This morning's news and notes include some teams' offseason plans, players with perhaps too much power according to some, and one TV viewer's insight as to why, perhaps, the NHL is indeed better off without ESPN. All this and more after the jump...

In today's game, the NHL players have the power - Canada.com
With Dany Heatley demanding a trade out of Ottawa, the argument is made that these days players have inordinate leverage over their teams. To get some perspective, Ken Warren interviews a retired NHL coach - Nashville's color commentator Terry Crisp.

Grease the Tires and Light the Fires: Getting Ready for Next Season - Five For Howling

Gootzman picks up an angle that nobody has been paying attention to - what do the Phoenix Coyotes need to focus on to improve their on-ice fortunes?

Blues are narrowing gap on Red Wings - STLtoday.com

Bernie Miklasz takes a look at how the St. Louis Blues are positioned within what is now the toughest division in the NHL. The Predators have a tall order leaping back over traditional doormats of recent years like Chicago, Columbus and St. Louis if they want to return to the playoffs.

Habs have $30 million for free-agent sweepstakes - Montreal Gazette

While Les Habitants are being sold to the Molson family, the team has plenty of cap space available, and you can bet they'll spend about every penny of it on free agents.

Lastly, it seems like whenever I make a weekend trip up to Indiana I find some unexpected hockey content in the Indianapolis Star, and this morning is no different. The following letter from reader Mike U. of Indianapolis was printed in this morning's sports section:

"As I watched the last couple of games in the Stanley Cup Finals on NBC, aside from great hockey, I noticed something else: I could see almost the entire screen! The only graphics were what was necessary to the game: team names and score, period number, time remaining. If there was a penalty, it showed how much time was left in the power play. That's it. No transparent logos for channels, no gophers running around pretending to avoid cards, no ads for upcoming shows - just what was essential to the game being broadcast.

Saturday night, I was watching the Nationwide Series race on one of the ESPNs. The top of the screen contained information pertinent to the race, and that's very helpful. The bottom of the screen contained the continual scroll bar of the same five or six items... over and over and over!

I am very sorry that UConn coach Jim Calhoun fell in the 12th mile of a 50-mile charity bike ride and broke five ribs. I'm sure there are people concerned that two college players opted out from going early in the NBA draft. There are people who want to know the baseball scores. But do you need to put all of this on a loop that repeats approximately every two minutes? It's incredible annoying and very distracting. Enough is enough."