New England Hockey Talk

[MGB Boy]

Just saw an ad for "X-Games 13" on ESPN. Wow. Don't know what surprises me more; That the dopey X-Games have been around for 13 years now, or that in all that time I'd guess that I've watched no more than maybe 3.5 minutes of the X-Games. I just don't care.

-Ricardo

[MGB Boy]

Quote: Originally Posted by bethandlouis (original)

Just picturing Briere saying, "get bent, dweebs" makes me laugh. Have fun shopping. Happy 4th hope your going to the big shindig on the waterfront. Louis has to work at Borders (can you believe they don't have holiday hours?) so I'll be at home keeping company Sherman (#2 dog) who is afraid of fireworks and thunderstorms (well anything that goes boom in the sky he pretty much freaks out. Big fun for me!

-B

Who will be keeping Louis company while the things go boom in the sky?

-Ricardo

[MGB Boy]

Damn you!

Bruins black Timmy jersey: $64.00 + $19.99
Atlanta Flames red Lemelin jersey: $105.00 + $19.99
Jesus backup t-shirt: $26.50
10% discount coupon: -$23.55
shipping: $8.95
total: $220.88

Damn you, I say! Damn you!

-Ricardo

[bethandlouis]

Tee Hee Hee

[bethandlouis]

Your brother's tale has inspired me. I want to go to Fenway. We've never been and I know it will be an experience. So seems the easiest (and cheapest) way to get tickets is through the Red Sox Nation. (comes with 2 grandstand tickets) I would like to sit in a seat but you can't do that for less than $100. it's all about the experience, right. Hopefully Louis will like the surprise. I'm not going to tell him about it. I'm trying to arrange to get tickets to the Labor Day game (they only have weekday games left. (I had to tell someone or I'd explode)!

Looks like Tampa lost Ruslan Fedotenko yesterday.

So when are you going to meet a nice girl?

[MGB Boy]

I've met plenty of nice girls. The bad ones are more fun

I'm currently a "Red Sox Nation" member at the "Ultimate" level, used it to get tickets to a mid-week day game in August. The other perk is that they put batches of tickets on sale to RSN members first for special events (which is how I got tickets to a Sox-Yankees game in April without having to take out a second mortgage). Plus the discount at the Yawkey Way store is nice.

Your Caps are in quite the brouhaha.

Tampa has problems. Since that 2004 Cup, they've only managed to squeak into the playoffs as a 7/8 seed, and they haven't made it out of the first round. Meanwhile, Tortorella's temper gets worse and worse, to the point that he's doing a good job giving free agents a reason not to go there. Adam Proteau of The Hockey News had this little piece about Perrin's recent decision to go to Atlanta since the Thrashers A) offered more money, and B) told him they wouldn't bury him on the 4th line the way Tortorella and GM Jay Feaster had publicly said they would:

John Tortorella's mouth is on the loose again. This time, it attacked former player Eric Perrin, who left Tampa Bay this week and signed a two-year contract with Atlanta.

"He can kiss my (butt)," Tortorella said of Perrin, whom he implied wasn’t grateful enough for the opportunities the Bolts have afforded him. "I wish him well, but good riddance."

What a charmer. Perhaps the notion that worker bees such as Perrin only have a limited window to make a financial splash hasn’t yet occurred to Tortorella. Perhaps the Lightning coach would rather there be an "indentured servitude" clause in the collective bargaining agreement.

Or maybe the guy is just a sour, mean-spirited control freak. If Oilers GM Kevin Lowe is looking for a way to sell Edmonton to free agents, "Tortorella Doesn’t Work Here" might be as good a slogan as any.

Jeremy Roenick is retiring, just five goals short of 500, a milestone he'd been quite vocal about wanting to reach. From this I can only conclude one thing: He asked every single team, and absolutely no one in the NHL wanted him.

-Ricardo

[bethandlouis]

Is Michael Nylander the hockey version of TO? That's some crazy stuff. But you have to have a signature. No sign No Play! (certainly different than that sign I saw on a gas station "No Pets, No Shoes, No Shirts, No Service" We left our pets at home so I guess they didn't want our money.)

I just don't understand why people are that way. Bosses don't understand the meaning of motivation. Their way of motivating is, "the beatings will continue until morale improves." It just doesn't make sense to me. People want to play for Gretsky even though the Coyotes did absoultely terrible but they say he's a good coach. Maybe he should go to anger management.

It's a nice girl you need, stay away from the bad ones!

[MGB Boy]

Nice girl shmice girl, Deb was a nice girl...

The problem with being a raving lunatic coach like Tortorella is that the players tune you out eventually. Doesn't matter what sport it is, the act wears thin and they tune you out. Even worse, as you gain a rep for it, the players see it coming and at each subsequent coaching stop, they tune you out quicker. Happened to Keenan at every stop he's made, happened to Hitchcock in Dallas and Philly, happened to Bill Parcells at every NFL stop he's made. The only reason Bobby Knight can get away with it continually is that college sports provides constant player turnover, so he always has fresh meat. The Lightning are already showing signs of getting sick of him, I have to think this is a make or break year for Torts in Tampa, no deep playoff run this year and I think he's done.

Nylander's been having lots of agent problems lately. He just fired his last agent because apparently the agent agreed to a three year extension with the Rangers without asking him. Now the new agent (supposedly) agrees to a deal with the Oilers but doesn't sign the paperwork, then signs with the Caps the next day. The Oilers are saying they only found out they weren't getting Nylander when they saw the news that he'd signed with Washington on TSN. Maybe the problem is that Nylander is a "low talker". These agents think they hear what he's saying, but not really. Next thing you know they're standing next to him at a press conference wearing a puffy shirt...



-Ricardo

[MGB Boy]

I'm not sure about this "On Your Minds" feature on MINI2. There's something vaguely creepy about coming to the site and being greeted by this...



-Ricardo

[MGB Boy]

Whoa. The Islanders just signed Guerin. Where the hell did that come from? I'm guessing he hasn't been paying attention to the exodus of talent from the island...

-Ricardo

[bethandlouis]

Whoa! That's wierd, I hope that people don't wander in here and wonder what's going on!

Alright, I confess what you need is a reform bad girl. That way you get all the good parts of the nice girl and all the good parts of the bad girl. I think that's what I am a reform. I have a tattoo, had several piercings and had my head shaved at one point. I was also very familiar with Manic Panic and the application thereof. Took out all my piercings and got rid of all my bad habits to land Louis. It's been great ever since.

A lot of people are saying that McPhee and Hanlon are on their last year if they aren't able to turn it around. With the talent that they are acquiring they should be able to do something. As long as they are able to get some good D on the blueline. Then we'll be semi-unstoppable.

[MGB Boy]

What is "semi-unstoppable"? Is that like "semi-sweet" chocolate? Is a semi-unstoppable team semi-good, semi-bad, or both?

I dated an unreformed multi-tattooed bad girl a few years back. That was a fairly wild ride. Fun but not sure I want that again. You may be right. Nice girl boring, bad girl scary. Hmm. Maybe I need "semi-bad"?

Lovin' all the pirate smileys...



-Ricardo

[bethandlouis]

Mike Comrie signed on to be an Islander too?

[bethandlouis]

reading some blogs looks like they're splitting the Alexes up on separate lines. Backstrom (if he's ready) will probably be one center and Nylander will be on the other line. Looks like there are a couple of Arbitration requests one from jurchina and the other from Laich.

[bethandlouis]

UFA seems to be more reason that people root for the laundry. Shane Hnidy is a Duck now.