Puck the System?

Nah, that idea totally failed.  I simply don't watch enough hockey to follow the entire league closely and bestow upon the world my witty thoughts and observations.

That doesn't mean I can't write about hockey anymore.

Sidney Crosby is a bitch, and it's hurting the league.

Fantasy Hockey News » Lemieux on the NHL: “It Failed”

That's Lemieux angrily venting about his team sucking and playing like cheap bitch ass punks cos their two star players are hurt.

Let's establish a few things -- I am not opposed, per se, to certain players getting special kinds of protection.  I am opposed when it interferes with the other team trying to play hockey.  Granting these special players some sort of magic injury protection helps keep them, and fan interest on the ice.

PUCK THE SYSTEM: A season in review

AAAHHHHHH. PUCK THE SYSTEM. AAAHHHH. PUCK THE SYSTEM PUCK THE SYSTEM.

I WANT TO PUCK THE SYS
I WANT TO PUCK THE SYS

So, I haven't been very good about maintaining this regularly. I briefly contemplated picking it back up during the playoffs, but the Flyers were doing well. I knew there was about a zero percent correlation, but it seemed like a good idea.

Anyways.

The season review will be as thus -- The Knuttel shall look at his pre-season predictions, and assess them

Prediction 1: Ovechkin will average more than one goal a game, and challenge for Gretzky's, if not Hull's, scoring record.
Assessment: Ovie finished the season with exactly 50 goals in 72 games. I do not recall if injuries affected his play in the games which he actually did compete, but that's still less than one goal a game, and not the full 82 games. Still he finished in third place for goal scoring. He also tied for second in overrall points, putting in a very good Assists total of 59. I would like to note right here that this is more assists than Crosby in his 81 games.

Prediction 2: Someone else will come close.
Assessment: Well, I guess this is more of a 1A type of deal here, but alas here goes -- Both Crosby and Steve Stamkos of the Lightning scored 51 goals. Both of them also played more games, but that's not the issue. These three were the only 50 goal scorers. Patrick Marleau of the Sharks was next in line with 44 goals.

Prediction 3: Malkin will end the season with 50 more points than Crysby, but everyone will still insist Crysby is the better player. They will both still refuse to play defense.
Assessment: Malkin had an injury shortened 67 game season, compared to Crysby's almost complete 81 game season. Malkin scored 77 points, Crysby 109. So Crosby had a more productive year. He also led the team in +/- with an unremarkable 15. Both still refuse to play defense.

Prediction 4: PHEONIX WILL MAKE THE PLAYOFFS
Assessment: Yep, they did. Wait a minute...

Prediction 5: hah, no they won't
Assessment: fuck

Prediction 6: Chicago will not compete for a playoff spot at all after making a decent playoff run for the first time in like 15 years last season.
Assessment: They ended up with the number 2 seed for the playoffs in the west, and won the Stanley Cup in 6 games over the Philadelphia Flyers. I couldn't have been more wrong than on this prediction. It will be interesting to see how they keep this young core together with the salary cap and all.

Prediction 7: Tampa Bay will have 2 40 goal scorers, but they will not win 25 games.
Assessment: They did not have 2 40 goal scorers. They had 5 20 goal scorers, however, including one 50 goal scorer. Two of these players also had more than 90 points. As far as 25 games, that was an exaggeration I suppose. The lowest number of games won by any team was 27 by Edmonton. Tampa Bay finished with 34 wins (34-36-12 80).

Prediction 8: The Toronto Maple Leafs will correct their grammar and go as the "Toronto Maple Leaves".
Assessment: Nope. The Maple Leafs refuse to use the President's English.

Prediction 9: Shit, these predictions are too mild. whatevs. wait for the season to actually start.
Assessment: I never made any further predictions after the season began.

Prediction 10: I refuse to make any predictions or write about the Canucks, Oilers, and Flames, due to their proximity to where nickelback is from. If the teams were to take it upon their own hands to eliminate this band, physically, I'll reconsider.
Assessment: I still have yet to write about these teams, and these teams still have yet to take up the offer. I guess that's a push.

So I guess that's not awful, considering how predictions rarely ever pan out, especially over the course of an entire 82 game season. I wonder if Puck the System will be back next year. I wonder if this was Gary Bettman's last year as commissioner. I wonder if NBC will expand its coverage of the NHL, or if VS. will reach an ESPN-esque level of viewership.

-- Knuttel

Olympics part 3, closing remarks

Ok, so the witty title or tag never really came, but whatevs. Frankly i was more interested in watching the games and admiring athletic prowess than talking about it. Do you know why? Cos I'm a do-er, not a talker.

I do things like watch the games on TV. end.

But there was some pretty awesome stuff going on. Skeleton and Luge were still exciting, despite the efforts of mr. no-fun-pants from georgia (poor taste, moving on). Bobsled remained the most boring of the sledding sports, largely because there was no John Candy coached team from Jamaica. Frankly I have a hard time following any bobsledder not named Doug E Fresh.

Snowboarding, meh. Ski-cross -- awesome. And mr. I-used-to-be-an-alcoholic biffed in the final to come in 4th, out of 4, to not medal.

Buddha Miller finally had a good games. Vonn took the cheese off her shin long enough to medal as well, though she may have screwed up her teammate. -- Oh, and Chris Collinsworth, please know what you're talking about before you say it. "I still think they should separate anyone that has a chance of medalling and have them running the track by themselves" (in reference to 2 skiiers being on the track, Vonn crashing and causing fellow american to restart) -- well they do usually do that, but if you watched it, you would also notice the huge amounts of fog and all together poor weather conditions. Hmmm, could this cause any sort of delay? Yeah, I think it did. Long delay = 2 runners on the track regardless of quality. And if theyre the best skiiers, shouldn't the threat of crashes be smaller? Thought so.

Crosby won a gold for hockey on the 25th, then managed to get on canada's other roster to score the game winning goal over america in ot to get them the gold. Dunno how that happenned. BTW, same medal order for both genders of hockey -- Canada, USA, Finland.

Biathalon, fun.

Figure skating, hate to agree with lyceck or whatevs, but the score for the long program is not based off one jump (which less than a handful of skaters can do) but off the whole program, you know, actual skating, transitions, spins, little jumps, putting something cohesive together. I didnt watch either, cos I don't really care about figure skating, but you got to look at everything when you're judging it, not one damn trick. You can't win a dive meet by simply having a really high DD. It doesn't work that way, you have to execute.

Moving on.

Curling's not a sport.

Moving on.

Canada finished with the most golds, making them the victors by some counts. They finished 3rd in overrall medals, coming after USA and Germany with 26 (14 Gold, 7 Silver, 5 Bronze). That's well short of the mythical "40" goal they were going for, but maybe canadians are just too nice to be that ultra competitive. Not to mention they had little to no balance. They had decent bob sledding, but they couldn't luge or skeleton for shit. Good on freestyle skiing, but not on any other kind of skiing. Good but not awesome in either short or long track speed skating. If one is to "win" the winter olympics, they need a solid presence in alpine skiing and sledding. They did not have that.

America passed it's single winter olympics medal count record with 37 (9 Gold, 15 Silver, 13 Bronze). They had 34 when they hosted the games in Salt Lake City in 02. Unless they add alot more events, I think 40 may remain a mythic number for the winter games.

-- Knuttel

Puck the System 2

AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH PUCK THE SYSTEM
AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH PUCK THE SYSTEM PUCK THE SYSTEM
I WANT TO PUCK THE SYS
I WANT TO PUCK THE SYS

Yeah, so looks like "Puck the System" is so far turning out to be not as regular as originally planned.

Whatevs.

Some Hockey news etc

only one team in the Atlantic division currently has a losing record. Not really worth mentioning who it is, because even if you don't follow hockey, it's easy to figure out. The Flyers are only in fourth because they have played the fewest games in the league, thus limiting chances to gain points from wins.

Ovie is hurt

Malkin was hurt as well for a few games, let's say five or so. During which, Crosby was held pointless. This either proves the Penguins have no depth so teams put everyone good up against Crosby and shut him out, or Crosby really needs Malkin to be effective or anything. Maybe it proves both. But Crysby sucks.

Ray Emery beat his former NHL team, the Senators (sorry, don't think there will be any NHL/KHL matchups pitting him against his closest former team) to cap off a five game Flyers win streak. It ended Saturday as their comeback attempt against the Sabres failed, 2-3.

In other news, two Flyers currently lead the league in +/-, Matt Carle and Chris Pronger.

And before I forget, to see how pens fans really view their team, I submit to you pictures they have edited for their players. I forewarn, they appear right out of 1999, but then again it is Pittsburgh we are talking about.

That is all for now

Now it's time for a rock show



-- Knuttel

Puck the System volume 1: season preview

After a month long hiatus, the Knuttel returns, with a new installment titled "Puck the System". Why the hiatus? Well, Knuttel thought he was going to OCS today, but he got delayed until January, so posting should again be semi-regular, besides, it's not like shit happens in the summer anyway.


WAR. PUCK THE SYSTEM. WAR. PUCK THE SYSTEM PUCK THE SYSTEM.
I NEED TO PUCK THE SYS I NEED TO PUCK THE SYS

Despite Gary Bettman's best intentions, the NHL still remains an active league that regularly plays games and has a fair method of selecting its yearly champion (the president's trophy, obviously).

- The Flyers have decided to dump both of their goaltenders from last year (Biron and Nittymaki) despite usually good play from both. I suppose the hot and cold streaks were too much, so they just decided to save Emery from the KHL, whose hot and cold streaks are so severe, I'm actually looking forward to see if he'll stab anybody who scores on him (bonus points if its Crysby).

- The Flyers have also signed Chris Pronger ... to a ten year contract. Here's to looking forward to the Flyers having a legitimate first line defender locked up until the age of 50 -- whatevs, Chelios is still playing I think.

- Crysby still has not shaken the hands of the Detroit Red Wings after defeating them in the Stanley Cup finals. Look for him to be a marked man and the subject of many a dirty hit. Also look for him to flop on many times more a clean hit.

- Not even The Great One could save hockey (or establish it?) in the desert (I know, I expected more of Rich Tocchet too). Despite all of this, Gary Bettman is insisting on keeping the Coyotes in Pheonix. Common sense would say the team would fare better in its previous home of Winnipeg, or even Hamilton, Ontario, but this is also the league that thinks salary caps, and salary caps alone create parity (the NFL has nothing to do with salary caps, and theyre gonna be gone anyway, it's all revenue sharing and ginormous TV contracts).

- Direct TV subscribers were almost left without hockey for the year, in yet another move where someone actually called Gary Bettman's bluff, and he had shit. Sadly VS. and NBC cover hockey a million times better than ESPN ever did, or even how ESPN covers anything now. It's just the exposure. I mean, ESPN's lead hockey analyst's credentials are coaching Wayne Gretzky for a year or two in LA (and not winning a single game later on in Tampa Bay) and having a mullet.

- Crazy predictions time
-- Ovechkin will average more than one goal a game, and challenge for Gretzky's, if not Hull's, scoring record.
-- Someone else will come close.
-- Malkin will end the season with 50 more points than Crysby, but everyone will still insist Crysby is the better player. They will both still refuse to play defense.
-- PHEONIX WILL MAKE THE PLAYOFFS
-- hah, no they won't
-- Chicago will not compete for a playoff spot at all after making a decent playoff run for the first time in like 15 years last season.
-- Tampa Bay will have 2 40 goal scorers, but they will not win 25 games.
-- The Toronto Maple Leafs will correct their grammar and go as the "Toronto Maple Leaves".
-- Shit, these predictions are too mild. whatevs. wait for the season to actually start.

-- I refuse to make any predictions or write about the Canucks, Oilers, and Flames, due to their proximity to where nickelback is from. If the teams were to take it upon their own hands to eliminate this band, physically, I'll reconsider.

-- Knuttel