November 2008 Archives

Andrew Hay started a good discussion of how to get started with an incident handling / incident response program over at the Security Catalyst forums.

There's lots of good information in there. As poster Dave Hull notes, academia is good for practising your IR stuff. There are both lots of intrusions, and lots of weird things that look like intrusions, but aren't.

Like some of the posters there, I've taken the SANS 504 course, although I'm not sure that I would characterize it as an in-depth introduction to incident handling. It is as much about how to avoid doing the handling in the first place as anything else, although there is definitely some good stuff in there on IR/IH.

I haven't checked out the NIST publications yet, although that's not the first place I've seen reference to them.

SANS has links to two cheat sheets for incident handling. One is aimed at server administrators, those who are (hopefully!) most likely to notice issues in the first place. The other is aimed at those who respond to confirmed incidents.

The server admin sheet is mostly what to do and some ways to do it; the handler's sheet is mostly a list of questions to be answered.

The SANS links are to a handler's website, and the result will give you a link to both PDF and Word versions.

I was watching some game on CI a few nights ago, and one of the colour guys - forget who - trotted out that old favourite, faceoffs being SO important. It seems to me that somebody in the Oilogosphere made some work of discrediting this, and I'd have thought it would be mudcrutch79, but I couldn't find the post. Or maybe I just made it up.

At any rate, what the colour dude was saying was that with the new rule this year, initial PP faceoff takes place in the offensive zone, that power play percentages were up. It does seem that teams are deadlier this year than last, although I'd want to look at the numbers going back farther than that. Still, we're a good 15-20 games into the season for all teams now, some 300 games now, so we must have enough data now to be able to draw a preliminary conclusion.

I don't have the time right now to suss things out - my life is busier than usual and I still suck at figuring out how to figure things out - but it seems to me that the way to approach it would be to look at faceoff wins by the team on the PP immediately following a neutral or defensive zone penalty, and see how many goals were scored in the first 15 seconds or so after the faceoff. If possible, look at zone possession - did the puck leave the penalty killer's end? First, of course, you'd want to make sure that PP% really has gone up over the year.

On the face of it: we know that the Oilers are usually a top 10 PK team. We also know that this year, they've few forwards who can be trusted to take a draw. And we know that this year, their PK is surprisingly stinky. Correlation, causation?

If somebody else wants to look at it, I'd appreciate seeing the results. Otherwise, I'll get to it when I can.

Last night was a weird game. The Oilers had no business winning it on the shot clock, Leclaire didn't play exceptionally poorly, they gave up a ton of power plays, and yet somehow the score wound up 7-2 for the good guys. The difference was Edmonton's PP was 2/3, and Columbus' was 1/7. The BJ's didn't help themselves by negating two of their power plays soon after they began, but still, on paper the Jackets should have had the 7 goals. And despite the shot totals, I didn't see that any of the Oilers played very poorly defensively.

For future reference, the lines looked something like this, and they didn't change much all game for a change: 10-18-83, 13-85-26, 89-27-12, 78-51-28 up front, and 44-77, 24-43, 37-31. Roloson started, Garon backed him up. I'm not sure those are what you would call classic 1/2/checking/energy lines with well-defined 1/2/3 defense pairings - you'd have to look to see who was playing against who. I'm not familiar enough with the Columbus lineup to guess what they would call their top lines, outside of Brassard-Nash-Huselius. Anyway, here go the grades.

Horcoff, 8: 1 goal, 2 assists; the goal and one assist were at evens, the other assist was on Gilbert's PPG. He played 23:21, including a sterling 5:01 of penalty kill time. His line looked a bit hesitant at first and got hemmed in a lot in the first period (so did everybody else), but he looked great overall, and even had a couple of 2 minute shifts. One of them ended with him scoring a goal, the other ended with him taking a penalty. He was on the ice for two ES and two PPG for, and one ES goal against. Temptation was to mark him to a 9, since the PK was so good and he figured into both PPG, temptation was to mark him (and everybody else) down a notch for being so badly outshot. Still, it's the results that count. Also went 10 of 19 on the faceoffs.

Nilsson, 5: 5 of his shifts ended with penalties, one of which was his own. He didn't play great most of the game, although he was on the ice for Visnovsky's goal - I don't recall that he had much to do with it though. He only had one shot and one hit, no special teams time. He got juggled around a fair bit as the game progressed. His penalty was a bad one, boarding in the offensive zone; he just got a little overzealous, but those are terrible penalties to take. He did have some good cycles with Penner.

Cogliano: 6: funny grade to give to a guy with a goal and an assist, but he didn't grab me, for some reason. His line got hemmed in a lot and I didn't think they got a lot going offensively, despite the points. His goal came on his only shot. He had some good PK time though. 4 of 12 in the faceoff circle - brutal.

Moreau, 6: one of those games where the offence wasn't there, but the defense was decent. -1 on the night, although he played 4:38 of fairly mistake-free PK and had 19:06 on the ice in total. He also had 3 hits and 3 blocked shots.

Staios, 7: -1, 20 minutes of ice - a whopping 6:10 of PK time. I'd have given him a 6, but he was a rock on the kill. Nash's goal came with him on the ice and he somehow managed not to be on the ice for the 5 even-strength goals - probably gassed from being on the wrong side of all that 5 on 4 action. Maybe could have been a 6, considering how porous the team was defensively.

Cole, 6: similar to his centre, Cogliano. 13:18 of icetime, no special teams time. He had some good rushes, including the one Cogs scored on. 3 hits. Still, wasn't as effective defensively as he needs to be.

Penner, 7: his statline didn't reflect his contributions. His goal obviously caught Leclaire by surprise, but it came off a wicked wrister that was probably earlier than the goalie was expecting. His ass was in Leclaire's face every time the Oilers controlled on the power play, and he might as well have had third assists on both PPGs. He was good enough defensively, although he looked slow a couple of times. (He also managed to keep up with Hemsky on a 2 on 1 break, so he can turn on the jets.) If he'd been faster, maybe an 8. 3 hits matched Captain Ethan's total, and one of them was a doozie. Coach rewarded him with over 17 minutes of icetime, including 2:39 on the PP and 1:44 PK. OK, I admit it, I like him, despite his floating earlier this year, and my wife loves him. He also had every right to look at the bench and smirk after his goal, but he didn't.

Boulerice, 4: Hard to do much in 2:27 of icetime, although MacIntyre always managed to. No hits isn't good for somebody supposed to disturb the poops. He did go sniffing when there was action while he was around, but no takers. He only had one shift in the second period and none in the third, with Penner gobbling up a chunk of his time and Reddox some more.

Roloson, 8: Neither BJ goal was his fault, and he had some 5 alarm saves in his 37 total. Solid night for the vet. He's stolen the starting spot back from Garon for sure, with JD breathing heavily down their necks.

Grebeshkov, 7: a very solid 7 at that. He didn't make any glaring mistakes, was very calm and smooth with the puck, and was a +2. He was on the ice for Nash's goal and I don't remember the play, but I don't think he made any mistakes. 16:51 of icetime, although only a minute on the PK. Only one hit, but he did make a few beauty defensive plays with his stick and body positioning.

Strudwick, 6: he had an assist but was -1. Probably overplayed a bit, with a boatload of PK time. He was solid, but not spectacular.

Souray, 7: he was smart all night and gobbled up nearly 24 minutes of icetime. He won't make us forget Chris Pronger, but he was full value for his contract last night too. His goal was an absolute bullet, he jumped up smartly every chance he got, and was rarely out of position. He would be an 8, but with that much icetime and as badly as the Oilers were outshot... well, somebody's got to eat it. Great pass on Cogliano's goal too.

Brodziak, 5: Mr. Invisible again. A missed shot, no hits... he's going to be back in the pressbox again if he plays many more like that. MacT didn't like his game either, half his icetime was on the PK and he only had 8 minutes total. Could argue for a 6 based on 4 minutes of decent kills, but his ES play needed to be better. He only had 3 shifts in the third period, and two of those were late, once the Oil had choked the life out of the Jackets.

Visnovsky, 6: +2, few mistakes, not on the ice for any GA and was on for 3GF. Scored 1-1-2 and had 16:48 of mostly evens play. 1 hit, 3 shot blocks, and a few "nice stick" plays. Very solid 6. Would have been a 7, if the team hadn't spent so much time hemmed in with him on the ice.

Gilbert, 7: got a goal and an assist himself, although his goal was a beauty backdoor on the power play, just like he used to get. It was probably the game-breaker, making it 4-1 at the time. 22:55 of icetime, including almost 5 minutes on the PK.

Pouliot, 6: scored a goal and wasn't terrible defensively. He had 3 minutes of PK time, and got 3 shotblocks in, one was really nice. He needs to use his size more.

Hemsky, 7: Strong 7 with 3 helpers and a ton of beauty passes, although he was only evens on the night thanks to being on the ice for Huselius's goal. I don't think he made any mistakes on that one, but he had a few others. Still, good-to-great was the definition of his play. He's gotten smarter on the PP, he shoots enough now that he can make the killers guess. He only managed one shot, although 2 more got blocked.

Reddox, 6: couldn't really tell he was only playing his third game, although he's just too small to be really effective physically - he had 3 hits, but nothing really hard. He's a bit of a waterbug, zipping around. He's not as fast as a lot of small guys seem to be, but he is very agile. His penalty was a poor one too. Still, he's making the coach have to think about sending him back down again.

Gagner, 6: two assists and +2 in 11:16 of icetime, could have been a 7. He didn't get a sniff of special teams time, big #27 took a lot of it away. Speaking of 27, Gagner made a great play on the boards to feed him for his goal. His defensive game was good enough, but I would have liked to have seen more. He was 4 of 7 on the dot.

Vast numbers (ok, 136) of my posts have disappeared, only to reappear elsewhere. I wanted to separate out the work-work bits of the blawg, for various reasons. Chances are, if you're reading this, you don't care, but I did want to note this historic occasion. And also make a link for my boss, who does usually read my roundups and sometimes forgets things.

Dustin Penner (pictured) is not in the coach's good books, and as if the scratching Saturday night wasn't enough, MacTavish let the media know today.

"He's never been fit enough to help us . . . he was signed to be a top line, top two line player . . . we thought the contract was a starting point for him, and he just viewed it as a finish line, and it's just been one thing after another."

Other words that got mentioned several times: consistency, work, motivation, "total lack of jam."

Is Dustin Penner what's wrong with the Oilers this year? Is he the reason why they've had trouble scoring and can't seem to get it out of their heads that passing across the ice with two defending players right there is a bad idea? Is he the one taking penalties with a 2-1 lead and 2 minutes left in the game? No, he's not.

Is Dustin Penner a symptom of what's wrong with the Oilers this year? Is his inconsistent play, his seeming lack of motivation, his bare minimum approach to the game, a demonstration of a greater malaise affecting most of the team? Yes, he is.

"The last thing I'm going to say about Dustin is the emphasis is on him to get his game to a level that he can help us. To this point it hasn't gotten there. Where do you go from here? He's gotta get it and get in there. Hopefully he'll be more motivated than he's been to get the . . . consistent competitiveness."

(If you haven't listened to the audio yet, you should. MacT sounded just like a parent throwing his hands up in the air over a rebellious teenager, something with which I have more experience lately than I'd care to admit to.)

MacTavish said Saturday night that Penner and Brodziak were the ones getting it in the neck, but it could have been several other guys too. Who else could those be? Smid's been a healthy scratch already this year and MacTavish was talking today about moving him up to the wing (!?) "to add some jam." I would say that other guys on the chopping block are Pouliot, Gilbert, Nilsson (Saturday night's performance notwithstanding), and maybe even Cogliano. Cole can't be too far behind; this year he's been like a Penner who hits more often, but he's had some cherry minutes with not much to show for them too.

Lowetide has a post up already about this (posted while I was working on that lovely picture) and I expect most of the rest of the sphere will follow shortly. LT asks, "What then do they [MacT's words] tell us about Kevin Lowe?" I think the answer to that isn't as interesting as one might guess. All his words say is MacTavish thinks Penner isn't living up to his contract. Lowe probably didn't present Penner to MacT as a fait accompli, it doesn't sound like MacTavish is saying the contract was a mistake, and I doubt he's absolving himself of responsibility.

The "coach lost the room" is a bullshit excuse promulgated by various groups of 20-30 grown men who want to point the finger at anybody but themselves. MacTavish is correct when he says that Penner (and others) have been doing the bare minimum to get by. Some would say it's the coach's job to motivate those players, and that if he can't, he should be fired. I don't agree, and I don't think MacT does either.

I heard it said once that when a coach calls out particular players from a team that's under-performing, he's not necessarily singling those guys out as the worst or only offenders. He's picking on those guys, because he thinks they have the strength of character to understand what's going on. I think if you look at their backgrounds, it's likely that Penner and Brodziak are such. Dimestore Psych 101ism, but this is the internet after all.

"The frustrating thing for me is that he's got the game, and he just can't find it. . . he's got a great set of tools, he just needs more horsepower."

While Penner is hardly the fastest guy on the team, I'd thought he looked miles better this year than he did last, and he hasn't looked gassed near the ends of his shifts. I'd have thought that a fatbody would be one of the last guys you'd want out on the penalty kill, and Penner's spent enough time there this season that it's not just a mistake. I don't think a coach who'd healthy scratch a guy like Penner would give him PK time to make up for the lost PK time either.

While I'm on the subject, I do find some of the coach's decisions curious; at the risk of sounding like one of the defenders of Jani Rita a couple years ago, Penner's hardly had consistent linemates, and why Gagner (who's done no more than Penner on the power play this year) kept getting Penner's spot on the #1 unit is beyond me.

Hopefully he'll be more motivated than he's been to get the . . . consistent competitiveness.

Hopefully Penner isn't the only one who finds it.

IBM has a post on their developerworks site, "11 secrets for lazy cluster admins." Just reading it I learned about a couple of new tools I hadn't heard of before, and given that I currently run 5 independent clusters, I've done a lot of poking in the last couple of years.

Chances are if you admin Linux clusters, there's something in there for you too.

I like Doug Weight, I really do. He's never played the game to end somebody's career, and while he plays hard - the result of which is sometimes an injury - he's never really played to hurt anybody either. Weight didn't have a lot of choice there, or at least that's what I told myself, and so did a lot of other guys. But really, he did. He could have not destroyed Sutter. Most head shots are avoidable.

In the last several weeks, it seems like there's been way too many incidents of head shots. I know one of the other Oilers webalawgosphere types has crunched the numbers and there's not been a lot more this year, so this is probably one of those OMG BAN GUNS type posts, but...

The last couple of years saw some major injuries to quality players. The Oilers had no enforcer since Georges Laraque was given his walking papers. Common wisdom held the two were related. This year they have Steve MacIntyre, who has yet to back down from anything and has delivered several devastating hits himself. Yet...

Three games ago, Dennis Grebeshkov was the recipient of a dangerous hit in the corner courtesy of Tuomo Ruutu. You'd think a 'canes player would know better, especially given his coach's rant after Weight did Sutter in, but there you go. Grebs is now on IR and it's definitely a concussion. Some might look at the hit and say oh, it wasn't that bad, he might be back. But brains are funny things. Sometimes you're Phineas Gage, and other times you're Glass Joe. Chances are, Grebeshkov will be fine in a few weeks. Chances are, his play will be unimpeded. But sometimes crap happens; there's a chance his career is done. Finis. Should have gone to college like Gibby; ask Paul Comrie about the value of an education to back your hockey.

Two games ago, Raffi Torres popped Ladislav Smid in the face. I didn't see that game, but I saw the replay and it was vicious, just the sort of play we cheered when Raffi was one of the good guys. Smid's day to day, but it was a blow to the head. Apparently he rode the bike and was fine and he sat out vs Pittsburgh as a precaution and now he'll get a few more days of rest, but again - you just don't know. Gage or Joe? Who knows?

Last game, Matt Cooke delivered an elbow pad directly to Tom Gilbert's phiz and, if that wasn't enough, less than five seconds later tried to end Gagner's career. Gilbert's visor is supposed to protect him from pucks and errant high sticks, not some dude's high tech armour. Theo Peckham delivered a beating to Cooke that was only interrupted by the refs, took a shot to the face while he was restrained, and wound up with 17PIM while Cooke, who'd dropped his gloves and got in that shot, got 2. Cooke's antics in the penalty box, which were the very definition of unsportsmanlike conduct, were seen by everybody but the referees, as was the blatant elbow. Peckham's a rookie and so doesn't get any slack, but Cooke is... well, not exactly Doug Weight.

Three games in a row, two concussions and another guy lucky to not have the second of his NHL career.

The NHL is cracking down on shots to the head? Like fun they are. If Sean Avery really cared about the game, he wouldn't attack Bettman for his lack of marketing skills, or Jarome Iginla because he's not a loudmouthed braggart from the future. He'd attack Bettman because he won't protect his most valuable asset, and he'd attack the NHLPA for refusing to hold Bettman accountable.

What a weird game. You knew the night wasn't likely to end well when the Oilers went 0-3 on the power play in the first period, and sure enough, the end result reflected the futility. That's not to say it wasn't an entertaining game, although one of the few reasons I didn't shut the TV off to study for my test this morning was because I'd said I would grade. I'm glad I didn't miss Souray's first and last SH breakaway though, and especially the expression on his face after he scored: "Yeah, I do this expletive deleted all the time in practise, drives Matty and Dwayne bonkers."

Horcoff, 6: 6 shots, some of them dangerous, 4 minutes on the PK and 5 on the PP, even +/-. The penalty kill was good, which salvaged the game, but the power play was bad, which sunk the game. 10's a leader, he needs to be better, although that's an editorial comment, not a grading one. Considering he saw a lot of Crosby though, he actually did fairly well, but no points means a strong 6.

Nilsson, 4: when he was a factor, it meant a Pittsburgh chance. He played only 58 seconds in the second period and 5:03 total, so either MacTavish agreed with me or he got hurt. He was on the ice for two goals against so I suspect the former - the first goal was while he was on the power play and the second right off the faceoff, although Sykora lines up across the ice from Nilsson so I don't see how that could have been his fault. Regardless, he didn't do much in the time he did get. Sorry Bobby, some nights are just going to be like this.

Cogliano, 5: On the ice for the same two goals against as Nilsson. No points, but some decent defensive plays salvaged what would otherwise have been a 4. He had plenty of try but didn't make things happen.

Moreau, 6: an assist and some righteous cycles with Cole and Pisani, but 3 GA while he was on the ice never helps. A pretty eventful 16 minutes of icetime overall.

Staios, 6: Steady Steve had a fairly serviceable 18 minutes, he did well to step in between MacIntyre and Godard when the latter wanted a second go after MacIntyre crushed Letang. 2 hits and 4 blocked shots is pretty much what to expect.

Cole, 6: looks good on the third line, he gives the opponents fits on the rush, cycle, and backcheck, and this game was no exception. He'd have likely had a 7, except he doesn't get much done on the power play and last night was no exception.

Penner, 6: 19:32 of icetime is more than usual for the big guy, he was the recipient of a lot of Nilsson's lost minutes. He only had one assist but figured into Hemsky's goal as well. Same as Cole though, would have had a 7 if he'd done more with his 4:20 of PP time. Big guy got credited with two hits and showed he's not a sap in front of the net, roughing up Letang, but got penalized as a result.

Garon, 5: not really as bad as all that, he was plain victimized on a few of the goals - nobody could have stopped Satan's - but as MacT said after the game, he wasn't bad but he needs to make those stops when the team needs them most.

MacIntyre, 6: normally 30 seconds of icetime would get you no score, but he devastated Letang on a clean hit and had a decent fight against the vet Godard. I'm not sure I agree with the need for a so-called nuclear deterrent taking up a roster spot, but as long as he plays like he did last night, he'll keep getting dressed.

Pisani, 6: scored and was good defensively, normally a 7, but he's (theoretically) a centre and couldn't win a faceoff to save the team's life. He also didn't get much PK time, surprisingly enough - Horcoff had 4:17, Pisani only 2:42. A very strong 6 nonetheless.

Deslauriers, 8: from the looks of it, should have had the start. 0GA in 26 minutes played, he made some killer stops on Crosby, Satan, and Malkin to stem the bleeding. Maybe he couldn't have done any better than Garon if he'd had the full game, but he didn't and he stopped every shot.

Strudwick, 6: pretty good defensively, nothing happening offensively, about what to expect. Very strong 6. 5:32 of PK time.

Souray, 7: he had some brutal defensive gaffes and giveaways, but he also made some very good defensive plays. 27:21 of icetime, and that shortie off the breakaway was a thing of beauty.

Peckham, 6: normally a -2 and letting Satan go to score a goal (no matter how much he had to pull his underwear out of his ass to do it) would be a 4 or a 5. But the kid showed moxie in his first NHL game this year, and mercilessly pounded Cooke. Against somebody less-practised at ducking and covering (see image to the right), he likely would have really hurt them. So he gets a sympathy point or two. He did comport himself fairly well against Crosby, which is more than a lot of vets can say, never mind rooks in their second ever NHL game.

Brodziak, 6: a helper and some quality PK time, but he got dominated in the faceoff circle and wasn't much of a factor either way.

Visnovsky, 6: no points, but +1. Some fine defensive plays - he knows exactly how to stop a player on a breakaway without drawing a penalty, last night was the second or third time I've seen him do it - but he had some brutal passes too. A whopping 7 minutes on the power play needs to come up with at least a second assist, and with his shot he needs to score.

Gilbert, 6: he comported himself much better than he has been, and his goal was classic 77. Visnovsky's appearance has hurt his icetime though, and his defensive play was good but nothing to jump out.

Pouliot, 5: if there was ever any question who drove the line in Rimouski with a certain #87, I don't think there is any more. Very much a non-factor.

Hemsky, 6: his goal was a thing of beauty, and he had 5 shots; two of the four that didn't go in were dangerous. Almost 6 minutes of power play time and nothing to show for it means he doesn't get a 7 or even a weak 8 because of the clinics on possession he put on.

Gagner, 6: the only Oilers C who showed any proficiency on faceoffs, funny considering he tended to get dominated last year. Only one shot though, and plays he set up went nowhere.

Overall, a very average game for most of the guys, and the results showed it: they got smoked by a very good team.