Hockey Guilty Pleasures

Intro: So I'm a Kings fan living in Edmonton (I know, weird), my favorite player is Drew Doughty, as you may have guessed by my profile name.

   

1. Player You Most Love To Hate:

God, I could just rant forever here. Dion Phaneuf, Jason Blake, Mike Ribeiro, Maxim Lapierre, Matt Cooke, all are very worthy candidates. But I won't waste everyone's valuable internet minutes so I'll take Captain Jerkface himself, Kevin Bieksa.

I hate when he talks. I hate when he plays hockey. But most of all, I just hate his face. He looks like that guy who moved in with your mom after your dad left, and you just refused to call him Dad. Hypothetically speaking, of course.

2. Team You Can't Help Rooting For:

I'm a born and raised Edmonton kid, so it should be the Oilers, but some of the armchair GM fans here make me want to light dynamite sticks and put them in my ears.

I'd have to pick the Blue Jackets. they're like Dewey from Malcolm in the Middle; all the other teams are busy arguing about relocation and revenue sharing and rule changes (and getting in squabbles over traded fouth-line centres who are injured because of their shitty lying GM), and there's Columbus, the little kid in the corner throwing a fit, being completely ignored.

Also Rick Nash is a fucking man.

3. Favorite Fight or Brawl of All-Time

Oilers-Thrashers. Februray 11, 2004. Starts off normally enough, as you see Francis Lessard square off with Georges Laraque and Andy Sutton and Eric Brewer chuckin' knuckles. Then, at about the 50 second mark of the video, the crowd starts getting louder, and Kevin Quinn calmly remarks Mike Bishai is fighting Serge Aubin FROM IN THE ATLANTA BENCH. And then, while that's happening, the two goalies, Ty Conklin and Pasi Nurminen decide actions are louder than words and they start getting into the festivities.

There are so many unanswered questions that remain after the dust settles. How did Mike Bishai end up in the bench? Where the fuck did Nurminen learn how to dish 'em out like that? Was it just me or did it look like Conklin was giving him a scalp exam in the slo-mo replay? Why was Ivan Majesky dry humping Jason Smith at the Oilers blueline?

Nurminen and Conklin ended up being ejected, and Atlanta was forced to play the last 2-odd minutes without a goalie, because their backup (I think it was Byron Defoe) was injured in pre-games.

I have never seen so much silliness at once in a hockey game and I will always remember this game for that reason.

4. Favorite Hideous-Looking Jersey of All-Time:

via 2.bp.blogspot.com

I don't know if it counts as "hideous-looking" but it was a little unorthodox. I just think it's beautiful.

5. Favorite Hockey Cliche:

Tie between "ferda" as in "Ferda boys" (for the boys), and "flow" for long, flowing hockey hair.

Honourable mention for "sauce."

6. Injury You Couldn't Stop staring At:

Kopitar's ankle injury from this year. The way his leg seemed to snap borth and forth, side to side as he fell to the ground.Yuck. And the look of sheer agony on his face as he lay there helpless just personified what the end of the Kings season would end up being.

via www.sportsnet.ca

7. Your Favorite Cheesy Hockey Reference in Popular Culture:

The "Slapshot Regatta" from She's Out of My League is a good recent one that comes to mind. Reminds me of the days me and my brother and my dad would play in our basement. The game always ended with my brother ripping a shot that hit my dad in the groin. Then he'd lose it and we wouldn't play for at least another 2 weeks.

8. Finally, What's the Thing You Secretly Respect Gary Bettman for the Most?

Surviving my repeated assassination attempts over the years.

Follow me on the Twitterverse: @lankykwas