Hockeyhead

I’ll admit, the new Sean Avery is pretty good.  He keeps his mouth shut off the ice, and isn’t forcing the NHL into making up new rules based on his sometimes erratic on-ice behaviour.  He did his job again on Monday night by making his presence felt on the physical side and adding an assist, but more importantly, his team walked away with a 3-0 victory over the slumping New Jersey Devils.  It marked the first time that Martin Brodeur and Sean Avery faced each other this season, not that we should really give a fuck… but here I am blogging about it.

The Devils’ David Clarkson was working on Avery late in the third period trying to get him to drop the gloves.  Avery wisely skated away and actually drew a double minor after Clarkson knocked him to the ice face first.  Avery picked up a single 2-minutes for roughing, and Clarkson was handed a misconduct on top of the double for roughing.  That Avery, so agitating.  Avery on why he didn’t choose to dance with Clarkson:

It’s a 3-0 game at that point, I don’t think that there’s anything to gain by doing anything,” Avery said. “It certainly takes discipline for sure. You fight for your team and for your teammates. At that point I didn’t need to fight for either of them.”

The Canucks dumped the Dallas Stars 5-2 in a bloody affair.  I’m serious, Daniel Sedin took an errand stick to the chompers, lost a couple of fangs and bled all over his red beard.  He didn’t miss a shift and scored the eventual game-winner on a power-play, how’s that for Swedish toughness?  Ryan Kesler had his pumpkin split open with a skate and lost some blood himself.  Vancouver is now 17-4-1 over its past 22 games.

The Minnesota Wild lost the game, but Marian Gaborik scored his first goal since December 4th.  The Rangers took the game 2-1, Sean Avery made a sweet pass to Scott Gomez for the winner early in the second period.  Avery engaged in his first fight since his return to the NHL, and it was a “staged fight”!

Avery Chucks Knucks With Cal Clutterbuck… Woo Haw!

I’m going to save myself the pain of rehashing the Oilers’ tough loss to Detroit last night, Mother Pucker summed it up perfectly:  Hemsky’s D Sucks.

For all of your Leafs, Raptors, and Blue Jays news head to our sister site: Land of the Leaf.

What does Alex Ovechkin do when faced with a full-frontal assault of media in Toronto questioning his motivation behind his infamous goal-scoring celebrations?  He equates celebrating scoring his 5oth goal celebration with celebrating a lottery win by drinking at a bar.  Well, I guess he’s right on that one.

The enigmatic Russian barely flinched when Toronto reporters chose to beat a dead horse just a little while longer.  Whether you find his antics entertaining or detrimental to the game, you gotta admit, the guy has a lot of balls to go along with his razzle-dazzle.

It’s a big number, I think for everybody. If I get it, why [can’t I] celebrate? If you win the lottery — a million dollars — you go to the bar and drink a lot, I scored 50 goals and I just celebrated.”

Sorry to Mike Ricci, the runner-up in this contest.  We were both seriously ugly, and now only you are.

Everything around here feels like Aqua Velva today, all blue and refreshingly cool.  Everybody bang your sticks on the boards or ice for dreadpiraterose of Convention Fans for her nice work on the site header.  We spent a Savard-like amount time grooming ourselves.

I love how Captain Canada there is doing his best Droopy Dog impersonation.  Good to see.

We’re feeling so good in our new plasticy skin here today that we’re calling it a day without posting anything insightful or intelligent (not much of a change from any other day).  Now excuse us while we hit a local watering hole and order up something tasty and blue.

I love when a hockey story of folkloric proportions emerges nearly a week after the incident in question.  Having all of the observations, eye-witness accounts, and bloggers’ takes give you enough to form an opinion of your own.

I’m not going to get into all the details of this one, you can read the best rehashing of it from Puck Daddy.   To put it briefly:

The basic premise is the same: Savard challenged Crosby and talked smack about his visor; Crosby had it removed on the Penguins bench; and when he reengaged with Savard, the Bruins player didn’t back up his words.”

Thankfully, my opinion on this matter only further strengthens another opinion of mine:  Marc Savard is a pussy.  A huge pussy.  Nobody, and I mean nobody enjoys skating the warm-up without a helmet more than Savard.

Patrick Roy was a great goaltender, and to many he was a childhood hero.  He must have broken a few hearts when all of the children grew up and realized he was sleazy son-of-a-bitch.  Karma is a motherfucker Patrick.  The debate will probably rage on for a good many years as to who actually is the greatest goaltender of all time.  Sure Brodeur had a painfully defensive system in front of him for his entire career, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that Roy is an asshole.  Wife-beater.  Dad/coach that sends his son to the other end of the ice to pummel an unwilling participant in a fight.

Congratulations Martin Brodeur, it’s been a pleasure to watch your performance over the last 15 seasons.  And unlike your all-time wins record predecessor, it’s been a pleasure to hear little about your off-ice activities.   Although that affair you had with your wife’s brother’s wife was mildly controversial, but you (being the stand-up guy that you are) ended up marrying her.

Well maybe that headline is a bit presumptuous, but what the hell?  The NHL’s last true dynasty team wants to bring back a retro (I’ll call it their best) jersey and the league will not allow it.  This is after all, the same decision makers who allow the Nashville Predators to sport their puke-yellow jersey.

Although they’re not dead, I bet Mike Bossy, Clark Gillies, Bryan Trottier, and Billy Smith are rolling around in their graves over this.  Don’t even bring it up to Denis Potvin, he wore that golf-ball helmet for years because it brought out the best in those jerseys.

I’ve touched on bad jerseys before , and the Isles have had their share of contributions, but Jesus Harold Christ on rubber crutches get someone with some respect for the game to make these decisions. (Hat-Tip Puck Daddy)

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