I’m looking forward to my next copy of The Hockey News.
Thanks to JP and hockey nut for finding the image.
The Donald wishes Colton Orr a Happy New Year….
… and Brendan Shanahan … and Ward.
College campuses have ever been known for informal, indecent, immoral, and irreverent fashion. And so this weekend it continues on the ice.
ESPN.com hockey columnist Terry Frei’s latest file occasions a rousing salute from this blog. Among his New Years resolutions for the sport of hockey:
U.S. newspaper sports editors, Part I: To come to grips with the reality that hockey-first fans, while in some cases not as numerous as the fans of other sports, actually devour printed and posted coverage about local teams. (Right, like everyone’s rushing to a Marina del Rey 7-Eleven to buy a paper and catch up on the news about the Clippers’ game at Portland?)
And:
U.S. newspaper sports editors, Part II: To ask their columnists to stop rationalizing their inattention and frequent ignorance of hockey by saying that when the franchises aren’t winning, attendance slips, proving they are not working in a “real hockey market.” (Right, like NBA teams — even in “prime” basketball markets — don’t slump at the gate when they stink on the floor?)
A Mid-Atlantic resident virtually all of my life, I can’t quite just dial-up delivery of a white Christmas, but is it too much to ask that it be cool enough on Christmas Eve so as to mandate riding to mom’s with my Jeep Wrangler top up? I haven’t heard yet where this December ranks among the warmest in Washington history, but I’m pretty sure I don’t need to. It’s simply unacceptable. If I want windbreakers and Bermuda shorts on Christmas, I’ll move to the Carolinas.
Meanwhile, to listen to the cable news talking heads these days, all is woe for the hearty residents of Denver, CO. They’ve had to shovel lots of snow this month. Two doozies of snowstorms, fairly close together, have hit them. Imagine living in or near the Rocky Mountains and having to shovel snow!
This is not a treatise on global warming-vs.-cyclical warming and cooling periods. I have an opinion on the matter, but all that’s germane here is that I’m miserable and there’s nothing Alexander Ovechkin can do about it, much less Bob Ryan.
You see, it’s important in winter to have winter. When we don’t, it seems to me, we’re doubly reminded that “Washington isn’t a hockey town.” But for me there’s additional angst: I suffer from acute seasonal affective disorder — just not the kind commonly alluded to. I actually get grumpy when the mercury reaches 40 any time in December. And when the television weatherwrongs and their anchor colleagues gloat and cackle over our Haiti-like holidays, I actually wanna sock ‘em in the jaw.
Why are they gleeful over aberational conditions? Are they anti-sledding? Anti-shinny? Don’t they know that it’s scientifically established fact that ice skating dates featuring hand holding and foot rubbing are 47 times more romantic than movie theater outings? Don’t they know that Washington is genuinely one of the most beautiful cities on the planet under a fresh blanket of snow?
By now you know that the Caps practiced outdoors here recently. The wonder is that they didn’t drown. Continue reading ›
No rest for the weary last night, as the Caps played their second consecutive game against a good Northeast division opponent. After losing in Buffalo last night, the Caps hosted a strong Montreal club.
It was good to get back to hockey after the bad taste and controversy of the night before, but the result wasn’t a complete surprise. It’s a tough stretch for the Caps, but the playoff-contending pack in the Eastern conference hasn’t really had anybody who has taken advantage of other clubs’ misfortunes. If the Caps can ride out the storm, squirreling away a point here or there, then they may be poised for a move when the shcedule provides more breathing room and they get healthy. Getting a point here or there is proving to be as difficult as originally thought, however.
Here’s a clip of Donald Brashear wishing Aaron Downey a Happy New Year.
This came one night after Brashear sent holiday greetings to Andrew Peters in Buffalo.
Thanks to HockeyFights.com for posting the videos.
Alex Ovechkin knew he was going to be a marked man tonight, but he probably didn’t guess that Daniel Briere would be spearing him in the jingle bells.
All things considered, it could have been worse (and I thought it was going to be double-digits after the first), but things don’t get much easier for the Caps tomorrow night. Here’s hoping Shaone Morrisonn, at least, can get back into the line-up to stabilize things on the blueline a bit.
I highly recommend a visit to the official web presence for this year’s World Juniors, which takes place in Sweden and commences the day after Christmas. In the past 5 years or so, this tournament has gained a richly deserved reputation for being perhaps the best in all of hockey.
Here’s why: It isn’t crammed into the compressed schedule of the Olympics; it doesn’t suffer from the conspicuous absence of marquee players as does the annual World Championships each spring; and for most competing nations, there’s been months and in some cases years of players skating in development programs together, allowing for greater roster chemistry than is generally seen within a relatively short tournament.
Best of all, the World Juniors faithfully generates at least one break-through performance that sets the international hockey world abuzz — think Alexander Ovechkin or Phil Kessel, each at age 16 — and it goes a long way toward clarifying which elite young talent will be grabbed up early in the NHL Entry Draft in June. Continue reading ›
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 Bobby Hull Bobby Hull |
 Wayne Gretzky Wayne Gretzky |
 Gordie Howe Gordie Howe |
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 Bobby Orr Bobby Orr |
 Ray Bourque Ray Bourque |
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 Patrick Roy Patrick Roy |
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An exciting game, on the whole, though the first period could be bottled and sold as a remedy for insomnia. Both teams were hurting and tired coming in, and it took them the snooze period to get it in gear. Once they did, though, some good drama.
A spirited contest when both teams woke up. Good to go into the break with a win, and happy holidays to everyone out in hockeyland.
This past Wednesday, the city of Pittsburgh stunned Pennsylvanians generally and the hockey fans there most particularly, and most especially NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman, when the mulleted town fathers voted to award a $50 million slots license to Majestic Star Casino. Majestic’s was considered a super long-shot bid to win the license. Worse for Pittsburgh’s hockey fans, the award dealt a defeat to the application by the Isle of Capri, whose bid included the promise to cough up a cool $290 million to fund construction of a brand new arena for the Penguins.
The Associated Press has reported that Penguins’ owner Mario Lemieux has closed all bidding on the team, and is poised to pursue relocation options for the team. Among the potential suitors: Kansas City, Portland, Las Vegas, Houston, and perhaps even a Canadian city. Think a city north of the 49th might lavishly support home dates for Mr. Sidney Crosby?
If you don’t think things took a turn for the dramtic worse this week for the fate of the Penguins, take a gander at the substance and tone of the press release the team issued just hours after the gaming license decision.
Caps’ fans have a sort-of stake in this news; after all, as we saw the Monday evening before last at Verizon Center, the rivalry between the Caps and Pens is as robust as ever, and the league would like nothing better than to spend the next decade showcasing Crosby-vs.- Ovechkin matchups a handful of times during the regular season (at least), and hopefully during the playoffs in the future. A Penguins move — almost certainly out West — vanquishes the viability of that marketing plan.
So how should Caps’ fans feel about this week’s news? The four of us at OFB thought we’d offer up our individual reflections, and we welcome yours. Continue reading ›
We in the East were a bit distracted Wednesday by news coming out of Pittsburgh, but San Jose Mercury News reporter John Ryan that day published a bombshell: the more NHL players jump into prototypes of Gary Bettman’s new uniforms, the more they want to jump right back out of them and into tradition.
Ryan observes: “The double-knit polyester is being replaced by a moisture-wicking fabric, hardly an uncommon switch in the athletic world. They’re also making everything tighter . . . The reasons are twofold: performance and protection.”
But then check out what San Jose Sharks’ forward Jonathon Cheechoo had to say about them:
“These are to add protection?” Jonathan Cheechoo said.
“Yeah. Apparently the tighter fit holds pads into place better,” Ryan adds.
“It does do that,” Cheechoo said. “I’ll give it that. But it also gives opponents a bird’s-eye view of where your equipment stops.”
[Cheechoo's] point: For players who are injured, opponents will essentially see an MRI of the body and know exactly which spot is most vulnerable. The sweaters hide a lot of that, particularly in the playoffs.”
Note to Gary Bettman: Oopsie!
And it wasn’t just Cheechoo ripping the new threads to shreds. Kyle McLaren wanted no part of them, either, according to Ryan.
You really gotta check out the full text of what may prove to be a pivotal turning point in this uniform madness. A couple of weeks ago we suggested here that momentum was slowing lurching the way of the sensible and traditional. On this front, Ryan notes:
I can tell you the league is very, VERY nervous about the reaction.”
Reminder: if you haven’t already, add your voice to the outrage; send Gary Bettman a little ornery Season’s Greeting, and sign the online petiton to preserve our sacred hockey sweaters. More than 4,000 have!
Five years into his development with the Washington Capitals defenseman Steve Eminger invites the most discomforting of questions by fans and team officials alike, among them this: just what kind of defenseman is he?
Such uncertainty and pervasive, quiet disappointment would have been unthinkable a few years back. While a rookie Eminger took to the Air Canada Centre ice one night and made 20,000 seated in one of hockey’s cathedrals forget about Mats Sundin. He was named the game’s first star, dominating all three zones and logging like 25 minutes of ice time. At one point he drew gasps from the Ontario cognoscenti, deftly pirouetting the puck out of harm’s way, a la Denis Savard but from the backline, and rushing the puck up the ice with powerful strides, QB-ing the Caps toward a scoring chance. His future seemed not only bright but chock full of two-way impact.
And this was hardly a lone instance of brilliance. Eminger represented Canada at the 2003 World Junior Championships. You know what kind of talent you have to be to dress for the Canadian blueline in that tournament? He also led his junior team, the Kitchener Rangers, to the Memorial Cup Championship in the same season, posting 29 points in 23 games after making the Caps straight out of training camp that fall.
Secured by the Caps in their foundation-building 2002 draft class, Eminger was selected 12th overall, one pick ahead of Alexander Semin. (There’s something about Eminger and the Air Canada Centre — the 2002 draft was held there.) It’s additionally disquieting to read The Hockey News’ pre-draft profile of him that summer:
Eminger has great wheels and won the puck control event at the 2002 Top Prospects Game. He has exceptional puckhandling and playmaking skills and quarterbacked the Kitchener power play this season. He showed at times he can change the tempo of a game if he wants.”
Today, there’s little tempo changing to Eminger’s game. There’s little in the way of “great wheels” displayed. In his own end he often ambles about stiff and upright instead of trusting his ample physical skills to head off threats from opposing forwards. Deft puckhandling and playmaking among Capitals’ rearguards? You think Pothier and Green and Morrisonn before Eminger. Continue reading ›
A rough cut of the commercial that Alex Ovechkin and Ted Leonsis are in was just made available.
Until we are able to embed the video, see it here.
There’s nothing earth-shattering in the impact or implication of the GMs’ decision, but Brodeur’s fuss invites precisely the good-natured ridicule planned at Verizon Center Friday.
Sherry Ross of the New York Daily News offered the lowdown on MirrorMess earlier this season:
Martin Brodeur, the hockey fan, liked the distinctive look that Alexander Ovechkin’s mirrored visor gave the league’s top rookie last season. Martin Brodeur, the goalie, didn’t like that he couldn’t see the whites of Ovechkin’s eyes.”
As the matter heated up a bit in the press this fall, Brodeur backpedaled, taking pains to suggest that he had no formal role in the furor. Still, he made plain to the Daily News‘ Ross what had him so upset about AO’s visor:
I said it wasn’t right because my game is watching an athlete, and especially when it gets to a shootout, it makes it tougher for me if I can’t see his eyes.”
And some French Canadians wonder why the rest of the hockey world regards them as whiners!
Anyway, the fun starts early Friday night at the rink. The Caps Road Crew is helping out with the distribution of mirrored sunglasses fully an hour before faceoff. Fans in Verizon Center sections 104 and 105 plan to be seated in shades by 6:25 — just in time to greet the Devils as they emerge on the ice for pre-game warmups. But our sense at OFB is that this prank is going to expand well beyond those two lower bowl sections. For starters, Verizon Center allows any ticket holder to watch warmups in the lower bowl, potentially swelling the number of pranksters.
The organizers of ShadesScheme have marketed the mischief enough so as to secure donations for sunglasses through PayPal, and some message board veterans have pledged the purchase of boxes of dozens of the eyewear. Later this season, a contingent of Caps’ fans, joined by the Caps Road Crew, will travel to New Jersey by bus for a Caps’ game there, and again they’ll be in shades. And we’re only about the fourth or fifth blog mentioning it.
At OFB, we commend these fans for their creativity — for well organizing a harmless prank that’s chock full of home rink spirit. We say to them: your future’s so bright, you gotta wear shades.
Perhaps the Caps’ holiday party was last night — they played the first 40 minutes like they were hung over (or as my friend put it, “It looks like they’re still drunk!”).
In the end, 20 minutes’ good effort won’t win games. The fact that the Capitals were in it in the third speaks more to Tampa’s weaknesses than to the Caps’ strengths. But it’s only one bad game — how they bounce back against recently vulnerable New Jersey on Friday should indicate whether the Tampa game was an aberration or whether their hot streak is at an end. Let’s hope it’s the former.
Meet your “Fighting Walleye”
As we mentioned two weeks ago, Cavaliers Hockey Holdings, LLC, filed an application with the United States Patent and Trademark Office for the wordmark Fighting Walleye. Cavaliers Hockey Holdings is a group of investors headed by Cleveland Cavaliers’ owner Dan Gilbert, who purchased a dormant American Hockey League franchise for play in Cleveland.
Today, we find out from Sidearm Delivery that this may be just a rumour. They reference an article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer from this past Sunday, in which Cavaliers President Len Komoroski said that all the talk about the team being named the Fighting Walleyes is premature.
“We’ve been getting a lot of suggestions, and we expect to have a nickname by the early part of 2007.”
That’s not really a denial now, is it? “Premature” does not mean “false information.” Along with the fact that they spent time and money to trademark the name, “Fighting Walleye” is a serious contender.
In less exciting news, the Cavaliers officials confirmed that the Cleveland franchise will be the top affiliate of Colorado in the NHL.
We’ll try to keep up with the avalanche of speculation that surrounds the AHL’s newest, fishiest team.
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