Whaler

>>That statement, totally untrue, hardly boosts the reputation of someone who has made over 12000 posts to this board. Just shows that *some* people's only enjoyment seems to come from attacking another, especially someone whose only post to this board in a year was one complimenting the Devils on their beautiful new arena. An attack post like this makes me doubly glad that I took down the Devils Stats site because of the ignorance shown by those who insisted that I was seeking to profit from a site with no ads, and free to anyone. To see that it STILL goes on after all this time is a further puzzle. *sigh*

Was just doing some "Summer browsing" of hockey boards, and just had to poke my head up to see if the shooting had stopped. he he. Seems calm so far! [grin] Now, back into the woodwork.

This has gone WAY beyond what I had imagined when I made my original post. I never intended to incite anything, and am distressed at the turn this has taken. Enough! No more posts on this subject from me. I'm done. I'm sorry for all the commotion. I'll not contribute to it anymore. My apologies to those who think they deserve them. Mostly, my thanks to those who were able to grasp what I intended to convey, and responded in kind. Enjoy what's left of the season.

I guess some people simply can't get around their paranoia. They MUST think that everyone has ulterior motives in whatever they do. Maybe it's a reflection of how they live their own life. I was NOT looking for some sneaky way to increase traffic! Period! I was doing what you obviously can't understand. Explaining why I had come to a certain decision to those who HAD been visiting, who might wonder why it's no longer up. I strongly resent being called dishonest. This irks the sh!t out of ME! I hope you haven't given up your day job to become a psychoanalyst. You're really BAD at it. But you have succeeded in one of your aims. Just when I was thinking I may have made the wrong decision, your post brought me back down to earth.

In fact, the changes to the jerseys has already been made. I'm always happy to respond to suggestions. The information about the Home/Away jerseys was welcomed, and the change was made to the Hurricanes site as well. Surprise, surprise.....I'm not difficult to deal with at all. [grin] And it is worth very much!! Thanks!

I would have no problems with a link being created to the site whatsoever. In fact, it would be welcomed. What I object to are the insinuations that I am seeking some sort of gain from all of this debate. There is no gain for me in any way, shape, form, or manner! If some stats fanatics get some satisfaction from a visit to the site, then great! That is the sum total of its reason for being. Indications lately have been that there is more interest than the visit counters have shown. This is cause for further consideration. When the season has ended, a review will certainly be made. This is only fair. I hope that any vindictiveness which has surfaced in the meantime can be controlled. Recent posts have indicated that many voices were never heard from. Those voices have now been heard comments pro and con processed. I look forward to a more rational outlook. Maybe there IS a middle ground after all.

And you are certain that THIS is the reason? Interesting. In fact, I'm looking into the possibility that a long tradition which I have been familiar with for decades has been changed. If I find that it is true, I will promptly make the required changes.I have NO problem accepting that a particular rule change or tradition has passed my attention. However, I find that it is extremely difficult to accept the fact that THIS, in itself, is the reason that hockey fans of any persuassion would refrain from taking advantage of a source of information pertaining to the team they follow. Changing the jersey colors is not a problem. Accepting that this is the reason, however, is.

Almost never. I really don't know why I keep my AOL membership paid up.

Thanks for the kind words. Bandwidth and HD space has not been a problem. I was content when there were only 6 or 8 people visiting. At least there was some interest, and a reason for continuing. When nobody was visiting for weeks on end, I had to wonder if it was worth continuing. I never expected to be attacked for doing what was fair. That is, giving the few folks on here who did visit, the courtesy of informing them why I had come to my conclusion. Why the attempt to explain was seen by some as some sort of charity appeal to be analyzed for what my agenda might be was a total surprise to me. I believe I let it be known from the start that I was not a Devils fan, but a due-paying member of the Hartford Whalers Booster club. I'm not a fan of the Carolina Hurricanes, either, although I've maintained the Hurricanes Report for 8 years without ever having been accused of having ulterior motives. When a couple of posts were made in this thread with extremely patronizing comments (to say nothing of hostile) I was tempted to shut it down then and there. But I had already stated that I'd continue through the regular season, and I intend to fulfill that committment. Again, I appreciate the offer of HD space, but that was never a problem. I hope the "war of words" can now be put on the back burner. Thanks for the added opportunity to get a few facts straight. Best of luck in the playoffs!

Thank you for taking the time to show this humble person the error of his ways. You are correct. I should take the time to contemplate on why I chose to force my profit-driven enterprise on the good folks who root for the NJ Devils. Oh, wait! There IS no profit for me for providing the service. Then surely I did it to further my own interest in the Devils. Oops! Forgot again. I'm not a Devils fan. So why did I do it? This might be an idea foreign to you, but it was simply to do a nice thing. How dare I come here and inform the majority of the posters who lack your insight that the service was available? You can't imagine how grateful I am that you chose to set this interloper straight. You've made my decision so much easier. Thank you again, kind sir.

I'm sorry to announce that, due to the lack of interest by Devils fans, the Devils Report stats site will not be renewed for next season. Although it has been my pleasure to supply the statistics found on the web site, http://members.cox.net/hockeystats/Devils/index.html the interest simply is not there. I'd like to thank the few who responded for the suggestions put forward which led to an improved look to the main page. However, there has been almost ZERO traffic at the site for quite a while, leading me to question the further expenditure of effort which winds up serving no purpose. I tried, and bombed. [grin] Wouldn't be the first time. A similar site for the Columbus Blue Jackets lasted only 2 seasons, but I had higher hopes for the Devils' site because the board here seemed a lot livelier. I've learned one important lesson from this. That is, to never listen to Toesave. [grin] He's the one who asked me to do the stats site for the Devils. I'll still be busy maintaining the original stats site I began 8 years ago for the Carolina Hurricanes. The site gets plenty of eyeballs, and I'll now concentrate on making it even better. I have appreciated the (few) comments I've attracted on here, and I wish to express my thanks for the warm welcome I feel I've had on this board. Thank you all!! (The site will remain through the end of the season, but not for Playoffs.) Good luck to your team!!

If you follow the Conference standings by points per game on the site, you can now click on a link to show you the standings league-wide. This was added a while back without notice while watching for "kinks" to show up. Since it seems to be operating OK, I thought I'd let those few stats lovers who go there know. To anyone who objects to postings like this as being off-topic or otherwise objectionable, I apologize. I post so rarely that proper posting protocol is not one of my strong suits. Your comments will be of great value in making my decision about continuing the site next season. Thanks!

Thanks for the comments, folks. They are appreciated.

Just wondering. At the risk of raising the ire of those who thought I was spamming the list in the first place, when all I was interested in was informing those who MIGHT be interested of the availability of a comprehensive web site for stats fans of the Devils, I take the step of posting again. When there were comments made about the perceived "messy page", I took steps to change the look to make it less "messy". Since then, a new "wrinkle" has been added in the form of a single-line "mini-summary" of the last game played, appearing near the top of the page. As simple as it appears to be, it is deceptively so. Much work was involved to perfect that one line until it actually performed as desired. Now, it seems that this effort has been for naught, and interest in stats of this type is far less than expected. Although it is my intention to continue the maintenance of the site through the end of the season, there is little incentive to keep it alive into seasons to come, since the interest simply is not there. I really ENJOY keeping stats of this type, but if it's for my enjoyment alone, and not something to share with others who have the same interest, it's simply not worth the effort. Please pay another visit to the site, after which you may feel free to advise me to continue, or to "shove it". If the interest simply isn't there, I apologize for ever having taken up your time with my posts. ALL comments, pro or con are welcomed, including off-board e-mail communications. For those who missed the original give-and-take on this subject, the URL is: http://members.cox.net/hockeystats/Devils/index.html

A change in the Conference Standings program will now show if the current update is incomplete, due to some late games not being included. In such a case, a NOTE to that effect will appear, and the teams whose games are not included will be marked with an "x". The incomplete file will then be updated the following morning. It shouldn't happen often, but when west coast games are involved, I'll put up the results as I have them before shutting down my computer for the night. They will then show as incomplete.

In most cases, within an hour after the end of the game. Sometimes, within minutes. Unless, of course, it's a west coast game, in which case the update should be before noon the next day.

In response to a poster who thought that my Devils stats site needed a bit more order, I'd ask that you have another look at the changes which have been made in response. The admittedly confusing information which had been located to the left of each section of the main report has been moved to the top of the OVERALL, HOME, and AWAY areas. Also, a bit of better lining-up of the Attendance page numbers has been done. I hope these are of some help to those who had trouble wading through the site before. Not sure it makes too much difference, because it seems that not many are checking the site out anymore, anyway. (I'm hoping it's because the counter isn't functioning properly, and not because Devils fans don't care. [grin] ) As usual, comments are not only welcomed, but acted upon whenever possible. Forgot where it is? http://members.cox.net/hockeystats/Devils/index.html

I may be wrong, but isn't FRONT PAGE a "Windoze" application? In which case, my Mac wouldn't like it very much. he he

A couple of posters have pointed out that(at least on their browsers) the numbers don't appear to be organized or orderly. "Good stats but page needs to have a little organization added to it like columns and rows. The numbers are just floating around."...njdevils783 "site makes me dizzy needs massive organization"...Elias26 Although I'm far from being an expert programmer, and realize that different browsers "see" web pages differently, I have spent many many hours trying to be sure that things line up properly. Granted, there is a lot of info crammed into a limited space. That's why I checked the site in Netscape, Opera, AOL, Internet Explorer (Mac version), Safari and Firefox. To those whose browser shows them a "jumble of numbers", I can make no promises that the look will improve and am sorry to lose you as viewers. If I had the programming skills to make it work for all, I would. Unfortunately, I'm an amateur programmer who had to struggle for a long time to even get to this point. Before I got the program written, I used to keep the stats in spreadsheets, and laboriously copy all the changes in values into a word processor file manually, and re-arrange the standings by copy-paste. It took well over an hour for each game. Now, everything takes 5 minutes for both Canes and Devils sites. I'm quite reluctant to mess with the code much more. I wish I could satisfy everyone, but that goal seems to be beyond my meager programming capabilities. Although this won't improve the look for some viewers, I hope it, at least, offers some explanation.

Some good points made in that post. In reply, please indulge me for a bit while I give a little history behind my post. For 8 years, I've maintained a similar stats site for the Carolina Hurricanes, even though I'm not a Canes fan. As my name would imply, I'm still a Whalers fan, even though my team is long gone. I just enjoy doing the stats. In fact, I also ran a site for the Blue Jackets for a couple of years, until I decided to end it because of a lack of interest on the part of Jackets fans. One of the Devils fans who used to visit the site kept asking me to consider doing the same for the Devils. The poster, TOESAVE asked again and again over several years. Since I gave up the Jackets site, I thought I'd have some extra time to give in to TOESAVE's requests. he he Obviously, though, he did a lousy job of letting his fellow Devils fans know about it, so I thought I'd try to find the most popular posting site for Devils fans, and pass the word along myself. Since I have nothing to gain from building the visitor numbers, except some satisfaction that some folks find the information useful, I do not see myself as a "post whore", but can understand why some would. For that, I apologize. As for coming into someone's home looking for free food, I rather thought I was *bringing* some food! [grin] That's my story. Thanks to anyone who even read this far. Again, sorry for not being the perfect guest. That was far from being my intention. Things seem to have been misconstrued, and I'll not stick around unless it's OK to call ocassional attention to any new changes to the site. Or, for that matter, if given the word that I'm still being a bother, I promise to stay away completely. Hope this clears things up a bit. Although I'm not a Devils fan, we do share something in common: I hate the Rangers! *smile* End of ramble.

I'm really sorry that you saw my post as being spam, when the post was made in an honest attempt to provide information about something which would be of interest to any Devil's fan. Anyone who checked it out before assuming it was spam would see that the site contains no ads or in any way would provide any income for the site. It is provided as a service long requested by long-time Devils poster TOESAVE. You might want to at least take a peek.

If you like team stats, you'll find this site to be just what you're looking for. Check out the way the Conference Standings page adjusts for games in hand to give a more accurate picture. Please use the e-mail link to make any comments or suggestions you'd like. Most of all.....enjoy! http://members.cox.net/hockeystats/Devils/