I’ll take my 50 goal scorer to go, please

As a Caps fan, this season hasn’t exactly been all that and a bag of chips, more like that big bag of chips you buy that’s filled with 75% air and the chips are all broken.
If Mike Green (the Caps secret ingredient, apparently) being out wasn’t enough, Ovechkin’s playing like Chimera and Chimera’s playing like Ovechkin, and Alex Semin’s playing like his one way ticket to the KHL can’t come fast enough.
Oh yeah, and they had their Coach (who took them from rags to riches, in case you’d forgotten) was fired because Ovie was being an asshat and didn’t want to listen to him (damn it, Ovie, the League’s figured you out. Adapt ya idiot!).
What a year for the Caps, eh?

In short, the Caps can only go up from this point, right? They have the ability and know how to do great things. The question is, do they really want it?

this is going to be my last post until after the new year seeing as I’m going to Miami for Christmas Break! I hope you guys have an awesome Holiday Season and get what you want from Santa.

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On the sixth day of Capsmas…

Tonight’s a pretty big honking deal; Mike Knuble’s playing his 1,000th game, Marcus Johansson his 100th, and Dale Hunter is officially no longer the shiny new toy, he’s that barbie whose hair you accidentally cut to short.

It’s no secret the Caps suck right now, and by suck I mean stink up the joint. They’ve only won two of the four home games in December. This abysmal statistic isn’t helped anymore by the fact that the last time the Caps played the Preds, they lost 3-1 because of a lapse in defense. Oh dear.

Enough about the poo fest Caps fans have put up with lately, it’s Knuble’s 1,000 game! Mike Knube is that dependable, veteran winger everyone wants. He has spark, snark, and just about everything you need for a strong locker room and a strong, dependable player.

That’s not all, every year he plays, he just gets better and better. Over the two years he’s played with the Caps, he’s scored 53 goals and has 40 assists. Not bad eh, Papa Knoobs?

"Oh, it's my 1,000th game? that's cool"

He’s a stellar player and a great leader, Washington is really lucky to have him to rely on. Without him, who wold we have to spread their sage (pissed) words of wisdom with journo’s in the locker room after a disappointing loss?

best quote ever: “Playoffs? Why are we talking about Playoffs?”  Congrats to Knubs and good luck to the rest of your many seasons.

As awesomesauce as Knuble’s 1,000th game is, let us not forget you have to start at 100 to get to 1,000. And that’ where Mojo comes in.

No more Hershey for me!

The Swedish born center played one year in Hershey before making his permanent NHL debut half way through last season. Since then, he’s been a solid 2nd and 3rd liner whose been a big help throughout the regular and Playoff seasons, respectively.

While he has a while to go before reaching the stardom of Mike Knuble, game 100’s a prett good start.

Here’s to Capsmas, 1,000th and 100th games (respectively, Green and Beags (get better!) and the Predators the Caps are going to (hopefully) smack around tonight.

The Schultz bonanza

Nope, I’m not talking about the tv show from the late 50’s, but the Caps silent defenseman, Jeff Schultz. Schultz is a defensive D-man by trade, preferring to stay in his own end and help the goalie more than go to the net and get goals.

That’s not a bad thing, it’s actually a very good thing. The Caps have had a constant struggle the past few years trying to find good defensemen who are more defensive minded, than offensive like Carlson and Green.

Schultz has been having a pretty good season. Again, he isn’t supposed to be a flashy in your face kind of player, but he gets the job done by, for the most part, getting pucks out of the zone. So what’s with all the commotion?

Some say Hunter picked the line combinations out of a hat, I like to think he stole Project Runways tasselled black bag to put together the lines. Either way, Jeff Shultz appeared on the first line today in practice.

While this may be a shock and cause you to spin in circles, don’t you remember back in the good ‘ole days when the Caps won the Presidents Trophy and were supposed to win the Cup? yeah, Schultz was on first line with Mike Green. The entire time. Did anyone blow a gasket? I think not.

If anything, Hunter was trying out new line combos to find that magic “spark” that’s been elusive for some time now. If it works, does it really matter whose on which line? You win the same either way. Or lose…

My two cents; Schultz is a good defensive minded D who plays hard. He might not be a first liner in Washington (although I like to think he could on a different team), but he’s definitely a solid second liner.

Hey Caps, there’s a game going on…

The Caps are about as consistent as my cooking skills, so not very. They looked like everything was going great and they were turning around their disappointing play of late,last game against the Jets.

Then the Caps decided playing well and winning was no fun, so they reverted to their old form. Old form meaning barely their defense, heart lacking more than the tin mans, and sloppy offense.

I don’t get what these guys are trying to do, or not do it seems. They have a star-studded offense (and defense) capable of putting up huge numbers, but they’re playing like they’re lost and don’t know what they’re doing. They certainly can’t be “saving themselves” for the Playoffs, because the way they’re playing, they might not make it.

I get that they just got a new Coach and are adjusting to a new style of play, but no Coach wants a little over 20 shots on goal in a game. Not to mention the frequent defensive lapses. If a player hardly ever makes a good play and is near invisible 90% of the time, shouldn’t you bench him instead of a guy who isn’t as much of a defensive liability? Take notes, Hammrlick.

I just don’t get it, they have the ability to be winning the majority of the games they lose, that’s no secret. What is would be how they’re playing, they just act like they don ‘t give a crap a majority of the time. Hopefully Hunter can figure it out and turn it around, they’re screwed if he doesn’t.

To quote the veteran winger Mike Knuble, “Playoffs? What Playoffs?”

What the Caps are missing…

To quote the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz (those summers spent watching the Wizard of Oz while eating mint chocolate chip ice cream were the best) “When a mans an empty kettle, he should be on his metal…if only I had a heart”. Now the Caps players are clearly not made of metal, nor do they go to an Emerald city to see a Wizard. But they are lacking in one dire area; heart.

The game against Philly was a prime example of that, the Caps could have won. Maybe not easily, but they have the talent and ability to win games against teams who top two players are out.

You could make the excuse that Bryzgolav was on, and there is no doubt he was. But I find it hard to believe a team that wanted to win would wind up 5-1 because of a goalie.

While not playing like they give a care in the world is the reason they played like crap, their defense and shots on net didn’t help either. You can’t score goals without taking shots on net, guys. If you don’t believe me, the Flyers score is a prime example.

They got shots on net, granted, against an off goalie. I can guarantee you that a few of those pucks are going to make it in. That’s just how it works, ask your poorly defended goalies. When playing any team, best players out or not, having 5 shots on goal in any period is inexcusable.

Which leads me to yet another glaring weak spot from last nights game; DEFENSE. It’s that awesome thing of where you help the poor fellow in ten jillion pounds of ear try to keep a little rubber disk out of a 6X6 ft. net. You should try it some time, good stuff. Another helpful hint; When the defense actually shows up and plays, the other team doesn’t score. Mind blown, right?

Speaking of defense, forwards, it isn’t your primary job but you can help when you see you zone being taken over by the opponents. Ovechkin, I’m talking to you. You can be the most offensively talented player in the world, but that don’t mean potatoes if you don’t play all aspects of the game at least decent.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what’s wrong with the Caps, but it’s going to take a lot to figure out how to fix it. There isn’t a “one size fits all” band-aid equivalent, the Caps are just going to have to through a lot of trial and error to figure this mess out. Does it involve major trades and acquisitions at the trade deadline? Who knows, but expect something big to shake this team up.

On the third day of Christmas, a true Caps fan said to me…

Flyers suck! Is what you were thinking, right?

Tonight marks the second time these two clubs meet, out of the four times total this season. The last time the Caps and Flyers met, things were going great. The Caps were undefeated and were on an 7 game winning streak with no clouds in view.

Fast forward to now; the Caps 17th in the league, with Philly 3rd. While those stats are pretty bad, the Caps are on the turn around having won their last two games and ready to make it a full-fledged winning streak by adding one against a bitter rival.

This game isn’t going to be a piece of cake for either team. Both want to win, to beat a rival and to improve their standings. The Caps are also still transitioning into the new system Coach Dale Hunter has set out for them, although things did seem to finally click the other night when the Caps played Toronto, beating the Leafs 4-2.

The Flyers are also battling injuries with Chris Pronger out due to an eye injury, which follows his reoccurring knee injuries. The Flyers are on a winning streak as well, which makes this game even bigger. No predictions from me tonight, but expect an intense game, as usual when playing a rival.

That’s all for tonight folks! I have a Caps game to watch and some Government to  do.

What has become of sports journalists

As a, hopefully, future sports journalist, I am extremely disappointed in some of the people covering this field. Specifically hockey.

People come to you, journalists, for fairly objective and professional stories about games, players, and the like. When you get away from that and start  writing biased stories with no true fact basis, slandering a player’s name. What are people really going to think of journalist? Every single person with a press pass has the responsibility to represent this field to the best of their abilities and someone fell very short.

If you hadn’t already heard, there was a piece written about Alex Ovechkin. This piece was pertaining to his recent drop off in production and the possibility of PED’s or steroids being the reason.

Whether or not this is true, I found it extremely unprofessional to post a story about a player, slandering his name when you don’t even have cold hard facts. All this 800 word post has is speculation. Not one drop of truth in the seeming sea of lies.

I’m not targeting the writer of this article. I am targeting what journalism has been reduced to. A bunch of men and women sitting around coming up the most fantastical lies to get the most views and reads. Isn’t that yellow journalism? Is this what you want your name on, a bunch of good sounding lies for publicity?

 If this is what sports journalism has become, then I ashamed for ever wanting to be a part of it.

Youth hockey, it’s important

This site was an idea I had after the (relative) success of my Caps blog, and I decided the world (or whom ever reads my stuff) should become more familiar with youth hockey and give it more support. Because you only really see fans at professional and college level, unless you’re related to a player.

The main idea of this is to just put youth hockey into the limelight and give the players the credit they deserve. And it so happens to be with my High School, George Mason. Feel free to get involved and come to games and support us!http://gmhshockey.wordpress.com/

Deja vu…

Remember last year when the Caps were on an eight game losing streak, no one’s job was safe, and 24/7 was filming Brucies f-bomb laden tirades? We happened to snap our losing streak to the Ottawa Senators (see where I’m going with this…) and had a rendition of Jersey Shore fist pumping in the locker room celebrating the win.

The Caps don’t have Bruce (congrats to Gordo on his second NHL goal last night) and they don’t have a HBO film crew following them around this year, but they’re on a downward spiral of 4 games and I’m sure there is some cursing going on. Can they snap their losing streak to the unfortunate Senators tonight? Or will the Senators escape with the W? Time will tell, but given the past few games, here are my predictions.

The Caps fired their Coach last Tuesday after a lackluster few weeks after their amazing start. At the beginning of the season, the Caps had beaten the Senators 2-1 at the Phone Booth. At that time; the Caps were 4-0 and looking an undefeated 7-0 streak in the face.

The Sens, on the other hand. Have been an average Canadian hockey team that doesn’t get much, if any, media attention. They’re record is a measly 12-11-2, which pretty sums up how well they play. Not great, but not horrendous. They lost their last game, so both teams are fighting to snap a losing streak or potential one.

I suspect the Caps will do their usual stone cold in the first hot and streaky throughout the rest of the game act. Ottawa will play like Ottawa, so meh. Whoever wins this game it’ll be by one or two goals. I also suspect this will be a low scoring and tight game. Here’s to the Caps defense showing up and the forwards not giving up, eh?

Other notes:

-Semin and Hamrlick aren’t playing due to undisclosed upper  and lowerbody injuries, respectively.

-Matty P’s in due to Semin being out.

-Random thought: Doesn’t Dale Hunter look like Patrick Swayze?