January 2012
3 posts
Striped punching bags
Oh, to be a top-flight hockey referee. To keep pace with players 25 years your juniors; to feel the wind in your helmet/helmet-like hair as you fly down the ice. To have crowds cheer you…when you slip and fall. To bring TV viewers off their couches and to their feet…as they scream obscenities at your image on the screen. To live your life knowing that at any given moment, there is...
November 2010
2 posts
“That’s typical Chris Neil. I had to protect that guy for three years when...”
– Brian McGrattan of the Boston Bruins, after Ottawa Senator Chris Neil went after “non-fighter” Dennis Seidenberg on Saturday
September 2010
1 post
“I had to go the tailor and let out every single one of my suits in the ass. Two...”
– Maple Leaf forward Luca Caputi on the consequences of his summer weight gain
July 2010
3 posts
“Fun fact: At ten days and counting, the Ilya Kovalchuk Sweepstakes have lasted...”
– Blogger DownGoesBrown, via Twitter
“A quick shout out to Flames GM Darryl Sutter. What’s that? There is nothing...”
– Derek Harmsworth, Maple Leafs Hot Stove blogger
“Instead of Pierre McGuire standing uncomfortably close to Darren Dutchyshen, we...”
– TSN anchor Jay Onrait
June 2010
3 posts
“When you finish 29th, your list of untouchables should be awful goddamn small.”
– Toronto GM Brian Burke
Ketchup: Foot-in-Mouth Disease
Yup, I called it: Chicago in 6. What I didn’t call was Adam Burish’s strangely-unnecessary comments after the game.
Adam Burish should know better than to put his foot in his mouth while wearing skates. Sure, if you’re a Blackhawks fan, or a Pronger hater, you might have had a chuckle when he came out with that little gem, but you know that at some point, Chris Pronger is...
May 2010
7 posts
Playoff Predictions: Stanley Cup Finals
As the #2 team in the West this year, one would think that the Chicago Blackhawks should be the prohibitive favourites to take down the East’s 7th-ranked Philadelphia Flyers. But the Flyers have already defied the odds in a big way during their Cinderella run, and ought to be able to make this series interesting. However, that being said, I’m pretty sure it’s going to...
A note on Montreal/Philadelphia
Yes, I was wrong about Montreal winning that one, but I certainly didn’t expect Michael Leighton to out-Halak Halak. You see, once Montreal had fallen a few games back, Halak lacked the sack to make a comeback, and that’s a fact.
(The rest of his team didn’t help him out either, but I couldn’t make that rhyme.)
Playoff Predictions: Conference Finals
I’m not going to lie: for a while there in Round 2, I was a little concerned about my picks. Detroit got blown away, Boston lunged out to a huge series lead, and Pittsburgh dominated Montreal in their first game. But in the end, three out of four ain’t bad…and the uncertainty I felt mid-round was nothing compared to the uncertainty I feel about the Conference Finals. There are...
"How to Blow It", a comprehensive guide by the...
It’s interesting that Boston not only led Philadelphia 3-0 in this series, but 3-0 in Game 7, before falling 4-3 in both. Of course, Bruins fans might use a different adjective to describe this. Whatever word you use, however, tonight’s loss represents the culmination of a monumental collapse that has now only happened four times in the history of North America’s major pro...
Dear Dave: The first 82 have a point
Perhaps you’ve heard of TSN’s “Hodgemail” segment. In it, they ask viewers to write in about their thoughts on a given question. This week’s query: “Does Washington’s first-round loss make a mockery of the regular season?” My own answer: How does this question even make sense? The first-place team was defeated by the eighth-place team. It’s hardly an...
April 2010
20 posts
“This’ll last a while, you know? It’s gon— you know,...”
– Capitals’ forward Mike Knuble is at a loss for words after their first-round upset at the Canadiens’ hands
“What the fun times?”
– TSN’s Dan O’Toole with some creative lip-reading of Bruce Boudreau’s reaction to Ovechkin’s goal being waved off (at 1:55)
Playoff Predictions: Round 2
Is there any team in the NHL right now that can claim they’re 100% proud of their first-round efforts? Even the Canadiens, who overcame a 2-game deficit, know that their biggest mistake was digging that hole in the first place. With only one of the East’s top seeds remaining, and the West’s #1 seed looking very vulnerable, things could continue to get interesting.
EASTERN...
About those Round 1 predictions...
Okay, so I’m not prescient; the East gave me a little trouble. But hey, 5 out of 8 isn’t so bad (obviously, I’m tossing the whole number-of-games thing aside). Here’s where I went wrong: WAS/MTL - MTL in 7 » Jaroslav Halak, after being pretty ordinary for the first four games, absolutely stood on his head. Mike Cammalleri also came up big, posting 5 goals and...
“Wellwood Smeagols away from a check…”
– CBC commentator Jim Hughson reveals his love of Lord of the Rings
“The Boston Bruins have gone on to win every series they’ve been in, 70% of...”
– CBC commentator Mark Lee does his best Brian Fantana impersonation. (He elected not to go with “70% of the time, they win every time.”)
“I watched the replay when Fehr scored the goal and his arm was shaking when he...”
– Caps’ captain Alexander Ovechkin follows Tomas Plekanec’s lead, calling out Habs’ goalie Jaroslav Halak
Andy Sutton Pulled Over by a Cop: A Screenplay →
So you’re an expert?
“I gues [sic] the nickname Jose Three-or-more is not far off.”
– TSN’s Dan O’Toole after Capitals goalie Jose Theodore lets in two goals on the Habs’ first two shots (via Twitter)
Sidney Crosby: Freak of Nature →
Sid does what he wants to, when he wants to. His highlights begin at around 1:25.
Three other things from this game: 1) I’m not convinced that Sutton’s hit was clean; he led with his elbow, which wasn’t tucked. 2) At the same time, Crosby might want to be more careful with his play along the boards; Ruutu certainly seemed to feel the second push from behind more than the...
“That last preseason game is when I got nervous. Where Buffalo smoked him like a...”
– Brian Burke on Vesa Toskala and other dark portents of the 2009-10 Leafs’ season
Playoff Predictions: Round 1
I made sure not to check out any commentators’ predictions on how the first round of the postseason will go, just to make sure my own weren’t tainted. Of course, TSN’s playoff coverage just won’t be as compelling anymore now that Maggie the Monkey isn’t there. (She has a career record of 45-45, by the way. I know because Wikipedia tells me so.) I’ve done...
Old Men River
Unless your team just lost the Stanley Cup, or you loathe the team who won it, you can usually find someone to be happy for after the big prize is awarded. Often, it’s a grizzled veteran who’s been plying his trade in the NHL for years, and has poured all his blood, sweat and tears into his game, but whose fingers were still devoid of Cup rings. Think of guys like Dave Andreychuk,...
“It’s not as though we are facing Brodeur or Miller. They don’t have...”
– Montreal’s Tomas Plekanec does his best to motivate the Washington Capitals
Now that Sportsnet is all done with their Leafs broadcasts for this season, I have a little bone to pick with the guys in the truck.
From Dictionary.com:
subheading - noun. a subordinate division of a title or heading.
Notice that a “subheading” is not “a continuation of a title or heading”. If you’ve got a title, and there are more words underneath it in a...
Calgary Flames Out
The San Jose Sharks have made Calgary’s elimination from the Stanley Cup tournament official, but even before that happened, Flames fans (and those with the surname “Sutter”) were asking themselves, “How did this happen?”
Calgary was not supposed to be a team that missed the playoffs; they weren’t even supposed to be a bubble team. The signing of Jay...
“Tuukka Rask would look good in a Leaf uniform.”
– Pierre McGuire tries his hand at comedy
Graham James: off the hook?
The Canadian Press has issued a shocking report last night that Graham James, the former junior coach who sexually abused his players (most notably Sheldon Kennedy and Theoren Fleury), has been pardoned by the National Parole Board. Perhaps even more shocking is the fact that this pardon was granted three years ago - the only reason it just came to light now is that a new accuser has filed...
March 2010
25 posts
What goes around...
During Ottawa’s 3-2 defeat of the Florida Panthers last night, a certain Senator had to leave the game after karma stepped in.
On the opening goal, Panther forward Stephen Weiss cut to the net with Anton Volchenkov following him closely. When defenceman Andy Sutton roared toward him across the slot, Weiss managed to dodge Sutton’s high hit while simultaneously sliding the puck into...
“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again — Dion Phaneuf could play on my team...”
– Rangers forward (and ex-Phaneuf teammate) Olli Jokinen
“Yeah, he’s tried [to contact me] and he’s tried to get my phone...”
– Bruin Marc Savard on Penguin Matt Cooke’s attempts to call him
Sweet Sounds of the Sabres
If you tuned in to TSN’s Montreal/Buffalo broadcast last night, you were in for a treat. (Although if you were a Sabres fan, you might have disagreed for the first 57 minutes of play.) I don’t know if it was TSN’s sound guys, or just the way the mics are set up in the HSBC Arena, but you could clearly hear the players and refs calling each other, whether it was a defenceman...
"A Matter of the Heart" →
Mike Milbury has a moan about the Bruins’ complacency against Matt Cooke and the Penguins. Except for his parenthetical complaint about visors, I totally agree (as my previous post shows).
Bad blood in Boston
I haven’t avoided posting because I’m lazy; it’s because I’m in Boston. The Wisniewski hit was cheap, and the Alfredsson hit on Beauchemin should have been worthy of at least a game misconduct. There; I’m all caught up.
Several weeks ago, my father and I managed to bag a couple of tickets to the Boston Bruins/Pittsburgh Penguins game of March 18. Of course, there...
Rosie DiManno on the NHL's rat problem →
Who would your all-rat team be?
“[Wisniewski] was probably the first star in our minds, as far as involvement in...”
– Anaheim head coach Randy Carlyle after Wednesday night’s game vs. Chicago