2 posts tagged “evgeni nabokov”
What a sports-intensive weekend. Unlike a lot of American men, I don't spend my Sundays worshipping the TV when it's time for the NFL season. I prefer college football, but even then, I can only watch so many college football games on a Saturday before my brain fries.
But April is a great month for sports, which would be a lot better if the NBA wasn't part of it. Basketball is truly the most...boring...sport....ever. Yes, I'd rather watch toddler bowling.
However, we got baseball, and we got hockey playoffs galore. And then there's always a plethora of MMA to be found.
I won't get into too much detail about all of the games, considering a lot of it is old news at the point I'm writing this, so a brief summary should suffice.
So, this weekend began on:
Friday, April 24:
Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim vs. Seattle Mariners at Angel Stadium
Shane Loux took the mound for the pitching-decimated Angels against Mariners ace Erik Bedard.
Loux pitched pretty well for 4 innings, only getting stung by a Russell Branyan solo blast in the 2nd inning.
Then
the 5th inning came, and Loux just died. Ichiro led off with a single.
Endy Chavez, single. Griffey, single. Beltre just missed a grand slam
with a double off the left-centerfield wall, scoring Ichiro and Chavez.
Russell Branyan then walked to load the bases. Jose Lopez hit a chopper
towards 3rd for a single, scoring another run.
By this point, it was 5-0, there were no outs, and Loux had come apart. Manager Mike Scioscia went to the bullpen, but another 2 runs scored before the Angels could get out of the inning.
Erik Bedard pitched fantastic for Seattle, only giving up 1 hit in the first 4 innings, a double to Erick Aybar which was also the Angels' sole baserunner. He gave up a dinger to Mike Napoli in the 5th, and the Angels scored twice more in the frame to bring the score to 7-3, but Bedard still had a healthy lead and pitched into the 7th inning before Shawn Kelley finished out the game for the Mariners.
So the Angels lost by a score of 8-3, and here are some photos from my less-than-good seats in the rightfield loge.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
New York Yankees vs. Boston Red Sox
What was supposed to be a pitchers duel was anything but. But what a wild exciting game. The Yankees sent AJ Burnett to face Boston's Josh Beckett, and this was one of those games you figured would be a low-scoring affair. If only.
The Yankees went up 6-0 on Boston by the time the 4th inning was over, and there was no reason to think that the fairly solid AJ Burnett would surrender this lead. Then Boston began their comeback, scoring 5 runs in the bottom 4, with 4 of those runs coming off a Jason Varitek GRAND SALAMI.
But this game was only getting started. In the 6th, Boston scored 3 runs going up 8-6 on the Skanks.
Then in the next inning, Johnny Damon hit a 2-run homer to tie the game at 8.
Boston then goes ahead 9-8 in the bottom of the 6th.
And then the lead switched AGAIN in the top of the 7th when the Yankees went up 10-9.
With all the back and forth in this ballgame, it was just super fun to watch. Mind you, I love a pitcher's duel more than anything. The best games are the 0-0 games that go into extra innings, but when both teams score a bunch of runs back and forth in every inning, that's pretty damn exciting as well.
When it was all said and done with, Boston outslugged the Yankees by a final of 16-11. There were 28 hits in the game, 6 of them home runs (3 for each team).
NHL Playoffs:
Game 5: Anaheim Ducks vs. San Jose Sharks
With the Ducks already possessing a 3-1 lead in this best of 7 series, every game was now a "must-win" for the Sharks, and with their backs to the wall at home in the HP Pavilion (aka: Shark Tank), the Sharks put up the early 1-0 goal at 7:25 in the 1st from Co-Captain Joe Thornton. The Sharks went up 2-0 in the 2nd.
But hold on, the Ducks came back with 2 of their own in the 3rd period thanks to Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry, and the game went into OT.
The Sharks stayed alive in the series when Co-Captain Patrick Marleau jabbed in a goal past Anaheim goaltender phenom Jonas Hiller at 6:02 of the first OT period to win the game 3-2. Even still, the winning goal was ultimately pushed past the goal line by the leg/skate of Hiller. Unfortunate, but so it goes.
This was another great game in what has been a thrilling series, thanks to the unlikely 8th seed Ducks taking it to the team that had the best record in the NHL regular season.
Sunday, April 26th, 2009
NHL Playoffs:
Game 6: New York Rangers vs. Washington Capitals
With the Rangers up 3-1 in this series, they didn't have Coach John Tortorella on the bench because he was serving a one-game suspension for losing his mind and throwing water at Capitals fans behind the Rangers bench.
What followed from Rangers' GM Glen Sather was one of the most laughable reactions in the history of the sport. Sather complained that Washington Capitals security should be disciplined. Why? Because Washington Capitals fans were verbally harassing/abusing the Rangers bench from their seats, and CHILDREN were able to hear this.
Apparently Sather has never been to one of his own team's games, or at least never sitting in the MSG seats, where this kind of behavior, and FAR worse, occurs every single game. The Rangers proved themselves to be a classless organization from top to bottom. A coach who benches Sean Avery (the scummiest player in all the league) because he wanted to set an example about keeping your emotions in check during the game, loses his cool because of the verbal taunts from Capitals fans. Sean Avery may be a giant piece of shit, but he can be pretty effective when he's able to taunt and agitate the opposition into taking stupid penalties, so as long as Avery doesn't take them himself. In Game 4, he did. But for Tortorella to go after Caps fans, who never threw any objects at the Rangers bench or did anything PHYSICAL to provoke Torts, proves he's as big of a dick as Avery. And then Sather's letter, hoo hee! Whattalaff!!!!
I hope the Capital fans rip the Rangers bench (verbally, of course) even moreso during Game 7 so they can make Tortorella's head literally explode.
The Rangers got destroyed on MSG ice this game by a final of 5-3, and while the final score sounds close, it's misleading. The Capitals made Ranger goalie Henrik Lundqvist look very very mortal, going up 3-1 in the first. 5-1 in the 2nd, and held on to a 5-2 lead until a 3rd Rangers goal scored with 6 seconds remaining in the game.
I can't wait until Game 7, even if I won't be able to actually watch it. The Capitals will have home ice, and they're not losing to this joke of a Rangers team, who should never have won 3 games in this series to begin with.
New York Yankees vs. Boston Red Sox
This ESPN Night game was actually the pitcher's duel that we were supposed to get on Saturday between Beckett and Burnett. This time it was Andy Pettite against Justin Masterson. Masterson, normally a reliever for the Red Sox, pitched a second start for Boston in place of Daisuke Matsuzaka. And he pitched brilliantly.
Masterson scattered 6 hits over 5.1 IP, walking 1, striking out 4, and giving up 1 earned run off a Hideki Matsui sac fly.
Boston's bullpen of Hunter Jones, Michael Bowden and Takashi Saito (pitching in place of closer Jonathan Papelbon, who needed some rest) stymied the Yankees for the rest of the game.
But the real story of this game?
Jacoby Ellsbury STOLE HOME! I would put the video up here but MLB will just yank it off YouTube, so... you should be able to find it quite easily in other places. :-)
In any case, with a 2-1 score in the bottom of the 5th, Andy Pettite pitching to J.D. Drew with a 1-0 count and bases loaded, Ellsbury stole home in what has to be one of the craziest plays in this early season. But Ellsbury is so fast, Pettite is a lefty pitching from the stretch, third-baseman Angel Berroa wasn't holding Ellsbury on, and the Yankees were caught completely off-guard. Posada made the tag on Ellsbury just after he had touched the plate, and the Red Sox went up 3-1.
J.D. Drew then doubled to rightfield, scoring David Ortiz, and that was all the offense the Sox needed to SAHHHHWEEEP the New York Yankees in 3 games.
With the Rangers and Yankees losing, Sunday was a very very very good day.
And finally, to top it off:
Monday, April 27, 2009
NHL Playoffs:
Game 6: Anaheim Ducks vs. San Jose Sharks
Hiller if ya hear me!! The Ducks won by a final score of 4-1, taking the series from the NHL-best San Jose Sharks in 6 games, and most importantly, doing it on home ice in front of a rabid crowd at the Honda Center (aka: The Pond).
You knew this was going to be a helluva physical game when 2 seconds into the game, immediately after the puck was dropped, centers Ryan Getzlaf and Joe Thornton went at each other in a fight. Thornton may have won that fight, but he did not win the war.
The Sharks took the 1-0 lead in the middle of the 1st period, making one wonder if Hiller was going to be ok this game. Luckily, that was the only goal that Jonas Hiller let in. Hiller outclassed San Jose goalie Evgeni Nabokov during the entire series. In this game, he stopped 36 of 37 shots. While Hiller has emerged as the top goalie on the Ducks team, with J.S. Giguere now serving as his backup, Nabokov still had far superior statistics with the Sharks during the regular season.
But finally with this 1st round series of the postseason, Jonas Hiller proved that a hot goaltender with a defense that has never looked better (Pronger, Niedermayer, Whitney, Beauchemin, Wisniewski), is going to be able to stop a high-powered offense that outshot Anaheim the entire series by a ridiculous amount.
Despite all that, Jonas Hiller posted two shutouts during the 6 game series.
A fantastic series, a huge upset, and perhaps a sign of things to come. Still, the Ducks have a tough road ahead of them as they'll face the Detroit Red Wings in the Western Conference semis. The Red Wings are well-rested, having easily swept the Columbus Blue Jackets in 4 straight games. But the Ducks could just be the Cinderella team once again.
Last night, from the third period onward, I watched the Dallas Stars vs San Jose Sharks Game 6 of the Western Conference Semifinals.
The score at the end of 3 regulation periods, was 1-1. If the San Jose Sharks won, they'd force a game 7, having come back from a 3-0 game deficit. This would also return the series to San Jose for the finale.
Only two times in NHL playoff history has a team come back down 3-0 to win a game 7.
Instead, we got 4 OVERTIME periods of phenomenal saves, exciting plays, momentum turns, and superb drama. Not to mention one of the most insane (and legal) hits you'll ever see with Dallas' Brenden Morrow leveling Shark Milan Michalek.
Michalek was gone for the rest of the game with what was likely a concussion, as well as some sort of arm injury.
But even this amazing hit soon became old news watching both goaltenders Marty Turco and Evgeni Nabokov make superhuman saves to keep their team in the game.
Ultimately Dallas won the game 2-1 on a Brenden Morrow PPG, sending the Stars into the Western Conference finals against the favored Detroit Red Wings.
One of the complaints about hockey over the years is that not enough goals are scored, and the league made attempts to alter the rules of the game to allow for more offense. But the reality is that time and time again, the best hockey games don't end by a score of 8-6, but 0-0 or 1-1 ties that go into OT.
The drama that is inherent in these low-scoring games with superb goaltending, are the games that make hockey great. I don't have any issue with the rule changes that the NHL made (except the one that limits goaltenders to only playing the puck wiithin a box behind the goal) in order to hypothetically increase the number of goals scored, as long as we continue to witness games like this. Low-scoring ties that go long into the night. A battle of attrition and heart that shows who the best team is.
