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.
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“After considering what Nash himself has said, I believe that, for all of his many contributions to the Columbus Blue Jackets and the greater Columbus community, he has turned into a mutinous captain.
What a powerful word that is: Mutinous. Yet this isn’t an expression of enmity – it’s just an interpretation of that which he pushed in front of my eyes.”
via The Power of a Single Word – Dark Blue Jacket
“David and Kathy Kreider, Chris’s parents, declined to comment for this story, but Chris said that the emphasis that they placed on education as he was growing up made the choice to stay at BC for his freshman and sophomore years really no choice at all. He has immersed himself in two pursuits—hockey and schoolwork—since arriving here. He carries a 3.0 grade-point average, has taken summer courses in an attempt to complete his degree as quickly as possible, and rarely attends the sorts of bacchanalian social gatherings so common to the college experience. “It’s been more of a job,” said Kreider, who turns 21 on April 30, and because ice hockey is not necessarily the keynote men’s sport at Boston College, “it’s been very easy to stay off the radar.”
via The Rangers’ Future Is Waiting…and Waiting – WSJ.com
(s/t Kukla’s Korner)
He was an outstanding player in his junior days, but his goal of an NHL career would take a massive set back in 1938. He learned through his coach that Conn Smythe, owner of the Toronto Maple Leafs, the team he grew up idolizing and following on the radio, would sign him if someone could turn him white. It was a devastating blow to the young forward.
“It was sickening and heart-breaking because all I wanted was a chance,” Carnegie said years later.
via Even After His Passing, NHL Appears to Turn It’s Back on Herb Carnegie – Habs Eyes On The Prize
Telling Russell was harder. He was nine years older, another jock who loved the sporting arena.
But Russell listened quietly, then asked if it was a phase. “I still love you, I still consider you my best friend,” he said. He jokingly offered a protective brotherly warning if Scott brought home a partner, and he didn’t like him. “I will let you know you have a ‘dick’ of a boyfriend. The same as if you brought home a girl who was a ‘bitch.’ I would tell you straight up.”
via A gay jock takes off the mask – Ottawa Citizen
“I can’t be the only person thinking about the juxtaposition of these two issues though. This is the hot campaign. THE campaign to attach your name to if you want to be considered a stand-up guy in the NHL. But yet women are still being called “puck bunnies” and no one seems to blink an eye. Yes, the slide show was removed. But someone allowed it to be posted in the first place. And someone was ignorant enough to think that term categorized all female fans. Or sadly, they knew exactly what it meant and they just didn’t care.”
via If you can cheer, you can cheer no matter your gender – Cardiac Cane
Right before that stretch of 14 games that he sat out in January and February, Bissonnette sought the help of a psychiatrist to help him cope with the mental tug-of-war he was waging to earn playing time and feel part of the group.
“You take it day to day — you have to take it day to day,” Bissonnette said. “It got to the point where I was getting a lot of anxiety, and I had to go talk to (head athletic trainer Jason Serbus) and I said, ‘Serbs, I need to get on medication or talk to someone.’”
Bissonnette chose the latter, visiting with a psychiatrist for a one-time, hour-and-a-half session.
via Phoenix Coyotes’ Paul Bissonnette’s world is changing – Arizona Republic
What had helped to build this sport so well in the 1990′s wasn’t just the winning ways of the team but how the Stars were able to build the sport itself in Dallas. So many Stars fans from today grew up as kids learning to play hockey around Dallas in one of the many Dr Pepper Starcenters or ice arenas in the area, or even in of the many inline skate leagues that existed at the team. All of this was built around the the Stars ability to connect with the youth in a sport that so many of us loved.
via Dallas Stars Closing The Void Between Fans And Team – Defending Big D
“That’s part of the sport. We get paid huge money to do it and most of the time you get paid big money it comes with a lot of risks involved and we’re compensated. We know that risk when we step on the ice so you go along with it, so everybody just shut up!
“These guys are going overseas spending nine months away from their wives and kids and risk their lives and do it for x amount of dollars, and we’re going to sit here and cry because one guy’s making $5 million and he’s out with a concussion then shame on us,” Barch said. “Shame on us, that’s what I think.”
There’s no shame in losing games due to having Mikko Koivu injured on the shelf and losing to more talented teams. There is, however, plenty of shame for having a team beating themselves and that is on Mike Yeo. Regardless of how the year has gone or excuses being made there is none for seeing youngsters look like they have been influenced by disinterested veterans and regress in their development.
via The Mike Yeo Conundrum – First Round Bust
I would not expect Shanahan to leave the league office any time soon, not with collective-bargaining negotiations upcoming. He will want to see his player safety department fully developed before he leaves. But he’s a player in his heart, and he undoubtedly misses wins and losses. He won’t take any GM job, but when the right one comes along, it’s my bet that he will take it.
via Count Brendan Shanahan among eventual GM candidates – USA Today
Let’s get a few things straight, SI. First of all, the moniker “puck bunny” has traditionally been reserved for those female fans who go to hockey games (or practices) primarily because they want to sleep with hockey players. In fact, the Canadian Oxford Dictionary defines a puck bunny as “a woman who goes to hockey games for the sole purpose of ‘scoring’ with one of the players afterward”. Puck bunnies are a subculture of the female hockey fan demographic; NOT all female fans are puck bunnies (NOT, by a long shot indeed). Think of puck bunnies as the hockey equivalent of rock groupies; in fact, most female hockey fans regard the label of “puck bunny” as derogatory.
via Dear SI: not all female hockey fans are puck bunnies – Hockey Broad
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.
