The Ducks announced today that defenseman extraordinaire (and the guy that makes Mike Fisher weep at night) Francois Beauchemin has been signed to a three year contract extension. This extension comes on the heels of Beauch playing one of the best games of this season against Phoenix where he scored two goals. After a shaky start to the season, Beauch has become the most solid member of the D-core.

After allowing Beauch to walk in 2009, Bob Murray re-aquired Francois in a trade that sent Joffrey Lupul and Jake Gardiner to Toronto. Not that I'm not grateful to have Beauch re-up, but it stings a little that this all could have been avoided...

FOWL!

Wow. Shock me, shock me - a trade with Toronto. Bob Murray accquired left wing Luca Caputi from good buddy Brian Burke for Nicolas Deschamps. Join me in congratulating Deschamps on his eventual Rocket Richard Trophy because that's how things go when we trade with Toronto.

By the way, the Ducks are now first place in the "Guys Named Luca" contest.

Luca Caputi

Toronto Maple Leafs

Height: 6-3

Weight: 200

Born: Oct 01, 1988

JEN:

As Robby reported in the Fan Shot, the Ducks have traded defenseman Jake Newton and a 7th round 2013 draft pick to the Colorado Avalanche for defenseman Kyle Cumiskey.

Let's take a look first at what we received in this trade:

Kyle Cumiskey

#10 / Defenseman / Colorado Avalanche

Height: 5-10

Weight: 185

Born: Dec 02, 1986

What I'm reading on Cumiskey is that he's fast, but his size causes him the most trouble. He seems to have been a work-in-progress for Colorado, since he was drafted in the 7th round by the Avs in 2005. In September 2011, Cumiskey was signed to a one-year RFA deal with the Avs.

According to our friends at Mile High Hockey, Cumiskey was put on waivers a day before the season started for the Avalanche. An interesting move from Bob Murray, seeing as Cumiskey cleared waivers this morning. (There could be some convoluted CBA rule as to why he wasn't picked up then.) There is some speculation that Cumiskey is not completely healthy after suffering a groin injury on October 5th. He's seems to have a history of concussions and groin issues. He will be subject to a physical upon arriving in Anaheim. After that, he's likely headed straight to Syracuse to learn the system, unless there are other moves planned.

What we lost...

On the 7th round 2013 draft pick - no biggie. The world is supposed to end in 2012, so we're good.

There were a lot of high hopes for Jake Newton. He was yet another collegiate free agent signing (3 year deal) back in 2010. People were in love with his 6'3 205lb frame and his gorgeous shot at the point, but beyond that, his actual defensive game was lacking. Carlyle has commented that Newton has not developed the appropriate skills to be an effective defenseman in the NHL. He, like Cumiskey, was a work-in-progress.

JEN:

The Anaheim Ducks announced today a revised deal for the 2011-2012 season (of which he was already under contract) plus a two year contract extension for Head Coach Randy Carlyle. The OC Register is reporting that the new contract moves Carlyle up amongst the ranks of the highest paid coaches; however, the specific dollar figures were not released by the organization. As quickly as the news of Carlyle's signing hit the hockey world, the conversation went off of him and on back on to Teemu Selanne. GM Bob Murray noted that Selanne's recovery from knee surgery has been slow and Teemu is feeling down. (For a guy that is ALWAYS happy, it's a little jarring). September is weeks away. We've got plenty of time to speculate more on this development.

Anyway, back to Carlyle. Since Daniel, Robby, and I have been writing here, we've never been accused of holding back how we really feel about Carlyle and the choices he's made through the years. Heck, I even broke up with him in my second post for the site. My feelings of the extension are "meh". I'm not totally enraged by the move, but I'm not Tom Cruise jumping on the couch excited either. He's had a great run for us and you can't completely turn your back on that kind of success. Yet, it's hard for me to gauge how much of that success can be attributed to a coach's methods than it can be to the team that was built to win. As long as the players continue to respond to him, I'm cool.

What is most interesting to me about this deal is the length. His new contract ends one season after the expiration of the contracts of Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry. The last year of the twins' deals is crucial for the franchise. If Getzlaf and Perry don't feel like they continue to win in Anaheim without changes major changes, is the organization likely to stand by Carlyle or give in to the super star players in order to keep them around? All speculation at this point, but something to consider. For the time being, he's our grumpy head coach, and I'm ok with that. How about you, boys? Don't tell me you two disagree on this, too..

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DANIEL:

As per Eric Stephens' Twitter account, the Ducks have signed Mark Bell to a two way contract. Bell is winger with some size who has spent the past two season in the Swedish Elite League. He has a couple of 20 goal season under his belt from the mid 2000's, when he was playing for the Chicago Blackhawks. Bell might be a piece to improve the scoring and grit and of the Anaheim's bottom 6. If nothing else, he'll provide a veteran presence in Syracuse.

ARTHUR:
For those of you that don't know, AC columnist Jen was blocked on Twitter by Bobby Ryan (@b_ryan9) a while back. As of now, I think she's still unsure of which tweetfoot she stuck in her tweetmouth, but her account has since become a flowery parade of 140-character-floats to get back into the winger-part-time-center's good graces. Since it's Jen, I assumed she was blocked with cause, but he apparently blocks anyone who he feels has spoken negatively while mentioning his Twitter account by name.

Fast forward to today. I was trolling AC writer Robby, world renowned Bobby Ryan lover, in a discussion of whether or not Joffrey Lupul is struggling. Luckily, Bobby Ryan was struggling until tonight, so I had the opportunity to prove that Lupul is actually doing okay while also sticking it to Robby that his boy wasn't finishing. Now, the overall point I was making was that Lupul should be playing more, and he would probably take that time from someone like Jason Blake, not Bobby Ryan but, as I said, I was trolling Robby, so I specifically chose to compare Lupul directly to Ryan to prove that Lupul was playing well.

As I spent time digging up the stats (and really don't tweet enough), I tweeted them. @b_ryan9 blocked me almost immediately. Our back and forth after the jump.

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Segment from The Element covering the first Ducks Operation Homefront event from 2008

ARTHUR:
The Ducks announced yesterday that Bobby Ryan will be donating $100 for every point he scores for the remainder of the season to the nonprofit organization Operation Homefront which provides assistance to troops, the families they leave behind and the wounded veterans returning home. According to CharityNavigator.org, Operation Homefront spends over 90% of its revenue on its charitable programs with over 92 million dollars raised since its inception according to the charity.

The nonprofit began its relationship with the Ducks in 2008, a process described in the video above during the first Operation Homefront event. Last year, Anaheim also hosted Operation Homefront Night at Honda Center, donating tickets and auctioning special camouflage jerseys to benefit the charity.

Most notable for Bobby Ryan's relationship with the organization was when Team USA GM Brian Burke invited Operation Homefront to Olympic Orientation Camp, pairing each member of the roster with a veteran to remind the players of the enormity and importance of representing one's country. Ryan was paired with Sgt. Austin Johnson, a native of Ft. Carson, Colorado and an 8 year veteran at the time.

http://www.operationhomefront.net/

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Carlyle and Fowler discuss his now confirmed stay in the NHL as well as his new accommodations for the season in the Niedermayer house.

THE TELETYPE:
The Ducks announced via Twitter that Cam Fowler will remain with the team past the 9 game mark this season.  The move will activate the first year of the 18 year-old's entry level contract and likely toll one year of his minimum requirement to reach UFA status if he stays past midseason.  The Ducks' 2010 12th overall pick has been sidelined since an October 17th hit from Shane Doan and currently has six NHL games played on the season.  He was cleared to play this week according to the OC Register and is expected on the ice Wednesday.

Anaheim also announced via Twitter that center Kyle Chipchura has suffered a concussion and will be placed on injured reserve for the next two games.  The Ducks forward took a hard hit from Douglas Murray against the Sharks on Saturday and sat out Anaheim's last practice with a stiff neck before this diagnosis.  The team called up rookie Nick Bonino over the weekend, likely filling Chipchura's roster spot.

Editor's Note:  Just because I think this is amusing, the Ducks Twitter noted that Fowler and Niedermayer are doing the Crosby/Lemieux thing.  The kid is living in casa de Nieds.