Archive for April 2009
Okay, first things first…a little site maintenance:
This will feature what should probably be my last couple of posts for a while. I enjoy playoff hockey as much as the next guy, but real-life duties call, and, as they say, all things in their place. It’s been a long season, and I’m ready to throw in the towel for a few months. Now, as for what Eric, Alex and Deanna might have in mind for off-season posts, I have no idea; there might be a hundred posts between now and next season, or there might not be any, who knows.
That being said, I want to thank those of you who have stopped by our little experiment here. It’s been a bit of a blur at times in the last couple of months, and we somehow managed to pack in a healthy number of opinions, ideas and f-bombs in that time. A job well done, indeed.
Now that all of that is out of the way, let’s get on with it.
I did not want to let this week go by without mention of the closing of the Crunch Time boards. Dave’s effort over the years is, to me, remarkable, and far more than I ever would have been able to give. I posted there for years, made some cool friends and had a lot of laughs and good times. In fact, that’s how I first met up with my three partners here. That core of old-timers made a very loose kind of internet family, and I wouldn’t want it any other way. I would venture to say that a lot of those old-timers would agree with me, too. I guess what I am trying to say is thank you to Dave…I, along with a lot of others, appreciate your efforts.
For everything that was good about Crunch Time, the opposite can be said for the syracuse.com forums. What a fucking abortion. On second thought, maybe that’s not entirely fair. I mean, if one was in search of nonsensical horseshit that reads as if it were written by a group of brain damaged gibbons, that’s a perfect place to visit. However, for the rest of us, those of us who understand the difference between “your” and “you’re”, well…
Hang on, I’m trying to think of a way to be diplomatic here…
Still thinking…
Hmm…
I’ve got it. The syracuse.com forums are the biggest collection of intellectual deficients and sideshow freaks in one place since the last Ann Coulter Fan Club meeting.
Hey, I just tried to capture the spirit of the thing.
If nothing else, the syracuse.com forums prove why quality control is important. Put another way, fuck this egalitarian idealism we seem to cling to — not everyone’s opinion has merit, nor should everyone have a forum to express malformed and blatantly idiotic thoughts. If that sounds elitist, too fucking bad. If you don’t like it, do what I did; start a blog and see if the people come to read it. In the meantime, I’ll stay above the fray and not give two shits about:
- Some mouth breathing simpleton pretending to be Brett Motherwell, of all people,
- Various dipshits stroking their cybercocks to memories of a captain who loved this team so much that he took a bad deal last summer and skipped town,
- Drooling fools who stupidly questioned Dan Smith’s leadership this year (NOTE — this group frequently overlaps with the above mentioned group of misfits), and
- Any of the poorly worded challenges to fight so-and-so before, during or after a game and coming to visit them in their section.
Really? This is the best we can do? No wonder we give the impression of being the AHL’s answer to an episode of Hot Ghetto Mess. Fuck.
The votes of these people (you know, if they bothered to vote) count just as much as mine. Jesus.
Inevitably, this cavalcade of assholery made its way to Crunch Time, and that was that. This, as so many parents say, is why we can’t have nice things. Some knuckledragging fucktard has to ruin it for everyone else. Hopefully, those in charge over at AHL Fans can keep on top of it, and the syracuse.com shitpile remains the sole domain of The Few. The Proud. The Twatwaffles. Enjoy it, jerkoffs…you deserve nothing less. Fuck yourselves with a bicycle sprocket.
Er, that’s it. Have a lovely summer.
Oh, and fuck Sidney Crosby. Dan Smith is your TRUE Hockey Jesus, infidels!
Well here we go… time for the ‘Eric’s’. Another meaningless awards show celebrating the 2008-09 Syracuse Crunch. But first, I would like to open with a couple quick statements on the ’08-’09 NHL playoffs…
I hate the freakin‘ Red Wings and all their fans, but, with that said, I am taking immense pleasure in watching them DESTROY the Spewjackets. Yeah, Howson, you self proclaimed genius, those call ups from the Crunch are learning a lot. LMAO
Lastly, being a Flyers fan… Note to Gary Bettman and all NHL officials- yeah, I know you want the Penguins in the finals to save your ass and get some TV ratings, but COME ON!! You can’t even get near Crosby or Gino without a god damned penalty being called!!
OK, on with the awards…
The ‘De Walt Tools’ You Got Screwed award- Mike Sgroi for not getting called back even with all the injuries and call-ups this year.
The ‘Nexus Hair Gel’ Hair of the year- Mike York and his ever flowing locks
The ‘Aspen Dental’ Grill of the Year- Mike Blunden and his toothless grill
‘Project Literacy’ award- (with nods to Alex) Slapshot and your forcing your uneducated views on all of us on Dave’s message board
The ‘Ben Gay/Polar Ice/Tylenol’ award- Captain Dan Smith for sacrificing your body to block shots and selfless play EVERY night
The ‘Glowing Banana Yo Yo‘ award- Dan Lacosta for being called up… sent down… called up… sent down
The ‘Invisible Man of the Year’ award- Steve Kelly… wait a second, WHO!?!?!
The ‘National Grid Public Utilities’ award- Trevor Frischmon, the ultimate utility man, for doing everything this year and never once complaining
The ‘Miller Lite Bucket O’ Beer’ award- Ross Yates and Trent Cull. That was the beverage of choice while laughing it up in January after Hamilton handed you your asses 6-2.
The ‘What the Fuck Giveaway to the fans’ award- Whoever thought up the mini War Memorial giveaway night. They looked like they were painted by my son’s kindergarten class.
The ‘Canadian Schools Career Days’ award- Rochester forward Riley Emmerson… son, whoever told you hockey enforcer needs to be drug tested.
Thank you ladies and gentlemen for coming out tonight, sorry for no red carpet interviews.
Please feel free to add any additional awards…
Thank you to Mike and Alex for letting me put my oft disturbed but always controversial opinions up… To the ‘Gang of Idiots’-Chad, Pat, TJ, Jen and Bacon Lips, see yous next year… Chuck-you better not drink that whole bottle… and anyone else I forgot-Six months ’til tailgating!!
I was pretty surprised to find myself getting a little teary-eyed as the season came to a close last Saturday night. Okay, I’ll readily admit that yes, I’m a woman, and that sometimes it doesn’t take much to make my eyes go all burry, but that…I mean, the season was terrible, right? It was horrible and all the players deserved to be shot and drawn and quartered and tarred and feathered and…
Or so you would believe, anyway, if you were reading the bitter posts on the now-gone Crunch Time message board by the “fans” after the team’s loss in Rochester. Many of them were saying how they didn’t even want to go to the final home game because it just wasn’t worth it. I’m not sure why I was very surprised, considering what we had been dealing with all year on there—I’d love to get a total on how many threads were started that stated things like “Season over!” or “Stick a fork in ‘em!” or “Blow them out the ass!” (not really on the last one, but you get the idea)—but yet there I was, shocked and appalled to find so many people just completely writing off the season simply because we didn’t make the playoffs.
Now, I know that’s a pretty loaded statement—“simply because we didn’t make the playoffs.” That’s the whole point of a hockey team, right? Or any sports team, for that matter. You want to make the post season. You want the season to continue as long as it possibly can, and don’t read me wrong here–I don’t blame people for wanting that. I’d love it if we had hockey to see this weekend. I’d gladly fork over another $210-ish on top of the season tickets I get every year if I could see another couple of hockey games.
However, if a team doesn’t make the playoffs, does that mean that the season wasn’t “worth it”? Does that mean that fans are “justified” in not going to the last game to pay homage and respect to those players that did go out there every night and lay it all on the ice? I just don’t really feel that’s right. Guys like Captain Smith, Frisch, Blunden, Picard, Spang, Holden, and Clitsome deserved to be shown how much it meant to us that at least some players on the team worked hard every night, regardless of how the season turned out. I think some people need a wake up call, so here it goes:
This is sports, people. This is hockey. The season is long and shit happens. Fact of the matter is, we are a developmental team. We all know the drill; we’ve been reminded of it countless times this year. However, this year we got a special treat in that we’ve also been told how small potatoes we are and that our games are nothing more than “glorified exhibition games”. Now, that’s bull shit. We’re important, we matter, and our dreams, and the dreams of our players, are just as worth-while as the dreams of fans and players of the NHL. But we are a developmental team.
I look at it this way: we’re here to allow players to get experience, to grow, and because of that special designation we’ve seem some amazing feats this year, feats that, to be honest, would not be seen in the NHL. Unfortunately, one of those feats was not making the playoffs, but I still get off on seeing the strides our team makes every year regardless of post-season status. Whether some people like to see it or not, some great moments unfolded in front of us:
–Mirasty’s defensive game improved, and his fighting skills were as crazy-intense as ever when he could find people to go with him. How many Rochester games benefited from Crazy Mirasty?
–Holden and Clitsome evolved out of necessity into two of the best four year old D-men we’ve ever seen on that ice (seriously, their games did improve, absolutely. Holden earned that Most Improved award, hands down. I just can’t help myself).
–Picard’s game during the last stretch of the season was just absolutely sick. And how about him takin’ on a goalie? Oh yea, it happened.
–Frischmon came incredibly far this year; his speed and puck handling led to some amazing moments.
–LaCosta, when he was allowed to be consistent, pulled off some damn pretty games (including, may I add, that final game of the season).
–LaLande was mostly solid and showed some fantastic promise, as did Dahm while he was here.
–How about Kennedy and some of the other kids we saw these last few games? Those guys can, and will, take us far.
–Captain Smith went out there every night (except for the one game he was healthy scratched per Columbus’ orders…) and proved again and again why he deserved to be Captain of that team and why he is just the fucking man. I’m with Eric on this one—RESIGN DAN SMITH!
There is much to look forward to next year, but of course, there usually is. We have nothing but promises to be fulfilled—or not, as the case may be. Such is our lot in this league. However, this team will get another chance next year to thrill us, and I am sure, playoffs or not, they somehow will.
In closing, I thought it was appropriate to post a poignant message to a certain someone from the now-defunct Crunch Time board:
“Slapshot”: it has been as pleasurful dealing with your bullshit on the message board as shoving ginger up my asshole would be (“figging”—look it up), and I must say I’m not sorry to have you out of my life. It makes my head spin to see you’re already planning on taking your negativity and complaining to another board, inflicting on them some of the very same idiocy that eventually resulted in Crunch Time closing down. However, I’m a good Christian woman, and as such, I hope you and Konopka will be very happy together during the offseason, seeing as the team he was Captain of this year shockingly didn’t do shit and he’ll have more than enough time to entertain you and be your boyfriend all summer. I’m sure you two will do very cute things together, and if you send me a postcard I’ll be sure to send a case of lube back to you. I know you both will go through a lot of it.
Phew. That was fun.
Seriously, in true closing, I want to say that each season is what you make of it, and I know I had some frigging goooood times this year. Chuk, Cheetah, Dave, Magic, Eric, Mike, the “Mirasty Family” that sat in front of us some nights (forgive me, I’m terrible with names)…you all made this season awesome. Even me taking an elbow-punch to the head by a Bingo fan will be remembered fondly. There have been some great memories, and I know there will be even more to come.
As always, GO CRUNCH!
Well, I thought I would start this post with a shout out to the bathrooms in the War Memorial and good-bye ’til next year, you roach and silverfish infested sess pools…
So the dream is over. This team was consistently inconsistent all year, and we as fans have no one to blame but the Crunch. Sure, we can get all over the Moose for not beating the Marlies, but should we really need another team to win when the Crunch couldn’t even take care of their own destiny? Look at the losing streak earlier this year. Look at ill timed losses to Rochester and San Antonio. Sure we put a glorified ECHL team on the ice most of the season, sure the Spewjackets looted and pillaged us all year long in their one and done playoff run. But the one thing I saw most of the year was a total lack of desire and passion. Too many games had that ‘going through the motions’ feel to them, and for that, the golf season starts early.
On the other hand, I really liked watching guys like Mike Blunden, who brought an intense forecheck with him night in and night out. Alex Picard, who showed why he was a first round draft pick. Trevor Frischmon, who was our ultimate utility man, and BETTER BE HERE NEXT YEAR. Kevin Harvey, who knew when to bait people into penalties, but also when to drop the gloves. Dan Spang, who played out of his skill set and gave us somewhat of a offensive defenceman after the departure of Clay Wilson. Jonathon Sigalet, who in the short time we saw him, gave us a top defensive pairing with Captain Dan. Even Nick Holden showed dramatic improvement this year. All of which brings me to my favorite and in my opinion, team MVP, Captain Sacrifice, the man of the post game ice bags, the man who had more saves than the goalie some games, Captain Dan Smith. I say a hearty “FUCK YOU” to all of you who questioned his leadership this year. Also, a big “BLOW IT OUT YOUR ASS” to those of you calling for Konopka. Dan Smith led by example, and never took a night off. He never passed blame for poor efforts and instead put the losses on his shoulders. Some games, Dan was also our best coach, as our robot behind the bench lacked the tools to get the job done. So please, BRING BACK DAN SMITH!!!
Well at least my earlier post was answered… I know why I am drinking before the game today…
