Fire Wagon Hockey

Showing posts with label all-star game. Show all posts

20 January 2009

Yes we did! Looch to miss Young Stars

Uh, so yeah, how about that thing downtown today, eh?? Was that intense or what?? I almost wish I had gone down just to hear that song Yo-Yo Ma and Izhak Perlman played echoing through the empty canyons of the abandoned city streets. Welcome to a new dawn, America. Let's try not to fuck this one up, k?

Moving on to hockey. Milan Lucic is bowing out of the Young Stars game due to a lingering injury. Frown.

Thrash play Habs tonight. Thrash play Flyers tomorrow night. Here's a tip for all you statisticians - Niittymaki is ill, and likely to not play. Start adding your 1s and 0s and tell me what you come up with!

Anyway, stuff to do, places to do it that aren't here.

09 January 2009

Hell yeah, Luc, Wheels and Little!!

Listen I just want you to know I can totally sit here for about an hour and come up with funny anagrams out of "luc wheels little" but I won't. Because I know you're dying for the news that's already on 93 other legitimate outlets, BUT THAT'S OKAY! No one gives it to you with my perspicacity! MOVING ON!

They're doing rookies vs sophomores this year, and I gotta be honest, I don't have the attention span to read the whole article and figure out who's playing where, although I could probably look and tell you. However, Here's your 2009 YoungStars lineup, sorted alphabetically.

Nicklas Backstrom (Washington)
Patrik Berglund (St. Louis)
Mikkel Boedker (Phoenix)
Andrew Cogliano (Edmonton)
Drew Doughty (Los Angeles)
Brandon Dubinsky (New York R)
Erik Ersberg (Los Angeles)
Michael Frolik (Florida)

Bryan Little (Atlanta)

Kris Letang (Pittsburgh)

Milan Lucic (Boston)

Steve Mason (Columbus)
James Neal (Dallas)
Mason Raymond (Vancouver)
Luke Schenn (Toronto)
Marc Staal (New York R)
Devin Setoguchi (San Jose)
Steven Stamkos (Tampa)
Kris Versteeg (Chicago)

Blake Wheeler (Boston)

Why the hell is Phil Kessel being snubbed for the ASW?

08 January 2009

Why we should look to the NFL for guidance

Once upon a time, being named to the NHL All Star game was an amazing honour. Not that it's not now, but it doesn't have nearly the significance it once did, especially with a traveshamockery being made of the whole voting process, year after year. So let's take a page out of the NFL's book, shan't we?

1/3 of the vote is decided by the fans
1/3 of the vote is decided by the players
1/3 of the vote is decided by the coaches and GMs

While I admire the effort of the fans to get a hard-working, oft-overlooked player into the ASG (after all, where would we be without our hard-nosed blue-collar workers?!), the Habs fans once again overachieve, and take crazy to a whole new fucking level. And frankly, I didn't think that was possible. But no. No no. Habsy the clown and his Kool-aid drinking followers have raised the bar on the crazy. And not the funny, haha, crack me up crazy. The uncomfortable, what-the-fuck-is-wrong-with-you?! crazy. Not Martin Lawrence craaaaaaa-zy. Chris Rock crayZEE! Just remember people, there's a fine line between clever and stupid. Seems that line blurs in translation.

Let's take a look at the players who did not make the starting line up, shall we?

Jeff Carter: 27G, 17A, 44P, +7
Phil Kessel: 24G, 16P, 40P, +16
Alex Ovechkin: 27G, 26A, 53P, +12
Marc Savard: 13G, 36A, 49P, +25

All of those players, except one, made the Eastern Conference reserve. And Kess? Well, I hope Kess didn't do like Savvy (4:42pm), and leave that weekend open.

The All Star Game has become a joke. Everyone's saying it, but is anyone listening? How many more years do the fans get to outsmart the league, and turn it into a circus? Change the way the voting is done, and make our vote far less significant than it is. Clearly, we can not be trusted, and even as they're snickering while accepting the "honour" of being named an All-Star, the players aren't too likely to rock that union boat and call shenanigans. Or bullshit. So someone needs to. Who's going to step up and be the hero?

This just in! Some not-Habs made the All Star team!

Boston, MA - The NHL announced today that Boston Bruins Zdeno Chara, Marc Savard and Tim Thomas have been named to the Eastern Conference All-Star roster for the 2009 NHL All-Star game, which will be held on Sunday, January 25 at 6:00 p.m. ET at the Bell Centre in Montreal. Additionally, one of the most offensively gifted group of Eastern Conference forwards in recent years will be headlined by starters Crosby, Malkin and Kovalev, along with Washington's Alex Ovechkin, Tampa Bay's Vincent Lecavalier, Carolina's Eric Staal, Buffalo's Thomas Vanek, Boston's Marc Savard, New Jersey's Zach Parise, Ottawa's Dany Heatley, Atlanta's Ilya Kovalchuk and Philadelphia's Jeff Carter.

30 December 2008

Marc Savard, Boston, 250,321

Patrice Bergeron, Boston, 227,573

Alexander Semin, Washington, 178,301
Simon Gagne, Philadelphia, 153,927

Thomas Vanek, Buffalo, 147,020
Mike Richards, Philadelphia, 122,374
Danny Briere, Philadelphia, 99,203
Vincent Lecavalier, Tampa Bay, 80,448
Derek Roy, Buffalo, 72,989
Chris Drury, NY Rangers, 59,033
Ilya Kovalchuk, Atlanta, 57,688
Dany Heatley, Ottawa, 53,239
Daniel Alfredsson, Ottawa, 48,864
Scott Gomez, NY Rangers, 47,879
Eric Staal, Carolina, 45,163
Zach Parise, New Jersey, 44,830
Jeff Carter, Philadelphia, 40,942
Markus Naslund, NY Rangers, 39,287
Jordan Staal, Pittsburgh, 33,832
Martin St. Louis, Tampa Bay, 30,872
Jason Spezza, Ottawa, 30,210
Rod Brind'Amour, Carolina, 24,984
Patrik Elias, New Jersey, 24,140
Brian Rolston, New Jersey, 18,395
Philip Kessel, Boston, 18,157
Ray Whitney, Carolina, 17,930
Maxime Talbot, Pittsburgh, 17,733
Milan Lucic, Boston, 14,345
Trent Hunter, NY Islanders, 9,218

DEFENCEMEN
Andrei Markov, Montreal, 1,106,848
Sergei Gonchar, Pittsburgh, 1,050,418
Mike Komisarek, Montreal, 1,035,662
Ryan Whitney, Pittsburgh, 1,009,452

Zdeno Chara, Boston, 443,521

Mike Green, Washington, 277,135
Kimmo Timonen, Philadelphia, 162,088
Teppo Numminen, Buffalo, 131,535
Tomas Kaberle, Toronto, 98,880
Wade Redden, NY Rangers, 78,050

Jay Bouwmeester, Florida, 77,141
Chris Phillips, Ottawa, 29,168

GOALTENDERS
Marc-Andre Fleury, Pittsburgh, 1,148,052
Carey Price, Montreal, 1,113,888
Henrik Lundqvist, NY Rangers, 151,193
Ryan Miller, Buffalo, 138,347
Martin Biron, Philadelphia, 103,567

Tim Thomas, Boston, 92,668
Martin Brodeur, New Jersey, 65,291
Vesa Toskala, Toronto, 40,761
Kari Lehtonen, Atlanta, 16,178
Tomas Vokoun, Florida, 13,826
Rick DiPietro, NY Islanders, 12,235

Text the last name of the player you'd like to vote for to 81812. Voting ends on 1/2/09. You may also text the name of the team you'd like to vote for to 81812, and each player on that team, if nominated, will receive a vote.

12 November 2008

Vote now for our All-Stars*

* If you can bear to go through that whole long required registration process. Thanks for making it easy, NHL.com! Well played!

Vote now!

04 November 2008

30 January 2008

Game Day Preview

Before I get into the game day, I have to point something absurd out. This is a humiliating stat for our game:

New York — Ratings for the NHL All-Star game increased from last year.

Sunday's game which was played in Atlanta's Philips Arena and aired on Versus drew a .8 rating, up 14 percent from the .7 last season.

The game drew 796,717 viewers.

The Ice Bowl put up a 2.6 rating, with a 5 share, meaning 5% of the people watching TV at that time were watching the game. Five percent. That's enormous. They don't even list the share for the All-Star game. It's starting to look like not even NHL fans care about the ASG anymore. Moving on.

In the magical world I live in, where the sky is pink, and we eat ice cream cones with kitties and puppies while riding unicorns over rainbows, the Thrash haven't had a game since 15th January, when they completely dominated the best team in the NHL. Since that game, they've been out played, embarrassed, and schooled. They've left Kari out to dry and gotten him benched, "just in case they don't show up again." To add insult to injury, Kovy didn't do much of anything in the All-Star game, except get stoned spectacularly by Nabby. Hoss quietly put up a goal few people have talked about in the shadow of Savvy's GWG.

Despite Bing being out with a high ankle sprain, the Pens have held on and gone 2-1-1 since he added the prestigious "IR" after his name. They've also put up 14 goals in that span, after only putting up 13 in the previous 4 with Bing playing.

Soooo... basically we're fucked. Unless, you know, the Thrashers decide they actually want to play hockey, which hasn't really seemed to be high on their list of priorities in the past 5 games. I'll be honest, I'm not holding my breath. But I'd love to be proven wrong. Who knows, maybe Lehts did punch all his teammates in the balls and get his point across. One can hope.

SOUTHEAST	GP	W	L	OT	Pts	GF	GA
Carolina Hurricanes	53	25	24	4	54	161	171
Washington Capitals	51	23	23	5	51	147	160
Atlanta Thrashers	52	23	25	4	50	141	175
Florida Panthers	51	22	24	5	49	130	147
Tampa Bay Lightning	51	20	26	5	45	147	172

28 January 2008

Man do I miss Savvy. And photos!

Yeah, you booed him at first, but those jeers turned to cheers when Savvy scored the GWG for the East, didn't you? Admit it. Don't hate. I for one love Savvy and don't blame him a bit for getting the hell out of dodge. You woulda too if Hartley was your coach. and had the chance to roll out. But I miss him. And rally helmets.

So. Here's some pictures. Kind of ordered.

Someone couldn't buy a goal in this game.

I had no idea who Ne-Yo is, I was kind of hoping for Usher, but this was the coolest thing I think I've ever seen in a hockey intermission. Gotta love a little ATL flava.

You wish your fantasy team looked like this.

11 January 2008

Hoss and Kovy All Stars

Joining Ovechkin on the forward lines for the Jan. 27 game in Atlanta will be a pair of hometown favorites, Thrashers forwards Ilya Kovalchuk and Marian Hossa.

Article about Kovy "Welcoming the Stars"

19 December 2007

Usher? Really? Like, Usher Raymond?

14 November 2007

Time to start voting!

http://fanballoting.nhl.com/

Get voting, folks. Vote for whomever you feel best suited to the game, but seriously, put in at least some votes for Kari. And don't forget, Kovy, Kozzie and and Hoss are also on the ballots! Let's get our boys on the ice for our home All Star game!

We beseech you!

06 November 2007

Lehtonen left off All-Star ballot!

Normally we wouldn't do post after post, and we know you're waiting to hear Kovy's status, but this deserved its own post.

The powers that be did not include Kari on this year's All-Star ballot. Now, we realize his play before injury was not necessarily stellar, but we do know he's fully capable of living up to his All-Star billing, and have complete faith in him that he will do just that upon his return.

Thus, we challenge you, our faithful reader(s), to write him into the game. We don't have a link for you yet, but as soon as we do, we'll give it to you. Vote, and vote often, and write our star goalie into net in his home arena!