Watching Hockey -- at the AHL All-Star Game

For all the gusto and occasional pomposity (just using the word, I think, qualifies) displayed on this blog and within the five-foot perimeter surrounding my person, I am from Binghamton and thus held to a natural ceiling of arrogance. I hear the bitching about the All-Star games. I understand. And agree. But the AHL All-Star game came to my home rink, the Broome County Veterans Memorial Arena in Binghamton, and I did not hesitate when Sir Douglas the Hockeywise offered two tickets (in his season-ticket spot three rows from the ice, nonetheless) for the fell-in-our laps event.

I was joined for the Sunday/Monday events by Chris McGinnis, honorary captain of the defunct Livingston Manor Maple Leafs, accomplished musician, Subaru owner, and former goaltender of the three-time cup-winning Charlestown Chiefs intramural floor hockey team.

McGinnis and I have a lengthy and illustrious hockey history. We have posed with the Stanley Cup together, visited the Hockey Hall of Fame, purchased tickets for and attended both ends of a home-and-home series between the Sabres and Maple Leafs about a month or so before Maple Leaf Gardens was closed, and attended the Binghamton Senators first home game upon returning the AHL to its rightful place at the Slap Shot-era Broome County Veterans Memorial Arena. So it was fitting we were there to celebrate hockey in a hockey town.

We made certain to have a well-rounded Binghamton experience. Before Sunday night's skills competition, we hit the Oakdale Mall in Johnson City to look for Senators hats, and wound up drinking giant mugs of beer at Ruby Tuesday's. After a brisk walk through the mall (taking the edge off of a minor buzzer), we headed to downtown Binghamton and parked on Exchange Street near the library. McGinnis came close to getting robbed there Monday night, but nonesuch on the Day of Rest.

The Arena looked good, glowing within its concrete shell.



And McGinnis looked pretty good, too, glowing in the main concourse.



You know the All-Star festivities aren't really going to be about hockey. Or, at least, I know that, and you know that. The Canadian and America media? They don't know. Or they pretend to not, which (hopefully) explains the 1,000+ references this week to "shinny," "river hockey," "fixing," and "meaningful." (apologies to John Buccigross, who "gets it," so to speak, and who got his missive about enjoying the game out there before this one.)

The All-Star festivities in Binghamton were about the Hockey Fan in a Hockey Town. They were there in abundance. I saw teachers I remembered from third grade, wearing the same Whalers jerseys and haircuts they wore back in Harry L Johnson Elementary School. (no period after the L bitches -- that's how we roll in the JayCee.) A lap of the Arena yielded close to 20 former high school classmates, most of whom I could recognize only by their eyes, and all of whom didn't recognize me in my pre-playoffs playoff beard.

Old-Time Binghamton hockey jerseys.



There was a wealth of out-of-town jerseys, including a group of Portland (Maine) fans sitting near us, a group from Philly, the usual assholes from Scranton Wilkes-Barre, a couple of Chicago Wolves jerseys, and a few from Hershey. There also was a fine representation of vintage Binghamton wear, including the now-ubiquitous Dusters jerseys, a few authentic Binghamton Whalers sweaters, an Icemen jersey (dark days in the Parlor City), and some game-worn Senators gear. (and only one guy in a Rangers jersey, a testament to my hometown.)

Among the general "I'm at a hockey game I'm wearing some hockey shit" sightings: A nice 80s-era Islanders sweater, what appeared to be a homemade Philadelphia Phantoms jersey worn three sizes too small, a Howard Johnson (hotel) jersey (?), assorted youth hockey paraphernalia, and a lot of this, which goes with hockey like Molson Canadian on a Saturday night.

At one point, a kid sat down in front of us, joining a father and son who had been there since the start. The father, laughing at the kid's arrival, said, "hey Meatball." And McGinnis and I must have been thinking the same thought, because we had to choke back the laughter, and then snuck a few photos.

Meatball.



As for the game and skills competition: There was some marginal entertainment value, but, alas, as Bucci wrote earlier, the fun really was in scanning the Arena, scoping out the other fans, the kids, the mascots, and season-ticket holders best known as curmudgeons, occasionally rendered happy and quiet. A beer vendor remarked to us that it was "too quiet," but I think we found it to be a luxury to not be as invested in the game's outcome. As an Islanders fan (and Mets, as well), I have learned to enjoy the games oftentimes separate of their outcomes (a necessary trick if you are to continue to be a hockey/baseball fan with those allegiances). We blew off most of the third period and walked around the building, stopping at the third-floor bar, and walking the tunnel under the stands.

Lineups, and a nice view of the old bird.



And a zoom on Tuukka Rask for Jaroslav. (Rask looked like the Real Deal, even in the loose environment of the festivities. Note Brian Burke crush Bobby Ryan, #29.)



Fan-favorite and all-around Binghamton legend, Denis Hamel, participates in the fastest skater relay.



The game ended in some kind of shootout, which might have been fun, but, well, you know. The crowd was out pretty quickly, and the kids, who were still jittering with anticipation after Sunday's skills competition, were a little subdued and tired.

We walked back to the cars on Exchange Street, started them in the cold, and drove away from Binghamton into the quiet outliers of the Southern Tier.

Queen of the Isle

I have not consulted the other Palm Isle denizens on this, so maybe they have different opinions. Maybe they would nominate one of their loved ones, or Lindsay "Lily Braden" Crouse, or the trying-a-little-too-hard Christie Brinkley, or her supermodel colleague and New York hockey player lover Carol Alt, or FSN NY's favorite Islanders fan Hilary Duff, or maybe even former Jordin Tootoo arm candy and current professional moron Kellie Pickler.

But until they do, I hereby declare Canadian Kathleen Edwards (who will be singing the Canadian national anthem at the All-Star Game in a few hours) the official Queen of the Isle. She was probably already a shoo-in because she (a) is awful purty and has an awful purty voice, (b) released a song called "Hockey Skates" on her "Failer" CD, and (c) has a song that namechecks Marty McSorley ("I Make the Dough"...listen to it on her MySpace page) on her upcoming "Asking for Flowers" CD. But she sealed the deal with this quote from today's Daily News:

"I'm sure every Toronto Maple Leafs fan will be mad that I'm singing the national anthem," says Edwards, who will appear at Irving Plaza in April. "But they can eat it."

How do you not love a woman who tells Leafs fans to eat it? Sure, she's an Ottawa fan, but, I ask you, is that really so bad? It's not like she's a Rangers fan. Man, that would be depressing.

Anyway, long live the Queen.

We Got One.

A reader, that is. The peerless Sir Douglas Schneider, he of the Canuckle fanhood and Wiki-esque (but, alas, more accurate) knowledge of the As and Ns HL, has blessed the Reverend with an insightful email response, furthering the now-burgeoning discussion re: Hockey Metrics (snappier name yet to be conceived).

Sir Douglas writes:

Rev. Z,

Well, that’s one way to sucker people into reading the blog. Thanks for the shout-out, I think. I’ll try to be more insightful in the future.

Re: Sabermetrics … there’s probably an “effectiveness” stat to be conjured up using TOI (the one not pronounced “TWAH”), points and/or plus-minus, but you’re right that ours is a much harder sport to measure individual performance than is baseball. I mean, is there a hockey equivalent of defence-independent pitching stats?

The key is probably to calculate the league average value – likely oh-ffense only – of five “replacement players,” and then to develop a way to measure how much better they perform when you sub in your guy with the four generics. One real challenge will be equalizing value of blueliners vs. forwards. In beisbol, everyone gets to go mano-a-mano with the pitcher, and gets roughly the same number of hitting chances each plate appearance (a minimum of three, except in rare cases where he gets drilled), but how do you level the ice sheet so that -- Alert! Reference to obscure Midwestern franchise upcoming! -- Stan Mikita and Pierre Pilote end up close to the same place? You need Crosby and Nicky Lindstrom to end up close to the same place. And it’s not as simple as TOI = at bats. Guys who play more minutes need to get credit for that.

And it’s probably damn near impossible to compare the value of a goaltender to that of a skater.

Aren’t you glad you brought it up?

DS

Random Thought to Deflect Attention Away From Another Poor Effort by the Islanders

Am I the only person who, upon hearing the name "Glen Metropolit," always says (either in my head or out loud) "Yip-ay-aye"?

I am? Fair enough.

Geno Malkin and the need for better thinking about hockey

First, a few AHL thoughts before I delve into the meat of this post.

Steve Downie, yay or nay?
The man is a terror, in some ways in the best sense. He is scoring points: eight in a nine-game stretch, which is a ++ for a guy labeled by scouts as a projected third-line agitator. And he is, of course, a pain in the ass. He thumbed Jason Blake in the eye and punched him while he was in the grasp of the referee. He fought Dave Clarkson of the Devils (video below), cut him (possibly with this visor), knocked out a tooth, and then, apparently, tried to rake his eye like an old-time wrestler.

Would you want him on your team? Would I want him on the Islanders? My impulse reaction: no. The grinder/fighter players I've enjoyed through the years have been the likes of Aaron Asham and similar players. We all have a tendency to overrate their value to their respective teams, but I always enjoyed the true middleweight fighting/checker. When Asham made Matt Barnaby cry, and I was in attendance, it was a highlight of my life as hockey fan. But (but but), am I (are we) being honest? Chris Simon comes to mind, and there's a decent argument to be made that Downie is far more valuable to the Flyers than Simon is to the Islanders (when either is allowed to play). I wasn't happy about the Hollwegg thing, but a lot of that unhappiness stemmed from not wanting the team to get the Goon label, not wanting to watch ESPN for the next 12 days, and not wanting anyone affiliated with the Rangers (or their fans) to have any reason to feel, even for a moment, self-righteous. When Simon stepped on Ruutu's big toe, I shook my head in agreement when The Mullet said Simon could have hurt him if he wanted to, and didn't, and laughed when Jaroslav sent an e-mail that said, "Chris Simon should not be taking time off to get his shit together. He should get a medal for stomping Ruutu."

We read enough, and hear enough from the hockey media about players "on the edge" when Simon or Downie find their way onto the news. And we hear a lot from pundits who share the opinion of Kelly "a message to you ... quit" Hrudey on HNIC's daily radio show: A league featuring a reserved spot for the true fighter is far preferable to a league loaded with pests such as Downie and Hrudey's personal boil, Sean Avery. Really? You'd rather have Eric Godard than Sean Avery -- Godard having membership in the 1 pt. club?

So Steve Downie, yay or nay? I'll stick with nay, because I think it's more than likely he'll either cripple someone or bite off a finger (shades of Hatcher?) before this is through. And don't forget, he's the kid who tried to brain someone in what I recently heard described as the "lawless Canadian Junior Leagues." But there's a part of me that knows were Downie to find his way to the island, I'd be telling the people I worked with that "no, this isn't worse than the Bert Toosery thing, he only cost this guy his hearing in his left ear, and the guy can still walk."

Anyway, that's hockey.

A few of Downie's finest (with the final word for Grapes):












The Reappearing Case of Geno Malkin, and dumb hockey thoughts
If msnbc is writing aboat Sidney Crosby, we've got cultural penetration. Let's all thank the weather gods for snow at the Winter Classic, and for thus bringing Crosby into the national light, and then, for thus resulting in expanded coverage of his injury.

Once the "when will he be back" story was comprehensively covered and speculated upon, the attention of the media was turned to a seemingly rejuvenated Evgeni Malkin who (you read it here first) was thrust back in a centreing role on the Penguins, and also thrust into the role of replacing Jesus. Ned Braden can sympathize. HNIC just-before-dark radio tackled the issue this week, with the needlessly employed Cassie Campbell dumbing things down for an audience learning too much from Jeff Marek. Each expressed some interest in Malkin's revival. And Cassie, because she is wrapped in the myopic culture of the Canadian hockey lockerroom, commented on Malkin's displays of "emotion" vs. the Caps (and also Ovechkin's, but he is coming close to being considered by the Canadians to be something other than of Russian origin), which were out of character for what she expects of her Russians, despite being born a year after the overrated, ultimately embarrassing Summit Series. We have reached a point, methinks, at which it is incomprehensibly stupid to characterize any of hockey's foreign players as possessing certain characteristics common to the group as whole, simply because there are too many foreign players, and they've been here too long.

A topic of greater interest might be Michel Therrien's continued mishandling of the Penguins. Is it a great surprise that Malkin can play? Is it a great surprise that a giant, nearly immovable centreman with finishing skills, passing skills, and some "edge," might ought to maybe possibly could be smart and good enough to play some centre? He doesn't need Crosby drawing defenders' attention away to shoot open goals. A player whose greatest strength is his short game, so to speak, should thrive with a combination of some decent-enough two-way winger and a floating finisher (or, as the journalist and general practitioner of hockey wisdom, Douglas Schneider, said today, "one of those table hockey guys who just spins in a circle waiting for the puck"). And, when Crosby is healthy, you have two lines that can score, and you don't need to spend 40 min. a night dressing up Jennifer Love Hewitt in Claude Julien's flannel pajamas (if her ass is too big for this country, I'll be an ex-pat by playoff time).

Maybe I'm wrong, maybe not. But it sure beats talking about how neat it is to see a Russian express human emotions.

More dumb thoughts: Bruce Boudreau called into the show. He's doing a helluva job in Washington, D.C. I considered taking the Caps on NHL 08 and trying to rejuvenate them for a Cup run, but I like Bruce Boudreau so much, I thought he'd do a good enough job in real life that my video efforts would somehow feel lacking. It was a good decision. Instead, I use the Wild and run two forecheckers all night, giving Jacques Lemaire heart pain he can't explain.

Ovechkin comes up in the HNIC conversation. Marek comments on the hit Ovechkin tried to lay on Malkin in Monday night's game (see below post for highlights), and asks Boudreau which part of Ovechkin's game is more valuable to the team, his scoring ability, or his physical play. Boudreau says, "they're about equal." End of conversation. Goddamn.

I've spent some time online researching what I would (and other people since 2004 or '05) call hockey's version of sabermetrics (for the uninitiated, or at least those who actually work whilst at work, sabermetrics is the statistical study of baseball performances, of which a watered-down version was heralded in Michael Lewis' Moneyball, is often credited to Bill James and his fantastic Baseball Abstracts, and is kept alive on hundreds of web sites, most notably Baseball Prospectus, and my personal favorite, firejoemorgan.com), and I've discovered two things, the latter of which is no surprise. The first is that statistical analysis of hockey performance is in its infancy. The second, which may help to explain the first, is something any hockey fan who studies other sports likely already knows: Hockey is such a fluid, chaotic, team-oriented, and ephemeral game, it is very difficult to create meaningful numeric structures to explain what is happening, or what has happened, on the ice.

(jeebus, as I write this, the effing Bs have gone up 4-0 on the Isles. Anything short of a Deb Kaufman pole dance at the intermission is going to send me to the Rangers game to root for the Thrashers. Lucic is a beast.)

But I know, even though I cannot yet find a statistical way of defending this or expressing it, that Ovechkin's superb ability to score goals, an ability very, very few people in the world possess, is far more valuable to the Washington Capitals than his ability to run into people, sort of like Steve Webb. Now, I don't expect Bruce Boudreau to come out and say this, because he probably understands there is marginal value to be gained from Ovechkin's physical play, especially if it is controlled enough it doesn't take away from his ability to score. So he, and thus the Caps, stands to gain from encouraging Ovechkin, and his teammates, to keep popping people. But why, oh why? doesn't Jeff Marek (who is, by far, one of the best hockey gabbers in the business) ask him what the hell he's talking about? Another example, not necessarily related but equally as soft, occurred during tonight's show when Marek asked an NHL goon (more on this later) if the new extension of the Vs. contract was exclusive, and if ESPN could elbow into the picture (a good question, one of high interest for me). The goon told Marek this wasn't the appropriate time to discuss the issue, it was a time to celebrate. Marek moved on.

Goddammit Jeff! I am a hockey fan, as are you, and that is a tremendously important question to those of us south of border. And you let him off the hook. I want to know. And, I want to know why Bettman's flak for the day said "the NHL have provided Vs. with great content, and they have given us a good product in return." (I would, and will, argue it is less than good, but that's a different fight.)

Ok. I will close on a positive note, keeping in mind the recent commitment of The Mediocre Among Us to do the same: I love the NHL Network. Thank you. "On the Fly" is the Anti-ESPN, and for that I offer congratulations, thank yous, and a promise to buy a new Islanders cap before the summer.

Good night. And I leave you on a happy note. Check out The Maven at the 1:49 mark.

Damn My Lucky Underwear

I watched the Isles get shutout against Edmonton on the 7^th, then saw them lose in OT to Vancouver the following night. I missed the next game, a win over Calgary. I only caught the NHL network highlights of the Ottawa win but tuned in for a loss to Montreal two nights later. I was out the next night when they beat the Devils. I made an effort to be free during games which came just in time to watch them blow big leads against Philly and Carolina. Out again last night to find that they’d scored six goals. I’m ready to apply for official ‘jinx’ status. I’m going to miss tomorrow night’s game so fans should be sure to tune in for that one. Sorry, Beantown. However I may actually be attending a game next week which can’t be a good sign.

I’m looking forward to going to a game now that I have a blog to report back to. If I’d had a blog at the last game I went to, I could’ve mentioned the “Free Simon” chant coming from a neighboring section. Speaking of Simon, it sounds like he’s coming back soon. Be sure to catch his next highlight at the top of the hour on SportsCenter.

I’m just now realizing that my two blog entries have had a decidedly negative tone. I’ll try to post more positive material in the future which means avoiding any discussion of the Islanders.

Give me a frikking break

Bruins 2, Habs 8

Jesus fucking christ. This was one of those games. One of those gin-soaked, yell at the wife, kick the dog and regret it the next morning games. Where to Steve Begin on this one?

1. Alex Auld. Alex, when warm-ups are over, that’s when the game begins. Your job is to stop pucks, not let them in. That first goal, you bit harder than a Civil War soldier with gangrene getting a leg amputated. You bit harder than Seabiscuit groaning under the weight of Spiderman’s fat ass. You bit harder than the American public’s belief that there really were WMD’s. You bit harder than …

2. It’s 2-0. You’re down one in the first 14 seconds, two in the first 5 minutes, on like four shots. Where was the fight? No one is dropping the mits? Where was Reich? Where was Lucic? Where was Chara? Where's Shawn Thornton when you need him? What the fuck is wrong with you guys? What happened to wanting to be a difficult team to play against? You guys wait until the third period to dance? It was 6-1 by then. Pathetic.

3. Claude Julien. The prodigal Frenchman. Does he have some sort of inferiority complex going into Montreal? Losers of six straight vs the goddamn Habs. That’s a mental thing. It’s a pride thing. It’s the whole Boston sports consciousness thing. The whole archrival, nemesis who always beats us thing. If you want to beat the Habs, B’s, you have to ask yourselves: What better time than now? What better place than here? That’s the attitude. Right here, right now. It’s not, wow, would you look at that Kovalev stickhandle. I hear he flies planes too. You know, Montreal is just like a European city only in North America. Don’t get too close to Koivu; you might catch the cancer. They all ought to have shock therapy after the game.

4. Darryl Reaugh. A cornucopia of food metaphors. “Juicy, succulent rebounds.”

5. The boards. When a puck hit the kickplate, were Habs fans kicking from the other side to make the puck bounce off harder? The Bell Centre has some of the liveliest boards in the league.

6. Versus cameraman. The game is hockey dude. Not tennis. Stop acting like a spaz with the f’ing camera. You’re giving me a headache.

7. Shane Hnidy. Minus fucking 4. Hnidy night.

Injured Crosby

My AP RSS feed had him as one of the Top Stories for a while. Big story.