Around View From My Seats, we enjoy great writing almost as much as we enjoy the sport we cover. Each week, there are excellent writers doing their thing all over the hockey blogosphere—so many, in fact, that it’s easy to miss some of the good stuff that gets published each week. Each week throughout the season, we shoot to bring you some of the best writing from around the web. Some will be from the mainstream media and some will be from talented bloggers doing it for the love of the game. Some entries will come from beat writers around North America and still others will come from national writers bringing a “big picture” perspective. We don’t care. We’re just looking for great hockey writing. Everything else can go to hell.
If you find anything that catches your eye and you think should be included, feel free to contact us and we’ll consider it for next week’s installment!
Without further ado, here is our weekly trip around the hockey blogosphere bringing you some of the best articles that you may have missed.
____________________________
“Before the lockout I can’t remember another player telling me no or me turning down a fight. That was just the way it was. If the score got too one-sided or if a good player got roughed up all the guys who could fight made sure their jerseys were tied down before the next shift. There were many more fighters on each team and there was a gentlemen’s agreement between them.”
via The Dirty Work (from Jason Strudwick) – Oilers Nation
“I’m somewhat troubled by the sale of future revenue streams, which is what securitizing the TV contract amounts to. Say that Vanderbeek succeeds in doing this. The Devils will then have, for the next eleven years, effectively $0 in TV revenue – they’d just be signing the cheques over. How do you make up for that if you’re Vanderbeek? He either has to find new revenue streams – difficult to do when he’s already had a rink built for him – or figure out a way to significantly reduce the cash needed to fund an elite team. That second option would probably look pretty attractive. How do you do that? You drive down the players’ share of hockey related revenue in the next CBA. If the players aren’t interested, you lock them out. No hockey for hockey fans.”
via Wherein I’m sure I’ll get slapped around in the comments – mc79hockey.com
“I think I’m pretty lucky that I don’t feel any side effects or symptoms now. Sometimes I blame it on my concussions when I do weird stuff, but I don’t feel like some of the guys who I hear have the problems. (Keith Primeau), I know he’s still had his share of problems, but I’m pretty lucky. I just use it if my wife told me something, and get out of doing the dishes.”
via Concussion files: ‘It’s the whole brain that takes that hit’ (with Eric Desjardins) – Sporting News
“He said he remains optimistic the NHL will send players but added that the IOC would have to know in 2013 so alternative plans could be made. If the NHL doesn’t send players, the U.S. and Canada would have to form teams from players in college or in Europe.
“In my mind it looks not too bad. I would say it could work,” he said. “We are looking at what would happen if they decide not to come. I will have discussions, especially with USA Hockey and Hockey Canada. If the NHL says no, the national federations would be more under pressure than European federations because players are playing in leagues there. If the NHL says no by the spring of 2013, they would have one year to prepare.”
via NHL players should participate in the Olympics – LA Times
“Decline of the Habs Empire” isn’t a title so much as a genre designation. It would be like calling an article about the Leafs “Forty Years of Frustration”, or publishing a Canucks essay entitled “Successful but Still Not Likeable.” Excepting that of the Romans themselves, few tales of decline have been retold as often as that of the Habs. Mordechai Richler wrote on the theme; so did Ken Dryden. Half of Red Fisher’s columns for the past ten years have used it as either the introduction or the finale. It is Montreal’s greatest trope, it’s most enduring cliché. If the team had any sense of humor about its media coverage (it doesn’t, sadly) they could have put out an anthology of literary writing on the subject in honor of the Centennial.”
via Defending Byzantium – Theory of Ice (h/t to Spector)
“Weirdly, the players (under former executive director Bob Goodenow) weren’t even all that insistent on a salary-cap floor in the last round of negotiations; it was something the NHL gave them. There will probably be a floor in the new CBA as well, but the gap will be wider than $16-million, just so the Nashvilles, Phoenixes and St. Louises can set their budgets and spend to their limits. The gaps between the haves and have-nots will widen financially, although how that actually plays out on the ice remains to be seen.”
via For NHL players, the cheque is (nearly) in the mail – The Globe and Mail (Eric Duhatschek)
“Weaver’s career has been nothing short of transient. He chose to pursue a college degree instead of playing major junior hockey. Undrafted as an 18-year-old, the 5-foot-9 defenseman had to play for a contract nearly every year of his professional career.
To put Weaver’s situation into perspective, entering this season, he had signed more contracts (seven) than he had scored NHL goals (six).”
via Weaver’s journey finally rewarded – Rinkside.net
“For Sarah, success was about others as much as it was about herself. It was about fighting to make sure other women had the opportunity to compete against her, to one day break her records and compete on the same level as men. Since she buckled into her first pair of plastic boots at the age of 5, Burke was a skier by trade but a fighter by nature.”
via How Sarah Burke wanted to be remembered – ESPNW
“I like fighting as much as the next guy, but Jesus Christ, how many people have to die? Look, man, when one of the greatest hockey players living isn’t playing because he’s concussed, then something’s seriously f—ked.”
via Silent Bob strikes back against violence – Toronto Star
“To date, the county has paid more than $90 million for the arena that serves as the Panthers’ home, and gotten back just $331,000 in profit-sharing.
The Panthers side of the scoreboard is far brighter, according to county records. Since the doors at BankAtlantic Center opened 13 years ago, Arena Operating Co., the Panthers’ sister company that runs the arena, has rung up a reported $117.4 million in profits. That’s more than 353 times what the county has banked.”
via Broward auditor: Panthers loan request “really, really troubling” – Sun-Sentinel (s/t to Litter Box Cats)
“This isn’t some older player en route to hitting the free agent market. This is Zach Parise. The former All-Star. The hustling point machine out of New Jersey. A former Olympian. Someone who’s now healthy and will turn 28 in July. On top of that, there aren’t many big money forwards going UFA in this coming summer. Throw in somefinancial issues where that may or not may be concerning and the rumor mill is churning. Do the Devils think about trading him? If so, what would be acceptable?”
via How Zach Parise of Today Compares with Zach Parise of the Past 4 Seasons – In Lou We Trust
Matt Reitz is the Editor-In-Chief here at ViewFromMySeats.com and former NHL Writer for ProHockeyTalk on NBCSports. When he’s not shoving a mic in the face of NHLers or explaining why home teams should wear white, he’s usually trying to figure out what song to play next on his iPod. It’s a never-ending job.
