Two goalies, no great starter. Blown leads. A Spezza injury, followed by a devastating (but short) Alfredsson injury. Sloppy, sloppy defensive work and a languid offense.
Each slump is new in circumstance and context but ultimately it comes down to the same goddamn thing: no goaltending, no defense, no offense, and no wins. No confidence, no smiles. This too, shall come to pass.
*
Forget about the players having a Stanley Cup Finals hangover. I have a damn hangover. I can't watch hockey for more than a few minutes without thinking of the damn playoffs and those damn Ducks and how long the season is before anything matters, how nothing was easy and conversely the ease with which the Senators played was a small miracle. I cannot practice the Zen art of hockey watching anymore, unless it's a team that I don't care for. Like the Chicago Blackhawks. And even then I am more amusing myself with Patrick Kane's angelic curls and pondering Toews' possible Mennonite roots than actually watching, watching them.
Am I losing interest?
Is this what it feels like to be on the other side of the divide? To be sickened by hockey, to have the nerve to say "fuck hockey" and change the channel to watch Gossip Girls?
Yet it's not like I can stay away from hockey news, from knowing what the score is, who's in net, who took too many penalties, and who handed out whiskey to a homeless dude in Montreal. I just can't fathom why the hell the season has started already and we've already finished a quarter while I'm still thinking about what went wrong in Anaheim. The start of this regular season has felt like an overblown epilogue to the real story that's already ended.
Please don't strip me of my hockey stripes just yet. I don't really watch Gossip Girls.
*
While watching the Leafs lose the game in the first period, I really enjoyed the film "Rhino Brothers" on CityTV. It's the story of a precariously professional hockey player who tries to quit hockey. He returns home to his overbearing, ambitious mother and his bitter brothers. The mother stiffly accuses his fiancé of distracting him from the ice and reminds him constantly of his points, goals, assists, ice-time … his older brother, a failed minor-leaguer, seethes in the background as an example of what happens when a hockey career fails.
The film really made me think about what happens when hockey fails. The theme of failed dreams isn't exclusive to hockey, but I find that often hockey, especially, is full of those clichés -- "perseverance," "fight through the pain," etc. Dedication, suffering through body checks and roster cuts are the ultimate badge of what it means to be a real hockey player -- one with "heart," you might say. But my god, metaphors of the ice can't be applied to the real world that easily. Hockey exists in a vacuum in that sense. As much as we glorify the "gritty" player for his heart, the player has to be constantly aware that he's an injury or a bad off-season away from losing his job. A player can try as hard as he wants but when he has marginal talent, no amount of blood, sweat or tears will ever make up for it.
What a cruel, cruel world.
How many of those real-life minor leaguers are playing in the leagues of Texas? Italy? How many of them still dream of being called up? When does hockey stop being love and start being a curse?
There is one TV character that reminds me of Chris Phillips, a younger, more socially awkward Chris Phillips. Matt Saracen, quarterback for the Dillon Panthers, plays football in a backwater, football-centered Texan town, takes care of his aging, senile grandmother by himself, deals with a sweet, naive but bratty, girlfriend/ex-girlfriend. He's quietly possible the most mature character on the show.
And you won't find any recent, long, emotional stories about Chris Phillips. He doesn't block shots heroically to win the hearts of young girls everywhere; he hasn't scored any key goals lately; he hasn't founded a school for young girls in South Africa. He probably will never attract much attention outside of Ottawa, but he has one of the most intriguing stories of any player.
He had a compelling story to tell about how he gained an inner strength at home, where he had to grow up quickly and learn the meaning of responsibility. Phillips didn't have time to be a kid. His mom was partially paralyzed by a virus that affected her spinal cord. His dad was 90 percent blind. Yet Chris and his sister, Jennifer, acted like it was no big deal to give of themselves when their parents needed them.
..
After doing countless interviews, Phillips quietly left the Kiel Center, pushing his mother's wheelchair. His father, holding on to one of Chris' belt loops, followed.
You often can paint pictures of how an athlete gives and gives in competition, but you never can get more inside an individual than I did at that moment.
To a certain degree, not many people completely regret the terrible things that happened to them in childhood. All the little slights of adolescence disappear. Chris Phillips doesn't lead so much as he exudes a sort of emotional confidence. It's not the coldness of Wade Redden nor the quiet determination of Alfredsson, but he knows it's not the end of the world if we lose, it won't be the beginning of the world if we win, and there is no strength like the strength inside.
Jason Spezza $49 millions over 7 years, when most people predicted $8, $9 million on the outside market.
He loves us, doesn't he?
I mean, it's hard to know if a player really even likes where he's playing, or if he's accepted it with a sort of grimness.
Besides cheesy TV segments, the only way to really show your loyalty and appreciation of the team and fans is through money.
The players really feel it too, don't they?
Still, we can't ignore the irony that a few years ago, Hossa's untenable $6 mil contract forced a trade, as we celebrate the wonderous occasion of this signing. 2 years later, Heatley has already re-signed, and Hossa has not ...
There are many things in hockey that will displace an unwilling player from a team. Most of these things are never mentioned publicly, such as extramarital affairs with a teammate's wife. Scoring a hurtful own goal isn't necessarily one of things things, but in Toronto, the only appropriate response for Bryan McCabe was to sob uncontrollably and beg for forgiveness. Instead, he said stoically that these things pass .. that fans will forget ...
No Bryan, they won't. YouTube remembers everything.
Everything about this situation seems to be PR. The chances of McCabe being traded, due to his hefty contract, are fairly slim. The correct move for Bryan right now to do is call an emotional press conference, express his undying love for the Toronto Maple Leafs and Mats Sundin, and hope that the fans take it easy on him with the rain of "Shoot!."
However, I would like to thank Bryan McCabe for a source of endless amusement and another reason to laugh at the Leafs. It's a bottomless pit of fun ...
*
The NHL uploaded 2006-7 player profiles that are kind of cute. You can see Wade Redden's hometown of Lloydminster, SK (it's full of tractors). Half of this is an ad for his wakeboarding company. Note: Don't watch this if you have a slow connection. Even with my relatively fast connection, Redden's buffering, slow, slurred speech was like listening to somebody on an acid trip. (Metaphor only.)
Watch it well. It may be his (second) last.
The one with Jason Spezza was done during Winterlude, with random scenes of strangers drinking hot chocolate, and old draft footage. You can really see the gel in Spezza's hair. There is also a disturbing scene of Spezza eating a beavertail ... "Ooh that is too good." No, Jason, no. You naughty boy.
I almost posted the Zdeno Chara one until I realized ... you know. He's gone.
*
On a weird parallel note, Tyler Donati, who I last saw play for the St. Michael's Majors, is now a Binghamton Senator.
In Hamilton, every time I ask about a certain destination, the person describing it pauses. Eyebrows knit. A word is contemplated, and it's always this word:
"Sketchy."
Jackson Square is sketchy. The people at that bar are kind of sketchy. East Hamilton is a sketchy place.
Sketchy people, sketchy places, sketchy buildings ... Hamilton is like an unfinished drawing.
To the optimistic Leafs fan, the type who thinks every year is the year, say,
"Do you think it's your year? Huh? Your year to win? Win the Stanley Cup? Make it into the playoffs? Win 16 games? Huh? Win? Win a championship? Win your first in 41 years? Huh? Have your players play really well? Toskala succeeds, Sundin stays healthy? The defense come together? Everyone trusts Paul Maurice? Huh? The rookies succeed? Huh? The offense becomes lethal? Huh? Score a lot of goals? Pitch a lot of shutouts? Make Toronto proud? Save JFJ's job? Huh? Your year to do all that, huh? Set some goals? Achieve them? Your year to win? ...
[dramatic pause]
.. It's not."
The longer you continue the string of questioning, the more successful this becomes. I find that inevitably, they start laughing.
Weekly Review - Major Storylines
Gerber vs. Emery (vs. Elliot)Martin Gerber's solid performances has bumped his rating from "play well so we can trade you" to "hey wait maybe he's better than the other guy." With a fantastic 40 second stretch in Saturday night's game vs the Rangers and 5 wins, Gerber finally looks like the goalie we wanted to sign. Maybe the square dancing propelled his confidence, maybe it boosted his coordination. Either way.
Contrast this with Gerber's failures last season -- sure, we didn't want him to start anymore, but it was a painful realization, not a giddy complaint. All the criticisms of Gerber were marked by panic for the team. Gerber just seemed, well, pathetic.
But no longer!
Emery's wrist injury will keep him out for a little while longer, and he should view Gerber as a threat to his no. 1 position. Emery may have carried us far into the playoffs, but he was nothing exceptional. Having a tandem of strong goalies works, as the past few Stanley Cup winners have shown us, it just hurts a little when you're spending $8 million on them.
Trends The Senators haven't blown anybody out yet, but it's been a steady pace. The essence of our chemistry remains and the early trends suggest that this is a mature team that knows itself well, knows the goals well, and damn well looks ready for anything. And now, we wait?
The only concern that carries over from last season is the lack of reliable secondary scoring. Although Mike Fisher was awarded with a very generous $4.2 mil/season contract, it's not going to make him score more. Making plays and scoring is something that God either lets you or declines you to do.
Short of praying that Peter Forsberg finds himself inexplicably attracted to Ottawa for some reason, there aren't many options out there for the Senators. This secondary scoring thing has been a perennial problem since Havlat's departure, and even for a while with Havlat. But this is the first season where we have realized the first-hand consequences of not having that fear-inducing second-line center ....
Scott Niedermayer
Then again, Scott Niedermayer has been "suspended", and it took him, Chris Pronger, and Pahlsson to neutralize our Big Line. At this point, it would be incredibly awkward for Scott Niedermayer to return. I mean, think of his team as his lover. The renewal of his contract is like an engagement proposal. If Niedermayer needs to think this long about being with the Anaheim Ducks, he's clearly ambivalent. The Anaheim Ducks deserve better than that. Take some time off, adopt a Malawian orphan, go back to school ... solve your mid-life crisis ... you've done all you can here, Scotty.
But in a way, this indecision makes me like Niedermayer even more. He has never been a stereotypical hockey player, with his scholarly glasses and quietly rebellious emoish haircut. I don't think he goes out to the bars every night and hits on the prettiest blondes. I've always felt that he had a deep appreciation of the game that few people realize. But there is nothing left for him to prove or challenge; without the context of winning or losing meaning something, it's just a job. And Niedermayer, who drives a Toyota Prius, doesn't seem to care about the money. I like his uncertainty because it means that he exists outside of hockey.
