WTF Wednesday

Let's be honest, the Wings need to win games. You know it. I know it. The Red Wings know it. It's starting to get a little critical, and with every loss I sink a little deeper into my pool of unending stress. And I'm not going to make a list of all the areas the Wings need to improve (at the top of which would be "winning games"), because hearing "defensive coverage is lacking" and "goaltending needs improvement" and "[insert name of scapegoat du jour here] needs to break his femur and never play hockey for us again" gets old after a while.

So instead of adding in our own pseudo-analysis to the log-jam, we here at Hockeytown Static have decided to do what (sadly) we do best - strange pictures.

And nothing is stranger than Red Wing goalies (past and present) doing what they do best - weird shit.


I have to start out with an apology that Jimmy Howard hasn't really been under the scrutinizing eye of the hockey paparazzi long enough to incur any pictures on the internet (that have floated by me so far, anyway) weirder than his weird-faced headshot from 2006


unless you think it's weird to see him in an apron, serving angel-hair pasta to homeless people in Grand Rapids.



*****

What's Ty Conklin been up to since he signed with St. Louis?



No, seriously, that's Ty Conklin. It's from the Blues' charity something something casino something, so it's not really all that strange, until you consider the fact that it looks like he grew and trimmed that facial hair especially for the event.

*****

This was real, honest to god cereal you could buy in the store. Steve Yzerman had some too - I think his had marshmallows. Proceeds went to charity.



I never tasted it, but I hear that Chris Osgood's honey nut deliciousness is Sharkie-approved.



OM NOM NOM NOM NOM

*****

And finally we get to the climax, where all the pictures that came before are rendered unnecessary to the point of useless, because Dom Hasek, god bless him, could anchor a wtf Wednesday all by himself:



These are from a photoshoot for a calender in the Czech Republic promoting literacy. It stars his daughter, Dominika, as Pipi Longstocking. And Dom as her... creepy, shirtless, tattooed father.



Here's him getting his make-up applied:



I can't even bring myself to come up with a decent response to this picture, and it's been on my computer since last summer. Just... wtf?

It's not the Arby's Curse - it's the Arby's Conspiracy...

Some scattered thoughts (since lately that's all I seem to be having) on tonight's game:

• Clearly the Red Wings need to sign Darren Helm for 2384873 bajillion years. And then start cloning him so he'll never get injured and never age. Games like this are why Lindsay's sacrificing the first two days of her spring break to own him as a bobblehead.
  

• Over on the other end of the spectrum, Dear Todd Bertuzzi: don't ever do that again. I mean the entire game. Don't ever have a game like that again. Go back to surprising everyone with timely goals and intelligent plays. Please.

• That goal by Datsyuk was the most spectacularly beautiful thing I think I've ever seen.

• Someone in the organization made a swanky deal with Arby's didn't they? A deal which would prevent hat tricks while allowing for a ridiculous amount of advertisement. Today Darren Helm went along with it. Just like the whole club's gone along with it for the better part of two seasons. Everyone except Henrik Zetterberg.

• Which is why I love Henrik Zetterberg. Because Henrik Zetterberg fights The Man.
  

The boys are back in town

Well... they're back in Denver, anyway.

I'm not going to try to do any kind of Olympic wrap-up. Mostly because both Lindsay and I are still trying in vain to figure out how we're supposed to live our lives now that there aren't 8 hours of curling televised a day.

And a little because HOLY CRAP THE RED WINGS ARE PLAYING AGAIN ALSDJFLSKDJF.

And WE HAVE ALL OUR SWEDES BACK.

And HALF OF THOSE SWEDES SCORED GOALS.

amen.

- After literally more than a full year, Andreas Lilja made his triumphant return to NHL ice. I missed him, and his shot-blocking, and (in a sick and twisted sort of way) almost missed his laughably questionable defensive choices. Welcome back, Lils. I'd say start kicking ass, but that's how we lost you in the first place so... just welcome back then.

- I wonder how many Wings fans joined the Pepsi Center faithful in their booing of Todd Bertuzzi every time he touched the puck. (I mean besides Mike Petrella.) (And in case you had no clue what the hell was going on, here's the gist.)

- You know, I don't really feel like it's been a real Red Wings game until there's been at least one goal called off thanks to Homer's ass. (Not that I blame the lack of goal on Homer's ass. I'm pretty sure Kelly Fraser and Craig Anderson were the only people in the universe today who blamed Homer's ass for anything. And you can't really count Fraser, because I'm also pretty sure he blames Homer's ass for everything from flat tires to being out of strawberry ripple ice cream to John F. Kennedy's assassination.)

- Dear Versus: This whole "unfairly using Darren McCarty to make me hate you less" thing? Um... well... it might be working, but that excuses neither your video replay issues, nor your toolishness. But a solid B- for not being NBC. Keep working on it.

Were the Wings perfect tonight? No. Were they healthy, did they get two points, and did they beat the Avs in Colorado? Yes. So I have nothing more to say.

The Canadian media needs to CALM THE HELL DOWN

This morning I put on CBC news. It spent two minutes on the Toyota recalls, and then brought in an actual sports psychologist to spend a half an hour talking about what Sidney Crosby needs to do to beat Ovechkin in their Olympic death match. They brought up how hard it was to beat the US, and the following words were actually spoken -

"Well at least we'll always have curling." Implying, I guess, that somehow another loss to the US would mean they didn't have hockey anymore.

And on the one hand, I want to tell them that it shouldn't matter who wins what at the Olympics, they still have hockey because their country honestly loves it, north to south, east to west - the United States has hockey on what really amounts to a state-by-state basis. It would be a pride thing for them to win, bragging rights, but it would be about the sport. Most Americans (but probably not the ones reading this blog) don't care if the hockey team wins, just that they beat all the other countries in everything. The sport doesn't matter to them, the smug sense of satisfaction that they get by being reaffirmed of their overwhelming superiority above all other countries (especially the stupid, over-polite, maple-sucking, socialist lumberjack host nation) does. (Case in point.)

Maybe that'll happen. Maybe Canada will lose on home ice and go home ashamed, and maybe it'll even be to the US and we'll be terrible and very stereotypically United States about it. I'm not going to apologize for my country's team doing better in the tournament.

And I shouldn't have to, because the state of Canadian hockey isn't at risk here. Canada's not always going to win gold in the Olympics, because international competition is a recipe for sheer ridiculousness. And even if they don't even make it to the podium, they'll still be ahead of everybody for medals historically.

So if you're a Canadian and you're reading this, and your country walks away from these games with less than gold, don't let it destroy your existence. The winners will have their medals, yes, and four years of bragging rights, but you'll still have kids out in backyard rinks from the end of school until sundown. And if you're less disappointed that the team lost than you are damn sick and tired of your southern neighbor's superiority complex (which is what I actually think is going on here), then just come out and say that. If our government didn't bomb France for calling us out for being assholes, we're sure as hell not going to bomb you. You're on the same continent. We could contaminate our own water supply.



On the other hand, that comment was an underhanded slight at the US men's curling team, and I sort of want to smack that woman for making John Shuster cry.

(And as a disclaimer, I love Canada, and the game last week was a real conflict of interest for me. I don't know why I rant at four in the morning. I'm going to get ten comments on this calling me out for fallacies in my logic that quote papers on the politicizing of sporting events in international competition, and then Puck Daddy's going to link to me, and every time he does that somebody calls me a chach.)

OLYMPIC HIATUS

...

Because if the crappier hockey players get a 2-week vacation, the crappier bloggers should too.

Go team... uh... go everybody.

So... how about those glass ads?

On the one hand, I'm sure I'll get used to them, and until Sam Bernstein (and I don't doubt this day is coming) pays for the rights to stick his face up behind the goalies during a game, I guess I can deal. Better than on the uniforms.

On the other, ALSDJFLASDJFAKSDF I CAN'T FOCUS ON WHAT'S GOING ON AROUND THE NET, SPARTAN FOODS, AND IT'S NOT DOING MUCH TO ENDEAR ME TO YOUR BRAND NAME.

Frankly, I'm sure if the Red Wings were winning more than half their games right now, I'd have the energy to send myself into a sufficiently frothy rage at today's over-bombardment of advertising and how I hate the way it's snaked itself into the fabric of modern professional sporting events, but the frustration of another shootout loss has sapped me of the necessary energy. Be glad. It would have been like five pages long.

There's not much I can really say about that game at the moment. A heck of a game for a lot of players. I can appreciate Nabokov's epic performance, even if I wish it'd been a little less so. And the Red Wings attempted, for the most part, to play at least fifteen minutes of hockey in every period. Up until the shootout, it was a fun game to watch. And we got a point!

But, I don't know, the Wings sort of need a win right now. And I have a bad feeling that when I wake up in the morning, Lebda, Meech, Maltby, Ericsson, Miller, Eaves, Osgood, Zetterberg, Rafalski, and Lidstrom will have been traded to Atlanta for two third round picks.

Oh dear sweet Hockey Gods, have mercy on my soul for this sin I have committed - I forgot how awesome Franzen was while he was gone.

Darren McCarty makes everything better

Well, that was a... game. I guess. But I was probably setting myself up for disappointment. I've had this hope since October that when Franzen took to the ice again for a game there would be a flood of relief, a big flood, like the kind of flood that sweeps houses away and causes billions of dollars in property damage and untold emotional pain - the kind of flood where the government steps in to provide aid and talks about passing some kind of budget bill allowing for the funds to start building levies so it never happens again. Like one minute you're walking down the street, and then you're like "hey, what's that noi-" and then you're under like 20 feet of water. Relief water. Delicious relief water.

There was no sudden flood of delicious relief water. There was like... a relief water drinking fountain. And there was a line.

And now I'm cursed with the burden of having to compare every mustache I see for the rest of my life with The Mule's epic nose-beard.

I shouldn't be excited about the Red Wings "at least getting a point". Last season I was peeved when the team had the audacity to need to go through overtime and a shootout to beat St. Louis. Yesterday when they hit overtime, there was a fist-pump. And on top of everything, we had to watch the ridiculousness on Versus.

Except I think I can deal with Versus if Darren McCarty keeps being there. Franzen's return only reminded me of how injury-fucked this season has been, so Mac was really the high-point of the night. He seemed a lot more relaxed than the first time he showed up on Versus, and he broke rule number one of unbiased commentating when he proclaimed his undying loyalty to The Organization.

Also, he giggled like a fifteen year old boy when Bill Patrick said "Speaking of enormous loads...", which really made me feel better about giggling like a fifteen year old boy myself. And might have made me giggle harder.

Seriously, Kenny?

Wings trade Ville Leino for Ole-Kristian Tollefsen and a 5th round pick in 2011 (which which, presumably, they'll pick Henrik Zetterberg's superstar successor).

Um... ok, I knew somebody had to go, maybe still more people, and Ville Leino was pretty damn high on everybody's hypothetical/prospective chopping block. You know, because he got scratched like every game. And his play... designated him semi-official fan scapegoat in Andreas Lilja's extended absence (don't worry guys - Lindsay saw him play in Grand Rapids last night - he's back to his shot-blocking, hard-hitting, questionable defensive choices self again).

And I'll miss him, because I was still holding out hope for him.

But who the crap is Ole-Kristian Tollefsen?

All we could find about him was that he was

• a defenseman
• a long-time Blue Jacket
• Norwegian
• incredibly injury-prone

I'm not really sure where Kenny's going with this. I really hope we just dealt Leino to get a guy, and not just took on a guy to get rid of Leino.

Groundhog Day

Today is that magical day when Bill Murray movies are showing on eight different channels and we wait with bated breath for an ugly rodent in Pennsylvania to tell us that it's spring everywhere except Michigan, where it's still going to be cold, bleak, and unfortunate until the middle of May.

still winter, bitches

On top of that, tonight the Red Wings play a west coast team until two in the morning, whereas tomorrow the Red Wings play a west coast team until two in the morning. And given what we've come to expect from the broadcast team at FSD... well, I'll be honestly surprised if we don't get at least three groundhog day jokes.

Heres hoping Todd Bertuzzi gets a birthday hat trick so that we can all go to Arby's and get some birthday curly fries.

And maybe I should clarify, because this seems to be happening a lot lately - if he does get a birthday hat trick, I want the Wings to keep the lead until the game is over. Not over like there's two minutes left. Over like all the players have retired to their respective dressing rooms and have disrobed and showered and are giving interviews to the assembled media. All the way over.

You listening Red Wings? You have to play the whole game until it's over.

Or you'll make me cry.