On Frozen Blog

Much has been written of the Capitals’ strategies, players, and playoffs prospects–all intriguing topics, worthy of vehement debate.

But what of those who work tirelessly behind the scenes every game? The ones who work the cameras, the sound board, the in-game entertainment. The ones (like most of us) for whom the NHL’s league minimum salary of $475,000 per year would be a pretty impressive pay raise. It’s true that their efforts may not directly affect the Caps’ tee times, but they are an integral part of the gameday experience.

So in the spirit of the great Canadian show How It’s Made–or perhaps Behind the Music?–I spent a game with the Capitals’ production crew to see how they created the in-game experience. The idea was initially inspired by the “pre-release” excitement about the True-HD screens, then bolstered by my first look at the new system from the stands. But while the new technology is itself impressive, delving into how everything, and everyone, works together each game was the motivation for this day spent with the production crew.

Little did I know that my Behind the Screens introduction would coincide with a frenetic 10-2 Capitals victory, and a whirlwind of activity that surpassed a typical night’s work.

The New Guy

The Washington Capitals’ Director of Game Production and Entertainment Scott Brooks was my guide for the evening. Brooks is new to the Caps; in fact, he was hired the same day as Capitals Head Coach Bruce Boudreau, a mere three months ago. His first day on the job was much like Boudreau’s–a game to run the day he arrived (in Brooks’ case, a home game on November 24 vs. Carolina). Also like Boudreau, Brooks had to hit the ground running despite not knowing most of his staff’s names, let alone the ins and outs of the organization. But he quickly warmed to both the Capitals and the broad array of talented people handling the in-game entertainment.

It may have helped Brooks’ acclimation that his roommate in corporate housing was another recent addition to the team: Quintin Laing. He even lived there for a while after Laing’s wife and child moved to town. Brooks didn’t expect to be living with a hockey player, but he said it was a great experience and helped him immediately feel connected to the Capitals.

Up High and Down Low

“It’s our job to try and get the crowd going,” he said. “The game for us is like a ramp. Fans walk in with hot dogs and drinks, they’re pretty mellow. We try to build energy with music, videos, and lights during pregame and ramp up to the opening video, then to the early high-point of the player introductions. Then it resets, calms down, and we try to ramp up the energy again.”

To that end, everyone involved in the operation is connected via wireless headsets. And the “everyone” is a much larger group than you might think, as Brooks was about to show me.

We first went up to 600 level to meet some of the sky-high team members. We stopped in to meet Bruce Anderson, the long-time Capitals organist. Yes, the organist has headphones too, so Brooks and Anderson can synchronize musical cues to the announcements or other events during stoppages in play.

We also stopped in to the booth where employees of ANC Sports operate the LEDs around the arena, including the ribbon screens, the LED screens above and below the main HD screens, and the out-of-town scoreboards. ANC, the same company bringing HD to the Washington Nationals’ new ballpark, develops the content in New York and has on-site personnel (again, with headsets) to queue and execute the ads, designs, and stats that scroll around the arena.

In The Sin Bin

The tiny space between the two penalty boxes is the domain of the Voice of Your WASHINGTONNNNN CAPITALS!, Wes Johnson. I spent the pregame skate with Johnson and Byron Hudtloff. Hudtloff wears the headset and acts as Johnson’s link to the web of connectivity that the team uses each game. They sit next to the NHL official scorekeeper for goals, penalties, etc. They are also next to “Billy”, who, according Johnson, has “the most highly trained finger in the industry” to trigger the red light that indicates television time-outs.

Hudtloff pointed out the most uber piece of equipment — the headset that links directly to the NHL’s Toronto-based headquarters, where officials watch every NHL game as it progresses. Most of the time, a referee in need of a replay judgment will pull the corded phone through the hole in the Plexiglas that links to the in-house replay officials. But occasionally, if you’re watching television and see a set of headphones passed through and clamped upon the referee’s head, it’s the direct link to Toronto for the NHL’s official review results.

Johnson and Hudtloff are both gracious and funny folks, and will likely be subjects of their own post on OFB soon. For now, I will share an anecdote from Johnson. I asked him what it’s like being in between the players after a fight. “It’s crazy, some of the things you hear the players shout at each other after being sent to the box,” Johnson replied. “I think the worst thing I ever heard spewed out of Matthew Barnaby . . . but that can’t be repeated.” One can only imagine . . . and then scrub one’s mind with Life Buoy soap.

Gotcha

To break the ice a bit, I asked Brooks about his favorite tricks or setups he’d worked on in his arena producer career. As game attendees know, teams sometimes use “plants” to perpetrate a video joke or hoax–Caps fans have seen it in those clips when a fan wearing the visiting team’s sweater is picking his nose, dripping ketchup down his chin, etc. They’re obviously Caps crew staffers in enemy uniforms . . . well, except when Philly’s in town, then it’s hard to tell.

Brooks orchestrated a fun reply to Thrashers fans’ impatience with the frequency of wedding proposals at the Atlanta Thrashers games . . . with an unintended side-effect. They had staffers play the roles of boyfriend and girlfriend; the man was in a pie-eating contest, with his girl watching the mess. Right after he won the contest, he got on one knee and proposed to his fake girlfriend, who blushingly accepted.

The crowd bought it, and chuckled at the fact that he proposed while covered in pie goop. More interestingly, the actor had recently ended a long-term relationship . . . and his ex-girlfriend’s friend was in the audience. Uh oh. That friend immediately called the ex; by the time the actor wiped the pie off his face and returned to his seat and cell phone, he already had a scathing message from his ex-girlfriend, who was stunned into disbelief that he proposed to “some new girl” less than a month after they’d broken up. Apparently his performance was a bit too convincing. Then again, if she has a spy network that effective, he’s probably better off.

I also asked Brooks about the omnipresent Kiss Cam. “We like to have fun with it, but you have to be careful with crowd shots.” Most of the time they assume, correctly, that those in stands will be happy to get big-screen time. But with certain crowds, “like when Philly is in town,” they have to be ready to cut away a little more quickly than usual to avoid that upthrust finger or another rude gesture.

Kiss Cam Tease

The following may be painful for our male readers: Brooks’ favorite Kiss Cam trick was another plant, when multiple staffers were stationed in a group of seats. The lineup was boy-girl-girl-boy for the foursome. The Kiss Cam “found” them, and the two couples smooched. Then the two men did a pantomime discussion, and “convinced” the two women to, oh, maybe kiss each other.

As the women slowly leaned in for the kiss, two other plants in the row right in front of the couples suddenly stood up, as if they just realized they were on the big screen, thus blocking the row behind them and the impending kiss. “You could feel all the men in the audience who were leaning forward in their seats kind of deflate and say ‘Awwwww’ as their views were blocked right before the two women kissed,” explained Brooks. A bit cruel, but pretty funny too.

The Real Deal

One of the strangest marriage proposals Brooks related–and a true one, not faked–was during a contest in Atlanta called “Know Your Cut of Beef.” I’m not certain what’s more unusual, that there’s a contest during Atlanta hockey games about cuts of beef, or that someone thought that would be the perfect way to propose marriage. What would be the equivalent here in Washington–”Name That President?” “Know Your Lobbyist?”

But back to the story: The man of the couple in question had arranged for his wife to be chosen “at random” for the contest so he could propose. Apparently he’d recently taken her to the supermarket for some meat-identification training, just in case they were ever chosen for the contest. And I should probably make clear that by meat-identification I mean learning to identify different cuts of beef — just to soothe (or disappoint) any who’d read more into that phrase than intended.

So at the game she’s chosen as the contestant. On the big screen are huge photos of cuts of beef, appearing one by one, that she has to identify. Apparently she’s acing the exam . . . until a big picture of an engagement ring appears on the screen as her boyfriend gets on one knee and proposes.

Okay, on second thought that’s kind of sweet despite the beefy circumstances. Just don’t try the same thing during Know Your Lobbyist.

Video Made the Video Star

The Caps have expanded their video production in recent years, and this season is no exception. Brooks credits their “unique relationship” with Base Productions of Herndon, Va. Most of the idea generation is done in-house, then given to Base for creation of the videos. For example, the Caps’ design team created the Young Guns poster (at right); Base created a video promotion clip based on that concept.

Brooks provided the recent Segway videos as another example; a combination of the Caps’ production team and head office folks had the initial idea to set Ovechkin and friends loose on the Segways.

By the way, Mike Green isn’t the only one who fell off his ride during the photo shoot–Scott Brooks did as well. “I looked up and [Base Productions cameraman] Todd [Burger] was stopped in front of me . . . those things don’t exactly stop on a dime, so I lurched sideways and fell off, but managed to hold onto the handle so the thing didn’t veer into the street and hit a car.”

But I digress. After getting the Segway video idea off the ground (or onto the ground), Brooks and the crew thought a CHiPs spoof featuring Mike Green would be a fun in-game video. So the Caps’ production team handed off the idea to Base to produce the video. Base then provided screeners (a.k.a. beta versions) to Brooks and the Caps for review, and after some give-and-take the CHiPs video was born.

So, for your viewing pleasure, the original video of Segway Day is embedded below. After you’ve watched that, click this link to see the Mike Green CHiPs spoof (complete with classic old-school theme song).

Stay Tuned

This behind-the-screens journey yielded far more than I can cram into a single post. So I’ll serialize things and return soon with more of the story.

In the meantime, look around at your next Capitals game, and maybe pause a moment to appreciate the wild web of people and technology that work together for your enjoyment.

Coming soon, Part II: In the thick of things.