Save your nickels, The Great Zoltan works for free on the final day of 2010 to predict 2011.
On the Chinese calendar, 2011 is the Year of the Rabbit. Which makes it a good year, they say, to crawl away into a corner and lick your wounds after that toothsome, vicious Year of the Tiger in 2010.
(Insert Maple Leafs joke here.)
It is a year in which the four digits — 2, 0, 1, and 1 — add up to the No. 4. Thus, a prosperous year for fans of Bobby Orr and Taylor Hall.
Estonia will adopt the Euro in 2011, while Brad Richards (Rangers) and Tomas Kaberle (Kings) will be adopted on July 1 as Unrestricted Free Agents. And during The International Year of Chemistry, Brian Burke will finally land a centreman for Phil Kessel (Patrick Sharp).
And one more thing: In 2011, a conjunction will take place between Jupiter and Uranus.
I’d watch out for that, if I were you.
The 2011 men’s World Championships are set for Slovakia, which means a mandatory viewing of the movie Hostel for all Team Canada players prior to departure. The World Juniors are split between Calgary and Edmonton — we predict a Terry Jones column chronicling how Edmonton did a better job as hosts — and the 2011 Stanley Cup final will be played out in Philadelphia and Vancouver.
Beyond than those indisputable facts, however, lies a vast forest of trees that may or may not fall in the coming year.
Which means it is time to don the Turban of The Tall Forehead, sharpen up the ol' goatee, and offer some penetrating predictions on what 2011 will bring.
I, the Great Zoltan who sees all and knows all, will answer your questions about what the coming year will bring. Please, do not attempt this at home:
Oh, wise and mighty Zoltan. Will a Canadian team finally bring the Stanley Cup home to the great North?
Give us your palm, son. Hmmm….
We see the Canucks getting past the troublesome Blackhawks in Round 2, and using that momentum to vault past Los Angeles to the Stanley Cup final. But look at your life line: It goes only five games.
With health, Canucks will win in five. With happiness — as in, if they are just happy to get there — the returning Flyers (who will have acquired Miikka Kiprusoff and Anton Babchuk from Calgary in exchange for James Van Riemsdyk, Michael Leighton, Andrej Meszaros and a first-rounder) will win in their second straight trip to the finals.
Tell us, Zoltan. Will Winnipeg finally get its NHL team in the coming year?
Ahhh, let us look inside the 1000-year door for the answer.
We see a Canadian dollar that will rise to $1.10 US, and an American economy that will claim a victim among the 24 NHL U.S. owners. It will be a surprise — not Nashville, not Phoenix — and it will happen fast.
The plunging US dollar will cause the league to take over a franchise's finances, as they did with Phoenix, and with others teetering on the brink NHL owners will instruct Gary Bettman that it is time to reward the patient Winnipeg group with a relocation in 2011.
It will be so, Winnipeg.
Great Zoltan — What will happen with the Toronto Maple Leafs?
For this piece of divinity, we will utilize pyromancy — the art of reading future in fire. Because by the time 2011 is over, Leafs Nation is going to want to tie GM Brian Burke to the ol' funeral pyre.
Look deep inside the flames, Leafs Nation, and you’ll see Tyler Seguin and Gabriel Landeskog — the first-round lottery picks dealt away for Phil Kessel — dancing around Leafs defencemen for years to come. After successive bottom five finishes with no draft picks to show for it, Leafs nation will turn on Burke and his plan.
He’ll need one heck of a July 1 to bring hockey fans back on board for 2011-12. Even a Leafs fan can only take so much.
Dear Zoltan, seer of all things. What else can we look forward to in the coming year?
Well, to attain rapid fire omnipotence this late in a column, we usually opt for oinomancy — the Greek art of telling the future by examining patterns made by wine.
(Gulp). OK, here goes:
* Montreal wins one round, but not two. Cinderella teams always take a step back the next year.
* Calgary deals Kiprusoff to Philly, but GM Jay Feaster can’t find the right trade for Iginla with Washington, Pittsburgh or L.A. Two trades of that magnitude are too much for one deadline. Feaster will successfully dump some vets though, as the rebuild begins in Cowtown.
* Hamilton will get its football stadium. No set of civic politicians could be so dumb as to blow a free stadium, could they?
* Ten points back at the deadline, Senators GM Bryan Murray trades Sergei Gonchar, Chris Phillips and Jarkko Ruutu on Feb. 28, getting goalie Sergei Bobrovsky from Flyers in the process.
* The Blue Jays will play meaningful games in September; The Lions will win the Grey Cup at home; Damien Cox will close his twitter account, on the advice of counsel; the NHL’s two outdoor games will be played at Citi Field in New York and Rogers Centre in Toronto, which will also set a Canadian attendance record for the UFC; the Oilers will move the building process into Phase 2, signing centreman John Madden and acquiring Mike Komisarek in a deal that sends Linus Omark and Gilbert Brule to Toronto.
And now, the turban unwinds.
Happy New Year, my friends.
