard to peg his chances at this point. He tends to be a polarizing figure among some members of the Professional Hockey Writer’s Association. Anthony SanFilippo, who covers the Philadelphia Flyers for the Delaware County Daily Times, just tweeted that he was “embarrassed” to be a hockey writer after Green’s Norris nomination. Yikes! So you see what Green is up against here. He was a runner-up last season to Boston’s Zdeno Chara. Let’s let Washington coach Bruce Boudreau respond:
“It’s bothersome after a while that I should have to [defend Green]. This is all I’ll say on it until after the playoffs — but to me these awards are all given out for statistics. And you want to make a statistic for something [Green] does negatively then feel free. But he’s got the best statistics all around for a defenseman And he’s not a forward. He’s a defenseman. He had the best regular season. He had the best power play [numbers]. He’s a huge part of all of this [success]. And so when you start nitpicking on him and say ‘Look it, he was on the ice for that goal against, he made that mistake.’ Well, I turn the TV on an awful lot and the same thing happens with Drew [Doughty] and Duncan [Keith], but nobody every mentions that. It drives me nuts.”
