Live From Winnipeg: Jets-Penguins Review

My friend Christian and I are attempting to attend a National Hockey League game in every city with a team. While our annual hockey road trips haven’t been as annual lately (thanks to kids and Covid), we’re closing in on our goal. This year, joined by our friend Jason, we visited Winnipeg along with North Dakota. I already wrote about our dining experience in Winnipeg and will write a separate post about being a tourist in Winnipeg, our time in Grand Forks, North Dakota, and how we confused both American and Canadian border agents. This post focuses on the Winnipeg Jets-Pittsburgh Penguins hockey game. Please note that there are plenty of non-hockey related items, so please continue reading even if you’re not a hockey fan.

Let’s start with scheduling this trip. Our initial idea was to attend a Jets game as well as a University of North Dakota hockey game. Unfortunately, the timing didn’t work out for a UND hockey game though we did incorporate a visit to a University of North Dakota football game instead. Because why wouldn't you go to a UND football game when you have the chance? Fortunately, the timing matched up with seeing the Jets face my hometown team, the Pittsburgh Penguins. I figured out that it's been over a decade since I attended my last Penguins game. In the pre and early Alexander Ovechkin era in Washington, it was really easy to get tickets to Pens-Caps games. That changed when the Caps started being good, and ticket prices got a lot more expensive. And while I go back to Pittsburgh at least once or twice a year, I haven't been to PPG Paints Arena, except to see the Harlem Globetrotters. This is a long way of writing that I was very excited to see Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin in person again.

Trying to be a gracious tourist, I didn't want to walk around Winnipeg and the arena wearing Penguins gear. However, I wanted to show that I am from Pittsburgh for people who might understand.

Even though there were a lot more people in Penguins gear than I expected (I forgot that Crosby is a national hero in Canada), exactly zero people commented on my shirt. 

Going with the Jets (and Top Gun) theme, I liked that the home team hits the ice to Danger Zone by Kenny Loggins.

That's Kenny Loggins!

For no apparent reason, the Jets have two mascots. The first is Benny, who served as the team's mascot in the 80s and 90s before the team moved to Arizona and is now the secondary mascot. Benny is named for the former team owner Ben Hatskin and for the song Bennie and the Jets because nothing represents Sir Elton John's longstanding ties to Winnipeg like a blue mascot with a giant red nose and mohawk.

The second mascot is Mick E. Moose, which may be one of the worst names in mascot history and seems like a Disney lawsuit waiting to happen. The silhouette of Mick E. visiting our section might give you nightmares!

When the Jets score a goal, the arena blasts Takin' Care Of Business by Bachman-Turner Overdrive (along with the goal horn). Fun fact: the band is from Winnipeg, so this song makes perfect sense. The mascot really should be called BTO rather than Benny. Anyway, after the initial playing of the song, the arena staff figure out who scored the goal, and each player has their own individual song. It's a very cool idea that I haven't seen before. While one player had your standard AC/DC goal celebration song and the others weren't very memorable, Adam Lowry's goal song is Espresso by Sabrina Carpenter which is certainly a choice. 

The Jets have a house band called Mach 10 that perform between periods. At one point during one of their sets, the lead singer announced that they were going to play a song that is a fan-favorite and represents Winnipeg. Was it a BTO song? Bennie and the Jets? If you guessed Bon Jovi's Livin' on a Prayer, you win!

I appreciate Winnipeg making me and others from Pittsburgh feel like home.

Mid-way through the second period, a chant of "Where is Rutger?" emerged throughout the entire arena. Rutger McGroarty was the Jets 1st round draft pick in 2022. While I don't know the entire story, it seems that Rutger never wanted to play in Winnipeg, so the team traded him to the Penguins over the summer. The one thing you can't do as a player is say that you don't want to be there. Fans hate that more than anything else, so even those wearing Penguins gear joined the chant. I tried to answer the question by explaining that Rutger is currently in Wilkes Barre-Scranton, home of the Penguins top minor league affiliate, but no one seemed to acknowledge my response.

Before the game, the team had a nice tribute to forward Bryan Little who had one last pregame skate with the team. I didn't realize that Little played his last game in 2019 but only formally retired recently. He is a fan favorite in Winnipeg.

This is the best jersey I saw at the Canada Life Centre:

If you really want to see highlights from a game that occurred a month ago, please check out the video below. The game recap is here too. You might notice that Pittsburgh center Lars Eller had two goals for the Pens. I think he is a solid veteran that the Penguins would want to help the team win. (Sean's note: The Penguins traded Eller to the Washington Capitals last week, so never mind.)

A month after this game, the Penguins are near the bottom of the Eastern conference standings and like this game in Winnipeg, regularly lose leads. Meanwhile, the Jets are 16-3 with the best record in the league. If the Penguins aren't going to win the Stanley Cup, I'm going to support the Jets especially since I can say that I attended one of their games during their championship season. And here are a few more pictures.

State of the Union Suggestions

Joe Biden will deliver the State of the Union tonight at the Capitol Building. Like most of these speeches over the last decade and beyond, I expect there to be multiple standing ovations by members of presidents' party and silence from the opposing party. While Biden often talks about bringing people together, I think he can do this tonight by having both Democrats and Republicans stand, or at least applaud, at portions of his address. Here are my suggestions on things he can say to unify both political parties:

* Dolly Parton is a national treasure and a saint.

* Major League Baseball needs to reach an agreement immediately so that the season starts on time.

* Abolish daylight savings time.

* I believe that children are our future. Teach them well and let them lead the way. Show them all the beauty they possess inside.

* Sean’s Ramblings is a great blog. (Actually, this might unify both parties in that this comment will result in absolute silence.)

* "President Reagan once said, Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. Well, Frito-Lay, bring back Bar-B-Q Fritos!"

* Sidney Crosby is the best overall hockey player over the last 20 years.

* Zaxby's is underrated.

This should just about cover everything. If there's anything that's missing, please share them in the comments. I'll be sure to pass them on to President Biden and his speechwriters!

Sidney Crosby Saves Game

Sidney Crosby is an awesome hockey player. Reason #947 was this play on Thursday night to prevent the New York Islanders from tying game 3 of the first round playoff series late in the third period.

Yes, most hockey players would have done the same thing in this situation, but it's one of the greatest players of the last 20 years being in the right position late in the game.

Meanwhile, Ben Roethlisberger is the greatest quarterback in Pittsburgh Steelers history. The Steelers would not have reached 3 Super Bowls and won 2 of them without him. While it's not really fair to compare Sid and Ben and the two plays, I'm doing it anyway. This was Ben in the playoffs earlier this year.

Again, I know that it's not fair to compare the two plays and James Conner was also there for the Steelers, but there didn't appear to be any urgency by Ben on this play. 

By the way, this is my final blog post in my 30 blog post in 30ish days challenge. Go me!

Make Sports Blowouts Fun!

Something unusual happened at the end of the Pittsburgh Penguins-New Jersey Devils game on Saturday. No, it’s not the empty net, buzzer-beating goal by Sidney Crosby from the opposite side of the rink. It’s that Pens’ defenseman Kris Letang took the face off (or at least stood in the face off circle) to end the game. (Start at the 8:20 mark of the video for the Crosby goal and Letang "faceoff.")

According to Hockey Reference, Letang has played in 856 regular season games over 15 seasons. This was only the fifth time Letang took a face off in his NHL career. So my question is why don’t defensemen ever take face offs?

Look, I know that it’s about positioning. If a defenseman is taking the face off, that means that a center or wing will have to take his/her spot. Plus, it’s likely that defensemen never practice face offs. However, you’re telling me that no defenseman in the league could regularly win faceoffs? There are likely many NHL defensemen who played on offense growing up or in the minors. I’m sure they won plenty of faceoffs then. Maybe they were the best at winning faceoffs on their teams or even in their leagues. However, due to their professional position, they never (or very rarely) take faceoffs now. I feel like there has to be a few NHL defensemen who could win a faceoff if a team really needs a win at the end of a period or game. Or if the game is a blowout, why not let defensemen from each team take a face off for something different?

This goes to a larger point in sports. I think most people enjoy the unusual aspects of the game. It's fun to see a position player pitch in baseball, though this happens weekly now.

I enjoy seeing Phillip Evans leading the Pirates pitching staff in ERA!

To see an offensive or defensive lineman score a touchdown. 

To see a goalie score a goal, especially one from near their opponent's goal like the one at the 2:30 mark of the video.

I suggest more of this in sports. If a team is down by 10 in the 9th inning of a baseball game, have someone who throws left-handed play 3rd base, shortstop, or 2nd base! Play all defenders on a power play! Have your center play point guard! So many possibilities!

Arsenal Player Eats During Game

I'm sharing a video that will likely get removed rather quickly. (Update: The video got blocked almost immediately.)



On January 1st, I was home celebrating the first day of 2020 by watching an English Premier League match between Arsenal and Manchester United. As you can see (by the pictures below, not the video), near the end of the second half, Arsenal's Lucas Torreira is clearly eating chocolate, an energy bar, or something else in the middle of the game.

Then, it appears that he put the remaining food into his pocket. My immediate thought was this seems really unusual, and then I began considering this from the perspective of a soccer referee. I don't think there is anything in the Laws of the Game that would prevent someone from having a mid-game snack. However, if a player threw or spit the food at someone, the player would receive a red card.

Now I kind of hope that this becomes a trend though I'm sure it would come down to sponsorships. Look, there's LeBron James running the Lakers offense while eating a McDonald's Big Mac! And there's Michael Thomas of the New Orleans Saints making an incredible one-handed catch...because he's holding a KIND bar in his other hand. How is Sidney Crosby able to make such an amazing pass while holding and eating a bag of Skittles?

Maybe eating during games will encourage more youth to play sports?

Random Ramblings

I know that I’ve talked about Wegmans many times over the years, but I wanted to add one more story about how awesome they are. Pedro Tulo was “helping” me put groceries on the belt from the cart and accidentally dropped the container of hummus, causing the package to crack. Fortunately, the hummus didn’t get all over the place. The cashier saw this and had a colleague get a brand new container without charging us. I’m sure that other stores do this too, but it was still nice of Wegmans to not have the “you break it, you buy it” policy.

In a parking lot last week, I squeezed into a space and when I opened the door, it slammed into the car next to mine thanks to some very strong winds. Naturally, the driver was in the car when this happened and gave me a “what the heck” gesture. I quickly looked at his car and saw no damage before giving a sorry gesture and also tried to pantomime that it was really windy. Then I walked away. I’m not sure what else I could or should have done.

Reason #1786 that Sidney Crosby is awesome: Watch this between the legs pass.



I love the Australian Open and Grand Slam tennis in general. (I also write some variation of this regularly.) With DirecTV, I get the mix channel for the tournament’s first week where I can watch up to 5 matches at once and then switch to any (or all) of them. They have this for the other Grand Slam tournaments, but I typically can’t watch during the day. With the time difference, I enjoyed flipping between matches before going to sleep. Someday, I’m going to visit Australia and attend the Australian Open. It will probably be 20 years, but it’s going to happen! (I'm going to visit New Zealand too on this trip!)

Finally, my favorite DC-area artist Emma G has a new song and video titled Living Proof. Check in out! (You can also learn more about Emma G on her website.)

Sidney Crosby Is Good at Hockey (Again)

This is Crosby's game-winning overtime goal Tuesday night in Edmonton.

Same play but with different announcers.

For clarification, the "again" in the title of the post is not to suggest that Sidney Crosby was bad at hockey at any point of his NHL career. I wrote a different post titled Sidney Crosby Is Good At Hockey earlier this year.

Maria Sharapova and Sidney Crosby

Wimbledon starts in less than a week, and it appears that there may be a new player in the tournament: Sidney Crosby

With apologies to Milos Raonic, Genie Bouchard, and Denis Shapovalov, Crosby would easily be the most-famous Canadian player in the tournament. I have no idea why Sharapova and Crosby are together, but this is pretty cool since Wimbledon is an awesome place to visit.

By the way, if you want to go down a sad path, take a look at some of the comments to this tweet. (I really hope that Sharapova ignores this.)

- Looking gorgeous

- I and you on the beach!

- This is my fifth tweet and you are not responding. Love from Pakistan.

- Don't know if Sid and Maria are dating.. One thing for sure, they both have awesome legs!

Okay, this last one made me chuckle.

Photos from Maria Sharapova's Twitter account.

Sidney Crosby Is Good At Hockey

There was a time when I considered Sean's Ramblings to be a Pittsburgh sports blog where I also wrote about other stuff. If you go back about 10 years, particularly during football season, my guess is probably half of the posts were related to Pittsburgh sports. Now, it seems rare to have a post about Pittsburgh sports.

Thankfully, Sidney Crosby did this on Wednesday which deserves it's own post.




(It took SportsNet some time to realize how insane Crosby's goal is/was.)




Washington's NBC affiliate (WRC) showed this goal multiple times during the 11:00 PM news on Wednesday night, and I found it amusing hearing them say something to the extent that we know you hate Sidney Crosby, but he's really, really good.

Postcard to Canada

We recently bought a new stroller and being the responsible parents that we are, completed the registration information to return to the company in case there are any product recalls in the future. When I went to mail the postcard, however, I noticed that the mailing address was in Nova Scotia, Canada, and it said free postage in Canada. While I was certainly fine with sending a postcard to Sidney Crosby's home province, since I don't live in Canada and have no plans on driving or flying across the border, I had to buy a stamp. Do you know how much it costs to send a postcard to Canada? $1.15!! No wonder I don't write letters to Canada!

This got me thinking though. The company that made the stroller is Britax, a pretty big player in the car seat and stroller market. No offense to my Canadian neighbors, but I was surprised that Britax didn't have an American address to send this. Maybe they are unhappy with all of the discussions about renegotiating NAFTA and want to take more money from its American customers from us buying stamps from, um, the US Postal Service?

Anyway, it turns out that there was also a product registration postcard that we can send to Allentown, where they may or may not be closing all the factories down. Britax was so prepared that they had registration postcards available for BOTH American and Canadian customers. We just only noticed the first one. I guess we'll fill out the second postcard and mail it for free.

Well, I know who to blame for all of this! (This video is NSFW!)

Congrats Pittsburgh Penguins

I'm posting this on Thursday morning more than 72 hours after the Pittsburgh Penguins won the franchise's fifth Stanley Cup including back-to-back titles and about 24 hours after the victory parade. I'm happy for the team and organization (feel free to say organization like they do in Canada - organ-I-zation), the city of Pittsburgh, and my fellow Penguins fans. What's odd is that while I'm happy, I'm not exuberant. I don't think I'm being complacent; it's just that I'm getting older and maybe sports aren't as important to me as they used to be which is an extremely odd thing for me to write. Old me would have written this blog post Sunday night or Monday morning.

When the Pens won their first two Stanley Cups in 1991 and 1992, I believe that I watched the games in Pittsburgh at my home with my dad and brother. When the Pens defeated the Red Wings, I watched game seven over at a friend's house. Last year, I watched the clinching game at home by myself. This year, not only did I watch the game at home by myself, I actually fell asleep and missed half of the second period and most of the third period. While my six year old loves sports and asks every morning who won games from the previous night, I wasn't going to let him stay up to watch a game on a school night. So I basically watched the game at home with my computer at my side following Twitter.

This seems a little sad though that's where my life is. Spending hours at a bar (and probably $25+ on food and drinks) to watch the Penguins game doesn't appeal to me and really isn't practical. Honestly, the reason I probably wasn't as excited about the Pens' win is because there was a family situation this weekend (everything is okay and may be a future blog post), and my mind was preoccupied with that and an appointment on Monday morning.

This post seems a bit depressing. Sorry. I'm happy that the Penguins won. I really am. I'm happy that Crosby and Malkin were able to "secure their legacies" and that Marc-Andre Fleury got another Cup. That Matt Cullen at age 40 won again and long-time NHL vets like Ron Hainsey and Mark Streit won their first titles after about a combined 25 years in the league. Chris Kunitz has 4 Cups! Matt Murray has played in only 62 regular season games and has two championships. This Pens team is extremely likable (even for those of you who hate Crosby, you can read this), so good for them and Pens fans.

So congratulations to the Pittsburgh Penguins! Now here are some pictures to commemorate the championship.

Embed from Getty Images

Embed from Getty Images

Photos by Getty and Matt Sunday of DKPittsburghSports. I don't know who deserves credit for the Justin Schultz photo.

Interview With Empty Netters' Seth Rorabaugh

I'm excited to introduce Seth Rorabaugh of Empty Netters in this latest installment of the Pittsburgh Sports Blogger Interview Series. Seth writes Empty Netters, a blog published on the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette's website, which is a must-read for any Pittsburgh Penguins or hockey fan. I think you'll enjoy this.

You're in a unique situation where you write a blog for a major newspaper. What is your background and how did you start working for the Post-Gazette? Were you hired specifically to write Empty Netters?

I started working at the Post-Gazette in the fall of 1998 as a freelancer. I was going to and living at Point Park College (now university) for a degree in journalism. One of my professors was a copy editor at the Post-Gazette and got me a job just answering phones on Friday nights for high school football. I did that for a year answering phones for all sorts of sports such as basketball in the winter and baseball in the spring. The next fall, I "graduated" to typing agate (i.e. box scores, standings, statistics, etc.). A year after that (fall of 2000), I was hired a full-time news assistant typing agate and other entry-level things. I did a little writing for high schools and small colleges throughout the years and started doing a little copy editing on the night desk for sports. In 2007, I started doing the blog in my spare time. Over time, it's has morphed into a full-time position.

The Post-Gazette credentials get you access to the Penguins and NHL teams and players that most bloggers don't have. Have there been interviews or people that you met that stand out either in a good way or a not-so-good way? Have you ever been star struck?

There have been a ton of interviews that stand out in good and bad sense. Easily the best for me personally was when Sidney Crosby was kind enough to give me an hour and a half one day during the lockout. We just sat in the bleachers at Southpoint and talked. I think part of it was that he didn't have anything else to do. Over the years, I've encountered lots of good and surprising interviews. In no particular order, Paul Bissonnette, Martin Brodeur, Steve Yzerman, Frans Nielsen, Bryce Salvador, Nicklas Lidstrom, Andy Murray, Brent Johnson, Matt Niskanen, Teemu Selanne, Ben Lovejoy, Mike Commdore, Andrew Ference, Toby Petersen, Ron Francis, Patrick Roy, Scott Hartnell, Jaromir Jagr are some that really stand out in a good way. For various reasons, John Tortorella, Erik Karlsson, Peter DeBoer, Patrik Elias, Zdeno Chara, Brad Marchand, Lindy Ruff, Adam Oates and Dwayne Roloson stand out as some of the worst. I will admit I still get a little star struck around the likes of Jagr or anyone of that era that I grew up watching. I'm really eager to interview Selanne again when the Ducks are in town next week. I still act professionally (or I hope I do) when I interview those players, but the seventh-grader in me is ecstatic when some of those players come around.

A 90-minute conversation with Sidney Crosby seems unreal. What all did you talk about? I sort of hope him living at Mario's house came up.

During the lockout, we (myself and other Penguins reporters) talked to Crosby and the other Penguins players working out down at Southpointe a lot. Under normal circumstances, a PR person will usually shuffle you away after 10-15 minutes. During the lockout, the players and team employees were not allowed to interact so we sort of had free reign on talking to these guys on and off the record. Most of them were really generous of their times and sometimes, I think they just had nothing else to do other than talk to us. Crosby was sort of in that boat. One day, I just asked him if he had a little bit of time for an interview. He said yes and we just sat in the stands and talked. After about 20 minutes, I asked if he needed go leave. He said no. I asked again after 40 minutes and he said no again. I published this Q&A and it turned out great in my opinion.

Not a question but a comment. I'm not at all surprised that John Tortorella made your list for worst interview subjects.

The shame about Tortorella is that he is very intelligent and has some tremendous insight into the game. There are occasional moments (I.E. non-game days) where he will hold court with reporters and answer all kinds of questions about the general state of the game. One time, I asked him about the art of "clearing the crease." And talked about how different it is today with the newer interference rules and gave a very detailed response. Sadly, he doesn't offer much on the day of game.

One of my favorite features of Empty Netters are the pictures taken of folks wearing hockey jerseys. How did you start taking game-day pictures? Do you ask people to pose for pictures or just roam around the arena taking action shots?

When I would "live" blog the home games in the first year or so of EN, I would attend as a fan then watch the game on my DVR and type up the play by play. I would add my notes I took from the game in person and link to photos of a players jersey I saw. So if I saw someone in a Janne Laukkanen jersey, I basically would do a Google image search for a Janne Laukkanen photo and link to that. Eventually, I joined the rest of humanity and bought a phone with a camera and started just taking the photos.

During hockey season, you write multiple lengthy posts per day with play-by-play coverage of every Pens games as well as sharing links from throughout the hockey world. Do you have any hobbies during the season besides following/writing about hockey?

I'm a big college football fan but as the season really kicks in, my time to watch that sport wanes. I also have a fantasy football league with some of my best friends from high school. I can only really indulge most of my hobbies in the summer. During those months, I swim and ride my bike as much as possible.

Is there ever a time like a February game against the Florida Panthers where you want to take a night off?

There are times in October that I feel that way. I love this sport, but trying to cover it, or at least cover it well, is a very time consuming endeavor. Unlike baseball, covering a night game takes up an entire day virtually. A morning skate starts at 10:30 a.m. You stick around the rink to cover both teams' skates until roughly 1:30 p.m. You can get home, do a little writing/research then you need to be back at the rink by 5 p.m. for a 7 p.m. start. Depending how late the game goes, you might not leave until midnight. When you work in sports in any capacity, you must understand you have to sacrifice a lot of your free time. I've skipped a lot of weddings, parties, family events etc., to cover the team.

I'm always amazed at how much I seem to learn about Penguins players and history by your posts. Would you consider yourself a Pens historian?

I like to think I have a good mind on Penguins history but anytime I'm around Penguins broadcaster Bob Grove or PittsburghHockey.net Webmaster Jim Kubus, I feel pretty inadequate in that area. They are the best Penguins historians around.

Has your work ever been featured in the print section of the Post-Gazette? Would you like your work to be published there?

I occasionally write for the paper if I happen across an interesting story or even a scoop. Most of my work is online and frankly, I'm much more comfortable writing for an online format than a print. Mainly, I enjoy the virtually unlimited space you can write with on line.

Can you explain your post on The Pensblog about three years ago where you asked readers to contact the Post-Gazette editors about Empty Netters? (At this point, I fully expect you to take off the microphone, declare that this interview is over and storm out.)

Sean, I'm under a non-disclosure agreement with my editors to not discuss that post on the Pensblog publicly. I can only reference my post on EN which followed it up. I appreciate your understanding on that.

Why the "great" Joe Vitale? He can never replace the great Mike Zigomanis!

A former Penguins writer for the Post-Gazette used to reference Dick Tarnstrom as "the great Dick Tarnstrom" in Q&A's with the readers. As a bit of a "tribute" to that writer, I started calling Mike Zigomanis "The great Mike Zigomanis" when he strung together a few good games. When he left, that "honor" fell onto Martin Skoula and eventually Joe Vitale. Vitale actually asked me about it once this season because he follows me on Twitter and I explained to him the lineage with Zigomanis and Skoula. A teammate was privy to the conversation and sarcastically said, "That's some great company Joe." Vitale calls me "The great Seth Rorabaugh" in return.

Finally, do you have any predictions about the Penguins, either as a team or for individual players this season?

I think they'll be one of the five best teams in the NHL this regular season. But the regular season hasn't really been their problem the last few years. It's the postseason. I usually hesitate to predict the postseason this time of year. So many things like trades or injuries can occur between now and then.

Thanks again to Seth to participating in my interview series. Make sure to check out Empty Netters everyday and follow Seth on Twitter @emptynetters.

Sid and Geno As Larry and Balki Bartokomous

I really should write about last night's Steelers-Browns game, but I couldn't pass up sharing the latest video by Benstonium.

This is just the excuse I've been looking for to incorporate Balki Bartokomous into one of my blog post. Plus, this is a great video. Enjoy!

Crosby's Back

All anyone in the hockey world is talking about is Sidney Crosby's back. Here is a picture of his back:



Oh, maybe they're talking about Crosby returning to the Penguins to face the New York Islanders tonight. As always, Benstonium put together a terrific video to welcome back Sid.



Let's Go Pens!

2011 Winter Classic Predictions

I am a Pittsburgh Penguins fan born and raised in Pittsburgh. I have also now lived in the Washington DC area for almost a decade, so I follow the Capitals rather closely. Therefore, I thought I would contact bloggers who are fans of the Pens and the Caps to get their takes on the Winter Classic, scheduled for 1:00 PM Eastern time on New Year's Day.

Your participants:

Ben of Capitals Outsider
Seth Rorabaugh of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette's Empty Netters
Sean Leahy of Yahoo! Sports - Puck Daddy
Rob of Storming the Crease
Brandon of This is Getting Old
Ngewo of Ngewo's World
Pat of Igloo Dreams
Cory of Three Rivers Burgh Blog
Sean of Sean's Ramblings

What a solid group! Anyway, I asked these folks the following five questions about the Winter Classic. Check out their responses.

1. Please predict Alexander Ovechkin's stats for the Winter Classic (ex. goals, hits, penalty minutes).

Ben -1 goal, 1 assist
Seth - 1 assist. The ice will be too slushy for skill player to do much. Expect some dirty goals.
Leahy - No goals, three hits, 0 PIMs

Rob - Ovechkin will register a hat trick, have 5 hits and 4 penalty minutes on Saturday. Or he could just skate around, hit people, and maybe register an assist. The Caps hope for the former, the Pens the latter. The truth probably lies somewhere in between.

Brandon - Ovechkin is always a threat every time he steps on the ice, but he has never faced a scenario quite like this before and will need change things up if he wants to be a factor in the game. Last Wednesday the Pens defense seemed to have figured out how to limit his scoring chances AND there is the potential for weather and ice conditions that will limit his mobility so his stat line will probably look something like this: 0 G, 1 A, 5 SOG, +/- 0, 4 Hits, 2 PIMS, TOI: 22:30

Ngewo - 1 goal, 3 hits, 2:00

Pat - One hit, where he tries to kill Malkin (again), but misses (again) and flies through the glass above the boards instead, knocking himself out of the game.

Corey - Oh man. Michalek is going to be like white on rice (if we are talking about white rice and not brown or Cajun rice) so it is going to be hard for OV to get a ton of opportunities. He will get his scoring chances and probably put one into the nets. You think the "refs you suck" chant was bad at the Steelers/Oakland game wait till you hear the boo birds for that goal announcement. He will probably take a run at Geno and get two minutes but it won't be a Penguins power play because Matt Cooke will probably breathe to negate any Penguins power play. I also predict that OV might step foot in his own defensive zone for the first time this season. I know this is a ballsy prediction, but someone has to go out on a limb and say it. No even going there on his double tramp stamp, can't imagine how his dad feels about that.

Sean - 1 assist and 2 penalty minutes. Ovie gets all the pregame hype, but Backstrom will be the best player on the ice for the Caps.



2. Will Penguins' center Jordan Staal play and if so, how will he do?

Ben - Yes and he will suck.
Seth – No.
Leahy - No he will not.

Rob - If Staal can brainwash the Pens’ doctors, he’ll be back. If not, then he will begrudgingly watch from somewhere inside Heinz Field. If he plays, it’ll be mostly ceremonial.

Brandon - Wow, tough question. Jordan claims to be pain free and I'm sure he wants to get back out there as soon as possible but I just don't think this is the right game to do it. Even if he is cleared to play, his fitness and stickhandling will still take quite some time to reach where they were before his injury so I'm going to have to guess that he will be making his return sometime during the following week. But to answer the 2nd part of the question: If he does play, he will surely have a limited role. He probably won't be put on the penalty kill until everyone is 100% sure he is good to go. Finding a line for him is also difficult. I assume he will eventually center the 2nd line with Geno, but until his game is ready for that he will probably take most of his shifts with line 4. Can't see him being a major factor in the classic from there. That being said, I'd certainly love to have him back ASAP.

Ngewo - Yes, and he will get a SHG.

Pat - I have no inside information on this whatsoever, but my gut says no - the Pens are generally conservative and have a long term perspective. This is just another regular season game, after all.

Corey - Can't see him playing. As big as this game is to the fans and the NHL it is only one of 82 and it is the first day of January. No reason to rush him and play. He will be back later in January (hopefully) and be back to his dominating self shutting down power plays.

Sean - No but his brother will play in the Winter Classic next year.



3. How many times will Capitals coach Bruce Boudreau swear during the game?

Ben – All of it
Seth – A lot.
Leahy - I've set the over/under about 47, win or lose for the Caps.

Rob - The better question is “how many times will a microphone pick up Bruce Boudreau swearing during the game?” Seriously, he’ll probably be on his best behavior because of the national prominence of the event.

Brandon - Bruce certainly does like to use his favorite word quite often. He swears quite a bit when his team is doing well, and even more when they are not so I'm going to have to predict a number somewhere around 38.

Ngewo - 42 (36 of them will be F-Bombs)
Pat - On NBC? None. On HBO? 87 times.

Corey - Oh man. If there is a whole hour dedicated to the Winter Classic on 24/7 then I would put the number at like 78. It is not that even Boudreau makes sense when he swears. Like if you put out a book that taught you the proper way to drop the f-bomb you would see nothing from 24/7 on there. He is awkward saying things and you can tell he does it just for the camera. Maybe he is in with Vegas to try and win some money so he can buy some more Primanti's sandwiches when he is in town. He could also be shaving "points". Lord knows he isn't shaving any pounds.

Sean - Pretending to be on a Hadeed Carpeting commercial, Boudreau will be good.



4. Any predictions and/or funny comments for Friday's Capitals-Penguins alumni game?

Ben - Alan May will get into a fight.
Seth - Since Brian Bellows isn't playing for Washington, no.
Leahy - Don Beaupre is going to get lit up like a Christmas tree ... like old times.

Rob - Like everything from the past era of the Caps-Pens series, this one heavily tilts towards Pittsburgh. The roster imbalance is a joke, which either speaks volumes about the inequality of the two franchises’ alumni base or, more probably, the willingness of the Caps’ alumni to put themselves through the experience of playing in bad weather when they’re out of shape. Let’s hope the NHL doesn’t find a way to use this as a tiebreaker for the real players.

Brandon - I almost feel bad for Bondra. The lone man going up against HOFers like Mario and Coffey as well as guys like Roberts and Guerin who could still probably play today if they wanted. I'm interested to see how much intensity will be brought. Obviously, there won't be fighting or slew foots but I wonder if maybe Mario will try to split the D for ol times sake or Gary Roberts might give someone a nice smack into the boards.
-Pens Alums win by at least 5 or 6.

Ngewo - I got nothing for the alumni game, but I can guarantee that every time a Penguin gets a big hit during the Winter Classic at least 10 people will tweet (ugh, did I just use the word tweet?) that Goodell just fined James Harrison...

Pat - Nah - I'd love to watch it, but the last I heard, it wasn't going to be shown until January 5th or something like that...

Corey - This is going to be an absolute s**t show. It is going to be great to watch 66 be on the ice again and probably dominate anyone the Caps put on the ice but outside of him and some of the more recent guys that have played hockey in the last five years it is going to be pretty funny to watch. Just imagine your dad, or yourself, going out and trying to play a legit football game with his old buddies, or your alumni game if you were a college athlete. Exactly. Ton of fun for people to watch but don't expect a whole lot of great play.

Sean - Rick Tocchet will win a nice bit of cash on this game.

5. Who will win the Winter Classic (please include the final score and the player who will score the game-winning goal)?

Ben - The Caps, 4-3, Ovie will score the winner.
Seth - Penguins 2-1. Matt Cooke.
Leahy - Pens take it 4-2 with Chris Kunitz potting the third and decisive goal.
Rob - Caps 3, Penguins 1. GWG by Mathieu Perreault.
Brandon - Slushy ice and wind will probably = a low scoring game. Pens 3, Caps 1
-Backstrom scores for WSH
-Sid scores the 1st, Talbot gets the GWG, and someone gets an empty netter.

Ngewo - Penguins! 3-2, Malkin

Pat - Penguins 4, Capitals 3 with Mark Letestu getting the game winner.

Corey - The Penguins win that game like 4-2. Someone like Mike Rupp will score the game winning goal. Bing will have a few points, probably a primary and secondary assist each. Bruce Boudreau will probably consume 2.5 dozen of full wings in between the first and second period and then 4 dozen "wing dings" between the second and third period and wash it down with Diet Coke in order to "watch his girlish figure". I think the Penguins are just the better overall team right now and that will propel them to victory. I Caps are talented but I can just see Mike Green looking like a pylon and letting Mike Rupp sneak behind him after a 50 foot shot gets stopped by whatever jobber the Caps decide to strap goalie pads on. Either that or Backstrom will shoot it into his own net. It will be a good game regardless as both teams will probably be on the top of their games, as we have heard neither team cares for each other even though everyone from the Washington fan base to the management has an inferiority complex for the Penguins. So is life.

Sean - Pens 4-2. I'll go with Pascal Dupuis (the Iceman!) with the game-winning goal.




Thanks again to all of these great bloggers for participating. Please make sure that you visit their blogs. In addition, please feel free to share your own predictions in the comments section below. Enjoy the hopefully rain-free game!

Capitals Lose

I’m generally a positive person, and I hope that my posts reflect this. Sure, I may complain about the Metro or the Pittsburgh Pirates on occasion, but I tend not to write discourteous posts about sports teams and their fan bases. However, to paraphrase the great E.U. in their classic 1988 hit, this post got a big ol’ butt (oh yeah). As a Pittsburgh Penguins fan, I’m happy that the Washington Capitals lost to the Montreal Canadiens Wednesday night. This is schadenfreude at its best.



I don’t know why it is, but I generally dislike Capitals fans. Perhaps it’s the fact that I attended several Caps games a year earlier this decade, and except for games against the Penguins where Pittsburgh fans took up half the building, there were a lot of empty seats. Maybe it’s because the majority of DC sports fans and media only started talking about and following the Caps 2+ years ago. No, I think it’s the way Caps fans think the Caps are the best team ever (though they won’t admit that today) and like to disparage the Penguins at every opportunity.

I’ll give you an example. I know someone who was born in Western Pennsylvania and is a huge Steelers fan. She is also one of the most rationale and intelligent people I know. However, she is also a Capitals fan and openly mocks Penguins captain Sidney Crosby by referring to him as Cindy.

In full disclosure, as a hockey fan, I would have loved to see a Capitals-Penguins Eastern Conference final this season. Each game would have been the lead on SportsCenter and the most talked about story in sports. The Crosby-Alex Ovechkin match-up is always awesome to watch. However, as a Pens fan, I’m happy that the Pens now have home-ice advantage for the next two rounds (not that this helped Washington much).

If any Caps fans are reading this, I’m sure that if the situation was reversed and the Pittsburgh Penguins won the President’s Trophy for best team in the NHL and then lost in the first round to a team that finished 33 points behind you in the standings, you would feel the same way. I guess the difference is that even if Montreal defeats Pittsburgh in the next round, Pens fans can always look at the Stanley Cup and see the names Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin & Mike Zigomanis on it from the 2008-2009 championship.

Penguins-Islanders Pictures (Hockey Road Trip 2010)

On Sunday, I watched the Pittsburgh Penguins face the New York Islanders live from Nassau Coliseum. Instead of describing the game and my trip, I thought I would share my Ansel Adams skills.

Sidney Crosby takes a faceoff. An overlooked part of Crosby's game is his ability taking and winning faceoffs. Did you know that Crosby took the most faceoffs in the league this season (1791; Paul Stastny of Colorado was 2nd with 1703) winning 55.9% of them?



Not overlooked is the fact the Crosby scored 51 goals this season. Here is Sid celebrating goal #50 with Sergei Gonchar, Pascal Dupuis and Evgeni Malkin. Apparently, Alex Goligoski is taking his time to join the fun.



Eric Godard scored his first goal of the season in the final regular season game. I don't have a picture of that. Instead, I have a picture of him fighting Joel Rechlicz.



My first hockey memories consisted of watching the Pittsburgh Penguins on WPGH-Channel 53. It seems like Rick Kehoe and the Pens faced the New York Islanders every game and always lost handedly as guys like Bryan Trottier, Mike Bossy, Denis Potvin and Billy Smith dominated. Of course, those guys dominated the league for four straight years!



Fortunately, I have much better memories of Trottier from the end of his career.



The Pens led 5-2 after two periods, but the Islanders stormed back to force overtime. Jordan Leopold scored the game-winner and there was great celebration throughout the land (except from some Islanders fans; others didn't mind the loss since winning would have hurt the team's drafting status). By the way, what is Bill Guerin doing?



Finally, why would someone wear a Limas Sweed jersey to a Pittsburgh PENGUINS game? Perhaps this guy knew the Steelers would trade Santonio Holmes later in the evening meaning Sweed may have an increased role in the 2010 season.



I have two other non-picture highlights from the game. First, I met Tecmo of PSAMP (Pittsburgh Sports & Mini Ponies). I've admired his work for several years and it was nice meeting a fellow Pittsburgh blogger in person. Cool guy!

Second, near the end of the first period, we learned that the Philadelphia Flyers and New York Rangers were in the shootout to determine who would advance to the playoffs. Nearly our entire section attempted to watch a television approximately a mile away and then tried to guess whether or not the team scored based on the reaction. Islanders fans were pleased with the result of the Rangers sitting home or golfing this week.

For more about the game, visit NHL.com, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and/or ESPN.

Plus, please click here for the Boston portion of Hockey Road Trip 2010.

Beano Cook Takes Shot at Roethlisberger

Yes, I'm posting a video two days in a row. In this ESPN video, Pittsburgh's own Beano Cook calls Sidney Crosby a class act. I don't think anyone in their right mind would disagree. (Please note that most Capitals fans are not in their right mind.) Anyway, near the end of the video, Beano subtly (or not so subtly) calls out the Steelers' QB.

"I'm just grateful Pittsburgh has Sidney Crosby right now. We need somebody, an athlete, with class. And that Crosby has. Lots of class. On the ice and off the ice."



Am I misinterpreting Beano's statement?

Super Bowl Sunday Thoughts

I was snowed in yesterday so I had lots of time to watch television. Here are my thoughts on the Super Bowl and more:

- Enough of the Danica Patrick commercials! Does anyone really ever go up to her and ask if she’s the Go Daddy girl? Even if someone actually does this, no one rips their shirt open wearing a Go Daddy tank top in front of Patrick. If this really happens on a regular basis, Danica Patrick should have her own TV channel.

- The Super Bowl commercials were not very memorable. However, Doritos and Budweiser had some decent ads and seeing Betty White run a crossing pattern better than Limas Sweed* was fun.

- Congratulations to Dick LeBeau on his election to the football Hall of Fame! Well deserved even if it was 30 years late.

- Jerry Rice received the biggest ovation during the pre-game ceremony introducing the new Hall of Fame class. I guess people recognized him from Dancing With the Stars.

- While I still like the Puppy Bowl, it just wasn’t the same without Harry Kalas.

- As a Pittsburgh Penguins fan, I’m never going to like the Washington Capitals. However, this has nothing to do with the team itself. While I think Alexander Ovechkin takes cheap shots on occasion, he is amazing to watch on the ice. It’s easy to recognize that he is one of the best players in the world. My issue comes down to Capitals fans. There is no respect at all among Caps fans for Sidney Crosby. Caps fans must have noticed all of his goals during last season’s playoff series where he went straight to the net and took abuse and hits from the Caps defenders to score. Crosby had another two goals against the Caps yesterday. Keep bringing those pacifiers while showing your admiration towards Alexander Semin, Caps fans.



- Only two days until the 2nd Annual Best Pittsburgh Sports Blog Tournament!


* I feel bad making fun of Limas Sweed. I really hope he has a breakout season next year. Of course, breakout would be 10 catches.

Sunday Notes

Between the Grammy Awards and the Penguins and Pitt games, Sunday was a good television day. Here are my notes from yesterday:

- Can the Penguins and Pitt play every Sunday until April? This will help get over the lack of Sunday football games.

- Actually, after watching Pitt lose to both Seton Hall and South Florida, perhaps we’ll just stick with the Penguins playing on Sunday afternoon.

- There were not one, but two television commercials during the Penguins-Red Wings game featuring racecar driver Danica Patrick. Does she have a big following among hockey fans that I am unaware of?

- "Have you heard about McDonalds new $1 menu at breakfast?" Has this sentence every actually worked as a pick-up line?

- Sidney Crosby’s 2nd period and shoot-out goals were sweet.

- South Florida’s Dominique Jones is the best college basketball player you’ve never heard of. I may also be the best college basketball player you’re heard of.

- The Grammys were kind enough to let us vote for one of three Bon Jovi songs for the band to perform. I think there should have been a write-in vote to have them cover a Barry Manilow tune.

- I think I liked Beyonce covering Alanis’ You Oughta Know.

- Pink is a professional. How else can you explain her singing while twirling round and round while wet.

- Speaking of the Pink performance, are the Grammy Awards now like Sea World where the first three rows are the splash zone?

- When did Lady Antebellum get big? I saw them perform during halftime of a Steelers game a few years ago.

- Ke$ha and Justin Bieber are available to present at Bar Mitzvahs, corporate events, and weddings!



- Is Kanye banned from all award shows? He should have been on stage for actually winning for Run This Town with Jay-Z and Rihanna.

This was about the time that I went to sleep.