SouthernWingsFan

:violin: He's one of the most popular players right now, and is arguably the face of the NHL. If you want the NHL to be more popular and recognizable to casual fans, we need to hear more about him and for him to do good.

We all know how important the Red Wings are to you, and other fans, whatever city or location is "Hockeytown". Be happy with that and quit trying to find things to be upset about. It's just a slogan people, nothing to get in a hissy fit over.

A solid fight both ways there. What I like about it is neither player just jumped one another causing an unfair advantage, and most notable (for me at least) is they both knew when to stop and gave each other kudos after a good bought. Great sportsmanship there which we sometimes don't see much of anymore I think.

I swear to god, some Wings fans are just absolutely amazing with how idiotic they think when it revolves around goaltending. People want to rip Hasek's you-know-what's off earlier this season because he's not playing that good, yet he DOES WHAT HE IS SUPPOSED TO DO last night and STOPS THE PUCK (which, unless I have been rolling up too many doobies tonight, IS A GOALTENDER'S JOB), YET HE STILL GETS RIPPED FOR STOPPING THE PUCK or not doing it in an "appropriate fashion" and still doing his job effectively. Amazing. People have ripped Osgood in the past for OMG YOU LET IN AN 80 FOOTER GOAL FROM THE YEAR 1924 and won't give him fair credit for winning games. Seriously, what the hell do some of you people want? Do you want a fireproof steel wall attached to the nets instead of actual human goaltenders? Sometimes I can't wait for the day that both Hasek and Osgood retire so people in here who do not use any logic or sense whatsoever can shut the f**k up about both of them, and that's pretty sad unfotunately because I ike seeing them both as Red Wings (and at the same time), they are both great goaltenders who will never get enough credit from some people. Will some of you idiots ever be happy? What if god was the goaltender? Would you be happy then? Because I may be just as idiotic, but the current alternatives right now to god as goalie are pretty damn good.

I usually stay absent of GDTs, but the game got slowly more entertaining starting in the 2nd period. I'm not one to get overly excited at much in sports or in life and am usually a more resesrved person, but the entertaining Hasek/Gaborik play at the end got me off my couch in a hurry and a rare yell from me. Long/short of it it was a "legal" play and am glad neither player got hurt. If anybody wants to see my detailed opinion of it (you might actually get me to blush then in being flattered in caring that much about what I say ), see Hasek/Gaborik thread, somewhere in the 4th page of commentary me thinks. Good to see Hasek get 2 in a row and getting out of his rut, hopefully Osgood will continue to play solid this season either Sunday/Monday (I'm assuming rotation those back-to-back games). SouthernWingsFan's Man Love Weird Dream-O-Meter for the following players... Zetterberg and Datsyuk - Simmering and Noisy Downey - Slowly getting warmer, like a jacuzzi slowly heating up Hasek - Same Lidstrom - Always consistently hot like a sauna And with that, I'll end the what the f**k weird rambling where people will probably go OOOOOOOOKAY at me with these proabable reactions. *shrugs*

Getting people in here not overreacting to this (or anything else in here) is like asking Michael Vick to adopt cats or asking Dick Cheney to buy instructions for using a hunting shotgun. Neither of the scenarios is going to happen unfortuantely.

Good. Osgood's usually done well against Nashville and can still continue kick tail this season and Hasek still gets PT to get more confident and out of his early rut. Rotate the two like Babcock said given the Wings current goalie situation if both are playing well in about a 50-50 to no more than a 60-40 split. There is no goalie drama or controversy there, it's only created by the fans.

I haven't really read the first pages of responses so I apologize if I re-state other people's points... I don't get too overly excited or emotional at sporting events or get out of my seat much, but that play absolutely got me off my couch with a yell. That play was nuts and I can't get enough of it. If there's "controversy" on this being a dirty play or because people don't like Hasek... 1. Hasek will charge out on breakaways if it's a realistic opportunity, and there's nothing against it in the rulebook for a goaltender to do. 2. He played the puck first and didn't intentionally go after Gaborik in any stretch of the imagination with intent to injure or taking Gaborik's legs out from under him or whatever. Gaborik was just unfortunately in jail in no man's land with his head down and couldn't get out of the way. 3. Bogus call on it being tripping. Again see #2 where he was playing the puck. If it was just your skaters jousting for position and one guy accidentally trips another guy, ok a penalty, but in this situation with a goalie and a breakaway, what the hell else are you supposed to do? Get out of the way so the skater has a free empty net? There is no controversy of it being dirty or of it b/c it's Hasek. It was just an aggressive (and VERY ENTERTAINING) play. Nothing more/less, case closed. EDIT: And most importantly, glad Gaborik did not get hurt on the play from getting airborne and Hasek did get a skate to the family jewels or anywhere else, cause that would probably ruin his weekend.

Bill Withers - Lean on Me

We're very damned lucky to be Wings fans, rooting for a team that's made the playoffs the past 15 or 16 seasons in a row (I lost count! ) and more often than not fielding teams that have good potential to win the Stanley Cup year in and year out, despite what people here might say otherwise because we aren't "tough enough" or the weekly Red Wings goalie rant of the week how goalie #1 sucks because of ABC and goalie #2 sucks because of XYZ. We are very lucky and unfortuantely a lot of Wings fans overall are spoiled take this team for granted I think in the grand scheme of things, when some franchises can't even make a dent getting into the playoffs or make a deep playoff run year by year.

Step away from the computer so you don't break it... Sit down... Take a few deep breaths... Calm down and have a beer... All-star ballots, not just in the NHL, but in the NBA and MLB as well, are written up way, way WAY early in a season based largely on popularity of star players and before some of those players might start to struggle aways into a season, but well before an all-star break. Osgood was more/less a "back-up" last season (please for the love of god let's not get into him not really being a back up or goalie comparisons) and Hasek did well last season, hence Hasek being on the all-star ballot and Osgood not being on it this season, along with the reasons in my last paragraph. This is nothing new in any professional sport. :rotflmao:

40-50? Don't get me wrong I'd love to see this happen, I like the kid, I think he has a lot of potential, and I think the ripping on him every now and again is pretty idiotic. 40-50 is reaching a little bit too much out of the realistic box though, in my opinion.

Stone Temple Pilots - Trippin' On A Hole In A Paper Heart

I perfectly understand being frustrated with players if somebody had a bad game etc. etc., and even the ripping on players while it's retarded, sometimes it's justified though. I hate it, but can usually deal with it. Unforutnately I think there's a difference sometimes between just ripping on players and wanting to see people do bad just because you have a vendetta against a player. Let it go. That's what absolutely gets on my last nerves and wants me to just knee people in the nuts. And unfortunately this attitude has been fairly common now and in the past with both the Wings goaltenders for some people. And it's pretty sad and pathetic if you ask me. I don't care who you are or what team you play for or what kind of idiotic things you might have done in the game (and we can all name quite a few players/instances which I'd rather not get into), you don't go around intentionally wishing bad things to happen to players, I don't care if it's Chris Osgood or Dominik Hasek or Chris Pronger or Jordan Tootoo or Claude Lemieux (yes even him). Sorry, I'm of the mindset that most people are good-natured and but sometimes make idiotic mistakes or might play bad, but in the end they are still good people. But I am digressing so I'll conclude...

Something I'm going to try to incorporate into my workouts after this evening, even though I've been keeping of with working out for the most part at least 3 - 4 times a week, sometimes 4 - 5... Tonight after the Wings-Canadiens games I worked out for a while and did treadmill duty again. I ran 3 miles at a pretty good pace last night so I wasn't in much of a mood to run today, so I jacked up the incline grade on the treadmill to the highest level/grade (15.0%) and I walked at an extremely fast rate for 30 minutes, anywhere from 4.0 - 4.5 MPH. That doesn't seem like much activity but that's a pretty brisk walking pace even on flat ground, and I was feeling it pretty quickly. I killed 440 calories in just 30 minutes doing this probably a fair amount more than I would've done if I ran a pretty good jog on a flat road. Double that and killing 880 calories in an hours is A LOT in the grand scheme of things. Doing this will be good for me as well because it's not quite as taxing as jogging/running, and with my work commute totaling anywhere from 75 - 90 minutes too/from work sometimes I'm pressed for time to work out and get things done, so I'm not often in the mood to run. Again, not as demanding as a jog but you can still get a good bit out of your body doing this.

If only all Wings fans could realize it's this simple to figure out (despite me disagreeing in the last bit of him having anything but only "big games"). DISCLAIMER: Osgood fans, I'm not trying to discredit how well Osgood has been playing so well so far from that post. Hasek fans, I'm not trying to make millions of excuses for Hasek struggling. The way the team played in front of him excuse is starting to lose water real fast. He needs to play better. That being said, he's still going to get his chances based on his name as stated. Sorry to say that to some of the people in here, I like to focus on here/now a good bit, but Hasek based on his history, recent (2005-06) and not-so-recent history, will still get chances. Whether you think that's fair or not, that's entirely subjective, but it's still going to happen. While Osgood is the clear-cut #1 RIGHT NOW, It's too early in the season to declare a permanent #1 right now FOR THE PLAYOFFS. I just want BOTH goaltenders to do well.

While the NHL isn't void of problems by any stretch of the imgination, neither is any other major professional sport. The game is far from perfect but it's pretty damn tiring to see people scratch and claw to complain about anything and everything with the game, sometime just for the sake of it. The game isn't as bad as we or the media make it out to be.

Rick James - Ghetto Life

I kinda like these dance moves from another current NHLer. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Mes053P3TU

Well, if we lose 2 or 3 in a row (and you know it will happen again this season at some point), people will sound like this about the Wings unfortunately, even when we'll probably be at least .600, .650 or so (extremely rough estimation, haven't checked the standings FYI). It's absolutely stupid for any fans of any team to panic right now when the playoffs don't start in April and it's not even the New Year yet. I guess I say that partly b/c the Wings are regulars in the playoffs, but there is a ridiculous amount of hockey left to be played before any "panicing" is legit towards a team that might miss the playoffs. You start panicing around mid/late February or early March if your team might not have a realistic chance at the playoffs.

The Wings offense is not lazy and it does not suck

Dave Matthews Band - Tripping Billies

Pretty jazzed up that somehow and someway LSU snuck back into the Championship game. And I apologize for sounding like an ass here and I know this will sound like a cop out esp. with me being an LSU fan, but I don't feel like debating why somebody might have thought Kansas or Hawaii or Georgia or insert college name "here" should be playing in the National Championship, because the system isn't perfect and even if other teams got to the title game, there would still be bitching and moaning about it from fans of other schools. And no, a playoff isn't the end-of-all-end solutions. I don't think there's a system that could significantly be that much of an improvement over the current selection. Just stick with what you got for better and worse. Yeah I know, I'm no fun. *shrugs* My only strong opinion about all this is you have to win your conference to play in the championship, even though it's not a formal/written rule. In 2003 Oklahoma got in despite losing the Big 12 title game. And kudos to Hawaii for getting in. Ridiculously soft schedule for the most part, but they took care of business with some lumps along the way, and won the bigger matchups (Boise St., Washington, etc.) as well. They deserve to be in the BCS having run the table. EDIT: And I think Missouri got shafted not getting into the BCS at all. But again, no perfect system, and with how f'ed up the college football season was this year, the picking of teams into the BCS games was probably going to be f'ed up as well. With the "non-BCS" stuff, kudos to my school for getting a bowl game this year despite underperforming at 7-5. Some analysts drinking kool aid way early in the year thought we'd be in the BCS, but way WAY too early to figure that out, my school had a redshirt freshman quarterback taking over, and it was going to be difficult to accurately say their offense would have consistent firepower every weekend. However, having their backs against the wall and having to win 3 of their final 4 to make a bowl makes it almost as sweet. 9 bowl games in the past 10 season which isn't too shabby for not being in one of the big conferences. My school will be playing against Houston on Dec. 28th in the Texas bowl.

He's eating his Wheaties every morning, that's why. Seriously, no logcial explanation from me other than that he's working just as hard as the past two seasons but rediscovered his scoring touch last year, and got going around this time of the season last year as well.

I was going to post an image I just saw of about 10 male bodybuilders wearing thongs group hugging each other, but I thought that was a little disgusting and inappropriate, so this will have to do. *shrugs*