Swarf

Here's some random bullshit for a Friday:

-Re: The Sharks. The Sharks play the German Mannheim Eagles tomorrow at 10:30 AM Pacific time. Even though this is pretty weird, it should be a lot of fun. The Sharks have to start Greiss, right? The only German player they have has GOT to play in Germany.

It's been a rough pre-season so far, but in the last game against the Canucks things finally went the right way. The guys who are supposed to score did and Nitty was solid in goal. Game like that make it a lot easier to stay positive.

-Re: Plagiarism. Our "Patrick Marleau Facts" have been ripped-off respectfully honored by Thrashers blogger "Mr. Recaps" (which is probably not his real name, but if it is real then that's awesome). They've put together a solid collection of True Facts about the Thrashers' own misunderstood wonder, Ron Hainsey. Some of the highlights:

Ron Hainsey has Word 2007 and accidentally saves all his files in docx format. Everyone gets mad at him because they can't open his files.


Ron Hainsey sometimes reminisces about how he "used to fuck ALL KINDS of fat chicks."


Ron Hainsey doesn’t have a pool but regularly describes "my pool" because no one on the team has ever been to his house.

Good stuff, even though that last one seems so true-to-life I have to wonder about Mr. Recaps himself. You can read the rest here.

-Re: Predicting wins for your team. Rudy and Earl have occasionally discussed how they make predictions for each game preview. They usually pick a win unless they are being funny, are depressed, or are trying some sort of reverse psychology thing. Since I'm coming up on opening day for my first full season blogging here, I've been thinking about what I'll do in my gameday posts, including whether I will be predicting a win for all 82 games this year. In talking it over with a coworker I've sort of gotten myself involved in a wager about it.

Long story short, my coworker the Lakers fan said it seemed unrealistic and "stupid" to predict a win for every game. I countered that:

1. I have confidence that the Sharks are ABLE to beat any team on any given night.

2. Actually thinking you can predict a game is pretty foolish. I will most likely choose correctly more often by always predicting a win than I would if I picked either wins or losses, given that the Sharks will probably win more games than they lose this year.

3. The Sharks rule.

So here's the deal: I'll predict a win for every game this year, while my coworker will try to predict either a win or a loss for every Lakers game. We'll keep track and whoever is correct more often by the end of the seasons will win...something. We don't know yet. Any ideas?

-Re: Fantasy hockey. I think my team is pretty bitchin'. Zac Parise will have a whole year with Ilya Kovalchuk on his team, Quick will keep the Kings' starting job and play behind a really solid defense, and Patrick Marleau wears footie pajamas. I also have the amazing defensive pair of Zdeno Chara and Dustin Byfuglien, which makes me wish this was a real hockey team just so I could see opposing forwards try to get past those monsters. Contrast this to my first week opponent, Sleek and Destroy, who doesn't even bother to have a full set of defensemen on his team. For shame.

It also makes me really happy that I have the world's richest goalie on my team.