The Two-Line Pass

Because I tend to not blog on the weekends, here is a feature that will run through the entire season. It aims to recap the weekend’s events and boils those events down to one admittedly superficial fact about each team. And hell, there’s a ton of other crap for me to blather on about too. And yes, I’m totally ripping off just about every other blogger ever’s weekly column, but that’s something you’ll have to deal with on your own time.

Danger: This post contains language that some people might not like. This will be the only thing on the site that regularly does so.

I got a couple of e-mails about the lack of posting this week, and I can see why. Not one non-Good Night post. Not one. This is not because I was especially busy. It wasn’t because nothing interesting happened in the world of hockey. Actually, it was pretty much the craziest news week in the sport since the season began. I just couldn’t bang out anything even resembling entertaining, interesting writing. Worst case of writer’s block I’ve suffered through.

This is by no means intended as excuse-making for general laziness. To help confirm this, I have decided that this week’s What We Learned will not be about any particular subject. Rather, it will be the actual, unedited things I had written up in Word and saved in the hopes of returning to it when I could rub two brain synapses together and maybe communicate a cogent, interesting opinion that someone would look at and then not say, “What a collossally stupid piece of shit.” In this, I have obviously failed.

(And just so there’s no confusion, yes, this is being done in lieu of actual content because I’m still not over this stupid goddamn writer’s block and I hate myself for it.)

Enjoy, and feel free to laugh at my expense.

Monday, or: Realization sets in

No posts attempted. Lazy and just realizing that I had nothing of interest to say.

Tuesday, or: Trying to work through the problem

Title: “Fight or die”

Premise: An hilariously tasteless title for what I had hoped would be a thoughtful post about the importance of fighting to the sport (especially in these contraction talk-laden times) in the wake of the death of Don Sanderson, who was in a coma for three weeks following a nasty spill in a senior league fight before finally succumbing to his injuries last weekend.

Post: “(Blah intro)

Obviously what happened to Don Sanderson was a tragedy. Clearly. But don’t you think that MAYBE, POSSIBLY this was just some freak accident? How many hockey fights take place all over the world in a given season? Hockeyfights.com says there were 664 in the NHL last year alone.

(other stuff)

Besides, the general public (read: casual-at-best hockey fans) like to see fights. I don’t understand any of these anti-fighting people, who, by the way, are coming out of the woodwork in a rarely-seen instance of brash and heartless opportunism. Is it a purity of the game issue? I’m pretty sure Gordie Howe fought people, if that’s the problem.

(holy jesus please end this)”

Title: “Michel Therrien is gonna get fired”

Premise: One of my favorite hockey blogs is Steve Ovadia’s Puck Update (plus we’re Twitter friends!), and on Tuesday morning he posted an interesting story about how on-the-outs Michel Therrien was in Pittsburgh. The team was playing like shit and Crosby wasn’t happy with him. I figured if nothing else I’d just talk about what an idiot Therrien is to have his team in such a bad position.

Post: “How does Michel Therrien still have a job?

The Penguins are x-x-x this season and x-x-x in their last 20 games. With talent like Pittsburgh’s, that’s inexcusible, no matter how thinly-stretched the roster is. Crosby and Malkin should be enough to win you games, especially against the Rangers.

The worst part is, the Penguins power play is at xx.x percent. You should be able to roll Crosby and Malkin out there with three fourth-grade girls and put up 20. (other stats & facts)

Really, the only thing he should have to be concerned with as “Coach of the Penguins” is keeping Sid Crosby happy. Fluff his pillow, personally sharpen his skates, get him Almond Joys whenever he wants, that kinda thing. He can’t even do that right.”

Wednesday, or: Futilely trying to be funny to compensate

Title: “Jarkko Ruutu is hungry”

Premise: In the wake of Jarkko Ruutu biting Andrew Peters and getting suspended for two games, I was going to Photoshop all manner of hilarious things.

Post: Even though I’ve since deleted it, I wish I had saved the Photoshop I did of Jarkko Ruutu as a sarlaac pit. It was so awful as to be camp.

Thursday, or: Snarkiness ho!

Title: “HOW MUCH FOR WHO?”

Premise: The Penguins gave Jordan Staal $16 million to play for them for the next four years and I almost had an aneurysm from laughing so hard.

Post: “Hahahahahahahaha.

Jordan Staal just got a four-year contract extension worth $16 million. I don’t understand why Ray Shero isn’t pushing a shopping cart around downtown Pittsburgh, picking up cans. The guy has 52 career goals in two and a half seasons, for Christ’s sake! It’s an insane contract.

With the Fleury and Malkin extensions kicking in next year too, the Pens have almost 42 million invested in 13 players, and the cap’s going down 3-4 million. They’ll lose Satan, Sykora, and Fedotenko for sure AND need to sign two or three defensemen, a backup goalie and four more forwards.

Jordan Staal! Four million dollars a year! Good luck trying to find someone to take that friggin’ contract, Shero, you idiot.”

Friday, or: Tackling the issues, maaaaaan

Title: Boy they’ll let anyone be an All-Star, except the players that deserve it

Premise: Mike Modano, with his 26 points, is an an All-Star. His Dallas teammate Loui Eriksson, with his 21 goals, is not.

Post: “I have to wonder how low the bar of qualifications for being an All-Star this year were lowered so as to allow Mike freaking Modano to make the cut ahead of any number of Western Conference forwards that clearly deserve the spot he is currently wasting.

(Stats stats stats)

And then in the East, David Krejci not only fails to make the regular All-Star team despite having 43 points, but he also fails to make the YoungStars team in favor of such wunderkinds as teammate Milan Lucic (26 points and an occasional healthy scratch!) and Mason Raymond (not that good at hockey).

All this, of course, is the result of fan voting. (additional anger here)”

Please judge me harshly for this. I deserve it.

What We Learned

Anaheim — So Bobby Ryan turned out to be pretty good, huh? Despite FAR fewer games played than the rest of the field, Ryan has quickly turned out to be by far the best rookie skater in the league this year. This despite terrible linemates (George Parros for five games!). Unless something changes very quickly, it really is a two-horse race at this point between Ryan and Steve Mason for the Calder Trophy.

Atlanta —So the Thrashers have a captain: Ilya Kovalchuk. I like Kovy a lot, don’t get me wrong, but how smart is it for Atlanta to give the “C” to a player that plays no defense and is likely not going to be with the team long-term. Strikes me as a blatant, kinda sad attempt to get him to stay. “Please, Ilya, we’ll put any letter you want on your jersey! How about an X? X’s are bad as hell!”

Boston — Matt Hunwick had a decent first fight in the NHL. He cleans poor Justin Williams out in the neutral zone, is asked to fight by Williams (as is the style nowadays), takes six punches to the head, and then DEMOLISHES Williams with a right hand. Watch that last replay. Over and over again. Amazing.

Buffalo — Heck of a hockey writer, that David Staples. But this latest idea of the Sabres trading an obvious problem in Max Afinogenov for a bigger, longer, priceier, more useless problem in Dustin Penner sounds like someone’s been reading a little too much HFBoards lately.

Calgary — The Flames had a busy week signing former World Junior competitors. First they pulled Mikael Backlund out of Sweden, had him play an NHL game, then assigned him to the WHL’s Kelowna Rockets. Around the same time, they also signed Keith Aulie, who was a stud on the Canadian shutdown pairing that worked so effectively against, well, everyone. Aulie’s a big kid. And big is good.

Carolina — “We were excited about coming and and playing them and I liked the chances we had in the first,” Carolina coach Paul Maurice said. Well not so much after that. The ‘Canes saw a four-game winning streak snapped and were beaten badly by Boston in just about every possible way. Asked how disappointed he was, Maurice replied, “What scale do you want to use? We’re disappointed.” Understandable.

Chicago — I dunno if you saw that Blackhawks/Predators game tonight, but god damn. After Chicago had maybe the worst game of the season on Saturday, it kicked the living shit out of Nashville tonight in the return leg. Not really in terms of flow of play so much, but they just hammered every Predators puck carrier they could. That’s how good teams rebound from bad performances: by taking it out on the opposition.

Colorado — Some were wondering whether Colorado’s recent AHL call-up Phillipe Dupuis was the brother of Penguins forward Pascal. They’re from the same town, are about the same size and even look vaguely similar. But, no, as it turns out, they’re not related. This was apparently a big enough mystery that it needed to be cleared up.

Columbus — Nikita Filatov had a hat trick for the Blue Jackets the other night despite just 10 or so minutes of ice time. Here’s a really cool fan video of his third goal and the ensuing celebration. Those hats got on the ice in a hurry.

Dallas — Speaking of Modano and Eriksson, those two guys combined for 15 of the Stars’ 38 shots against Ilya Bryzgalov on Saturday night. That’s really ridiculous. The Stars, you probably know, lost 1-0 in a shootout.

Detroit — That kid that had his Henrik Zetterberg Winter Classic game-used stick stolen? He might get it back. Pretty awesome.

Edmonton — As many of you likely know, any unhappiness or ill content in Edmonton makes me happy, but for Craig MacTavish to shit on Future Superstar Robbie Schremp for not being a “decent player” in the AHL was like Christmas 2 for your buddy here. “He’s got decent hands and he can work a power play okay, but he’s slow, he’s not a physical player and he’s soft at this level.” So awesome. So so awesome.

Florida — The case is now being made to keep Jay Bouwmeester at the deadline. Considering the Panthers’ surprising position in the standings, I don’t necessarily disagree in theory, but it’s not like Florida’s a Cup contender or anything close. You hafta trade this kid for whatever you can get.

Los Angeles — Golden Globes were tonight. Y’see Kate Winslet win both Best Actress for Revolutionary Road, which I’ve yet to see, and Best Supporting Actress for The Reader, which was awesome? That’s gotta be unprecedented, right?

But the big winner of the night was obviously Slumdog Millionaire, this year’s Little Indie Picture That Could. It won best drama, Danny Boyle won best director, and Simon Beaufroy won for its script. It was a very good little movie (I had it No. 6 this year), but it just didn’t feel like a BEST PICTURE winner, for which it has to be the favorite come Oscar time. Of the films nominated, I liked The Curious Case of Benjamin Button better than Slumdog Millionaire, and while both had script problems, the acting and directing in the former far surpassed that of the latter.

Oh and Heath Ledger won for The Dark Knight. No shock there. I might be the only Batman fan in America that actively disliked that movie. Take Ledger out of it and it’s Batman Forever bad. I wish the Dark Knight DVD had featured an “only Ledger’s scenes” cut. I’d actually enjoy watching that as opposed to the silly allegorical drivel that was Christopher and Jonathan Nolan’s script.

Minnesota — Presented without comment: Michael Russo’s midseason review. Okay, one comment: You know things are bad when Krys Kolanos not getting a concussion is viewed as one of your team’s positives.

Montreal — With all the Habs getting into the All-Star game, no one saw fit to squeeze Max Pacioretty in there? Hell, if Mike Komisarek can make it, so can Pacioretty. No proble.

Nashville — Steve Sullivan’s back! Yay! YAY! *confetti* *streamers* Oh, he didn’t dress tonight. *tomatoes* *boo hiss*

New Jersey — Brendan Shanahan, huh? Was Gup Worsley not available?

New York Rangers — Bobby Sanguinetti had an eventful weekend. He got named to the AHL All-Star team, AND got called up for the first time ever, but didn’t play because, as it happened, the worries (hopes?) that Michal Roszival was injured were unfounded. Too bad.

New York Islanders — All-Star non-snub: Mark Streit. People were mad that he made the team for some reason. I know the Islanders are just terrible, but Streit’s as legit as a pick can get. He’s first among Eastern Conference defensemen in scoring, he’s eating 25-plus minutes a night for the Isles and he’s only a -3 on THAT team. That ain’t too bad at all.

Ottawa — Waiving Martin Gerber? Smart. Re-signing him in the first place? Not so much.

Philadelphia — Former Flyers and Flames assistant coach Wayne Fleming, now with Avangard Omsk in the KHL, was asked to go home during the second intermission of a game earlier this week. Early reports said he was fired mid-game, but he wasn’t. I’m not sure which is stupider, though. Picturesque outdoor All-Star game aside, the KHL is a friggin’ joke and should be treated as such.

Phoenix — I don’t know much about economics or owning a sports franchise, but I think if you’re only making like $9 per ticket you sell, you’re basically dicked. Am I right about this?

Pittsburgh — Know what might really help Pittsburgh? Jaromir Jagr signing there in two years for league minimum. That’d be awesome. I doubt he’d have lost a step in turning like 62 years old and playing in Russia for the previous two seasons. It’d work out great. Where was this offer THIS summer when the Pens could’ve used Jagr?

San Jose — If you’re like me, you’ve often found yourself sitting at home on a Sunday afternoon saying, “Man, I wish there was a 1,300-word writeup of a Worcester Sharks game for me to read right this second.” Well, Sharkspage got yo ass covered.

St. Louis — The Boston Globe’s Kevin Paul Dupont theorizes that the Bruins would be in the market for a guy like Keith Tkachuk if one of Patrice Bergeron or Marco Sturm isn’t good to go come deadline time. That is a move that would make the Bruins better. Kinda like that Thrashers deal a few years ago. Except the Bruins will definitely make it out of the first round of the playoffs.

Tampa Bay — Well they shoulda kept Stamkos in juniors. The team will now regularly use the rarely-Seen rookie as a healthy scratch while it helps him work on his strength and conditioning. What a stupid franchise. Top to bottom. Terrible.

Toronto — Mikhail Grabovski is one ref-shoving son of a bitch. When his career is over, he’ll have a second one ready to go as a member of the Four Horsemen. WOOOOO!

Vancouver — If you were watching Hockey Night in Canada, you’d have seen a “Two Sedins, One Cup” sign. I laughed my ass off, but of course do not have a screencap of said sign.

Washington — Actual All-Star snub: Mike Green. Sure, Greenie don’t play the defense so good, but no one does in the All-Star game and he’s exciting as hell. Booooooo, people that pick the All-Star reserves. Booooooo.

Play of the Weekend

If you haven’t seen this goal by Michael Ryder from David Krejci, you haven’t lived, jack.

(Sorry, I can’t directly link to NHL videos with Wordpress and no one has put it up on YouTube yet. Deal with it, I guess.)

Gold Star Award

I would be so bold as to say that Nikita Filatov had a pretty good weekend.

Next week’s game I’m totally going to watch on Center Ice if I’m home

Tough call this week. Do I go with Bolts/Kings on Monday or Bruins/Habs on Tuesday? Real noodle-scratcher, this.

Event that should replace the shootout and would be just as relevant to hockey skill

Give both teams 20 minutes to fraudulently vote one of its members into the All-Star game.

Soccer update only I care about

Ugh. Liverpool were played to their second goalless draw against Stoke this year while Manchester United flattened Chelsea at Old Trafford, 3-0, to chisel ever so slightly away from the Reds’ lead atop the table. No good.

College hockey update only I care about

*throws computer*

The No. 1 DVD I own and kind of want to watch this week but likely will not

This week I got the complete series of The Wire. I ordered it just before Christmas on amazon.com for the insanely low price of $90. I don’t know whether that deal is still on-going, but if it is, you’re gonna want to jump all over that.

An update on last week’s “No. 1 DVD I own and kind of want to watch this week but likely will not“

I didn’t post one of these last week, having fallen asleep less than a period into the Flames game, which started at 7 p.m. But we’ll pretend that I said Pineapple Express and I will tell you that yes, I watched it twice.

Perfect HFBoards trade proposal of the week

User “donJones” knows that the Penguins are unwilling to give up Jordan Staal. So in his “Kings - Penguins” proposal, he posits a much better, more even-handed trade:

To Kings:
E.Malkin
M.Satan

To Penguins:
D.Brown
P.O`Sullivan
V.Voinov
O.Moller
1st round pick 09

Where do we sign?

Signoff in a language that’s not English

This entry was posted on Monday, January 12th, 2009 at 3:00 am and is filed under What We Learned. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.