A Wingnut’s Meditation on the Playoffs

A while back, Kirk wrote to me:

I'm actually interested in seeing what playoff hockey is all about. Who knows, it may even hook me on to the sport a little.

I felt the need to write a lengthy, self-serving posting that would encourage Kirk to not only care about hockey, but to embrace his destiny as a Wingnut. After all, friends don’t let friends become Bruins fans. It’s not quite as bad as being a fan of say, the Buffalo Bills. But it still hurts. You can’t want that for a friend.

Kirk, the playoffs are the most wonderful time of the year. It’s hard to explain how deeply hockey fans feel about the playoffs. As a sort of benchmark, Dinur phones me every year and wishes me Happy Playoffs, as if it were Christmas or Hanukkah. No joke. For the past couple of springs, I’ve had really good theory sections and the Wings have fought all the way to the Stanley Cup series. The spring has been pretty magical and it comes not a moment too soon. Winter quarter always sucks moderately, because football is over by mid-January. The hockey regular season is still going, but I’ve not been able to adjust my lame attention span to following much regular season hockey (although I find programming everything into Outlook really helps me track a lot better—I’ve had fun following the Yanks so far this baseball season).

I followed hockey closely in February and March of this year, though. The Wings, for the first time in about twenty years, looked like they might not make the playoffs. Being a Wingnut, you just get so fuckin’ spoiled. It was hard to think we wouldn’t be a playoff contender.

Reflections on this Year

But sure enough, the Wings pulled through. It’s just so awesome to have your team have so much damned character. And it’s so damned hard to accept that the last of my generation of Red Wings (the guys who are our age I mean) are pretty much gone. Ozzie’s a back-up now. Malts may be gone next year. These guys are core players who, while not the greatest players in Red Wings history, are some of the best teammates in any sport’s history and who have a great relationship with the fans. These guys are hard-core professionals who know that they’re insanely lucky to get to be NHL hockey players and approach the game with gratitude. They’ve developed their careers around core athletic and sportsmanship values that are so pure that they make me want to cry.

Any will anyone ever forget Nick Lidstrom, patron saint of hockey defensemen everywhere? And this veritable hockey god was actually in the shadow, if you can imagine such a thing, of Steve Yzerman for a time. Try imagining Lidstrom in anyone’s shadow. That’s how amazing the team has been. This has been a legendary and rich time in Red Wings history.

Yeah, I was a little sore after being eliminated by the Sharks this year. But in all frankness, as long as we weren’t swept, I was okay with it. Thank God for that drubbing we gave them in Game 4. Yeah, we lost the series. But let’s face it: dynastic conditions are very difficult in the present NHL. We’ve been insanely good for several years. There is much speculation by persons like Dinur and Todd Tavares at school (a Bruins fan, God help him—Ai! The pain!) that this Golden Age is coming to a close. Yet we keep managing to find highly viable combinations of veteran experience and youthful talent. Management has been superlative—we keep winning while rebuilding. It’s really something to behold. Show me another team that has been managed so well.

I only wish my dissertation were half as impressive.

Right and Proper Playoff Philosophy

Moreover, it’s important to note that we’ve also been one of the few philosophically pure hockey teams in the league, really until this year. I have to admit that while we’ve been genuinely good, several other teams in the NHL have suffered from bad coaching philosophies that have made them vulnerable in the playoffs. In Kirk’s last letter, he said to me:

Football, basketball, baseball and soccer don't really change, they are just more intense, but apparently the "experts" agree with you that teams that are built to win in the regular season aren't necessarily the best teams in the postseason. I think the only other possible comparison to this is in baseball, where a great offense can get get you a great record in the regular season but in the postseason all you need is 3 great starting pitchers and you have a chance to shut down all your opponents. So, teams with mediocre offenses but great starting pitchers may manage to have a winning record and perhaps even win 90 games or so, but then go on to knock off more flashy 100-win teams in the playoffs if their pitchers manage to dominate.

Hockey is like your account of baseball, except exactly the opposite. In the hockey playoffs, the true edge belongs to offensive powerhouses. This is why the Wings have been dominant in the offseason for several years. Several teams in the league were wrongly fixated on immoral and improper strategy for victory that is primarily “defense first.” This strategy is an abomination and the gods do not favor it. While many teams favored this strategy, I prefer to foist most of the blame on Ron Wilson. He probably didn’t invent it. But after Nagano, he deserves the blame for anything that’s wrong in North American hockey. The Ron Wilsons of the world have simply tried to rely on their regular-season, defense-first strategies going into the playoffs. These teams would develop very tight defenses. Then, they’d get a goal or two lead and then actually sit on it for the remainder of the game.

That sort of strategy can work in the regular season. Actually, it often works well. The hockey regular season is long, somewhat like the baseball season. Moreover, there are thirty teams in the league and you meet most of the teams from the opposite conference only once per season. The regular season is not a very scouting intensive experience. You aren’t going to play tonight’s team all that often, so it’s not like any one team has a great set of incentives to really learn the other team’s weaknesses. Games are not usually played as series, in baseball’s style. You just develop a method that’s well-suited to your team and keep plugging away at it. Under those constraints, a strong defense is a very good insurance policy in the regular season of making the playoffs.

Of course, any fan of the San Jose Sharks can tell you that making the playoffs is different from winning in the playoffs. The psychological dynamic is quite different in the playoffs, where you face a best of seven series. Suddenly, your ability to really learn your opponent’s weaknesses is critical to victory. In this setting, it is my opinion that the key to victory is a highly intelligent and high-powered offense that has the psychological aplomb and patience to learn how to dismantle the opponent’s defense. Naturally, defenses also learn in this process. However, hockey defenses are extremely vulnerable, owing to the critical importance of a single man—the goalie. Once a goalie is cracked, i.e. faces a definitive and crushing failure, it very rare for a team to come back in the playoffs. That said, it is never impossible. One need only recall last year’s Stanley Cup series for evidence of this fact.

Digression on Game 6 of the 2002 Western Conference Championship

That said, such a performance is exceptional. I think the textbook case of defense not winning the playoffs is Game 6 of the 2002 Western Conference Championship, between the Detroit Red Wings and the Colorado Avalanche. This game was the definitive turning point in a series that ended the intense and bitter rivalry that emerged between the two teams over the course of the ‘90s, banishing the Avalanche to obscurity over the following years. While the former Quebec Nordiques did win their Stanley Cup the year before, I feel this series put the cap on any Avalanche attempt to define themselves as one of the storied franchises of the National Hockey League. I feel this is true for some time to come.

Some context: Both teams had been quite impressive during the regular season, with the Wings entering the playoffs as the first seed, having won the President’s Trophy. The playoff bracket is reproduced below, courtesy of my friends and yours at Wikipedia:

Note that the first seed in the Eastern Conference was the Boston Bruins, who were eliminated in six games by the eighth seed Habs. This is typical Bruins fare. Look, Kirk, it’s your choice. I’m just sayin’.

But to return to the original digression, the Avs were the second seed in the conference, tied with the San Jose Sharks for second highest points in the league. This conference championship, then, was a showdown. If the Avs were to ever show that they were better than us, this was their moment.

In all fairness, they didn’t suck. It was a seven game series that was played neck and neck. The Red Wings won the first game at the Joe, 5-3. Colorado came back for Game 2 and won in overtime, 4-3. In Denver, the Wings pulled ahead again 2-1, also in overtime. Once more, the Avs tied the series, winning Game 4 in Denver, 3-2. Then, in Game 5, the Avs pulled ahead in the series, winning against the Red Wings 2-1 in overtime.

The turning point was the “Statue of Liberty Goal” scored by Brendan Shanahan in the first period. As you can see below, Roy thought he had the puck securely in his glove. But the ref hadn’t whistled it dead and it had fallen out as he was hoisting it. Shanny scooped it in. The shame shattered Roy’s psyche. In Game 7, he basically left the light on and the key under the mat for the Wings. The Avs were shut out, 7-0. I like to think of this as the definitive moment of Patrick Roy’s career. I imagine there are many who disagree with me and I really could care less. This is how I will remember him for all time to come.

During the playoffs, when the goalie is finally broken, you have them. True, series are won without this spectacle. But there is nothing quite as satisfying as watching your team destroy your opponent’s goalie. The core point is, the playoffs are about your offense’s strategic ability to learn how to crack the opponent’s defense and your defense’s psychological ability to recover from failure. At the end of a series, you know who the better team was. This is the glory of the Stanley Cup playoffs.

Return to Discussion of Proper Playoff Philosophy

In the past few years, one of the elements that, in my opinion, contributed to the Wings’ hegemony was the overwhelming number of teams that employed this Ron Wilsonesque defensive philosophy—get a lead and then sit on it. Let your strong defense and super-cultivated goalie do the rest.

One can see the temptation. There are some very refined goalies in this sport. Among the most refined was a man named Dominik Hasek, otherwise known as “Mr. Slinky for a Spine.”

But even the refined goaltending of Dominik Hasek doesn’t win Stanley Cups. Briggs Moon probably remembers a team that used to hail from Minnesota, the North Stars, actually defeating the Great Slinky for a Spine in Game 6 of the 1999 Cup finals. It was in third overtime and I had already gone to bed, to be sure (I had to work in the morning), but the Stars eventually won the Cup that night. This sad story (well, not for Briggs) has three core morals.

First, Slinky for a Spine would only win the Cup when he got to (you know it) Detroit, where we don’t play “sit on the lead” hockey. So forget that “defense first” crap. It doesn’t win the Stanley Cup.

Second, there are some things that money can’t buy, but Dominik Hasek isn’t one of them. And the identity of the team that could afford to buy him (and Brett Hull, too)? The Detroit Red Wings. Remember this, when picking your allegiances.

This last moral needs a preamble. I was living in DC during the ’99 playoffs and actually ran into this guy from Buffalo on the metro. He saw my shirt, and said, “Now that the Wings are out, you’re rooting for Buffalo, right? You have to root for Buffalo.” You could see the pleading desperation in his eyes. “They have to win. They have to.” You could see what losing the Lombardi Trophy three times had done to the poor man. For pure pity’s sake, I told him I would root for the Sabres. So fucking sad. So yeah, there are worse teams than the Bruins, Kirk. But still, friends don’t let friends become Bruins fans. It’s just too bitter. When I called Briggs the next day to congratulate him, all I could think of was the poor bastard from Buffalo on the metro. So fucking sad.

So third, don’t let that happen to you.

Well, to get back to the subject. Over the past few years, people have realized the defensive approach doesn’t work—thank God! It was disgusting while it lasted. In general, the league is abandoning the defensive trend and learning to play proper playoffs hockey again. Take, for example, the team that beat us this year, the Sharks, have done everything possible to become us. They fired Ron Wilson and hired Red Wings Assistant Coach Todd McLellan. And they do look a lot like us now. It’s kind of scary when guys in teal (teal!) try stealing your identity. I have to admit that they did well at managing the transition from regular season hockey to playoff hockey this year. Pretending to be the Wings seems to work for them.

Prophecy: If the Sharks don’t win the Cup this year, they will forever be a choke team. I mean, they bought one of our coaches and tried to become us, doing a not-half-bad job. What else could they need? An octopus on the ice? Motown hits over the loudpeakers? A trumpet rendition of Hava Nagila during third period? There can be no excuses. If they don’t win this year, they’ll be one of those teams. One of those teams like the post-’71 Bruins. Plus, those fuckers will still be wearing teal.

So, hopefully, for Dinur's sake and the sake of all my in-laws, Thornton will remember this little bit he did last year:

Bottom line for the Wings after this playoff season: As the NHL abandons its dalliance with a defensive approach to the playoffs, the Wings need to come up with some new innovation for these guys to later copy after we beat them. The good news? We probably will.

MULE!!!

DING-DING!

Mitch Albom is right:

But if you look at the totality of the series — the fact that once again, on Sunday night, the Wings gave up the puck far more than Pittsburgh (21 giveaways to 12), the fact that Pittsburgh outshot the Wings in Joe Louis Arena (32 to 26), the fact that Pittsburgh won more face-offs than Detroit (27 to 24) and face-offs are Detroit’s signature pride and joy — well, you have to figure this eventually will find its way onto the scoreboard.

We've been luckier than we've been good. Bottom line--they've hit the post twice. And the Penguins are angry. Tuesday and Thursday are going to be intense.

Let's hope the Wings get some rest tonight and have an easy trip to Pittsburgh. This is not going to be easy.

What A Fuckin' Relief

I hate playing the Mighty Ducks. There's no glory in winning. They're literally a Mickey Mouse team. They're an unnatural abberation. They can only suck. If you lose to them, it's the ultimate humiliation. Michelle had to actually remind me last year that the Ducks beat us one year to go on the win the Stanley Cup. Apparently, I'd blotted out the memory. Well, it took seven games, but we beat these fuckers by a point. Not a single goal from Pavel Datsyuk. I hope my boys pull it together against the Blackhawks. We still have their captain, by the way. I'm hoping that the Wings play a little more normally now that we're not playing the bad karma team from hell.

Grading this weekend. Yippee! I want to write. Kirk gets to play more Civ than me and I'm jealous. I guess I'm just grouchy all around. But we beat the Ducks. I refuse to accept that as an accomplishment. But I have a sinking feeling in my stomach that it is, and that makes me edgy and unhappy. Their defense looked awfully good. It wasn't all Jonas Hiller.

But we advanced. And Chris Osgood's goals against average for the playoffs are 2.06 and his save percentage is 0.921. Everyone who whined about my boy Ozzie can go fuck themselves.

Bring on the Hawks.

Pleasant Memories:The Statue of Liberty Goal

May 29, 2002. My memory has embellished this goal. I seem to recall the triumph on Roy’s face completely dashed. We won 2-0 that night. The next night we crushed them 7-0. I recall that Western Conference Championship as the Candy from Babies Cup.

I Goofed Off Last Night

First things first. The Wings won game 1 against the Avs. I missed the Wings’ dominant first period. Colorado apparently scored first. Ozzie let one in with 11:07 left in the period, annoyingly after only two previous shots on goal. The scorer’s name is Statsny (can you tell I never see regular season hockey? I have no idea who the fucker is—who virtually any of the Avs are). But Hank Zetterberg replied definitively with a goal at 10:14 left in the period. Dan Cleary scored with 6:12 left in the period. I arrived just in time for Johan Franzen to score the Wings’ third goal with 2:37 left in the period. By this time, Colorado had roughly 6 shots on goal as opposed to the Wings’ 12, which is pretty normal for a Wings’ game. By the end of the period, the ratio was 16:7 in favor of the Wings. The offense was looking fine. Still, it’s disturbing that Ozzie let that first goal in. I didn’t see it, so I have no idea how soft it was.

Second period was almost an antistrophe. Johan Franzen scored again with 18:47 seconds left in the period. An Av named Liles scored in response with 14:43 left in the period. The Avs scored again (Hejduk) with 3:31 left in the period. The Wings still outshot the Avs 21:14 in that period, but the Avs picked up production. Moreover, they hadn’t shot many of those shots when Liles scored. So, naturally, I’m worried about Chris.

The third period was scoreless. Shots on goal had more parity, 10:6 in favor of the Wings. Ozzie made some beautiful saves. Prognosis: The Avs were sloppy in the first. Chris lost focus in the second. The Avs didn’t slack off in the third and Chris was back in form. So far, it looks as if we can win the series if we don’t slip up. As with most teams in this league, they just don’t have our firepower. They’re going to come back at us hungrier next game. Quote of the game:

Osgood is hoping the old memories stay in the past.

“If you were to ask the guys that played in those series, they wouldn't be commenting on this one now,” he said. “So, I don't really feel that this is the time for me to comment on or compare the series because there's new players on both sides.”

Well, I don’t expect anyone is expecting the ghost of Patrick Roy to come flying out the tunnel to beat anyone up. What an asshole!

Civ 4

I played Civ 4 for the first time in weeks last night. Craig wanted to watch some blood and gore movie and I was too tired to grade, so I indulged. I had played Tokugawa in the Warlords version (aggressive and protective) for several iterations, wondering if I could develop a conquest machine. No luck. I had a combat-hardened, well-trained military, but you can’t really produce enough units to overwhelm one’s opponents later in the game. I even deliberately kept away from huge cultural developments. I instead focused on trying to create an efficient economy to support the military machine. But no luck. I’d fall behind in technology by the late medieval period. When my military was out-classed by new technology, it was still professional enough to fend off any attack. But I’d fall far behind in score. A hyper-seasoned military doesn’t seem to be an asset.

So in this latest iteration, I’ve been FDR instead (Industrious and organized). I was definitely the wealthiest Civ in the world. But again, toward the late medieval period, I’d fall behind in score (if not really in technology). I was on a very peaceful Confucian continent with Elizabeth and Mansa Musa. Elizabeth and I would up losing a city each to one another due to limited cultural development (I really invested in my city, but the cultural gravity of her nearby capital proved to be too much). The global hegemon, Montezuma came to curb Elizabeth’s power. I was in the bottom half of the game in terms of score from the late medieval period onward, though I was second to Monty in terms of finance and culture. I needed to be creative with my money, but I was way too tired last night to think of anything. It’ll be weeks before I play again.

I’m coming to the conclusion that Civ 4 is just too complex to be much fun. When I do well against the machine, it’s because I’m planning. Who has time to plan for a game? I have enough trouble planning for life.

Checking In

The Wings are up in the series 3-2. I was grading tonight (check out my grading meter), so I didn’t get to see the revenge game. Since I knew Craig would be pissy at me for ignoring him to grade, I let him control the remote. Plus, I really need to get my grading done on time. I have 69 papers and no help.

I did, however catch the fact that Chris Osgood was in goal. I’m quite grateful to see Hasek circulated back out of the line-up for a while. Slinky for a spine, my ass. I’m sick to death of his “Ford pick-up I need to be warmed up for the first ten minutes of the game and be rested for a few more minutes after goals get scored on my ass” bullshit. He just isn’t all that and a bag of chips anymore. Ozzie’s having a good year. I’d love to see him win us another Cup.

Not much other news. My grant application got turned down. That’s okay, though. Like I said, I only managed to get one out. Not a shock that it wouldn’t go through. The point is, I got one application out. Let’s see what I do next year. Baby steps. I’m learning.

Speaking of learning, now you can learn about why queers are queer with this fun video I lifted off of another blog! By the way, in no way do I endorse George's desire to hush Martha's pointing out Heather's bisexuality in order to provide a simplified political point. Not only would this be profoundly un-queer, it would ruin most of my buddies' favorite sexual fantasies. I'd never do that.

PLAYOFFS!

‘Tis the season! The Wings are matched against the Nashville Predators. The bad luck of the President’s Trophy has set in already. Our dish is getting repaired between 4-8 pm tomorrow, just in time to keep me at home for the Game 1 of the series.

I have another Sharks fan for a student this term, too. They’re coming out of the woodworks. I’ll have to offer her condolences in class tomorrow, just in time to start discussing how they’ll write their Hobbes papers.

And yeah, those who have checked the other blog will note that I’m behind on timelining. I gotta get crackin’. Publish or perish, playoffs or no! Plus, I need to get back to the gym. I'm a failure as a queer.

Reflections on Porn and Sports

Next week is Week 8. The term is moving into final swing. This last part is going to be intense. I have to design lessons and readings for roughly ten hours on the Lebanese Civil War. They’re turning in their papers about nationalism in either England or France on Tuesday. I’ll be plugging and chugging the rest of the term. It’s going to be an uphill slog. Dinur will be visiting during Week 10, so it’ll all be pretty fuckin’ nutty.

So, Hattar, you say. What’s been going on? Here’s the all the latest:

Revelation to Twits Everywhere: The Internet Is for Porn

This has been my official position since my sophomore year of college, when I discovered the world of the Usenet. Dumbfucks in the college of education would talk about the importance of getting every child in America hooked up to the internet at school and I’d want to ask them, “So, basically, you really want to give ten year-olds access to gangbangs and hot, man-on-man sex?” But I knew they’d respond much like KateMonster in this video:

But Trekki says it all: “So grab your dick and double-click for PORN, PORN PORN!”

Ozzie Pitches a Shut-Out: Red Wings Smash Avs, 4-0

Yes, razz me all you want, Chris Osgood remains my favorite Detroit Red Wing of all time. Yes, he isn’t a god like Yzerman, or Shanny, or Lidstrom. But he lives for hockey, loves his teammates and is remains one of the cutest guys in the NHL. Yeah, he can be streaky, I admit it. But now and then, he does something truly magnificent, like end a six-game losing streak with a shut-out against the hated Colorado Avalanche. Of course, we’ve gone on to lose to the Flames 0-1 and tonight to the Canucks 1-4 (ouch…), but beating the Avs is still beating the Avs.

Some Loser Sharks Fan Posted to My Blog

I have several actual friends who are Sharks fans, so I don’t automatically label any Sharks fan a loser, even if they’re fans of the team with the gayest color scheme in the NHL. And I don’t mean “gay” in that really good, Seattle Quake Rugby player, hardcore man-on-man sex, I-love-queer-porn kind of a way. I just mean “gay” in that seventh-grade, “you’re a wimpy loser” kind of a way. I mean, teal? Who the fuck wears a teal jersey? I mean it could be pink, but still, teal is pretty bad. By the way, I’m actually gay and an actual Sharks fan had to tell me that the name of that wussy color. I’m a real, bona fide fag and I didn’t know that name of that loser color until Dinur launched into his hilarious defense of his jersey and its pathetic color, years and years ago, back before the flood.

Anyway, seriously—check it out! Here’s dumbfuck’s text:

haha redwings suck, 6 game losing streak! It shows that when your team's average age is like 37 you're going to get tired and injured eventually. Almost every year it comes just before the playoffs, just like now.

Now, you ask, how do I know that Loser’s a Sharks fan? Well, that itself has an interesting story. Because I get this weird-ass comment attached to a blog entry that’s nearly a year old, I naturally zip over to statcounter.com to try to see who might have posted, in case one of my friends is playing a prank on me. Well, it turns out, that I was having quite an active reader day. People from around the world, especially North America and Europe, were hitting my blog looking for a photo called “dinur and joe thornton.jpg”—yup, those exact words down to the “.jpg.” Here’s the photo:

The photo is Dinur’s, but I posted it last year. Now, I renamed the file when I posted it, because Dinur hadn’t and it had that “letters and numbers” filename that cameras give to files. Indeed, I made a google check and, sure enough, my blog is rated superhigh on google image searches for Joe Thornton. As individuals across the world are searching for the file by name, and the search is not “joe thornton shirtless,” I’m assuming that they’re all Sharks fans and not queer boys (or straight girls, for that matter) who like athletes. So, odds are, the Whiny, Toothless Loser is a Sharks fan. Will I deign to respond in words? Why bother? Let’s review an icon that symbolizes a fundamental reality that will remain written in stone for as long as that limp-dicked loser, Ron Wilson, remains coach of the San Jose Sharks. Indeed it’s this icon that set Loser Boy off in the first place:

That’s Pavel Datsyuk firing on the Sharks’ empty net in last year’s playoffs. No team coached by Ron Wilson will ever knock the Wings out of the Stanley Cup playoffs (Remember 1998? I know Sean does) or ever win an Olympic gold medal (I’ll never forget or forgive Nagano). ‘Nuff said?

Well, no, not really. Some wiseass out there will point out (possibly Kirk would say this in that rather understated and detached tone that he likes to employ whenever dropping an analytical bomb on the Green Bay Packers, a tone I doubt I could ever successfully mimic), “Well, certainly your anonymous poster with dubious capitalization is a bit of a loser for not signing his name. I’ll grant you that. Nonetheless, isn’t his analysis essentially correct? Isn’t all of this drama that you’re stirring up essentially a ruse to distract us from the fact that these older, more injury prone Wings are likely to have a spotty end of season record, what with their current injury profile? And isn’t stirring up all this drama just as gay as, well, a Sharks jersey?”

Well, I guess I have to come a little clean. I can’t say that I’m thinking that the Wings are going to be as spectacular as they have been all season through the course of the spring. They have to heal up. It’s true. But I ask you to remember two things:

First, would you want your team to endure the Curse of the President’s Trophy in the playoffs?

Virtually none of you lazy fucks at the age of twenty looked as hot and were in as good a shape as Chris Chelios is at 46. Hockey isn’t football. You critics can go fuck yourselves.

Will Sexy Rexy Return?

Long time readers of this blog (all four of you) may recall that I sometimes get irked that among the leading key terms that lead readers to my blog is the phrase “Rex Grossman shirtless.” The search, incidentally, leads to several pictures like these:

Rex apparently developed a taste for Captain Morgan in his frat boy drinking days. No shirtless pics and no wonder! I mean, you’d have to be a ditzy blonde bimbo like the one in the frat picture to want to fuck Grossman. Well, okay, that or maybe Kabeer Gbaja Biamilla—but that was strictly professional.

Anyway, I want Sexy Rexy to return because KGB plowing his ass makes for excellent Sunday morning porn. But apparently, Lovie Smith wants him back for other reasons. I’m floored, but here’s the text:

“You guys know how we feel about Rex Grossman,” Smith said. “We'd like for him to be a part of our program next year. As we talk about all our players that we've been with, there's been some highs and some lows. But we think Rex Grossman is a good football player and I choose to remember more of those highs. I still don't think he's peaked yet.”

I’d be rolling on the floor with laughter, except the motherfucker is 6-2 against the Packers. Of course, he admits that beating the Packers is his principal goal as a coach in that article. McCarthy’s principle goal is winning the Super Bowl. Nonetheless, it would have been nice to have beaten the Bears before losing the NFC Championship to the New York Football Giants.

Bubba Franks Released

Three-time Pro-Bowler Bubba Franks was released by the Green Bay Packers last week. To rip off the caption, Old Number 88 “played in 114 games for the Packers (94 starts), catching 256 passes for 2,300 yards. His 32 touchdown receptions are tied for 10th on the franchise's all-time list.” Damn. That only leaves Favre and Driver. That’s it. I’m gettin’ old. And I don’t look nearly as hot as Chris Chelios. I need to hit the gym harder this week.

That Cheeky Bastard Dinur

Dinur sent me this photo from the Sharks-Wings game a few nights ago. This is what happens when you become friends with your students. They get cheeky. They send you obnoxious sports photos. They stop asking you questions about social science and start asking you questions like:

Do the Red Wings dislike Osgood? Dominik Hasek plays roughly 2/3 of the team's games, and with the exception of tonight, has a phenomenal season (his GAA before tonight was 1.80, and he was 2nd in the league with 5 shutouts). On nights he doesn't play, the Wings list him as a scratch, and start a guy by the name of Joey MacDonald (sorry, I thought Jimmy Howard, he was the backup last year). They scratch Hasek so that there's no chance of him seeing ice time if he's not the starter. Osgood rarely (if ever) starts for the team any more. Do you think it's just the team grooming a goalie for the future in MacDonald, or do they not think highly of Ozzie in the organization any more?

You see, that cheeky little bastard Dinur knows that I’m a really big fan of Chris Osgood’s. In the realm of male sports banter, that’s called a liability. You see, it’s not that Chris Osgood is that bad. It’s just that he’s not that good. There’s the essential rub. You see, Chris Osgood can be a completely inspired player. He makes some exceptional saves. Back in 1999, I remember my friend Baron Bryan (he’s not Irish—in fact, Bryan is a corruption of Ibrahim—he’s Lebanese! He’s an airline pilot and a hockey goalie, really good-looking and a lot of fun to drink with—I taught him the Arabic alphabet) saying, “Yeah, you see, Osgood will make a great save like that one and then turn around and let in a soft goal later that evening.” Even back in ’99 I’d get flack like that.

When I first became a Wings fan in ’98, I wasn’t really impressed with Osgood until I saw him play live in DC. He’s the most gloriously alive goalie I’ve ever watched. He’s about my height, so he’s not very big for a goalie. He looks like a small tiger when he’s in net. Any goalie can look focused on camera. But off-camera, most goalies stand around looking bored while the puck’s on the other half of the ice. I mean, watching Olaf Kolzig, I swear he could be thinking, “I am so fucking bored [swig of water from sports bottle]. You know, I could be jacking off right now.” Never Chris Osgood. He’s focused every moment he’s in net. He never takes his eyes off the puck. He’s excited. He fucking loves hockey and that’s why I love him. He’s a great sport. No ego, no bullshit. Completely focused on the game. Loves Detroit and his teammates. Couldn’t wait to get back.

To answer your question, Dinur, after that last slump he had that led them to pick up Hasek, I think that the Wings management decided that they wanted a star goalie, which is why they’ve been infatuated with Hasek. Hasek sucked, so they gave Manny Legace a chance, but Legace fell apart in the playoffs. Playoff hockey is like regular season football: each game isn’t purely decisive, but every game counts seriously. The victory in the here and now is absolutely essential. It’s a totally different psychology. Yeah, there was lots of other stuff wrong last year, but Legace’s performance was the most damning part of the Wings’ playoffs fizzle. So they axed Legace. Chris wanted back in, badly enough to take the humiliation. So unless something goes hideously wrong with Red Wings goaltending, I’ve got to think he’s permanently out. He came back for cheap, so they won’t fire him. But he’s dead-ended. They decided after that last slump that he was a nice guy, but he doesn’t have the makings of a legendary goalie. They want a fucking legend.

I love Chris Osgood because he’s a value-rational player. He doesn’t play hockey for the money or for trophies. He plays because he loves the game and he loves his teammates. That’s the reason you play—for the game itself and for the love of your teammates. That’s life in a nutshell—the quest to grow and express the form and the love of those who share the quest. I’ll always cherish Chris Osgood for that. His example made me a better person.

Plus, he’s kinda cute. And I remember the old days.