Wes Johnson, has players for this year’s Memorial anticipating hearing their names called in true Capitals style.  “What started out a few years ago as a casual, monthly pickup hockey game among Caps fans has developed into a charity that we all are excited to be a part of,” explains Toner.

“What the PCOI group had done to honor Dave – and to fight cancer – is so appreciated,” offers Patricia Fay, Dave’s wife.

“We are honored and excited to again hold this event.  Dave’s support of our sport and unbiased, reliable reporting of the Washington Capitals made him a favorite of players and fans alike. Dave’s untimely passing from cancer last year was a loss for so many and we are pleased to again donate all proceeds from this event to Hockey Fights Cancer,” said Keaton.

We invite you to come out and watch the game and cheer on your home team as they play to win Lord Brown’s Boot and support the fight against cancer.  There is no admission fee to watch the game, but donations are always appreciated.

For event information, visit the organization’s website at www.putcanceronice.org.

Filed in Charity, Dave Fay, Hockey Heroes, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (4)

Enshrinement Day for Two from D.C.

By pucksandbooks
Monday, November 12, 2007

Hockey Hall of Fame - LogoTwo members of the Washington Capitals’ family today get inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame: Scott Stevens, who played eight seasons with the Caps, and the late Dave Fay, the team’s beat reporter for the Washington Times for nearly a quarter century. The Hockey Hall of Fame web page offers poignant profiles for all members of the 2007 class of inductees.

Mike Vogel is in Toronto for the ceremony, and not surprisingly, he’s merged business with pleasure, having already filed some thoughts on an OHL game he took in with Ron Weber and the Times’ Corey Masisak this weekend, which featured the game’s next great talent, 2009 draft eligible Jonathon Tavares of the Oshawa Generals.

No doubt we’ll be able to see snippets of the inductees’ speeches tonight in between periods of games, but with Corey and Mike covering the proceedings the best accounts will come from Washington writers this week.

[Update: The NHL Network will be televising the 2007 Hockey Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony tonight from 7:30pm - 9:30pm]

Filed in Blogs, Corey Masisak, Dave Fay, Hockey Hall of Fame, Hockey Reading, Internet, Media, NHL Network, Print, Washington Capitals, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (2)

The Primitive Timing of Season Previews

By pucksandbooks
Friday, October 12, 2007

I received helpful feedback recently from Associated Press reporter Peter Kerzel, who penned the Caps’ preview for this season’s THN Annual Yearbook. You may recall my suggesting that Kerzel’s file, which featured curious forecasted line combinations among other personnel considerations, delivered the impression of being a bit outdated for this reader. Turns out, Kerzel had to have his forecast submitted to THN editors in the second week of July — “barely enough time for free agents to get signed,” Kerzel told me.

“We were allowed to make some changes the beginning of the following week,” Kerzel pointed out, “but at that point, everything was formatted and the books sent to press so they could be in stores by mid- to late August.”

Here’s how early in the summer this preview was penned: Kerzel collaborated on the project with the Washington Times’ Dave Fay.

“Dave thought he had a pretty good handle on personnel,” Kerzel said. “Of course, that was before Fleischmann’s ascension, Kozlov’s move to center, Backstrom’s move to wing, [and] Clark’s move to the third line.”

“I’ve run into this same issue before, when covering the Caps and putting together a preview for The Sporting News. The year Washington acquired Jagr, the trade was consummated literally at the deadline for copy to be finalized.”

“If not for a really good editor, a guy named Ray Slover, who helped me turn around a rewrite on a dime – while still keeping the same amount of space that had already been allocated – the whole preview could have been out of date almost immediately. It’s just an inherently troublesome part of the process.”

In his preview Kerzel picked the Caps to finish 10th in the East this season. “I still think the Caps are on the bubble as far as playoffs go,” he told me, right before the season opener. 

Kerzel’s THN preview this summer also offered some conspicuously kind words for the team’s bloggers.

“The whole notion of blogging has really caught fire. One of my baseball  pals, Roch Kubatko of The [Baltimore] Sun, was given blog duty a couple of years ago and wasn’t sure what to make of it – demotion? Lack of interest from the bosses? Two years later, his baseball ruminations are the most well-read blog on any of the company’s newspaper’s blogs. He’s developed a cult following.

“And I can say for sure that blogging has changed the way most media outlets approach their jobs. I know with my work for the AP, the fact that someone can blog it right away on a daily paper site means we’ve got our feet to the fire to turn around the news much quicker these days.”

Filed in Dave Fay, Hockey Reading, Media, National Hockey League, Print, The Hockey News, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (1)

Wide Open Observations of Opening Night (at Home)

By pucksandbooks
Sunday, October 7, 2007

Olie postgameAn attempt to provide a sense of the atmosphere I encountered in and about Verizon Center beginning late Saturday afternoon:

4:45 p.m.: We do not have anything approaching hockey weather. In fact, walking down 6th St. under a blazing sun, I’m uncomfortable in merely bluejeans and a business shirt. But I’m better off than six fans I pass who are outfitted in new red Reebok Caps’ sweaters; they are collapsed and passed out against Verizon Center walls, sweat pouring off their temples. District Police revive them by removing the new sweaters and replacing them with old CCMs. Almost instantly the fans recover.

Seriously, I saw a fair number of fans in these rib-huggers out in the heat, and none of them seemed to be moving 9 percent faster than me.

The Caps have a number of young, attractive staffers scurrying about 6th and F Streets on Segways distributing pocket schedules.

5:05: The former Modell’s Caps’ and Wizards’ gear store, which nobody seems to know is named what now, easily has 60 or 70 shoppers in it two hours before the game. It’s actually quite difficult to move around in, it’s so congested. There is rack after rack of new color and logo caps, and they are disappearing fast. The lines at the two registers are consistently six or seven people deep. The team’s new look has been manufactured in a massive array of fashion in this shop, and it’s clearly popular with fans on opening night at home.

Back outside en route to the press entrance, I seize upon an amazing sight: a band of about 25 or 30 men and women — mostly men — congregated on 7th St. wearing hot red wigs, red dresses, and red athletic shoes. This is no ordinary opening night of hockey at home, I think.

5:20: Predictably, it’s novelty-night crowded in the press lounge. Comcast among other broadcast outlets is doing a remote outside the rink, drawing a lot of media personnel who’d otherwise be in the lounge. I arrive in the lounge with a mission to survey various media for their respective slottings of the Caps in the East this season. Here’s what I achieve:

Mike Vogel: 3rd (obviously, he has the Caps winning the Southeast)

Ron Weber: 10th (ouch!)

Eric McErlain: 7th

Corey Masisak: 7th

Dmitry Chesnokov: 6th

6:00: In the press box I’m seated between Eric McErlain and Dmitry Chesnokov. Meaning, my hockey education will be advanced tonight, and I’ll also have the immediate company of good friends. To the right of Eric is a Voice of America reporter originally from the Czech Republic. A couple of reporters in our row mention that the Caps have preserved a press box working space — all season long — for the departed Dave Fay. I mention to the VOA guy that my recollection was that Mr. Leonsis established that policy within a day or two Dave’s leaving us. Incidentally, the bottom of page 1 of the Caps’ 2007 Media Guide carries a dedication to Fay.

6:15: I’m in the refreshment area of the press box, which is partially glassed in, and seeking quiet there because Tim Lemke of the Washington Times is interviewing me about blogging and its impact on the Caps. He emailed me a week or so ago and informed me that he’d already spoken with Eric McErlain (good idea, that) and Jon Press.

The interview lasts longer than I thought it would simply because Tim and I have a real interesting and easy exchange, and he asks good questions. Also, because I love talking about this topic. Lemke mentions his impression that the four of us put a lot of work into OFB. I don’t quite know how to respond; objectively you could posit that we devote a healthy number of hours each week to the site, but even when I’m writing at 2:00 or 3:00 in the morning, knowing I’ll be dragging in the office the next day by early afternoon, I never view the endeavor as labor.

Full disclosure (sort of): three times I ask Lemke to turn off his recorder so that we can chat off the record. I want to provide him as full a sense as possible of what has happened to us over the past year, and various members of the hockey community have shared with me, with a good deal of candor, what they perceive the state of things media in D.C. to be. Mike Vogel once told me that 80 percent of what he hears in his hockey travels necessarily has to end up on the cutting room floor. “It’s a good way to preserve friendships,” he told me. Continue reading ›

Filed in Blogs, Comcast SportsNet, Corey Masisak, Dave Fay, Eastern Conference, Hockey Weather, Internet, Media, National Hockey League, Print, Ron Weber, Sovetsky Sport, Sweaters, Tarik El-Bashir, Washington Capitals, Washington Post, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (13)

Truer Words

By Gustafsson
Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Jason LaCanfora had the great honor of delivering the eulogy for Dave Fay this past weekend. Jason got to know Dave quite well as they shared the Caps’ beat for rival newspapers for five years. It was a moving and insightful recounting of Dave’s life and work.

Jason and Dave’s wife Pat were kind enough to release the full text of the eulogy to the Capitals’ web site. One passage in particular stood out to me:

I remember visiting Dave and Pat at home and in the hospital in 2004, and being overwhelmed by his zest to work even then. I’d ask him repeatedly why he was in such a rush to get back to that freezing, decrepit rink in Odenton, and the answer was always the same.

He’d say, “[...] if I don’t go out and cover that practice, no one will.”

Dave always feared that his paper would ignore the Caps if he didn’t push so hard to cover every game home and road, even when sick, and, anything less, to him, wouldn’t be fair to the sport, the fans, the players, the team.

Truer words have never been spoken.

With the move from an isolated and ancient Piney Orchards rink to the convenient and modern Balston facility — as well as the growth of blogs dedicated to the Capitals — practices remaining uncovered may be a thing of the past.

Sadly, Dave’s other fear, that newspapers would ignore the Caps without his efforts, is still a concern shared by many. Newspaper circulation and ad revenue are down; as profits decrease, so does quality and coverage. Reporters are increasingly having to cover more ground as cuts are made, thus forcing even the hockey-friendly reporters to make hard choices about where to invest their limited time.

Truer words, indeed.

Filed in Dave Fay, Media, Print, Washington Capitals, Washington Post, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (2)

Hit the Ice to Beat Cancer

By OFB
Friday, July 20, 2007

Put Cancer on Ice - http://www.putcanceronice.orgOur friends at PutCancerOnIce.org will be holding their monthly charity hockey game on July 29th from 2 - 3:30 pm at Kettler, and will be donating the proceeds to Hockey Fights Cancer in the name of the recently departed Dave Fay.

Please take a moment to head to their website and see how you can get in some summer-time puck and help a good cause while you are at it.

Filed in Dave Fay, Washington Capitals| Permalink| Comments (0)

Funeral Arrangements for Dave Fay

By The OFB Team
Thursday, July 19, 2007

From the Washington Capitals PR Staff:

Viewing and funeral arrangements for legendary Caps beat writer Dave Fay have been made for Friday and Saturday, July 20-21:

Viewing:
Friday, July 20, 2-4 p.m. and 6-9 p.m.
Stauffer Funeral Home
8 E. Ridgeville Blvd.
Mt. Airy, MD 21771		 Services:
Saturday, July 21, 11 a.m.
St. Ignatius of Loyola Church
4103 Prices Distillery Rd
Ijamsville, MD 21754

In lieu of flowers, the family asks that memorial contributions may be made in Dave’s name to either:

Hockey Fights Cancer
PO Box 5037
New York, NY 10185-5037		 Hockey’s All-Star Kids Foundation
National Hockey League
1251 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020

Online condolences may be expressed to Dave’s family at http://www.staufferfuneralhome.com/.

Filed in Dave Fay, Media, Print, Washington Capitals, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (0)

Dave Fay: A Hall of Famer Passes on

By The OFB Team
Wednesday, July 18, 2007

The hockey world in general, and the Washington D.C. area hockey community in particular, lost a great friend last night, as Washington Times hockey writer Dave Fay finally succumbed to a lengthy illness.

Fay, a fixture on the Caps’ beat for the Times since the early 1980s, brought knowledge, insight, remarkable dedication, and a passion for hockey to his work, and has been one of the defining personalities in coverage of hockey in the Nation’s Capital. His dedication to the sport was recently richly recognized, as he was presented with the 2007 Elmer Ferguson Memorial Award by the Hockey Hall of Fame in late May. He will be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame this fall.

We at OFB offer our sympathies to the Fay family, and are thankful that we were able to read Fay’s work for so many years. He will be missed.

Update: WashingtonCaps.com’s Mike Vogel shares his thoughts on Fay and his career here.

Memorial contributions may be made in Dave’s name to: Hockey Fights Cancer, PO Box 5037, New York, NY 10185-5037 or Hockey’s All-Star Kids Foundation, National Hockey League, 1251 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020. Canadian friends may send Memorial contributions to: Hockey Fights Cancer, P.O. Box 1282, Station B, Montreal, Quebec H3B 3K9

Filed in Dave Fay, Hockey Hall of Fame, Media, Print, Washington Capitals, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (2)

Times’ Dave Fay Headed to Hockey Writers Hall of Fame

By The OFB Team
Tuesday, May 29, 2007

Washington TimesAt a time when newspaper editors across the country are demanding that reporters compromise their commitment to their beats with additional and time-consuming assignments, today Mike Vogel discovered the news that the Washington Times’ Dave Fay will receive the highest honor his profession can bestow, for his singular commitment to the Washington Capitals’ beat: he’s headed into the Hockey Writer’s Hall of Fame.

He’ll be inducted this November.

At OFB, we’ve had our share of disagreements with Dave about his assessments of the team in recent years, but we are also aware of his unrivaled commitment to covering our game in this region. Dave has been on the Caps’ beat at the Times since the early 1980s. Disagreements aside, if we had more of Dave’s ilk on the beat hockey wouldn’t be mired in its crazy-Uncle-kept-in-the-attic status it is in the common D.C. newsroom.

May 30 Washinton Times coverage: Corey Masisak; Dan Daly

Filed in Dave Fay, Hockey Hall of Fame, Media, Print, Washington Capitals, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (2)

Whining Now Has Company on the Beat

By pucksandbooks
Tuesday, March 20, 2007

cupajoe.jpegI’m an equal opportunity media critic, and this morning the Washington Times’ Dave Fay reminds me that the one thing worse than no hockey coverage is rank amateur analysis of the game by a media pro. “Wrong direction — Capitals keep getting worse, not better” indicates that not only did Fay get up on the wrong side of the bed before writing but that he’s resorted to message board muddled thinking as inspiration for it.

I think any discussion of Washington as a rank amateur hockey town needs to acknowledge what its hockey fans have to endure from the annointed who cover it. (Mercifully, through the miracle of technological democracy, this is changing.) This morning’s Fay column is exhibit 984.

Where to begin?

How about with this absurdly false premise:

“Two years ago Washington and Pittsburgh started out about the same level — two bad teams with one exceptional talent.”

Look, I understand the proclivity to compare the Caps and Pens; there’s the bitter playoff history, the Patrick division past, the relative proximity of the cities. But for once and for all, can we at last acknowledge the Pens’ privileged draft perch — way, way at the top — the better part of this decade? Was it just El Sid and riff-raf Craig Patrick accumulated in Mulletville as play started up again two years ago? What of no. 1-overall netminder Marc-Andre Fleury? Or Ryan Whitney and his 53 points thus far this season? They arrived with the 5th overall pick in 2002. And since then they’ve been bolstered by immediate-impact, uber-elite talents in Malkin and Staal. Until this season, the Penguins have been Entry Draft lottery fixtures.

The true story behind Pittsburgh’s ascent relative to Washington isn’t so much that it happened but . . . why did it take so long???

In particular, we’d do well to remember the high crime and draft felony perpetrated on the Caps by the league — most particularly to Pittsburgh’s benefit — in 2005. It was then that the league conducted its first post-lockout draft in “snake” style, meaning in even rounds, the draft order was reversed. This mayhem was an attempt to achieve a compromise between those who felt all teams should have had an equal chance at Sidney Crosby and those who felt tradition should reign, and weaker teams should have been in the running (as was the norm). The Caps were coming off a 59-point 2004. The league crafted an unprecedented provision that penalized a team for drafting no. 1 overall the preceding couple of seasons.

The principal effect of this screwjob was to deliver SuperSid to a desired market and award the Caps someone along the lines of say Sasha Pokulok . . . in the middle of the first round. Just two weeks ago I asked Mike Vogel if that summer’s stupidity has set back the Caps’ rebuild. “Without question” was I believe the reaction he offered me.

Speaking of Pittsburgh, though, its owner-savior had an interesting initial few seasons in the big league. Drafted in 1984, he and Pens management delivered the team to the postseason for the first time together in . . . 1989. Was Fay bellyaching about that patience demanded of Penguins’ fans during those five years?

And what are the origins of this Fay rant?:

” . . . the [Caps'] marketing department wants fans to believe they are dealing with the 1976-77 Montreal Canadiens.”

Has there been anything either formally or informally intimated by management evocative of dynastic claims? Instead, I’ve noticed public commentary phrased along the lines of “build for competitiveness year-in- year-out . . .,” maintaining roster flexibility with respect to salary additions (and boy won’t that be needed in the summer of 2008, with six key RFAs sitting down at the negotiations table), fostering an organic, build-from-within ethos — the models for which are compelling whether viewed in New Jersey or the Rocky Mountains.

Apparently a captain notching a certain 30 goals on the campaign is a dismissive trifle for Fay: “The Caps are fielding a team that has two players with measureable skill levels — Alexander Ovechkin and Alexander Semin . . . ” Methinks Fay needs some footage of the productivity of recent, preceding Caps’ captains. Ones who’ve been traded for chump change and allowed to walk as free agents. Let’s just say there isn’t a run on Halpern sweaters in central Texas these days.

More message board sub-mediocrity mush:

“Take Alex 1 and 2 off the roster and this is a team that would have trouble winning in the American Hockey League.’

Not if it were coached by Bruce Boudreau, it wouldn’t. But heck, why don’t we just go through 29 other sets of rosters and cherry pick off the prime talent and agree they’d all miraculously be basically unaffected. I mean the Pens without Sidney and Malkin, they’d still sneak in the postseason I’m sure. The Devils without Brodeur and Rafalski, no worries. What’s to be gained with such ludicrous hypotheticals?

I never thought I’d say this, but work like this makes me long for more column space for Danny Snyder’s boys.

Filed in Dave Fay, Entry Draft, Media, Morning cup-a-joe, NHL Trades, Pittsburgh Penguins, Print, Washington Capitals, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (3)

Quality Depth at the Washington Times

By pucksandbooks
Friday, February 23, 2007

NewspapersGreat news on Dave Fay, the Caps’ beat reporter for the Washington Times: he’s recovering well, and his colleagues expect him to begin writing again on hockey soon, likely in the form of some analysis pieces. Dave has been a fixture on the Caps’ beat for the Times really since its inception, in the early 1980s, but had he known that during his convalescence he’d be backed up on the beat by a staffer whose family hails from western Pennsylvania, and who to this day harbors a full-throated, unwavering allegiance to the Pens, I wonder if we might not have seen Fay attempt to blog from his hospital bed.

Certainly I have to chat with Nate Ewell about greater scrutiny of the credentialed.

I met the backup scribe, Corey Masisak, in the Verizon Center press lounge before Wednesday night’s game against San Jose, and his roots notwithstanding, I liked him. I asked to meet with him because a couple of weeks ago I thought that the novelty of his circumstances at the Times — stepping in at a moment’s notice, in the middle of the hockey season, to cover for an area legend fallen ill — suggested a novel story. I came away impressed by his handling of his beat-baptism-by-fire 2007; he is poised and composed and offers a quiet thoughtfulness that belies his youthful appearance.

His has been a fast rise in a nascent journalism career. He left Pennsylvania for the University of Maryland in 2000, drawn to College Park for the quality of its journalism program. He covered various Terrapin sports teams for the school’s well regarded Diamondback student newspaper. He’s been at the Times about three years, where he’s covered minor league baseball and Navy football. His selection to cover for Fay, however, wasn’t entirely related to the quality of his coverage on the other beats.

“In the [Times'] newsroom the editors knew I was the only one who liked hockey,” he told me, laughing.

“Of course it’s not the way you want to start an assignment,” he added.

Back in December, Masisak “shadowed” Fay on a Saturday night Flyers game at Verizon Center. “That was a huge help,” he said. But soon thereafter the beat became his, and while he’d been around the Nationals’ locker room a bit, this was going to be his first full-time assignment covering a pro sports team. He confessed to a serious case of fright.

“I remember doing nothing but intense research — constant reading — the first four nights after I got [the assignment]. Coming in in the middle of the season, I needed to learn names and faces, what the team had done . . . it wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be.”

The Times, like so many other large print media outlets these days, has seriously scaled back its staffing on team road trips. Masisak, who traveled frequently on the road with Terrapin teams, knows well the value of being seen day in, day out by the athletes he’s covering. Recently, at an LA Kings practice at Kettler Capitals Iceplex, Masisack was the only beat reporter present.

“It makes a difference,” he noted. “When you get to work with guys every day, you’re certainly going to develop relationships.”

Masisak’s work covering Navy football made him a bit apprehensive initially about moving to a pro sports beat. “You don’t get higher quality [individuals] than those guys in Annapolis,” he said. But working with hockey players, he soon found that “character” athletes could be found in NHL rinks as well.

“Everybody in hockey is so nice,” he told me. “I was working on piece about Eric Staal, and he gave me his parents’ phone number up in Thunder Bay [Ontario]. I got a hold of his mom, and after talking to her she had Eric’s dad ring me later. This is what it’s like among players, coaches, managers, and their families across the league.”

Filed in Dave Fay, Media, Print, Washington Capitals, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (1)

Morning cup-a-joe (1/18/07)

By pucksandbooks
Thursday, January 18, 2007

cupajoe.jpegTuesday night’s game account for the Washington Times yesterday was filed by Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Sun, filling in for the ailing Dave Fay. In it he pointed to tonight’s game in Carolina as a crossroads one, suggesting that a Caps’ loss may well spell the end of any viable postseason aspirations. My initial reaction to Garrioch’s claim was defensive — Hey, outsider, bug off! Fifteen minutes later, however, with some introspection’s fuller inventory of all that hails and ails our squad, I confess to subscribing to Garrioch’s thesis.

The truth of the matter is harsh, if not immediately apparent: the Caps this morning are lodged in 13th place, just 5 points out of 8th in, as everybody knows, a tightly compressed Eastern conference hierarchy. But take a closer look at an important discrepancy between the Caps and the team immediately above them in 12th place, the Islanders. The Caps have surrendered 162 goals, the Isles 134. At least three teams between 8th and 12th in the East do a lot better job at keeping the puck out of their own net than does Washington. That isn’t a formula for a great deal of leap-frogging in three months’ time.

Add in the facts that the Caps remain badly banged up (Mike Green the latest to go down), that their offensive production is wildly unbalanced, and that 9 of the team’s final 14 games are on the road, and things look grim.

But your next reaction ought to be this: no worries, mate. The reality that I would suggest is settling in is the one that ought to be: the Caps are right about on schedule in the rebuild. They are not last season’s early season pinata, nor are they the battering ram they look to be in about 24 months. They are somewhere in between.

If we take a deep breath and a crossover stride back, we can acknowledge the razor-thin-margin-for-error, all-the-cards-have-to-fall-perfectly-in-place scenario that would have delivered the Caps to 8th in the East on April 8. They signed Richard Zednik to bring some veteran presence and offensive balance, both lost with his long-term injury that coincided with the meat and rigor of the Caps’ schedule. And he was playing outstanding hockey when he went down.

The other long-term injuries don’t bear the impact of absence individually that Zednik’s does but rather harm in an accumulative way: the Caps simply don’t have the depth to address a bevy of injuries anywhere in the lineup. And acquiring that depth is a mission secondary to securing the core pieces for long-standing playoff viability.

Meanwhile, in season two of the rebuild, some superb pieces to the puzzle have been added. A thought-to-be burst of offensive pizzaz — but a potential “troublemaker” to go along with — has in Alexander Semin turned out to be a wrecking ball of a gamebreaker, a first-tier All Star candidate for the next 10 years. And his teammates like having him around.

The all-important captaincy for a young rebuilding team was sagely set upon the shoulders of courageous, accountable, and productive Chris Clark (his predecessor has 16 goals in his last 115 games). Many wondered if last season’s 20 goals were a fluke of flanking Ovechkin. This season, he’s a mortal lock for 25. From this vantage, it isn’t difficult envisioning a 32-year-old Clark leading the Caps in the playoffs. He is simply the finest captain the team has had since Dale.

On the blueline, two important subtractions took place in the offseason and were replaced by Brian Pothier and Mike Green. The organization knows that more shuffling on the backline will have to take place this offseason, and that it has yet to acquire a shut-down no. 1.

On the near horizon is the arrival of highly drafted, heavy artillery that will positively remedy some of the present woes. (The bulked-up Eric Fehr to the right of Semin next season?) That doesn’t lessen much the sting of real-time defeats, but how often is glory’s path paved with rose petals and fried turkey?

Filed in Carolina Hurricanes, Dave Fay, Morning cup-a-joe, Washington Capitals, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (3)

Veteran Scribe Sidelined

By The OFB Team
Tuesday, January 16, 2007

The OFB Team sends best wishes and hopes for a speedy recovery to the Washington Times’ Dave Fay, who is battling some health issues. Get well soon, Dave.

Filed in Dave Fay, Washington Capitals, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (1)

The Mullets March on Washington

By pucksandbooks
Monday, December 11, 2006

russians.jpegLast season, the NHL and the media covering it blanketed all four Capitals-Penguins’ games with coverage focused exclusively on superstar rookies Alexander Ovechkin and Sidney Crosby. It was as if the other 42 athletes dressed for the games didn’t exist. One year later, the two hockey teams are receiving coverage in the leadup to tonight’s first matchup of the ‘06-07 season between the teams.

It’s a highly healthy development, and credit goes to some startling and unexpected storylines. First, nearing mid-December, the Caps hold the eighth and final playoff spot in the Eastern conference, with the Penguins just three points behind. All four of last season’s Caps-Penguins’ games were contested by Eastern bottom-feeders. There was so little in standings stake at place. Both clubs would need health and a bit of luck to qualify for this season’s postseason, but tonight could be the preface to a much-anticipated, long overdue renewal of the springtime bitterness and drama that has bred beautiful bile between the teams’ supporters. And given the youth both clubs boast, it appears likely to be a renewal of considerable duration.

Unless the Penguins move to Hamilton. Or Las Vegas. Or Portland.

Joining Ovechkin and Crosby as high-profile, game-changing talents are Penguins’ rookie Evgeni Malkin and Caps’ almost-rookie Alexander Semin. These two are every bit as likely as the league’s 2005 poster boys to score the winning goal tonight. Malkin is a big offensive dynamo, as adept at playmaking as he is at scoring, and he’s evoking comparisons in western Pennsylvania to no. 66 (with less whining). Semin is a stickhandler almost nonpareil, with wicked wrists in the slot to match. If the game stays tight it will be intriguing to see if coaches Terrien and Hanlon load up their respective first lines with these young guns to try and win it.

Kris Beech entered this season largely as an afterthought among Caps’ and Penguins’ fans, but of late he’s helped shore up the revolving door of pivots on the Caps’ second line. A key part of the trade we no longer mention here at OFB, he’ll have perhaps almost as much motivation to perform well tonight as the first-line centers.

But perhaps the most surprising element leading into tonight is the play of Caps’ netminder Olie Kolzig. Last week Glen Hanlon claimed that the Caps regard him as the finest goalie in the league, and that Kolzig is playing the finest hockey of his distinguished career. It’s early still, but some around the league, including a few high-profile hockey talking heads, are lobbying on Kolzig’s behalf for the Vezina.

There’s strong preview coverage of tonight in the MSM. WaPost’s Tarik El Bashir, in addition to forecasting the Caps’ largest home crowd of the season tonight, dishes out some behind-the-scenes comings and goings at the practice skates the two teams held at Verizon Center yesterday. Dave Fay adroitly notes that the Penguins appear to be behind the Caps in the rebuilding schedule, having just jettisoned aged and unproductive John LeClair. And what the heck, here’s Pittsburgh Post Gazette Pens’ guy Dave Molinari and his take.

Monday night Mullet Madness at what used to be MCI Center. It’s good to have the hatred in bloom again.

Filed in Alexander Ovechkin, Alexander Semin, Dave Fay, Pittsburgh Penguins, Tarik El-Bashir, Washington Capitals, Washington Post, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (3)

Fay Can Fail — and Has

By OFB
Friday, November 24, 2006

Just want to thank Dave Fay for not filing for a few days before the Atlanta game. No blog entries, nary a peep. The Post isn’t the only paper in D.C. guilty of poor coverage — though we should thank Fay and the Behind-The-Times for it’s previous random Semin-bashing. Fay also files for The Hockey News, and the quality of that venture can be debated. Here’s hoping things turn around.

Filed in Dave Fay, Media, Print, Tarik El-Bashir, Washington Capitals, Washington Post, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (1)

Meet Our Captain

By Gustafsson
Tuesday, November 21, 2006

A hockey captain should lead by example? How’s this, courtesy of Saturday’s Washington Times?

Washington Capitals captain Chris Clark did not play last night, but it wasn’t because he didn’t try. Simply put, the team physicians wouldn’t clear him.

captainclark.jpg

Clark was hit in the mouth by a puck late in the third period of Wednesday’s 3-2 loss to Boston, sustaining several broken teeth, a fractured palate and possibly other injuries inside his mouth (exact details are vague). He has spent the last two days with physicians and dentists and met with doctors before last night’s game to plead his case.

“I have never seen a more courageous thing in hockey,”

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Filed in Chris Clark, Dave Fay, Mike Vogel, Washington Capitals, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (1)

On Frozen Ombudsman for the Week of November 17

By pucksandbooks
Friday, November 17, 2006

The week commenced catastrophically: on an ad hoc assignment to cover the Caps, WaPost’s Amy Shipley, seemingly in over her head, filed an ignorant and nonsensical game account from Miami Monday night. However, the week improved appreciably thereafter, culminating with Christmas-morning-wrapped-goodies-under-the-tree kind of news relating to a geriatric hockey hating television news anchor at WRC announcing his retirement!

While Team OFB will acknowledge the news in predictable and appropriate fashion, on this sunny Friday keep in your thoughts the melancholy this moment enveloping the region’s rodeo fans. Continue reading ›

Filed in Blogs, Dan Steinberg, Dave Fay, George Michael, Internet, Lindsay Czarniak, Media, Print, TV, Tarik El-Bashir, WRC, Washington Capitals, Washington Post, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (1)

Axis of Media Evil

By pucksandbooks
Friday, October 6, 2006

Mr. Smith went to Washington to reform politics. Lodged in greater Washington, D.C., a barren outpost of hockey media silence thanks to the malicious disinterest of The Washington Post (henceforth referred to as The Compost), among others, I am venturing into cyberspace to broaden my hometown’s coverage of the planet’s greatest game, and especially of my mistress since my seventh birthday, the Washington Capitals. Thus the birth of On Frozen Blog. Welcome.

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Filed in Blogs, Dave Fay, ESPN, George Michael, Hockey, Lindsay Czarniak, Media, Print, Ron Weber, TV, Tarik El-Bashir, USA Today, WRC, WTEM, WTOP, Washington Capitals, Washington Post, Washington Times| Permalink| Comments (5)