Rangers Coach Attacks Capitals Fan
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Don’t know much or care a lot about hockey (though I’m perfectly content to jump on a bandwagon for a local team: rock the red) but I’m pretty sure its not cool to attack a fan.
57 Responses to “Rangers Coach Attacks Capitals Fan”
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It’s been done before.
Hockey is the last NA sport to ban fighting; that’s what MMA is now for.
You should give it a chance OW; I’m Jamaican, but growing up in Toronto, you’d HAVE to be a fan to still love hockey.
It’s really just miniaturized soccer on ice.
It’s been done before.
Hockey is the last NA sport to not ban fighting; that’s what MMA is now for.
You should give it a chance OW; I’m Jamaican, but growing up in Toronto, you HAVE to be fan to love hockey.
It’s really just miniaturized soccer on ice.
Looks like Tortarella requested the guy be removed and the Caps’ security wouldn’t – and the fan responded by dousing the back of Tortarella’s suit. http://www.myblueshirtheaven.com/2009/04/25/tortorellas-tort/ – Letting your fans attack other teams and ignoring their coaches? Sounds like they’re running a classy organization down there in DC.
So that wasn’t Robin Ficker? That’s what Canadian sports coverage told me as I watched the game here in Korea.
Vernon Maxwell style
It’s really just miniaturized soccer on ice.
That doesn’t make me want to watch. In fact, the opposite.
I think you’re missing out on a great sport, O.
You seem kinda cranky about it, though. Any reason you think it’s such crappy game?
It has the most action out of any sport out there. And the most continuous action. Baseball and Football are both sports where there are stretches of nothing and then a sudden bursts of action.
An, because you can substitute players in the middle of the action, there’s always fresh legs on the ice, and higher quality action.
Oh, and before I forget…
I fucking hate the Rangers.
You guys think a 3-2 hockey game is boring but go nuts over a 21-14 football game.
Avg NFL game has 7 minutes of action.
Think about that next time you spend ( waste ) a Sunday watching the Foreskins.
I fucking hate the Rangers.
I fucking hate that song they play whenever they score a goal. Jesus is that annoying.
“Avg NFL game has 7 minutes of action.”
I bet baseball is roughly the same.
Soccer has more continuous action, but there’s no way you can keep up 100% effort for a 90 minute game, so for most of the time most of the players are not giving it their all but are waiting for the ball to come in their general area.
Basketball is the closest to hockey out of the team sports played here, but in basketball there’s too much scoring. No one point matters as much as in sports like baseball, football, or hockey.
And there is the little matter of all that ice. Most people can’t even stand up on ice, let alone play a fast paced profession sport on it.
The hockey puck is this tiny little thing you can’t see, in person or on TV. I suspect it isn’t really there, and the players are choreographed to wave their sticks a lot and punch each other once in a while. Like professional wrestling.
I’ll take basketball.
Hockey is a great sport to watch live, at an arena. It is fast, it is furious and very easy to get a hang of how it works. Much harder to follow on TV – even HD. Go see a game next season. See two or three before you make up your mind. Its a terrific sport.
I confess that part of it is basic unfamiliarity. I can’t skate, and I didn’t grow up playing hockey or in a region where its really a top tier game (Maryland, Florida). I know this is a common complaint, but yeah the lack of scoring drives me nuts. I know logically it can be explained but I think part of it is that so many scoring attempts are actually made but few make it through.
No shock to regular readers, but those 4 hours of football are glorious hours spent for me.
Yes, I’m totally sure a superfan’s assurances are as right as rain. Let me go write up this totally dispassionate post about how there is direct linkage between the Dallas Cowboys and Satan and I’ll get right back to you.
If you’re really watching football there is more going on than what happens from hike to whistle. There’s for instance the whole strategy of clock management, which – depending on the situation – can hold my interest while the team is huddled and calling a play.
It’s true that the actual plays are far more viscerally exciting, but I’d say it’s also misleading to say a game only has seven minutes of action, when what happens outside the plays can affect the outcome just as much. Even if the ball can’t move.
Oliver is a closeted Manchester United fan. We all know it.
Well O, I’ll tell you what. If you ever make it up to Pittsburgh, shoot me an e-mail and I’ll take you to a Penguins game. I doubt I can turn you into a fan, but I don’t know many people who don’t enjoy themselves at a hockey game once they’re there.
‘It’s really just miniaturized soccer on ice.
That doesn’t make me want to watch. In fact, the opposite.’
Ok, think of it as giant foosball; on ice.
‘I fucking hate the Rangers.’
Say no more; Avery is such an asshole.
Of course geographical confines can make certain sports more accessible than others, and individual preferences apply, but you’ve got to be kidding suggesting that football, baseball or even basketball provide the same nonstop action as hockey; the other top tier sports are plagued by endless stoppages and time outs, while hockey basically runs three 20 minute periods of constant action.
Yes there is less scoring, but how many 113-89 b’ball games can you honestly say held you in a state of excitement?
Hockey’s definitely not for everyone, just like how football isn’t for everyone (I’m not a fan). I can’t watch basketball if it’s not a NCAA game without much on the line, either. I grew up in CT, so that explains my love of hockey, I guess, though my general indifference toward football comes down to personal preference.
The NHL made some terrible marketing/expansion choices over the last decade, and the lockout was a punch in the face to their own fans much less the casual observers. Thankfully, we’ve got teams like the Caps and players like Ovechkin leading a charge so people who don’t care much for the sport (like OW) are taking notice. And it helps, since his blog has about one billion more readers than mine!
That action deserves a fine, not a suspension. It’s not like Tortelli went batshit on the fan like Caps owner Ted Leonsis
OK hockey fans is one sentence explain icing.
Non-hockey fans can think of icing as simply a ‘delay of the game’ penalty.
Oliver Willis: “Yes, I’m totally sure a superfan’s assurances are as right as rain. Let me go write up this totally dispassionate post about how there is direct linkage between the Dallas Cowboys and Satan and I’ll get right back to you.”
And the New York Rangers. … And the Yankees.
OK hockey fans is one sentence explain icing.
Touche.
Me: “I fucking hate the Rangers.”
jrfunkenstein: “Say no more; Avery is such an asshole.”
Of all the shit he has pulled, I can’t believe insulting Elisha Cuthbert is what got the NHL to crack down on him.
Of all the shit he has pulled, I can’t believe insulting Elisha Cuthbert is what got the NHL to crack down on him.
Well, she is awfully cute.
Icing is when a team not playing shorthanded shoots the puck past the other teams goal line from their own half of the ice without the puck being touched .
One long sentence ….
Dont ask me to explain why Avery making a sick joke gets the same suspension as Brashear who tried to take some ones head off with a late hit. The NHL is run by an ex NBA hack … the man has almost singlehandedly ruined the league.
Too bad because it is the greatest sport in the world and by far the best to watch live…. it sucks on TV and Im a huge fan.
‘OK hockey fans is one sentence explain icing.’
When the puck crosses all three lines (two blue lines indicating each team’s defensive zone, and the centre red line), without having been touched by a player whose team sent the puck down the ice.
‘Of all the shit he has pulled, I can’t believe insulting Elisha Cuthbert is what got the NHL to crack down on him.’
Hey man, they got OJ for that Vegas holdup; whatever works.
‘The NHL is run by an ex NBA hack … the man has almost singlehandedly ruined the league.’
Couldn’t agree more.
Glad to see so many Ranger haters. Go Rangers! Ha.
As for comparing hockey to soccer, that’s a joke. Soccer is a game that moves along at a snails pace for the most part with little spurts here and there of excitement. Hockey is constant movement up and down the ice. It is a sport however that is best viewed live. I’ve seen people with interest in the sport become instant fans the first time they attended a game.
As for Avery, his reputation is more than it really is. The guy is an agitator. A pest. That’s about it. The one thing he isn’t, is a dirty player. What he does, doesn’t hold a candle to things that people like Todd Bertuzzi, Chris Simon, Dale Hunter and Claude Lemieux did during their careers.
Icing: Icing is a rule designed to prevent a team from dumping the puck deep into its opponent’s zone in order to use up the clock or to avoid playing defense.
Icing is when a team not playing shorthanded shoots the puck past the other teams goal line from their own half of the ice without the puck being touched .
Without being touched? How do they do that, mind control?
Icing in one sentence:
When the puck crosses at least two red lines, one of them being the opposing team’s goal line, without being touched by either team after the initial contact, this is called icing.
As for Tortorella being doused with beer: This came after he sprayed the fan with a water bottle. Then the fan threw the beer, then Tortorella threw the water bottle. Then went after the fan with a stick. In a letter to the league, the GM of the Rangers said he sprayed the water because the fans behind the bench were big meanies who said naughty things about the players.
Oh and Jay, Avery is most certainly dirty. Here’s some recent antics:
Avery on Tim Thomas (Casually skates by Thomas and hits him in the back of the head with his stick blade)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2lEUxwngZA
Avery on Simeon Varlamov (Makes sure the ref isn’t around, gets in Varly’s face, Erskine comes over to pull him away, and he punches Varlamov in the face as he gets removed)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21PgzXQJGgI
Avery on Milan Jurcina (Watch him bring his trailing arm around to smack Jurcina in the face with the end of his stick. Same video, he clubs Pothier in the face (Pothier’s been out for a year with a concussion prior to this)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wFI-rMS42s
Eh, I hate Avery as much as anyone hates an agitator that’s not on their team, but he’s really no worse than most.
Hell, Jarko Ruutu, the Penguins’ old agitator, bit a dude on the hand the year after he went to the Senators. (At least I think it was the Senators). Plus during an Olympic game he slammed Jaromir Jagr’s head into the boards like he was trying to break his neck.
Huge Ranger fan but Avery is a joke… his cheap hits in Gm 4 almost cost the Rangers the game… he is a clown and doesnt deserve to wear the sweater of an Original 6 team.
Dont agree with what Torts. did but the Rangers did ask several times for extra security and didnt get it …imagine the uproar if this happened in NY.
To those not familiar … the Rangers lost Blair Betts to that cheap hit by Brash… Betts is one of the best defensive forwards in the lg… a key player in the Rangers league leading penalty killing unit… no surprise the Cap scored 2 Power Play goals after the incident.
Brashear went out and ruined the career( Betts might never return ) of a very good and very underrated hard working player …. and gets the same suspension as a guy who made a filthy joke.
And so it goes.
Rangers can win tonight if they get some shots on Varlamov… the Russian Rebound Machine…. too much passing .. get the puck on net and get a garbage goal.
Hell of a series for a first rounder…nothing like the Stanley Cup Playoffs.
‘As for comparing hockey to soccer, that’s a joke. Soccer is a game that moves along at a snails pace for the most part with little spurts here and there of excitement.’
Yes, it was a joke.
‘Oh and Jay, Avery is most certainly dirty.’
No argument there.
‘Huge Ranger fan but Avery is a joke… his cheap hits in Gm 4 almost cost the Rangers the game… he is a clown and doesnt deserve to wear the sweater of an Original 6 team.’
Right on all counts.
Goons are a dying breed for a reason; hockey will soon ban fighting, or be forced to after someone is killed in a needless fight.
Only Bettman would insist on waiting for the latter rather than being proactive and demanding the former.
No other sport comes to close to the intensity of NHL playoffs
Jay Caruso: “Glad to see so many Ranger haters. Go Rangers! Ha.”
At this rate, it’s Rangers go, ‘Bye, Bye.’
You have to admit, they haven’t played well the last two games. Hell, is it wasn’t for Henrik Lundqvist early heroics, the Rangers would have been eliminated already, and with your goalie struggling, the last two games, it could be over tonight.
“As for Avery, his reputation is more than it really is. The guy is an agitator. A pest. That’s about it. The one thing he isn’t, is a dirty player. What he does, doesn’t hold a candle to things that people like Todd Bertuzzi, Chris Simon, Dale Hunter and Claude Lemieux did during their careers.”
Oh please. I bet you can’t name five things Todd Bertuzzi has done in his career. I’ve seen sucker punches worse than what Bertuzzi did result in no suspension at all. If there wasn’t a scrum right on top of that player, I doubt he would have been as badly injured. Bertuzzi deserved a suspension, but not the demonization he got.
On the other hand, Pronger, who you left of the list, has a serious reputation for dirty hits.
Avery is a mental case who should have been suspended a number of times.
I think fighting needs to stay in the game … let the players police the ice… the idiots refs sure cant..besides they are fun as hell to watch. I do think they should stop the fight the second a player losses his helmet.
In a bizzare way hockey fights are very gentlemanly way to settle things…drop the weapon in your hand and fight hand to hand.
Part of the reason Brashear had the freedom to go head hunting is that the rangers had benched their goon for that game..Brashear is a pussy and knew he was free to smash into any Ranger w/o fear of getting his ass kicked. Take fighting out of the game and people like Brashear have no consequences to pay on the ice.
Hockey is played a full speed all the time it is the most frustrating game to play ( and the most fun ) emotions are high on the ice.. you need an outlet … choice A have a fight ….choice B go head hunting like Brashear did. Choice C is even worse where you get into Chris Simon territory with the stick swinging.
Jay Caruso: “Glad to see so many Ranger haters. Go Rangers! Ha.”
Me: “At this rate, it’s Rangers go, ‘Bye, Bye.’”
Fuck.
The.
Rangers.
‘I think fighting needs to stay in the game … let the players police the ice… the idiots refs sure cant..besides they are fun as hell to watch. I do think they should stop the fight the second a player losses his helmet.
In a bizzare way hockey fights are very gentlemanly way to settle things…drop the weapon in your hand and fight hand to hand.’
Why do you think it’s not tolerated in ANY other sport?
Could it possibly be because THERE’S NO DAMN NEED FOR IT?
Hockey will be forced to ban fighting, hopefully before someone is killed; Bettman is moot about it because he spent a ton of money and time PROMOTING fighting as a critical part of his experiment to export the game to mainly Southern US states that had no history of it as a regional sport.
Now he has to face the music if someone is killed by these pointless exercises in violence, that every other major sport condemns.
I live in Toronto, and know damn well that the vast majority of games do not include a fight.
I watched both game 7′s last night, the Rangers/Capitals and the Hurricanes/Devils, which were 2 of the most physical and skilled series so far in the playoffs, and was on the edge of my seat for both contests, as they produced two of the most dramatic finishes I can remember.
Neither contest featured a fight; just intense, highly skilled hockey at the highest level, that was both entertaining and admirable for their lack of violence.
NOBODY can convince me that fighting is NECESSARY in hockey; it’s simply tolerated and that can be changed pretty damn easily.
Ban it, and it WILL stop, just as it has in any other civilized sport.
Still the greatest sport there is, even with the scourge of fighting.
jrfunkenstein: “Why do you think it’s not tolerated in ANY other sport?”
Hell, fighting is tolerated in baseball. How many bench-clearing brawls have you seen? They never boot everyone out of the game and end the match. No, they throw a couple people out and say, ‘Good job, that will make the highlight reel for sure.’
jrfunkensteinL
No other sport is played at full speed at all times like hockey is .. no other sport has fresh players on the field at all times…no other sport generates the type of emotion hockey does.
No other sport has all that going and have the players wielding deadly sticks… a pressure cooker that needs to be bled every so often… and the fights are fun as hell to watch.
No fights last night…it was a gm7 afterall…. but a game in November when a goon like Brashier or Simon are going around spreading cheap shots…. then you need an enforcer to police the game.
Great win for the Caps last night..Wade Redden is the antichrist.
Good luck vs Cindy and Pens.. youll need it you will be playing vs The Pens AND the refs.
Go get the Cup!
‘Hell, fighting is tolerated in baseball. How many bench-clearing brawls have you seen? ‘
A helluva lot less than fighting in hockey; and I’ve been watching both sports avidly for 40 years.
‘…and the fights are fun as hell to watch.’
THAT is the reason it’s still tolerated; all your other rationales simply qualify it as an exciting and entertaining sport.
I live in Toronto, CANADA; none of you fans can purport to tell me that fighting in hockey is NECESSARY PART OF THE GAME.
It isn’t; it’s simply a holdover from a bygone era that hasn’t been dealt with employing a 21st century understanding of how utterly irrelevant and dangerous it is.
If he could, Bettman would promote decapitations if he thought it would sell the game in Mexico.
‘…but a game in November when a goon like Brashier or Simon are going around spreading cheap shots…. then you need an enforcer to police the game.’
You’re missing the point; if fighting is banned, the game doesn’t need goons.
But then you’d have to get drunk and fight other fans I guess.
Good to talk hockey with you…nice break from the politics… funny we went on a big political bent on a rangers blog the other day.
I dont agree…with your view ..no fighting = more stick fouls ….more elbows.. more cheap play…. more Brashears and people like Brashear who will pay no consequence for cheap hits. I dont think taking fighting out of the game will remove all the goons from rosters…. there will always be a couple of guys on each team that are there solely to hit and intimidate.
We already know the refs are the worst of any major sport and Bettman has taken the game down to the same credibility as harness racing… the players need to have the ability to police the game.
I have been a rangers season tix holder since 1976 …. had a chance to go to Maple Leafs Garden a few times ..my fav. arena of all time… if you get the chance, go sit in the Blue Seats at MSG for a Ranger / Islander game.
‘We already know the refs are the worst of any major sport and Bettman has taken the game down to the same credibility as harness racing… the players need to have the ability to police the game.’
I don’t see the refs being poor at all; as human beings they are fallible, as are baseball, football and basketball refs, the latter being the worst in my opinion as fouls are committed left and right by star players who never seem to be penalized for them on the court.
And yes, Maple Leaf Gardens was an awesome shrine for hockey. Had a friend who was an usher there for many years and enjoyed some fantastic standing room only contests and concerts; the history in there alone was beyond belief.
Hopefully it will never be razed like the old Montreal forum, which was another original six temple that will be sorely missed.
At least refs in other sports seem to have a decent sense of fairness… the special treatment Crosby gets is sickening..and the way the refs let Avery take a mugging on every shift is disgraceful. I reffed hockey for a few years and it is almost impossible to call a good game .. its the double standards the refs dish out that gets to me.
Always enjoyed my trips to Toronto..we were always treated with courtesy by Leafs fans.
The Forum is gone..Boston Garden..The Olympia…Chicaco Stadium ..and now my fav place in the world will soon be rubble…Yankee Stadium.