A Bad Case of the Dingies

Dear Bears,

Step it the heck back up. Eric Fehr was not this whole team in the last 10 games. Andrew Gordon, thank you for trying to make up for the rest of the heartlessness out there last night by getting your second hat trick of the season. You can have a puppy treat. Deano, thank you for stepping up when Louie Robitaille chickened out. You can have half a puppy treat. When you remember you're wearing the C and it's your job to motivate the guys out of whatever the heck funk they think they're in, you can have the other half. Joe Motzko....augggghhhhh *throws hands up in despair.*

Love, Teka.

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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

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An open letter to hockey

Dear Hockey,

Welcome back! For a minute there, I thought you would be gone forever. I mean, when you hung out with Lockout and then started getting cold sores on your mouth, I thought we wouldnt see for a while. But you came back, and when you went on your break this year, time moved oh so slowly.

I really missed you Hockey. While you were gone, the world seemed to think I could possibly care about someone else, like Football. What a douche. He gets tons of money and media attention, but spends all his time getting arrested and torturing dogs. Obviously, Football has never been to Thunder Bay, Ontario. Nobody parties like the Dutch.

And then some slut named Soccer came along, like I would ever look sideways at her. Actually Hockey, I have to admit...I did look at her out of the corner of my eye. But only for a minute, and I started to get an itch down there when I did. Who knows where she has been...

But now you are back, and I can tell that poser Baseball to stop calling me. What's that, you heard that I was hanging out with Baseball? Well, I dont even want to dignify that with a response. And even if I was with Baseball, it was because I was lonely without you. Now that you are back, Baseball is out of my life and I will never have to look at those track marks on his arm again.

I'll see you this weekend Hockey.

XOXO,

Shmee

PS: The author admits, she does enjoy baseball, soccer and even football. But hockey is her number 1 man.

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