Archive for NHL
Paul Bissonnette is about to enter his 3rd year in the NHL, his second with the Phoenix Coyotes. In the 41 games he appeared in last season, he scored a paltry 3 goals. But what he lacks in scoring ability on the ice, he more than makes up for in other areas, as evidenced by the above tweet where he reveals a secret to those who are not a tried and true Ladies Men on how to make up a batch of “Panty Soup,” which Bissonnette describes in a later tweet as:
Panties + moister = panty soup. Do not, and I repeat do not get the crab blend. U will instantly regret it. Upset stomach fo sho.
The crab blend would clearly indicate that said young lady is a ho…fo sho.
Apparently, all that is required to whip up a nice, wet bowl of Panty Soup is the Planet Earth DVD. I could see that. As Bissonnette explains in yet another subsequent tweet on the topic:
I’m serious folks. First scene is the polar bear scene with her cubs. The girls melt. Its an f’ing afrodisiac.
Awesome. Thanks, brah! But here’s where old Weed Against Speed one-ups this youngster. How about Planet Earth on freaking Blu-Ray? The girls not only melt, they invite all their friends over for an f’ing orgy, my friends. You’ll be “bating like .750 with that move,” or something. Either he intended to tweet “batting .750″ or he’s explaining that you might be on your own and will be (mastur)”bating” to get off if the young lady has the crab blend going on and you have to throw her out of your pad after she stinks up the joint with dat skeezy move.
Fo sho.
(Updated: you may recall that Bissonnette’s Twitter account, @BizNasty, was the source of much controversy earlier this summer when he criticized Ilya Kovalchuk’s contract. The Twitter account he made those (among other bizarre, highly entertaining statements) on was subsequently shut down, hence the BizNasty2pointO. And I think we are all the better for it).
Hoo boy, talk about it packing a lot of excitement into a short period of time. Patrick Kane’s incredibly epic time with the Stanley Cup included hoisting the coveted trophy at Niagara Falls and getting stuck on a ladder 70 feet in the air in Buffalo on Friday. So, when Saturday came, Kane and the Cup needed some down time to just chill. And what better place to maxin’ and relaxin’ than a Jimmy Buffett concert?
That’s right, Patrick Kane is apparently a Jimmy Buffett fan. Yep, a full-fledged Parrothead. You know, nothing surprises me about this Kane fella anymore.
Kane joined Buffett onstage during the crooner’s concert at Toyota Park in Bridgeview, Illinois. Via the Chicago Tribune:
Jimmy Buffett doesn’t ever really need a reason to celebrate. But Saturday at a packed Toyota Park, he got a big one in the person of Chicago Blackhawk Patrick Kane, who emerged minutes into the concert with the Stanley Cup in hand. Wearing a Hawaiian shirt, the grinning Kane grabbed a tambourine as Buffett performed “Boat Drinks” and footage of the winger’s championship-winning goal aired on projection screens. Hockey, 90-degree temperatures and dozens of bouncing beach balls: Why not? Anything goes with Buffett, just as long as it doesn’t involve work.
What a wild ride it has been for Patrick Kane and Lord Stanley’s Cup. Forget about going back into that stuffy case, the Cup probably needs a tropical island vacation to decompress after the events of the past couple of days.
Jimmy Buffett drinks in hockey, heat and humor at Toyota Park [Chicago Tribune]
Patrick Kane ‘little scared’ while stranded on ladder with Stanley Cup [Puck Daddy]
(previously at the Sportress: Caption: Get Patrick Kane A Bloody Mary Or The Stanley Cup Is Down Niagara Falls!)
By a wide margin, Alexander Ovechkin is easily the Most Interesting Man In The NHL World. That the league does not wholeheartedly embrace his somewhat oddball, but always entertaining antics is a huge mistake, as the NHL, more than any other major professional sport, needs to do a much better job of highlighting and marketing the few engaging personalities they have in the fold, and the fact that the league has chosen the boring, vanilla Sidney Crosby truly shows how shortsighted it can be about how to grow the NHL brand.
Case in point: in a few short months, Ovechkin, the guy who I once dubbed “Unfrozen Caveman Hockey Player” back during my days at Melt Your Face Off, has caused more of a stir in the blogosphere to attract the attention of non-hockey fans than Crosby has done in his career. Ovie has, among other things, taken part in a hedonistic Turkish party boat soiree, been photographed maxing and relaxing while hanging out with a sheep and set the Russian gossip rags ablaze by going out with his new uber-skinny model girlfriend. Let’s face it: the guy knows how to live it up and maybe he might ruffle the feathers of the stodgy traditionalists among the conventional hockey fan set, the fact that people who don’t even follow hockey seem to enjoy following his every move and find him incredibly compelling is a development which the brain wizards behind the NHL’s marketing machine should take notice and embrace.
Now, courtesy of Washington Capitals-centric blog Russian Machine Never Breaks (via D.C. Sports Bog) comes two shining examples which characterize Alexander Ovechkin’s ever-expanding cult of personality. First off is his t-shirt which praises the merits of female streaking seen above (video from which screencap is pulled here – note on video: Moscow looks really nice – is Ovie in a Cold War-era bunker or something?) And even better than that, a video (via Russian Machine’s Twitter account) depicting what every young Russian hotshot dreams of doing: cruising around the streets of Moscow kicking it to some Tupac cranked-up on the car stereo. Picture him rollin’! Actually, you don’t have to picture him rollin’, you can see it for yourself:
And here Roger Federer thought Rafael Nadal was a petulant little jerk.
Roger Federer and Sidney Crosby, titans of their respective sports, were both in town in Toronto over the weekend: Federer for the Rogers Cup and Crosby for…I don’t know, for a dose of Canadianicity or something. But OMG! Guess what? Their birthdays are only one day apart! Crosby turned 23 on Saturday and Federer turned the ancient – in professional tennis terms – 29.
Unfortunately, the two were supposed to meet up and mess around on the tennis courts but the rainy weather in Toronto altered practice schedules and it was not to be. After undoubtedly throwing a temper tantrum – I’m speculating here, but it wouldn’t be shocking – Crosby, a self-described avid tennis fan, still thought it was pretty cool to meet the legendary Federer (via the Toronto Star)
“Just getting a chance to meet some of these guys is enough,” said Crosby, “but I’d love to be able to hit around (with one of the big stars).”
Crosby, after yet another temper tantrum because he couldn’t get the straw stuck into his Capri-Sun (just kidding, he probably only had one meltdown) added:
“Getting the chance to meet Roger and a few of the guys is something I want to take advantage of here,” said the Pittsburgh Penguins captain. “I follow (tennis) a lot … so this is a pretty neat experience for me.
“He mentioned that he watched the Olympics and stuff like that. I’d mentioned that I’d seen him play in the U.S. Open, pretty general talk,” said Crosby. “I think it’s pretty neat, being athletes and being able to relate to certain things, it’s always fun to understand and learn what he may go through.”
Fascinating. Now, for those of you who find video of two grown men being forced to pose in front of a shared birthday cake intoxicating, video follows.
No, really, Forbes actually ranked Kevin McHale the best general manager in sports back in 2007 when he was well on his way to completely ruining the Minnesota Timberwolves franchise (well KG had something to do with it too, but that’s another story for another time) – so take the fact that the esteemed magazine (except when it writes anything about sports, clearly) ranked Red Sox fans as America’s best with a grain of salt. Below is a brief explanation of the methods Forbes used in determining that a lowbred population of loudmouthed Yah Doods and their pink Red Sox hat-wearing hussy counterparts are the absolute best fans in the country. I’m just kidding, not every member of Red Sox Nation is a knuckle-dragging moron, just the ones that the average person comes into contact with on a daily basis. That’s all.
Via Forbes:
To produce a list of the best fans in U.S. sports, we looked at every team in the “Big Four” U.S. professional sports leagues: football (NFL), basketball (NBA), baseball (MLB), and hockey (NHL).
For each team, we gathered three different metrics. First, we measured their home and away game attendance, which indicates a team’s drawing power in its home market and nationwide. Then we counted their merchandise sales (Numbers for the NFL, NBA and MLB were provided to us by Sportsonesource, a sporting good industry analyst, and the NHL gave us their own data). Finally, we ranked each team’s in-market popularity, based on surveys of American sports teams by Turnkey Sports and Entertainment. We ranked all of the teams, then took the top four from each of the four leagues.
How scientifical. It’s almost like they put some real honest effort into this exercise. Oh, and if you happen to be curious, Steeler Nation came in at second best, followed by, er, Red Wings Nation at the third spot. Fascinating.
Well done, Forbes, but no matter how scientifically sound your methods happen to be and irrespective of whether or not any of your sports-related findings end up being generally agreed upon by most people, whatever sports-related findings your periodical comes up with, no one is going to buy it, Because you, Forbes, named Kevin McHale the best general manager in sports.
EVERYONE DENIES THIS!!
America’s Best Sports Fans [Forbes]
Best General Managers In Sports [Forbes]
Courtesy of the fine folks at Mr. Irrelevant comes news that Alexander Ovechkin has a new piece of arm candy, svelte Russian model, Valeria Sokolova.
From a LifeSports.ru report via the fan site, Alex Ovetjkin (please note the amusing Russian-to-English translation):
Alexander Ovechkin seems to have fallen for, this time for real. The romance between a shaggy forward and model Valeria Sokolova develops in full swing, Sasha introduces his new passion to all his friends and does not let a long-legged blonde go one step away…
The girls with forms has always been around Ovechkin, like the domestic showbiz diva Maria Grigoryeva-Appolonova or Victoria Lopyreva. Now the power forward has changed his taste and can’t see enough of the delicate silhouette of this female model.
Girls with forms? That’s a new one. Of course, as mentioned above, the translation may have something to do with the odd phrasing, otherwise it causes me to think this terribly thin gal was once a spokesmodel at Mathematical Supplies Trade Show (“Hey, check out the chick holding the three-dimensional dodecahedron model…she’s hot!”)
Just because I know you are dying to see what caliber of Russian gal an Unfrozen Caveman Hockey Player with millions of rubles can land, a photo gallery of the leggy, waifish Sokolova follows:
What the fungus? Who is that broad and how will she help sell games? The decision to put some unknown lesbian on the cover of NHL Slapshot truly boggles the mind, doesn’t it? Especially coming from an incredibly successful company like EA Sports. A rare miss.
What’s that? That’s The Great One, Wayne Gretzky? You gotta be kidding me. What in tarnations has happened to the guy? And what’s the deal with the hair? I would hate to have to be the person to break it to him, but That 70s Show has been off the air for years, so there’s no chance Gretzky is landing that cameo appearance he is clearly coveting with that hairdon’t. Jebus.
Get a haircut, Wayne, you damn lesbo-looking hippie. And try to find some modicum of self respect before you end up on the Men Who Look Like Old Lesbians website.
[H/T for image to Pro Hockey Talk]
Sweet fancy Moses! What in the holy hell are they wearing? Did I get sucked into a temporal wormhole and come out at a 1920s beach party on the other end?
Technically, these atrocious get-ups are not the actual wedding garb worn by Detroit Red Wings forward Henrik Zetterberg and his blushing bride, Swedish television personality Emma Andersson (the extra “s” is for “swimwear”), but instead are the outfits worn by every single person who was invited to a pre-nuptials swimming party in Molle, Sweden. I imagine there is nothing better than being forced to put on ridiculous outfits after already being forced to attend a damn wedding. They look like they are wearing the standard prison garb at a penitentiary where Aquaman is the warden. Or something. I’m sorry, I’m not thinking too clearly right now – the black and white motif is screwing up my rods and cones and making my brain hurt.
Here is how Johanna Hellsten of the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet depicted the scene:
Det blev en rivstart på tv-profilen Emma Andersson och hockeyproffset Henrik Zetterbergs tre dagar långa bröllopsfirande. När bröllopsgästerna anlände till Grand hôtel i Mölle strax efter tre i går eftermiddag blev de serverade den norrländska drinken vargtass. Men något helt annat skulle göra dagen till en riktigt blöt tillställning.
Aha. I see Interesting.
Unfortunately, no mention on where the couple is registered, but I would guess the safe bet would be IKEA.
European Red Wings congregate in Sweden for Henrik Zetterberg’s wedding [Detroit Free-Press]
”Nu smäller det” [Aftonbladet]
Fourteen years. It has been fourteen long years since the NHL callously broke the hearts of an entire community when they ripped the beloved Jets out of Winnipeg, transplanted the franchise to Phoenix and renamed them the Coyotes. And as the Coyotes franchise continues to deal with problematic ownership issues, there have been mutterings that a potential return of the NHL to the largest city in Manitoba, Canada is a possibility, albeit a long shot. And while talks have been mildly encouraging, none of these rumblings have taken away the sting and pain endured by the region’s betrayed residents, nor will Jets fans ever get over their collective heartbreak over losing the team.
Well, for one individual, the frustration finally boiled over. This particular soul, a 32-year-old resident of nearby Lundar, Manitoba, reached the point of no return and realized he was mad as hell and he wasn’t going to take it anymore. As any sane person would do when facing a similar issue, he called 911 to air his grievances regarding the Jets leaving town in 1996 and demanded that RCMP officers do anything in their power to get the Jets to move back to Winnipeg. He has been charged with “public mischief, false messages, harassing phone calls and obstructing justice.”
It was announced earlier today that Jonathan Toews will be the cover boy for EA Sports NHL 11. Toews is following in the footsteps (skatesteps?) of teammate Patrick Kane, who previously was bestowed the honor when he was the featured athlete on the cover of NHL 10. From NHL.com:
“I am really excited to be on the cover of NHL 11,” Toews said. “It’s been an amazing year for me and the team, and it’s nice to end it by being a part of a game I played growing up. The NHL games have always been great, so it’s an honor for me to be a part of the EA Sports family.”
“Jonathan Toews is one of the best centers in the NHL today,” said Jordan Edelstein, Vice-President of Marketing for EA Sports. “He is a great ambassador for the sport of hockey and his impact on the sport this year is undeniable. It’s great to have him in the EA Sports family.”
Jesus, Toews is living the frigging dream, man. A gold medal, a Stanley Cup championship, a video game cover, all at the ripe old age of 22? Not fair, man. I knew I should have played hockey. Or maybe just learned how to skate. Or blown off the restraining order and agreed to appear at the 2010 MuchMusic Awards with Miley Cyrus. Okay, that last one is a lie. Sadly, life is chock full of regrets. Making a poorly-executed Miley Cyrus joke is just another example of that.
Toews follows in Kane’s footsteps with NHL 11 [NHL.com]
(previously at the Sportress: Jonathan Toews + Miley Cyrus + Awards Show Banter = Awkward)
