selkie

Yeah, laugh now, but they are so going to kick Morocco's ass come in-line hockey tournament time.

Preserving my favorite press quote on the game last night from Michael Rosenberg at the Freep: http://www.freep.com/article/20110208/COL22/102080442/1053/SPORTS05/Michael-Rosenberg-Red-Wings-Pavel-Datsyuk-rustproof Cracked me right up because the Avery thing is such the truth.

It depends on what the fine print on the NHL's agreement with the Namibia Ice and InLine Hockey Association on player movement says. (Yes, that organization really exists)

If the target looked kinda like, say, an Ottawa Senators logo....

Per the Freep today: Darren Helm is also known as "Danger" I prefer not to think too much about goaltending of the 80s and 90s because it's such an unhappy place, and the level of suck tends to make me think that Bob Essena was around far longer than he was.

Was Cheveldae the guy Demers couldn't start for home games anymore because the booing was too bad? Or was he the guy who did get the home starts because they were booing the other guy? Speaking of doghouses of yore, there's also Big Keith Primeau, always said with irony because he played like someone who was 5'6".

The Grim Reaper- Stu Grimson Little Ball of Hate- Pat Verbeek

I power voted for Clay Aiken during his season of American Idol Still, I'm not sure why The Big Game of whatever type it is really needs an intermission musical act at all. Give the tv viewers highlights of the sport involved, give me dancing bears that may or may not be thinking of mauling Dan Patrick, just something other than songs that were actually relevant 10-25 years ago and are now being trotted out again for the sole reason that the audience is familiar with them and can drinkenly sing along.

From the tweets:

Or 20

The PRK won Group IIIB last year, beating Armenia in the gold medal game, and pasting Mongolia 22-1 along the way. They advanced to IIA this year, which is going to be a decidedly tougher group. (Mexico, Australia, Belgium, New Zealand, Serbia)

A few years back, I remember hearing about a book someone had written about playing hockey in the IIHF D&E championships pool. (sinced renamed Divisions IIB and III) And it actually sounded like crazy fun despite the low skill levels. This year's Division III championships is in South Africa in April, and features Greece, Israel, Luxemborg, Mongolia, South Africa, and Turkey all fighting for the right to maybe move up to IIB at some point. I'm kind of surprised Israel isn't better. Seems like they should have some Russian/former Soviet areas Jewish hockey players who immigrate there. Even if they weren't good enough to stay in the Russian/Ukraine developmental hockey systems all the way through, you'd think it would be enough to kick start the Israeli team up a level or two. (The Israeli national figure skating teams are actually quite good because of those kinds of immigrants to the country) And I suspect Greece-Turkey is always a little on the intense side, no matter the sport involved.

Helm's had a number of good scoresheet games lately, as well as the good hustle that led to the penalty in Ozzie's 400th. Seems like the hands are finally starting to catch up to the legs that have impressed since 2008.

From Mlive: http://www.mlive.com/redwings/index.ssf/2010/12/red_wings_tomas_tatar_scores_g.html

What's kind of scary is that some fans are getting all nostalgic about the Sabres getting rid of the 'Buffaslug"

The Macon Whoopee Camellia Festival jerseys were pink. And this was back in the days before a men's pro sports team would think of getting on the breast cancer research bandwagon, which is the only thing that makes said pink on a men's sports jersey acceptable. Southern bush league legend is that the players did actually refuse to wear them, only to be reminded that failure to dress in official team kit would lead to failure to get a paycheck for the game.

Or alternately, you can just embrace the utter WTF? that is minor league hockey jersey design. If anyone has some time to kill at work, and wants a good laugh, I'll recommend Rhodent's Bush League Factor site: http://www.bushleaguefactor.com/hockey/index.asp It really is too bad that he takes down reports on teams that have gone defunct because his descrpitions of the Danbury Trashers (folded because their ownership group was indicted on organized crime charges) and Lubbock CottonKings were treasures.

I am oddly disappointed that I can't find a picture of the Macon Whoopee Camellia Festival jerseys on the web. They're a class of their own.

Considering how Ozzie frequently seems to fire up and step up his level of play when he's gotten a new chip on his shoulder, you know him hearing the Larsson comments might not be a bad thing. He always seems to play best when he's got something new to prove, and a guy putting more fuel on the fire about how he's done after last season's problems is just the kind of thing that might get him working harder to get back to 07-08 form.

Born and raised in South Detroit!

Bush league hockey already went there with the currently on hiatus Austin IceBats, whose arena was indeed known as the 'Bat Cave' when used for home hockey games.

Territory rights are something like 100km in the NHL. Go Grand Rapids would be a live relocation option if they could expand Van Andel to 17K seats (and honestly if they could, the demographics of that market for NHL play are actually better than a number of the usual suspects like Winnipeg); Milwaukee is kind of iffy depending on your measuring points re: chicago, and I don't remember the Hamilton geography. Disney paid a pretty good chunk of change to the Kings when Anaheim entered the league, and the talk in the 90s of moving the Whale or Lightning to the Palace was pretty much killed because Illich could demand enough of a territory infringement fee to make the whole thing cost-prohibitive.

Sounds like Sammy version 2.0, just with slightly lower aim.

I do wonder how much the power issues are going to have affected ice quality by game time. Bad ice doesn't generally work to the Wings' favor.

Supposedly a techno version of the traditional Russian folk song "Kalinka"