Me again. Remember what I said about suck? Before this blog got flooded by letters by girls everywhere, concerned about the performance of their boys?
Remember what I said about suck?
Don't do it again. Friends don't let friends suck. Especially when they play Edmonton.
Go for the jugular. Kick them when they're down. Kill.
Hugs and Kisses,
Leanne
PS. Ladies, I'm blushing. I love you all, I really do. Even all the Edmonton partisans. Really.
Showing posts with label hockey hell. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hockey hell. Show all posts
Saturday, February 09, 2008
Dear Flames,
Monday, February 04, 2008
Thursday, January 31, 2008
It’s Been How Long?
(x-posted to flyers.femme)
Tomorrow is February 1, 2008. It’s sure to be one of the worst days in the history of the National Hockey League.
What did we do to deserve this? Is it, perhaps, the trade-off for bearing witness to the greatness of the Great One? Whether or not that is the case, how much longer must it continue?
In case you’re a hockey newbie or just crawled out from under Fraggle Rock thanks to the help of the Electric Company, these lamentations mean it’s been 15 years since Gary Bettman became the NHL Commissioner.
(You have no idea how painful that is to type! Gary Bettman. Fifteen years. NHL Commissioner. No end in sight. I see it and I still cannot make sense of it.)
Here’s a short list of what has been flagrantly stolen from hockey fans under the Bettman Reign:
a.) NHL teams in Hartford, Quebec City, and Winnipeg;
b.) Conference and division names that embody the personality and history of hockey;
c.) Goalies playing as if they were the sixth man on the ice;
d.) The ability to watch an NHL game in the U.S. on the country’s major sports channel throughout the week; and,
e.) The very reputation of the sport, due to two lock-outs in a single decade.
In light of what some fans see as felonious mismanagement by Commissioner Bettman of the job he was selected to do, I ask the hockey faithful to consider an increase of complaints on this sad anniversary. Bring an end to the madness and restore the coolest sport on the planet!
Therefore, I move that:
1.) The placement of any new expansion teams or teams being relocated from poor-attendance markets in the U.S.A. must first be considered for (a) cities which lost their teams during the Bettman Years and/or (b) other Canadian sites.
At least two of the teams which suffered this dire fate were in the midst of a recession in Canada. It was not so much that there weren’t enough fans, but rather a lack of funds. Currently, on any given day, the Canadian dollar is equal or slightly better than the U.S. one.
2.) The names Adams, Campbell, Norris, Patrick, Smythe and Prince of Wales shall be re-instated. Additional names for the two new divisions created through expansion may be taken from other historically-appropriate hockey figures or trophies;
3.) The goalie trapezoid shall be removed from the ice;
4.) Because the score for many games in the 2007-08 season have more closely resembled baseball scores than traditional ones for hockey, all discussion of enlarging the goal shall cease and a moratorium lasting to infinity shall take effect;
5.) The recently renewed broadcast agreement with Versus shall be reviewed and inquires shall be made with ESPN/ABC. If a deal can be reached with ESPN, the contract with Versus shall be shortened or bought out so that the sport can reach more viewers in the U.S.;
6.) Because leadership can lose relevancy and/or efficacy after too much time in office, an individual may hold the post of National Hockey League Commissioner for a ten (10) year period, commencing with his/her first day serving the appointment as said Commissioner.
He/she may hold a subsequent five (5) year extension term as Commissioner provided no lock-out or game stoppages related to contract disputes occurred during his/her tenure; and
Friday, January 25, 2008
I think I've ranted here before....
Pennsylvaniagate and the reports I read after it last night got me thinking about respect issues. I know I've chewed over and over fan respect issues, here, there, and everywhere, but respect for players seems to be starting to leave as well, and both as an athlete in a very public-based sport and as a sports fan, I'm not okay with that.
Here's my problem. In a Bears/BabyPens game last week, this is what I saw...
Curry, the WBS Pens' goalie, is hurt. Obviously hurt. Hurt on the Bears powerplay, so they're down in the WBS end. Curry goes to his knees, and doesn't get up. Can't get up. Tries to get up, and goes back down, and basically is forced to finish the penalty kill on his knees in the crease. The refs don't call a thing, even though the coaches are screaming at him. FINALLY, the penalty kill ends or they dump it or something, but play stops and he makes it pretty obvious that he's in pain. The trainers come out and work him over, the backup is masking up, and he's definitely seems to be favoring one leg. Lo and behold, however, he takes a few laps back and forth and decides that he can stay in for the rest of the game.
Cue booing Bears fans.
Honestly, I don't care which team you cheer for, when you have a hurt player who decides he can gut it up and stay in, you applaud. When you have a hurt player who can finally get up and leave the ice under his own power, you applaud. If you have to have a player stretchered off, but they showed some goddamned gumption about getting the injury you applaud. If they're there putting their motherloving lives on the line to entertain you, (because that's what pro sports come down to, as they wouldn't be playing for money if it weren't for the audience,) the least you can do is show that you appreciate the fact that they're playing hard and getting hurt FOR YOU.
The showing of booing Talbot at the Wachovia Center last night was just disrespectful. I don't care if you're a Flyers fan or a Penguins fan or what, if someone's hurt, you give them some respect, you don't say "Well, he deserved that" even if he did. These are humans we're talking about. Big hefty humans who know what they're getting into when they start playing the sport, granted, but humans none the less. To treat them like their lives and bodies don't matter because they're on a sports team specifically to entertain you is nothing short of shallow and when you think about it, really kind of horrifying. You wouldn't boo an actor on the stage if they twisted their ankle or had pneumonia and STILL went out there to do the show (both of which I've seen firsthand) so why should a sports figure be that different? The actor AND the hockey player are both there to be entertaining, so what the H-E-double hockey sticks is the difference in respect levels?
Just, really, people. Think about what you're doing before you follow the lead of a few idiotic and disrespectful fan sheep. I'd love to believe that people are mostly good, but between the recent few incidents at Bears games and the continual disrespect I see coming out of some other major hockey markets, you're making it hard right now.
Also over at THTM
Saturday, January 12, 2008
You Don't Know What You've Got 'Till It's Gone...
Bear with me, this almost ties into the "Where is the oddest place you have seen hockey" question that's up...Well it's more like the un-answer to the question, since I always expect to see hockey everywhere.
When I was choosing a college to attend, I refused to attend a school anywhere near my family. Man oh man I could not wait to leave Minnesota. Now looking back on my decision, I've discovered that I really, really like living here in Minnesota. I just needed to go to a completely different climate/culture to realize this. Right now I'm thinking about it even more as I start to pack my bags to head back to hockey hell (AKA Oregon). Here we have the State Tournament, an event that is played out in St. Paul, and is on public TV to the exclusion of everything else. We have a pro team, tons of good college hockey, we can get the Canadian networks, and everyone I know follows hockey at some (usually multiple) level (s). I went to some games and sat in my parent's seats, and all the people around me were asking about school, they knew/remembered things about me, were careful around my arm after surgery, and were more than happy to shoot the breeze about a variety of subjects. (Fishing, hunting, Twins, Gophs, armchair GMing, weather patterns, etc) All of this made me think about how much I miss striking up random conversations (and snow, hockey, non-Asian food, cream based everything, Caribou Coffee....). I guess I just couldn't fathom a place that didn't love hockey that much. On the flip side, my friend at school can't fathom anything about Minnesota. They seem to think it's some alien planet. People told me how it would be in Oregon, but I'm clearly a slow learner and need to figure these things out for myself. Mark Parrish and I are having our very own" We love Minnesota, and damn is it good to be back" club.
Centre Ice online is about to become my god again since I will no longer have hockey on local TV or even cable, because I could not get 350/1,800 students to sign a petition saying they wanted more hockey on our TV package. Stupid Willamette.
I really should stop rambling and procrastinating now. I have to go and pack, clean out the fridge/stuff my face, and watch the Leafs vs. Sharks on CBC.
Sunday, January 06, 2008
WHL, NHL, AHL, QHL, XHL, WTF-HL...
Having spent as much of my vacation on hockey as humanly possible, I will say this. There's a reason the Portland Winterhawks are the bottom of the barrel in the WHL. Boy howdy, and I thought I had gotten used to an AHL level of play.
Every time I watch an NHL game, I'm stupidly excited by how many passes actually connect solidly, as in the AHL the tendency is to get it almost there and have it take a wierd bounce or be completely missed right at the last second. In the WHL, really, I was getting excited when a pass got within five feet of someone in the same uniform, which is kind of a sad commentary on the state of my home team.
Of course, you can't really take it out too hard on the guys. The Winterhawks are a major junior team, after all. These are still high school-age dudes, and they are still technically in a training league. The only one I found myself consistently abusing during the course of the game was the goalie, who neglected to finish his butterfly slide across the net and let Seattle dingle one in off his toe. And don't get me started on him being on approach vector for the blueline a couple of times. I don't care what the hell his name really is is (Mucha,) he's always going to be "GoddammitBabyConks!" to me after that game.
Not that the Hawks always sucked, either. Back in the day when they had Hershey defector Jakub Klepis and Reading Royal goalie Curtis Darling, they were the Western playoff champions, and five years prior to that they swept the Memorial Cup awards entirely. It's just lately they've become an axis of suck, from what I can tell. Which is sad, as Oregon needs all the hockey it can get and they're not helping prove my claim that we could support and love an NHL team if we got one. Even if they do call us Hawkeytown
And just to drive home that Oregon as Non-Hockey-State bit? Two bookstores down (one being a chain, the other being the big indie bookstore here) I can't find a copy of any of The Hockey News's big issues on a newsstand. The horror! How will I live without Sid's pillowesque lips for the entire plane ride home?
Ah... erm... anyway.
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
A life without hockey...
I am in hockey hell. No, I am in hockey-less hell.
After going through the most ridiculous apartment hunt I have ever been through (and this from a girl who has moved 13 times in 2 1/2 years) I finally found a place to live. Except, the cable company has turned my cable off and refuses to put it back on. That means no Versus, Center Ice, or any other possible hockey. And of course NBC has decided to bounce the first couple games of the friggin STANLEY CUP final so that you need to have Versus to view it (they are probably busy broadcasting professional bowling or something). I have been without hockey for almost three weeks and wont get cable back until I move into my new place this weekend.
Whats that you say? Go watch hockey at a sports bar? I would except that my Mom is in town helping me pack and flinches at the words: hockey, bar, hockey, beer, alcohol, hockey. I have been reduced to hitting "refresh" on ESPN.com over and over on game nights. And forcing friends to call me with play by plays.
I am in hockey-less hell.
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