Fred Chartrand - AP
27 days ago: Crowds gather for the parade of NHL hockey trophies, including the Stanley Cup, on the Rideau Canal in Ottawa, Ontario, on Thursday, Jan. 26, 2012, ahead of the NHL All Star game scheduled for this weekend. (AP Photo/The Canadian Press, Fred Chartrand)
The NHL All-Star weekend is supposed to be a relaxed celebration of the game's great stars, and while there were some fun moments last night, the actions of one idiotic fan soured the atmosphere...
The Preds have 7 home games in February - save money on tickets with the OTF Discount!
Fan disrupts All-Star Fantasy Draft by yelling out Wade Belak’s name - Nashville Predators Examiner
I'm not sure who's the bigger pig, the drunken boor in the crowd at the draft, or the utterly tasteless punk who left a comment after Jim's piece here.
Preds On The Glass: An All-Star Weekend Look Back: Western Conference
Buddy's feeling pretty good about his preseason Predators projection.
The Hippodrome: Must David Poile and The Predators Make A Move? | Pith in the Wind
I'm surprised J.R. didn't work Hamlet into his opening bit about David Poile's quandry. "To trade, or not to trade - that is the question."
It’s time to kill the All-Star Game - The Globe and Mail
Frankly, I'm surprised we haven't seen more of these "wwaaaaaaahhh" articles. I unabashedly love the All-Star Game, sportswriters be damned.
Joey the Jr. Reporter takes on Ottawa, lands date - CBSSports.com
The next logical extension after bloggers are granted media access.
All-Star festivities kick off with Rideau Canal trophy procession - NHL.com
OK, this is a pretty cool scene.
Couture has good time with being last pick - NHL.com
Logan Couture of the San Jose Sharks had the dubious honor of being the last All-Star selected, and immediately said on Twitter that he was looking forward to tricking out the new Honda that came as a consolation prize.
Brophy on Leafs: Is Kessel slowly fading? - sportsnet.ca
Kessel went on a tear after being picked last in the 2011 All-Star Draft. Will this bit of mojo pass to Couture now?
In which Scott Hartnell and Joffrey Lupul share a toilet during NHL All-Star Draft | Puck Daddy
OK, maybe this is a little too much "behind the scenes".
Tim Thomas says he has ‘full and unwavering support’ of Bruins teammates | Puck Daddy
Really? "Full and unwavering support", or just the reluctance of players in general to criticize each other? I suspect the latter.
The NHL's playoff push - The Globe and Mail
Columbus is still in it... if they can pull off a 30-3-0 finish.
Lowetide.ca | Trading Samwise
If Sam Gagner has anything like the moxie associated with the name Samwise, I want him.
McKenzie: Is Stars captain Morrow available for trade? - TSN
Here's an interesting name that I don't think we had considered on the trade market...
Have The Oilers Really Made Progress This Season? - The Copper & Blue
They're lining up for another lottery pick, but have the Oilers actually improved as a team?
Understanding the Secondary-Ticket Market | Ted's Take
Washington Capitals owner Ted Leonsis talks about the development of the ticket resale market over the last few years. Remember, that Tickets link at the top-right portion of the page here takes you to a service which shows tickets available for Predators games from a wide variety of outlets, like StubHub, eBay, and more.
BREAKING: J.P. Mac Sends Letter To Season Ticket Holders - The Cannon
You certainly get the sense that ownership in Columbus is sincerely motivated to building a winner there, they just can't seem to find the formula just yet. I do believe that hiring Craig Patric a few months back is a good start, though.
GMC: Why Long-time Detroit Executive Jim Nill Won’t Be Running Your Team Anytime Soon | Edmonton Journal
The Detroit assistant's name comes up often when GM positions open around the NHL, but he's still a fixture there.
Harris Polls > Football is America’s Favorite Sport as Lead Over Baseball Continues to Grow
Hockey holds steady as the favorite sport of 5% in the latest Harris Poll, pretty much the same mark its held for the last 7 years.
Top 60 Prospect Midseason Rankings | The Hockey Writers
During this break in the NHL schedule, perhaps it's time to review some prospect for the upcoming Entry Draft this summer.
Americans consider ban on fighting in junior ranks, hope Canada follows suit - The Globe and Mail
USA Hockey is moving towards an automatic game misconduct and an additional game suspension for fighting at the junior level. Will the Canadian junior leagues follow suit? That would require a massive culture shift.
Bettman reveals third group interested in Coyotes - The Globe and Mail
I'm not getting my hopes up here.
0 recs | 37 comments
All Star Games
Yes, plural. They’re all the same. They mean little (baseball’s effort to make it mean something is interesting, but not fair). BUT, they’re for the FANS. Get everyone together, put on a show (usually lots of passing), and hope nobody gets hurt. I’d love to see the ASG done as an ourdoor game, whether it’s on ice or street. And I personally love the draft. What isn’t fun about watching pros sweat it out like people of my athletic ability had to do. I think the players know what’s going on, and seem to have a good time with it.
Still, my favorite part is the skills competition. If they just did that, I’d probably be cool with it.
Evanbio - January 27, 2012
Exactly
Someone who complains about the lack of hitting and intensity in an All-Star Game kinda misses the point.
Dirk Hoag - January 27, 2012
you just gave me an idea for new “skills competition”: Hardest (legal) Hitter. Put a test dummy against the boards and display the force of the impact.
It’ll never happen, but could be fun to watch.
Evanbio - January 27, 2012
Ryan Miller could make the All Star Game every year this way.
Patten - January 27, 2012
as the dummy I suppose…
Only Fan In J.C. ? - January 27, 2012
Unlike other Leagues at least the NHL
is creative and trying to do things that are fresh. The old days, the crowd was dead throughout most of the game and the skillz competition, with polite applause sprinkled in. The fans only really got to cheer during the pre-game intros.
Now, the fantasy draft adds a very watchable event to the weekend, we have players near microphones (Spezza may be goofy, but at least he had personality….and he didn’t laugh), and the skillz competition is improved (the slapshot comp and speedskating comp were always fun, but recent adds like the goalie race are great).
About Diamond’s article: it was one jerkface ‘fan’, not the whole crowd that was downright disgusting. Some tweets last night reported groups of folks chanting Belak. Not true. That one linked video is unclear, but if anything, it was the one humanoid (to borrow from Bobby Heenan), not the entire Ottawa crowd.
If anything, the fans added to it, and Chara/Lupul did too, because they were more than willing to play along. Chara stopped a Go Sens Go chant dead in its tracks by ‘hurry up’ picking Phaneuf, which transitioned into ‘over-rated’ which Phaneuf cracked a smile at. Lupul said he wouldn’t want to be cheered in Ottawa anyway. The game is meaningless, like the posters above said, its all for show, and its all for the fans. Same for last night.
PekKarlsson - January 27, 2012
Is that really the best thing to see in Ottawa? A stupid bridge over some river?
What a flea-bitten, rat infested garbage town.
Pekka for Predator Pontiff - January 27, 2012
do you have some kind of history with Ottawa? because your loathing for it is pretty intense.
Only Fan In J.C. ? - January 27, 2012
Yes, I have a history with an Ottowan.
Pekka for Predator Pontiff - January 27, 2012
Like a briiiiiiiiidge over frozen water…
On which I skate downtown.
cisar - January 27, 2012
Paul Simon.....
…..doesn’t escape the stupidness of your city’s trademark being an ugly green bridge.
Pekka for Predator Pontiff - January 27, 2012
It’s a picture of a canal, not a bridge. That canal is sweet.
For instance:
The construction of the Rideau Canal was a preventative military measure undertaken after a report that during the War of 1812 the United States had intended to invade the British colony of Upper Canada.
Canals are awesome. I grew up on one.
cisar - January 28, 2012
I also grew up on a canal.
The Erie canal. But I thought canals have water in them, unlike that seen in the above photo?
And I didn’t know Canada had a military. It’s probably similar to the military of the Vatican, right? Interesting tidbit.
Pekka for Predator Pontiff - January 28, 2012
Psst… Canada wasn’t always Canada.
cisar - January 28, 2012
Huh?
When did they become a state?
Pekka for Predator Pontiff - January 28, 2012
some good Belak news
A band in Ft. Worth is having a Belak-a-thon to have “A celebration of the life and legacy of Wade Belak in support of the Andie and Alex Belak Scholarship Fund and to raise awareness for concussion related injuries.”
here is a link to the Facebook page.
http://www.facebook.com/events/126759617443639/
If there are any preds in the area you should make the trip on over there.
bvkv09 - January 27, 2012
Wow, I wish this was closer. Thanks for posting this! With all the musicians in Nashville, we should be able to have an event like this here. We could even do it annually.
Chas-E - January 27, 2012
Fan disrupts All-Star Fantasy Draft by yelling out Wade Belak’s name
You know, I didn’t even notice this last night. To me, the crowd noise was just that…noise. The fact that the press is making news of this and drawing attention to it is ridiculous.
If the video is “reprehensible,” don’t promote it. And “obviously inebriated” is pure speculation.
What we do know is somebody yelled something that sounded like Belak. However, by forging this incident into an actual story and adding a dash of motive, we’ve created a moment of insolence that will resound again and again to infinity – and that is disrespectful to Mr. Belak and family.
On a more positive side, Henrik Sedin was actually funny last night and Iginla seems like the classiest guy in the NHL. Now lets get through this event and get back to real hockey.
Chas-E - January 27, 2012
It was apparently toronto fans, I am guessing
informing a toronto reporter bruce arthur, who tweeted it, and few people went from there.
Diamond, maybe not intentionally, embellished and was a little inflammatory saying the crowd was disgusting, or the NHL should re-evaluate the draft based on something Diamond heard somebody retweet a Toronto reporter’s recounting of what some one else heard. And backed up by a video where you can’t decipher anything.
If it happened, call it what is was, one guy being disrespectful, not a drunk Canadian crowd.
Lots of national US and Canadian media there, all with twitter accounts. Were they too big time to turn this into a story? Its possible it was a non-story. Not everything you read on Twitter is factual. Until they make Wiki-Twitter.
Henrik, Lupul, Karlsson/Spezza, Kane and his blonde. Wish there were more mic’d up moments. And more young guys were like Kane or even painfully awkward like Kessel. Benn and Couture are great hockey players, but incredibly bland.
PekKarlsson - January 27, 2012
Not everything in wiki is factual.
cisar - January 27, 2012
I realize
weak, weak sarcasm on my part. Didn’t come across, I guess. I blame the internet!
It is crazy how Twitter can make something misheard, or perhaps even made up, a story. But I guess hockey already knows that (Fake Bob Mckenzie, Fake Dreger, Fake anyone around the Trade Deadline………..or Eklund year round)
PekKarlsson - January 27, 2012
Seriously?
What’s the deal about Belak? Why would somebody shout his name? Does it mean anything?
Pekka for Predator Pontiff - January 27, 2012
You should use the sarcasm format. > /sarcasm <
cisar - January 27, 2012
Speaking of drafts...
Copper & Blue is a great blog, one of the best in the NHL, but I’m wondering when Derek Zona is going to get around to pondering the NHL entry draft system that repeatedly rewards the Oil’s poor performances. The last two overall picks, Taylor Hall and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, are skating in Edmonton now, and only Columbus stands in the way of a third straight number one pick. Teams may not need high draft picks to succeed, as the Wings have demonstrated mightily over the past two decades, but they certainly do offer a push in the right direction—and the Oilers have received a more than generous shove, haven’t they?
Hockey Hillbilly - January 27, 2012
but isn't that the point?
The teams with the high draft pics need more help. You’d think they’d eventually get all the pieces together, but maybe not. If nothing else, the growing Oil should be fun to watch soon.
Evanbio - January 27, 2012
They already are. Watching them at Bridgestone Arena was like watching a team of speed skaters.
Hockey Hillbilly - January 27, 2012
Oilers could still win the draft lottery...
… and move up into first as well. The worst five teams have that chance to be #1.
djzielin - January 27, 2012
Someone first needs to figure out to what extent this actually rewards franchises. It seems like the only teams that are consistently very, very good are the teams that are consistently very, very good. Has a team taken a few years of very high draft picks (achieved through great suckitude, not through trades) and actually built up into a very good team?
That’s an actual question. Does anyone know if/how often this has taken place? Because it seems on first glance like it hasn’t really worked that well as a strategy.
CAustin - January 27, 2012
current blackhawks are probably closest
predwheels - January 27, 2012
Penguins first round picks 2003-06
1 fleury
2 napkin
1 Crosby
2 Stasi
In consecutive years. In 2005 won the draft lottery, picked Crosby.
cisar - January 27, 2012
Whoops, autocorrect screwed me. Staal not Stasi . Damn.
cisar - January 27, 2012
Napkin’s awesome. He really cleans up for his teammates out there.
Dirk Hoag - January 27, 2012
LOL
DonBorvio - January 28, 2012
Haha! Stupid auto correct.
MALK-in.
I wasn’t on my computer.
How about
1. Flurry
2. Napkin
1. Frosty
2. Stasi
cisar - January 28, 2012
Hawks, Penguins, Caps
Josiah2729 - January 28, 2012
TT
I don’t doubt for one second that Timmy has the full support of his teammates. They probably gave him a hard time or joked with him about it, but at the end of the day they’re a hockey team, and I highly doubt they care whether or not one of them came to the White House. What reason do they have to bash him? As long as he’s making saves, I’m sure he still has their full support.
Stu0624 - January 27, 2012 via mobile
So Columbus is going to get a sympathy All-Star Game?
That kind of sucks. I suppose it’s good for them to help them not go under, but sheesh.
http://www.bluejacketsxtra.com/content/blogs/puck-rakers/2012/01/all-star-game.html
DonBorvio - January 28, 2012
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