Ken thinks it's Downey Time

And so does the crowd at the Joe. That part was spectacular.

Watching Marty Turco get tripped up by his own guy behind the net? Having Lilja score on him? Also spectacular.

The rest of the game, not so much.

I watched it with Lindsay down the hall in my building, where there's a big screen television next to the laundry room. This means that not only did we have to sit through that ridiculousness, but we had to do it while we were dodging the dirty looks of every frat boy wannabe folding his boxer shorts, group of friends coming upstairs with pizza, and family lugging their kid's crap to the elevator and out for an early weekend. And there were a lot of them.

I was hoping that my excitement over Hank signing a contract that won't expire until I'm 34 would fade at nothing, not even the skanky hos on Dallas being skanky hos.

But my heart sank as soon as I saw who was officiating this game. I don't know what the Red Wings did to Dan O'Halloran. Maybe Mike Ilitch killed him in a past life. Maybe Lidstrom ran over his dog. Maybe Maltby egged his house.

Maybe Homer egged his dog in a past life. I don't know. Aside from actual orders from Bettman to be a biased goober (which I can't rule out), that's the best I can come up with.

And then Turco decides to be a whore and win the game.

I'm not going to mince words here. I genuinely do not like the guy. And I like goalies. I like them a lot. Marty Turco is where I draw the line. I had a really crappy day today, even before the game started. Marty Turco's shit-eating grin during his unnecessarily lengthy post-game interview (thanks, FSDetroit) DID NOT MAKE ME FEEL ANY BETTER.

By the end of the first period, I was already stuffing my face full of brownies and on the phone with my mother, bitching about the officiating and the imminent ruination of Turco's perfect Joe Louis record of Fail. It was like hockey was a douche of a boyfriend who was cheating again. But am I going to take him back? Of course I am. So are you. Oh, you'll say it's the last time you let it toy with your emotions, tell all your friends you're sick of its abusive games, but in the end, crawling back to it's the only thing you really know how to do.

Oh baby, I'm sorry. Please, please take me back!

And it will, Saturday afternoon, where it will either buy you a diamond necklace for your birthday, or sloppily make-out with Alex Ovechkin while it knows you're watching. Better break out the Ben and Jerry's..

Well something good had to come out of tonight

Read it. Read it now.

http://www.mlive.com/redwings/index.ssf/2009/01/red_wings_to_announce_henrik_z.html

So much for my denial-based sense of zen-like calm

I was back in Livonia this weekend, doing French homework (did you know that in French, "le mieux" tacked on to the end of a phrase means "the best"? Guess who's last name is no longer used in my household), and braving my parents' dial-up internet connection (I know) for one of my favorite parts of the All-Star festivities - AWKWARD STYLIZED PHOTOSHOOT PORTRAITS!! Last year we were treated to The Throne:

*insert Masterpiece Theatre theme here*

This year? Disembodied heads emerging from the void:

Nice hair, Stamkos

I'm not sure I want to imagine how creeptastic Datsyuk would have looked in this.

Which brings me to my actual topic - the ASG dropout suspension. I haven't really read anyone else's opinion on this. I probably won't. I'm trying to maintain my denial-based sense of zen-like calm surrounding the entire issue. This is how I get through finals week coinciding with the playoffs. But I digress...

If Sidney Crosby wants to show up to the All Star game broken to have his picture taken and reinforce his role as head tool of the NHL media, more power to him. But keep in mind that unless he's living a secret double-life, there's something Pavel and Nick both have that he lacks.

No, the answer is not "mad skillz", nor is it "Stanley Cup rings", although I'm thinking a lot of people reading this might try to argue one or both.

I'm not BFFs with any of the Red Wings, and for all I know, the whole team spent the all star break doing drugs with hookers in Bermuda - but between the two of them, Nick and Pavel have two wives and five children - families, families who don't get to see them everyday because they spend a third of the season in another time zone. The fact that Crosby lives the sad, isolated life of the deified superstar shouldn't really be held against the Red Wings.

So, Gary, if you want to punish two of the best players in the league for preferring to spend time with their kids rather than showing up to your media circus to get their toenails painted up in the Bell Centre press box with Sidney Crosby and his dad, I guess that's your prerogative.

Since Columbus isn't fast approaching us in the division, ahead of us in the league, historically apt to break our players' faces, or going to stir up bad memories of playoff series past (nor have they been beating us this season), there's no real sense of honor at stake in this game. Only 2 points - 2 points I'm not crazy about having to watch my team struggle so hard for - but 2 points I daresay the Red Wings can, just this once, afford to lose, should they lose them. I'll be ok with this game. But the principles involved still make me more than a little outraged.

Have fun with your power-trip, Gary. I hope it makes you feel as tall as you thought it would. Just be careful - if you do, in fact, manage to successfully run the league into the ground, you'll have to find some other way to get that giddy, all-powerful feeling you get when you screw over the Red Wings.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go wash again. It's been a whole day since I agreed with Pierre McGuire, but I still feel unclean.

I guess the answer is no.

The ASG crazyness will continue.

http://watch.tsn.ca/nhl/clip132730#clip132730

The fact that I'm actually agreeing with Pierre McGuire is making me want to vomit. My personal favorite part? When they imply that Nick Lidstrom is embarrassing the NHL by not attending the All Star Game, but the league's commissioner gets booed every time he steps on the ice or opens his mouth. Logical. Very Logical.

Will the ASG crazyness never end?

Sidney Crosby is out with a knee injury. Martin St. Louis is in. I pretty much dumped Lucky Charms all over my bed when I read this. If there was anyway to make more people angry about the All Star Game, this would be it.

It's getting to the point where you can't really call it an All Star game anymore. No members of the defending Stanley Cup champion team, no "Sid the Kid"... what's next?

My personal opinion? Replace the entire Eastern Conference team with the Detroit Pistons. I would watch Rip Hamilton try to score on Luongo all day... that right there would be some serious entertainment.

What happened to the All Star game?

I don't even know if anybody reads this. My sister and I were supposed to be working as a team, with one of her jobs being the pimping out of my awesome writing skillz to the internet at large, a job from which I might have to fire her (not least of all because I've been reconsidering whether the world really deserves to be subjected to the thoughts running through my head.)

However - the fact of the matter is that somebody might, so I feel compelled, nay, obligated, to make sure they're well aware of the fact that as of today, Mike Babcock is the only Red Wing in the All Star game.

The Chief at A2Y has covered this subject better than I could ever hope to.

If you don't already read that blog, you should leave this one immediately and go do it.

And I agree with much of what has been said in the comments of that post, but mostly with the burning desire for Babcock to show up on the bench in his Winter Classic fedora. If that were promised, I would no doubt watch the game.

On the CBC feed, though. Blegh, Versus.

This weekend, I'm heading back down to the east side, but even with good home cooking, that's my loss. If any of you are within reasonable driving distance of Grand Rapids, I've got something you can do instead of letting your eyes glaze over during the skills competition on Saturday - Darren McCarty is signing autographs at that night's Griffins game.

For a $13 upper bowl seat you get - a live hockey game against Calgary's farm team; a Griffins-themed rally towel; to listen to Karen Newman sing the national anthem; to meet Darren fricking McCarty; a post-game autograph session with three players, two of which have actually played games with the Red Wings; and so much more! (well... not that much more.)

More information can be found here.

I can't go, or I would. You should go. Let me live vicariously through you. I'm stuck at home watching the All Star game. This year, I'm rooting for the goalies.

The game's not even over yet

Lindsay wanted me to write out a lengthy game report, but if you'll just scroll down to the previous post, my prediction #3 (The Ugly) wasn't too far off. 3-6 Coyotes, Stuart and Datsyuk are MIA. (I never got into my roommate's vodka.)

I'll blame this on the fact that all the Red Wings were thinking about their upcoming All-Star break vacations in Cancun, and just plumb forgot to play hockey. Much in the same way no one does busy work the day before summer vacation, or the year and a half before graduation. They'll all show up to next week's game against the Blue Jackets ready to go. This is what I have to believe.

There'll probably be a post about the All-Star game.

I'm never making predictions again.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

For tonight's game:

It can go one of three ways -

1. The Good
1st period
- Conklin gets the start
- The Coyotes get murdered
- Dan Cleary's dad interviews Nick Lidstrom during first intermission.
2nd period
- The Coyotes continue to get murdered
- Eurotwins?
- Pavel talks about how much he loves Hank in the second intermission.
3rd period
- The murder fails to cease
- Gretzky swears on camera
- Conklin's new nickname is "Mister Zero", the internet crucifies Ozzie less zealously for a day.

2. The Bad
1st period
- Conklin gets the start
- The Coyotes don't allow themselves to be murdered
- Larry Murphy interviews pissed off Mike Babcock during first intermission.
2nd period
- The Coyotes start to murder the Red Wings
- Hank's on a line with Sammy and Drapes
- Ken spends second intermission talking with Windsor native d-man Ed Jovanovski about his hat trick.
3rd period
- Overtime loss
- Ken Holland swears on camera
- Conklin's new nickname is "Chris Osgood", the internet calls for a change in captains.

3. The Ugly
1st period
- Conklin gets pulled
- The Coyotes rape our already rock-bottom team GAA
- Intern Mike interviews Claude Lemieux during first intermission.
2nd period
- Rape continues
- Franzen, Hossa, Datsyuk, Kronwall, and Lidstrom need assistance off the ice
- I spend second intermission hitting my roommate's vodka.
3rd period
- Regulation embarrassment
- Nick Lidstrom swears at Trevor Thompson on camera
- Conklin's new nickname is "Manny Legace", I don't get back on the internet for three months.

I can't wait.

Sometimes my sister sends me emails at 1 a.m.

And then rants about things that have nothing to do with the Red Wings. It happens about three times a week.

Um, Dany Sabourin's with the Oilers. Mathieu Garon is riding lumber for Fleury now. It wasn't a straight up trade, either. They got rid of another prospect and another draft pick.

I see how the Penguins team-building system works now - assemble an above average team. Continually trade away YOUR FUTURE for players who rush in mid-year, make your team GREAT, then leave in July, forcing you to begin the cycle again. I can only imagine that Ray Shero, tired of dealing with scouting reports and rookies, just mails Wilkes Barre-Scranton season tickets out to every other GM in the league. All this can be yours... This spring, he hopes to deal the Baby Pens entire blue line and every pick of the 2012 draft for Ilya Kovalchuk (I'd die.) and a still ailing Marian Gaborik. Malkin cries tears of joy that he doesn't have to be a winger anymore, and Colby Armstrong gets a permanent glazed look over his face, is easily distracted, and doesn't score goals anymore. New Atlanta captain Slava Kozlov comforts him as best he can, in present tense and using few contractions.

Come summer, Ilya signs a 15 year, 28 billion dollar contract with the Oilers, and... Gaborik goes to Vancouver, just because it would piss off Minnesota's 8,000 fans, which would probably make things uncomfortable for the 10,064 people with too much time and money who go to watch hockey three times a week because the only other thing to do in that state is ship fish to Norway and count over-glorified ponds.

Armstrong goes back to the Penguins, along with Kari Lehtonen, who by now wants the hell out, because Garon's signed with the Red Wings; Jimmy Howard gets off the phone with Ken Holland and beats his head against the brick outside Van Andel Arena.

What's left of Atlanta moves to Winnipeg, where there is much rejoicing.

Yeah. She's a fan of the sarcasm.

All that panic for nothing....

So yesterday there was mass hysteria sweeping the internet regarding Hank and his contract. Helene St. James came to the rescue yet again:


"A CBC report, which did not cite any sources, claims “a 10-year, $75-million offer to Zetterberg has apparently been rejected.”

I asked Zetterberg about this today after the morning skate at Staples Center

“No,” Zetterberg said. “I haven’t turned down anything.”"


The rest of the article is at freep.com/redwings if you're interested.

Crisis averted.

Not really a game report...

I don’t watch the Ducks very often. The Wings only play them a few times a year, usually around two o’clock in the morning, and spend most of the game bouncing pucks off Holmstrom that never end up counting as goals. The Ducks goal horn sounds like what would happen if Satan (the Prince of Darkness, not the hockey player) tended a Lighthouse of the Damned. Chris Pronger’s legs being so much longer than his torso looks foolish and it pisses me off. There’s a 35% or more chance that someone leaves the game on IR.

So when I’m watching the Ducks, I’m not actually watching the individual players; I’m watching myself, in the reflection of the glare off the glass of the television screen, slowly going insane.

I cite this as the reason why I’m almost happier for this game to be over than I am for the Red Wings to have won the game.

In the first ten minutes, I was calm enough, and the Red Wings were doing well enough, that I was almost ready to admit that for the first time, I had been watching the players on Anaheim, and I saw more than a few playing some damn good hockey.

The feeling didn’t last very long.

No, sadly, from that point out, the game was yet another unbalanced three-speed ceiling fan of emotion, from Getzlaf’s goal all the way until Chris Pronger tried to Jamie Langenbrunner another 2,638,468,234 foot shot past Ozzie in the dying seconds of the game.

It’s also really nice to know that you can still trip, hold, and otherwise interfere with Pavel Datsyuk all you want, no whistle. The officiating is consistent this way, I’ll give it that.

But now I’ll try to move away from the cynical, end-of-the-world, I hate hockey mentality, because the Red Wings won tonight, and no matter how the actual game made me feel, beating the Ducks is still beating the Ducks. So here’s what I walked away from this game with:

• Chris Osgood is absofreakinglutely amazing. It isn't just everyday that the general populace will go along with me when I say this, so I'm getting it in while I can.
• Derek Meech - aside from that part where he looked like he died, I think I like where this is going.
• I shouldn't try to watch hockey after drinking a double-strong caramel macchiato, because my roommate will come in to see why I'm yelling 'NEIDERMAYER' at my tv, then worry about the fact that I'm twitching worse than Nikolai Khabibulin during a shoot-out.
  

Finally, I’m serious about Pronger’s torso-to-legs ratio pissing me off. I’m not sure what it is about them. Maybe it’s jealousy. As a veteran of 15 years of ballet lessons, I know what I’m talking about when I say that someone has long, well-turned out dancer’s legs, and Chris Pronger is one of those people. God. His grand jetes would be spectacular. But… this is Chris Pronger we’re talking about, so he doesn’t leap through the air like a gazelle, he just lifts his elbows and looks foolish. I’ve drawn you a diagram to illustrate, practically to scale, just in case you hadn't noticed it before:

I do these things when I’m up too late at night. So if his eyes are stealing your soul. as they are mine, blame Pacific standard time, not me.

Blargh....

I keep a file on my computer that reminds me of things I love about hockey. Someday, the 4 minute minor (successfully killed) that Chris Osgood incurred by trying to kill Slut Ribeiro after already taking a 2 minute puck-playing minor will have a place of great prominence. Today it's a painful memory.

Today, I'm not doing so well, because my happy thought was going to be rising save percentage, but Ozzie wasn't even a .90 for the game, so I'm basically ready to print off a picture of Marty Turco and deface it.

Dial-Up internet should be illegal

So we're back from winter break hiatus. It was a good break; Detroit improved their record a bunch and definitely showed Chicago who's boss in the Winter Classic. If you happened to miss the game, Hulu has the NBC feed posted.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/51948/nhl-capitals-at-devils-010109#s-p1-so-i0

It's listed as a Devils-Caps game, but I swear it's the Winter Classic. Staying on the topic of the Devils, Shanny is coming back! It's not to Detroit much to my sister's dislike, but just so long as we don't play them in the Finals I think she'll live. It's only in the verbal agreement stages now, but it's a start at least.

All-Star Game update: The only thing good I've been able to find about this whole ordeal is Pavel's thoughts.

"I think Hossa said 'I don't want to go,'," Datsyuk said. "Maybe without Hossa no go, I'll be fastest player on ice."

On to less happier things:
Tonight's game.

It's always fun to play Dallas, even if the Wings lose, because they never fail to make Marty Turco look foolish. Let's reminisce a little:


Beautiful. Too bad we couldn't see it again tonight.

Anyway, if you can get over the fact that the Wings blew an early lead to Dallas and look on the bright side, they still get a point, and Ozzie got his revenge on Mike Ribeiro. If you didn't see the high-sticking I'll keep looking for a video but Ribeiro was pretty busted up. Darn.

EDIT
I found the video!

-LoFFeN1987

bahahahahaha

peace. love. hockey