Behind Brodeur

I watched the Coyotes/Devils game last night from all of ten feet behind Martin Brodeur’s back (and Bryzgalov’s in the second), standing in the zamboni doors with Stan (The Man, The Maven) Fischler.  I love that man, and watching from there, with him, was amazing.  Huge thank you to the great people at MSG+ for including me in the production of last nights broadcast.

Surprisingly big dude, actually

Even when I attend Coyotes games as a member of the media, I can’t handle sitting in the press box.  Honestly, I can’t fathom how anyone can give insightful game reviews from up there.  Not a dig to those that choose to, and are able to, I just can’t get a feel for the game if I’m not closer to the speed of it.

Sitting where I was, I could see Yandle make a look-off with his eyes before firing the puck at Lombardi’s stick.  I could see Mueller’s eyes down before he (luckily) beat Brodeur five-hole (who goes five-hole on a padstack?).  You can get a legitimate idea for who’s doing what out there, instead of watching for strictly x’s and o’s like you have to do from eagle perspective.  Maybe it just doesn’t work for my type of writing.

The point is, sitting back there was one of my favourite hockey-watching experiences ever. 

I was shocked to note two things I should’ve long-ago noted: Marty’s simple helmet design is really sharp, and for some reason, it’s never registered with me that Brodeur wears #30.  I bet if you’d asked me yesterday pre-game, I couldn’t have answered that correctly.  Embarrassing.

Watching his huge two-pad jammer on Upshall from mere feet away was surreal.

*****

I still get super nervous before doing stuff like this, so cut me some slack:

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So, no girls-in-skirts cleaning the ice, huh Phoenix?  It seems to me like this is the exact market they’d have that going on, so I asked the guy running the crew there what the deal was (ice crew also stands in zam gates – paid $8.50 an hour to have the best seats in the arena).

Here’s the end of a conversation I had with an unnamed staff member, explaining why the girls-in-skirts got outed for dudes-in-tracksuits:

 ”Girls are too unreliable.  They would call an hour before the game and bail out.”

“…Girls are too unreliable?”

“Well, the type that want to be displayed in skirts in an igloo are.”

“Ahhh, yep.”

*****

John Tortorella has the exact personality you want your head coach to have, but I’m starting to think he might be a “work ethic” coach over a “systems” guy.  In translation, he’d be a great junior coach, but maybe not so much of an NHL one.

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I had an awkward, hallway walk-by with Brodeur after the game.  Just him and I, going in opposite directions in a smallish hallway where you should probably at least acknowledge the other person.  I had roughly seven seconds to think of something clever to say to him once I saw him coming down the hall.

I nodded.

*****

I tried to explain the player-ref on-ice relationship in an article for The Hockey News - It’s a tad long, but I think it includes the funniest thing I’ve done as a writer…. I convinced them to link the words “stubborn ECHL refs” to something awesome.  Enjoy.

And For His Next Act, Dorsett Slips On A Banana Peel

And now, your bi-daily violent hit review -- the hit-from-behind on Columbus player Derek Dorsett, courtesy James Neal.

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First, thanks to Bob Mckenzie for the review of “I think there’s a chance there could be a suspension here”.  Let’s continue discussing while we scour the ice for the rest of Dorsett’s frontal lobe.

Second, WEAR A FUCKING VISOR, Derek. 

Third, okay, the hit is horrible.  Dorsett is really really hurt.  We need to stop this stuff.  ….But that was funny, right?  I mean, wasn’t it exactly how a vaudeville actor would have played “getting knocked unconscious?”  Or like, in a pre-teeny-after-school-special type show?  Right over backwards, arms out wide?  Okay, okay, you’re right, it was brutal.    ….Ohscrewyou, that was funny.

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Pre-season this year, I predicted the St. Louis Blues to be a sneak-into-playoffs type team, then they got off to a real crap start.  Then, I predicted the Coyotes to get off to a real crap start, and they came out looking like a sneak-into-playoffs type team (or Stanley Cup winner, depending on who you ask).

He shoots, he's old!

Though I’ve backed off on the Coyote bashing, I’ll take this chance to re-affirm my stance that the Blues are good.  With their goaltending, and depth at forwards, their ship has to turn around eventually.  And if not, I’ll start blaming totally arbitrary things like their schedule, or being stuck in a tough division with Nashville and Columbus.

I also predicted Chicago to win the Presidents trophy.  I’m not far off on that one, but I may have overlooked the fact that the Capitals division -- Atlanta, Tampa Bay, Carolina and Florida is the most nauseatingly poor grouping of teams since the WNBA (ahhh, felt good to get another shot in.  Been awhile).

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You can say what you like about last nights Toronto/Carolina game -- battle for the basement, two teams who can’t hold a lead, whatever… but for fans buying a ticket to a hockey game, that was epic.

Not many fans out there appreciate the nuances of a fine goaltending duel - but they all love what they saw out there last night.  Props to those who stayed to watch the last 30 seconds after the ‘Canes did their best to puke the game away in the last minute.  No, no… not props.  Big ups.  I’m switching to using “big ups” more.  Big ups to ‘Canes fans.

*****

Stan, the very very Jewish man.

Everyone who had the Devils leading their division (vs. Philly, Pitt, the Rangers and… my Isles) raise their hand.  Liars.  Put your hand down.

On the topic of the Devils, I put in a call to my buddy Stan Fischler yesterday -- “The Maven” as he’s affectionately known, deserves at least a whole post, and I will get to that.  For now, I want to do two things -- One, thank him for applying to get me NHL credentials (I’ll occassionally submit pieces on the Coyotes for his newsletter, in exchange), and two, plug his new book Who’s Better: Rangers, Devils, Islanders or the Flyers? (Hint: it’s not the Rangers)

It’s a full comparison of each team’s history, everything from goaltending to tough guys to best Cup-winning team.  Oh, and I wrote the story of Dad’s end-to-end rush against the Rangers for Stan.  So, you know… that was sorta cool.

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Have a great weekend folks.  Oh, and watch this.  I legitimately “lol’ed”:

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THE Garden

Granted, my debut at Madison Square Garden wasn’t at Tyson – Holyfield.  It wasn’t at a Ranger game.  But being at the men’s Big East College Basketball Tournament wasn’t such a bad way to take The Garden in for the first time.  Minus the nine dollar beers (and five dollar normal sized bottles of water, for real), it’s a special building.

It’s a much more personal arena than I thought.  I had imagined such a famous arena (the world’s most, as the PA announcer repeatedly reminded the crowd) was going to be some huge ampitheatre where the players would look like Hobbits from the upper rows, but it’s not like that. 

I wouldn’t have had to find out what those seats were like if it wasn’t for my true New York experience.  I showed up looking for scalped tickets, and wasn’t a step on the sidewalk near the building when a guy in a backpack asked me if I was “selling”, which is what those gentleman ask - no legal repercussions for buying, only selling.

I had been told to get a seat in at least the 200 level to really take in the college feel.  When Big Al (as his ‘business card’ said) offered me 300 level for 40 bucks, I told him I was paying 20 for a 200 level or better and walked away. 

After the chase-down-we-can-work-this-out-approach, he handed me a ticket in the lowest bowl, and agreed to give it to me for $25.  I offered him the $20, and he said no.     

So when I gave him the ticket back and he started to laugh about me driving a hard bargain, I figured I had won.  He said fine, deal, here’s the ticket, and scurried away like the cops were six steps behind and about to finally pounce.  I got inside and gave my ticket to the people at the front. 

Section 311.  F—k.

It’s alright, I was a single, so I found a good seat anyway, but man.  Welcome to New York, rookie.

The arena has amazing acoustics - even at half time when everybody is simply talking it’s loud.  I’m adding good seats to a major boxing match at MSG to my bucket list which currently only has “play Augusta” on it (PS less than a month until The Masters, eeeekkkk).

You have to love college sports.  The band.  The students.  The chants.  The games just feel oh-so-important.  In the WCHA, my team played in front of 15,000 in Wisconsin, 12,000 in North Dakota and 10,000 in Minneapolis.  The student section was always in the same t-shirts, standing the whole game while chanting chants that you’d have to have taken a class in fan-obsession to know.

   (Kohl Center, Wisconsin)

But college basketball fans are even more influential because they’re right on top of the court, so the players can pick out certain individual to be the object of their hate.  

At most college games you can yell anything from any seat in the building and nobody will tell you to sit down, including the profanity-riddled slew of derogatory comments coming from my nearby seat-mate, which brought nothing but chuckles from the crowd.

The two games I saw weren’t thrillers, with the better team inevitably taking over fairly handily in the end, but I was glad I went.

I even ended up bringing Chinese food  uptown to Stan Fischlers apartment for dinner (Stan is one of the better connected hockey men in the world, as well as the current record holder in Jew-jokes-told-per-day.  I even learned a new Yiddish word).

And tonight, I’ll be in the production meeting of the Rangers – Predators game  for the MSG network with Stan, trying to take in what I can about how that all goes down. 

So today, back on the train!

*Also noteworthy:  Stan has written five books on trains, including the one I take in, the LIRR (Long Island Rail Road).  Fascinating guy.

Short Shifts

More Bourne blurbs on random topics:

Jim Rome spends the majority of his hour-long program offering sage wisdom to athletes who messed up.  My advice to him:  You aren’t “hip-hop”; stop calling people “suckers”, “chumps” and “fools”.

Here’s a sentence not many people have uttered in their life:  Clark Gillies bought me a Snuggie for Christmas.

I had a phone call with Stan Fischler tonight, and was fully entertained.  You can’t help but love a man that tells a hippo joke within 12 minutes of the beginning of your relationship.

I vote we keep it classic and stay with calling golf clubs irons and woods.  People have taken to calling them “fairway metals”, but let’s not start describing clubs by what they’re made of, I’m pretty sure that’s a slippery slope to start heading down.  For some reason, “Pass me my nine graphite-titanium alloy” doesn’t sound right.

The Lighthouse Project on Long Island would be amazing.  Unfortunately, it involves an earth shaking volume of money and time that seems less and less likely in these sketchy economic times.  Even more unfortunate, is that the Isles can’t stay in Nassau County if they don’t get a new building; theirs is embarrassing.  What player wants to climb the impossible ladder to crack the big leagues and spend their career in a dressing room worse than the one they were in years earlier with their junior team?  Has anybody proposed just building a new arena?  Why does it have to be billion-dollar city-changing overhaul or nothing?

I tend not to believe in coaches and managers that get hired straight to the NHL after playing without being tested at a lower level.  I’d rather have a coach who barely played (if ever) but was a student of the game than have a former great player be a figurehead to the team I’m a part of.  Read up ex-players, these positions involve more than just knowing the game; you have to be able to teach systems in every zone to sometimes stubborn players, not just dress nice.

A recent travel day:  A)  I had to rebook my flight to NY last second because the Minneapolis airport was closed.  My bags were to switch planes with a few others.  Before I boarded, I asked to make sure my bags had switched flights, but no, it turns out, they had not.  When they called down to have my bags switched, it turns out the workers thought the guy had been making some Bourne Supremacy joke… siiiggghhh.  Seriously?

                                            B)  The guy on the flight beside me swiped his credit card in the seat in front of him to buy a movie, then proceeded to watch it with no headphones or captions.  When offered headphones, he declined.   Huh.

And the big news of the day:  I spoke with David Kolb this morning, the managing editor of the new Max Hockey site.(www.maxhockey.com) I’ll be a columnist on their site starting after the trade deadline.  The site looks great, and includes a news wire of constantly updating NHL info from all over the internet.  There are individual team sites with recent game highlights and conference statistics available on the brand new site that’s fully committed to being the best at covering the NHL.  Check it out!

Also, my second piece “The Pro’s of Rec Hockey” is up on The Hockey News site, www.thehockeynews.com