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Because Mirtle is both tireless and awesome, he's compiling a list of nominees announced through various media for the Bill Masterton Memorial Trophy, which is "given to the National Hockey League player who best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship, and dedication to hockey." This usually means someone who overcame some kind of ailment, injury or addiction; whether it was non-Hodgkins lymphoma (Saku Koivu and John Cullen), alcoholism (Ken Daneyko) or eosinophilia myalgia syndrome (Mark Fitzpatrick, yikes). Looking at the current ballot, one thing is clear: If "sucking" can be considered an ailment, Ty Conklin has this thing in the bag.

Since the Masterton is the League's de facto "Comeback Player of the Year" award, it's no contest: Conklin resurrected his career from postseason punchline to legit NHL starting goaltender. You want "dedication to hockey?" How many of us would have crawled into a hole with a bottle of the hard stuff and disappeared after Game 1 of the 2006 Finals? You want "perseverance?" How about signing a $500,000, one-year contract with a Penguins team where he was third on the depth chart? You want "sportsmanship?" How about just four penalty minutes? That's 33 less than Sidney Christ!

Although he may have lost his starting job, he still leads the NHL in save percentage (.928) and his record (17-6-5) and GAA (2.35) are aces. But he's obviously not going to get Vezina attention for 27 starts, and he's not going to get Hart attention even though he was every bit as important as Malkin was in keeping the Penguins near the top when Crosby went down. ConkBlock's had one of the most remarkable reversals of fortune as we've seen in recent NHL history: A "never-was" that morphed into an impenetrable starting goalie, who inspired not only his teammates but an entire clothing line. He deserves something for the effort; so while he might not have the bacterial meningitis that previous winners like Jamie McLennan had, I think he's earned the Masterton.