Without a doubt, blogging tools such as Twitter have been great tools for fans to share and receive information. The best part about it, however, has been its ability to filter out the junk information that surrounds the game of hockey.

Two great examples today.

A local sports reporter was being interviewed on the radio this morning and suggested a current Oilers enforcer Luke Gazdic was a better player than former Oiler Georges Laraque. It was quickly picked up on Twitter.

Unfortunately, the reporter didn’t back up his assertion, leaving it up to listeners and the online community to correct him. Jonathan Willis of the Cult of Hockey had this to add:

Aside from his fighting prowess, Laraque was an exceptional player for someone in his role. The quickest comparison to Gazdic is that Laraque scored 34 points as an AHL rookie; Gazdic had four and never hit 30. Where Gazdic is just breaking into the majors at age 24, Laraque was in the middle of a 29-point season at the same age. It’s possible Gazdic has been slowed by his shoulder problem this year, but even so there is no comparing the long-term track record of these two, either as fighters or as hockey players.

The second example was in regards to how well the Oilers goaltenders have done against their former teams this season. There seems to be some belief that a goalies are more motivated to play against their former team and might have some inside knowledge about the  shooting tendencies of their ex-teammates. Bruce McCurdy kindly put together the numbers that squash that theory:

 

And since Viktor Fasth lost to the Ducks today, you can add that to the list as well.