19 posts tagged “hockey”

I've been somewhat neglectful again of updating this blog on a consistent basis. The reason? Real life interferes.

But hopefully I'll find a little more time between all the sports action going on with the Mets and Angels, and other baseball playoff matchups, college football season now underway, and the NHL season starting in October.

So, with that out of the way, let's briefly talk about the New York Mets.

Through 143 games played, the Mets are 63-80. There are 19 games remaining in the season, so the chances of going 81-81 are virtually impossible unless the club goes 18-1. Now it's a matter of 70 wins instead of 81. Can they get there?

Back on August 6, I predicted that the Mets were going to end up with a final record of 77-85. However, even that seems unlikely unless they can go 14-5 to finish out the season. Possible, still not very probable, especially considering how the club has played over the past month.

Now, at best, the Mets are in the role of potentially playing spoilers to the rest of the NL East as they'll be playing Atlanta, Florida and Washington the rest of the way. None of them are in a strong position to take the NL Wild Card away from either the Colorado Rockies or Los Angeles Dodgers, although mathematically, Atlanta and Florida are still in the hunt.

As for 2010, there's going to be a LOT of talk going into the offseason as to what this Mets organization needs to do in order to rebound. The desperate need for a power-hitting leftfielder. How will the team fill holes at catcher, 1B, and the starting rotation? Will the bullpen undergo another overhaul outside of Frankie and Feliciano? That will all be covered in due time.

Right now, the Met players that are still healthy simply need to focus upon doing the best they can on the field. For many of them, this is an audition for a spot in the majors come 2010, never mind the Mets.

If you believed in hexes or curses, one could certainly understand the troubled case of the 2009 New York Mets.

Wow, what a fuckin game!

The Ducks, faced with elimination down 3 games to 2 against the Detroit Red Wings, played the way they needed to play after looking terrible in games 4 and 5.

The Ducks were careful about not taking too many penalties (each team had 4 on the game until after the game, where tons of penalties were handed out), finishing through with some superb hits, and playing a strong defense in front of goaltender Jonas Hiller. Hiller didn't let any goals through until a late power play goal by the evil Johan Franzen at 17:35 of the 3rd period.

At that point, the score was 2-1, and the Ducks had to hold on for dear life for the final 3 and a half minutes. And they did just that, with Jonas Hiller making a desperation save off Pavel Datsyuk at 19:57.

The Ducks have improved their "elimination" game record with the Game 6 win,

Best Record in Elimination Games (All-Time)              

Team                           Record            Win Percentage

Minnesota                   7-3                    .700

Anaheim                     8-5                    .615

NY Islanders               26-17                 .605 (WOO-HOO!)

Colorado                     9-18                  .514

So now the Ducks are going to play their 4th postseason Game 7 in franchise history. They are 2-1 so far, with the 1 loss coming in the 2002-2003 Stanley Cup Finals to the New Jersey Devils in East Rutherford. The two wins? The 1997 Western Conference Quarterfinals against the Phoenix Coyotes, and the 2006 Western Conference Quarterfinals against the Calgary Flames.

The Ducks are absolutely unquestionably capable of beating the Detroit Red Wings at Joe Louis Arena. But they've gotta play smart, not allow the Red Wings to dictate the pace of the puck nor game, and pressure Osgood. They don't have to outshoot Detroit, but they can't get completely outshot by Detroit either. Ducks goaltender Jonas Hiller has to be a wall and not let Detroit get the first goal. Bobby Ryan has got to find a way to step up and produce. He hasn't scored a goal since Game 4 of the San Jose series and he has been -4 during the series with two assists.

If that Ducks team shows up in Michigan on Thursday, they'll be meeting the Chicago Blackhawks in the Western Conference Finals.

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.

AngelsvsMariners042409_1

AngelsvsMariners042409_2

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AngelsvsMariners042409_4

AngelsvsMariners042409_fireworks1

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.

Sean Avery put on waivers

Ok, I admit, I've been extremely negligent in updating this blog since the World Series.

It must have been the sheer misfortune of the Phillies winning the 2008 World Series in 5 games over the Tampa Bay Rays that caused me to become so lax.

Of course, there are other sports I follow (college football, hockey, MMA) that I have also not been very good at discussing/bitching about here lately, but that will be changing immediately. Well, not with college football.

But don't expect much about the New York Islanders right now cause HOLY SHIT they are terrible! :-(

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.

I really wanted to watch the Mets-Marlins game today, but I could not.
I really wanted to watch the Northwestern-Michigan game today, but I could not.
Neither of them were on TV in Southern California.

So I settled this morning for the NHL season opener from Hockeytown UK! That's right, the Anaheim Ducks and Los Angeles Kings played at the O2 arena in London, England to open the regular season. The Kings won 4-1 in the debut of Kings 19-year old rookie goaltender Jonathan Bernier who was very impressive in goal. The defending Stanley Cup champion Anaheim Ducks, without retired Teemu Selanne and probably-retired-but-he-can't-decide Scott Niedermayer, didn't look all that together, but it's reallllly early in the season, and tomorrow is another day. Another day in which the teams will play in the O2 arena, this time with the Ducks on "home ice."

How do they create "home ice" in London? Well, it's based on graphics, and the production you would get at the local arena. For example, when the Kings scored a goal, you got to hear Randy Newman's "I Love L.A." Tomorrow when the Ducks score a goal, you will hear the huge foghorn and maybe even the Pennywise theme song during the intros.

But enough about hockey, for now.

Oh yeah, Northwestern made things interesting in the game against Michigan, leading 16-7 going into the half, but then the Wildcats couldn't score again, ultimately losing 28-16.

And then, baseball.

The great news is that the Mets won. John Maine pitched the game of his fucking life, taking a no-hitter into the 8th inning before having it broken up by an infield squibber down the third-base line. It was the only hit of the game for the Marlins. Meanwhile, the Mets brutalized the opposition 13-0 on 19 hits.

And still no Mets pitcher has ever thrown a no-no in franchise history. So many come close, but none have succeeded.

So then, the FOX affiliate in L.A. showed us the Cubs vs Reds gamea. Now, I am a Cubs fan, I am very happy to see them in the postseason. But this game had absolutely zero bearing on anything in the postseason. The Cubs have already won their division, they're just playing to play. The Reds, LOL. So I'm screaming a tirade of profanity and anger at my TV, wondering why they aren't showing the Phillies-Nationals game, a game with HUGE playoff implications. After maybe a half-inning, someone at FOX must have realized that they should switch to a game that actually matters, and they went to Philadelphia.

After about 4-5 innings of that game, they then switched us over to the Milwaukee Brewers vs San Diego Padres game, which I could at least understand, even if I wasn't happy about it. After all, San Diego is in the playoff picture, they're on the West Coast, and they're fighting for a playoff spot as well. Plus it was a pretty good game.

The Brewers, down 3-2 in the 9th inning with 2 out and a man on 2nd, had to face all-time saves leader and future HOFer Trevor Hoffman. In perhaps a nice twist of irony, Hoffman was facing Tony Gwynn Jr. If the Padres won the game, they were guaranteed the wild card and no one could take it from them.

Gwynn Jr. tripled down the rightfield line to tie the game 3-3. They game went into extra innings, and the Brewers ultimately won the game 4-3 in 11 innings.

And in the most important news of the day, the Washington Nationals beat the Philadelphia Phillies 4-2, which put the Mets and Phillies in a tie for first place of the NL East with identical records of 88-73.

It all comes down to Sunday, and someone is going to choke, even if it goes to Monday.

If the Mets win and the Phillies lose, the Mets win the NL East.
If the Mets lose and the Phillies win, the Phillies win the NL East.
If both teams win OR both teams lose, there will be a one-game tiebreaker played on Monday between the two teams in Philadelphia. Considering the ass-whupping that the Phils have put on the Metropolitans over the course of the 2006 regular season, this is an extremely undesirable outcome. But at least the Mets will have a chance. Plus they do play better on the road.

One thing is for certain, Sunday is going to be super-dramatic. And fuck FOX for putting NFL games on instead of MAJOR baseball games with dire consequences.

First a recap of my predictions of the final 4 teams...

Eastern Conference Finals:
Buffalo Sabres (1) vs Ottawa Senators (4)
Original prediction: Buffalo in 7 games.
Reality: Ottawa in 5 games.

I don't know what happened to the all-powerful Buffalo Sabres, but they got destroyed by an extremely hot Ottawa team. This is the best team that Buffalo has ever had, and they couldn't make it to the Cup Finals.

Western Conference Finals:
Detroit Red Wings (1) vs Anaheim Ducks (2)
Original prediction: Anaheim in 6 games.
Reality: Anaheim in 6 games.

Detroit surprised everyone by defeating the San Jose Sharks in the previous round, and even gave Anaheim a run for their money, but ultimately the Ducks are too good and J.S. Giguere proved to be the differencemaker, sending the Ducks to their 2nd Stanley Cup Final in the last 5 years (they lost in 7 games to the Devils in 2003).

So now we move to the Stanley Cup Finals. Two teams that have never won the Stanley Cup. One team has never been to the Finals.

Stanley Cup Finals:
Ottawa Senators vs Anaheim Ducks

This actually looks to be a very tough series. Ottawa has been very hot in the playoffs, running over Pittsburgh, Jersey and Buffalo to make it to the finals. This means they had to defeat 2 of the best goalies in the NHL (Martin Brodeur and Ryan Miller), and Senators goalie Ray Emery had to best them both. With guys like Daniel Alfredsson and Dany Heatley on the front line, Ottawa's offense is extremely potent.

And then you move to the Anaheim Ducks, with Teemu Selanne, Rob and Scott Niedermayer, and top defenseman Chris Pronger, not to mention the franchise's long-time goalie Jean-Sebastian Giguere (but we just call him J.S.). They ran through both Minnesota and Vancouver in 5 games, and Detroit in 6, to get to the Cup Finals.

The one thing that seems to be constant, is that all the experts out there agree that this series is going 6 or 7 games, but there's no consensus pick as to which team is going to raise the Stanley Cup. Ottawa is hot, but Anaheim is a better team, and it really depends on if Ottawa can stay that way, or if Anaheim plays as poorly as they did against the Red Wings in Game 3 of the Conference Finals in which the Ducks lost 5-0.

Ultimately, I have to pick the better team, which are the Anaheim Ducks, who also have home ice advantage. They're going to win the Cup in 7 games. I just hope people in both the U.S. and Canada (well they definitely will in Canada), watch this series.

It's a good thing that the Mets-Yankees games are going to be on national TV this weekend. I'll definitely be watching Saturday's game, and I really do expect the Mets to sweep the Yankees.

Having watched the Sportscenter highlights of the Mets 3-2 victory over the Yankees, the clip that made my nipples tingle and my dick hard was the final game-ending strikeout of Jason Giambi by Billy Wagner. It wasn't even the strikeout itself, but this FANTASTIC reaction of a couple of Skankee fans behind the plate who clutched their respective skulls as if they were about to die in a plane crash.

I'm sure I've had many of those similar reactions myself over the years as a Mets fan, but I've never been on TV making them. I'm going to TRY and do a live play-by-play of tomorrow's game on this very blog.

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So the Ducks and Red Wings are now tied up at 2 games a piece in the Western Conference Finals, and this is becoming a very interesting matchup. The Ducks SHOULD be destroying the Red Wings, but they've become mortals. They still managed to win Game 4 despite the one-game suspension of Chris Pronger, but need to shoot on Dominik Hasek with an AK-47 at this point. The Ducks should not be losing to Detroit at all.

And then there's the Buffalo Sabres. What happened to the best team in the NHL? They showed their greatness against the Islanders and Rangers, but then they faced the Senators from Ottawa, and have become the Columbus Blue Jackets. While the Sabres survived the 4-game sweep by finally (and barely) beating Ottawa, they are still in a 3-1 hole. While there have been instances of NHL teams coming back from 3-0 playoff deficits in the past, they are still quite rare.

I'm thinking the Sabres will win one more game before Ottawa puts this series away in Game 6. Still, a surprising turn of events, and one that shows that even the teams with the best records, don't always go the furthest in the playoffs.