SB Nation User Blog: Nael M.

If anyone thought the NHL's regular-season games in Europe were a short-term experiment, guess...

Nael M. — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 19:40:14 -0000

If anyone thought the NHL's regular-season games in Europe were a short-term experiment, guess again.

The league wants to expand to six teams next fall, up from four, and have approached the following clubs to gauge their interest: Minnesota, Carolina, Boston, Columbus, Phoenix and San Jose. Sources from all six teams confirmed as much but also stressed that it doesn't mean for sure they are going over. It remains early in the planning stages.

Pierre LeBrun on the possibility of games in Europe next season.

No. Just no.

The Plight of the Californian Hockey Fan

Nael M. — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 20:03:41 -0000

The Plight of the Californian Hockey Fan

Fear The Fin reader mymclife put together a great piece on the hell fans of the California teams get from other hockey fans. Good read.

WTC: Heatley's historic night, Joe Ike fired

Nael M. — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 20:08:25 -0000

WTC: Heatley's historic night, Joe Ike fired

New WTC post from Pollack. Of note:

*Heatley's +6 night is the best for a player being on the ice for all his team's goals since Richard Smehlik had a +6 for Atlanta back in 2002. Also, the Heatley-Thornton-Setoguchi line's combined plus-minus went from -12 to +2 thanks to that game.
*Some observations on Jason Demers' bad night, including the Nabby shove at the end of the game.
*Joe Ike was apparently let go, according to Greg Jamison. Team got rid of 8-10 jobs during the off-season, and dedicated PA announcer seems to be one of them. The guy doing the PA last night was Danny Miller, who you may recognize as the contest and promotion guy during TV breaks.
*McLellan with some comments on the team's defense and whether the Thornton line would break out that night.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be in the corner depressed about Joe Ike being let go. :(

Randy Hahn interview on Kotaku

Nael M. — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 19:16:44 -0000

Randy Hahn interview on Kotaku

The Sharks' own Randy and Drew are returning to do the commentary for 2K Sports' NHL 2K10, and video game ~~tabloid~~ blog Kotaku decided to interview Randy to get some insight into the process of recording commentary for sports games in general.

BoC's Mike Chen on the Sharks' situation

Nael M. — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 19:34:56 -0000

BoC's Mike Chen on the Sharks' situation

Good insight on why exactly the Sharks' problems aren't as big of a deal as some folks make them out to be.

Sharks owners named 4th best by SI

Nael M. — Tue, 12 May 2009 22:35:12 -0000

Sharks owners named 4th best by SI

Sports Illustrated has just put out their lists of the top 5 and worst 5 owners in each of the major sports, and the Sharks' ownership group, San Jose Sports and Entertainment, was named the 4th best NHL owner.

H/T to Puck Daddy for the link.

The FIRST Battle of California

Nael M. — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 02:11:44 -0000

The FIRST Battle of California

With the excitement over a potential BoC in this year's playoffs, might as well quickly point a Sharks-Ducks series would actually be the SECOND Battle of California - the first was in the 1969 playoffs, where the Kings beat the Oakland Seals 4 games to 3 in the Western Division semifinals. With many folks incorrectly saying this year would be the first playoff series involving Cali teams, might as well point this out - especially since this is the 40th anniversary of the original BoC.

The "Evgeni Nabokov" twitter

Nael M. — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 04:48:50 -0000

The "Evgeni Nabokov" twitter

For those of you that missed it in the GDT, here's that fake Nabby Twitter account again.

ESPN.com loves The Todd

Nael M. — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 18:26:16 -0000

ESPN.com loves The Todd

ESPN.com's Pierre LeBrun put up an entry on his blog singing the praises of our beloved coach Todd McLellan, including asking why he isn't being considered for the Jack Adams Award this season.

H/T to Puck Daddy for pointing it out.

Wasn't the regular season not supposed to matter?

Nael M. — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 18:33:09 -0000

I've been thinking about this long and hard, and in the light of the flipping out of the fanbase after Coyote Ugly 2.0 and the team meeting yesterday, I feel now seems like a good time to let this out. It's an observation I've noticed over the season from the fans, and it intrigues me a bit to see how everyone was reacting at the start of the season compared to now.

When this season started, the general consensus of both the Sharks and their fans was that what mattered was not the regular season, but the playoffs - everything they'd do in the first 82 games wouldn't matter one whit if the team screwed up in the second round again. Even as the Sharks shot off intro the stratosphere and became a Presidents' Trophy contender, Sharks fans on any medium you could say were saying, "Yeah, but the real test will be in the playoffs." Supposedly no matter how well they played in the regular season, it was generally accepted that the playoffs have always been a different animal (especially for the Sharks) and that we shouldn't be taking the results then as any indication of how they would do in the second season. A cautious tack to take, but a reasonable one as well.

Now, the team is suffering through their worst stretch of hockey this season, and all of a sudden every Sharks fan with access to a forum or a commenting system is going "How can they play like this? They'll never succeed in the playoffs when they play like this in the postseason!" And all I can think of when I read every one of these posts saying this is, what happened to "the regular season doesn't matter"? Now I'm not denying this team has been stinking up a lot of joints lately, but what I thought everyone in the fanbase agreed that the regular season had no bearing on postseason success - but that was back when the Sharks were giving the beatdowns, not receiving them. Now that the team has been showing they're human, fans are acting like every game is a damn crystal ball into how these guys will play into April and May (because obviously these games indicate they won't make it to June ;)

Really, it's absolutely bizarre to me how quickly Sharks fans have dumped the "the playoffs are the only thing that matters" mantra as soon as the team's play inevitably went south (I say inevitably because even the best of the best have rough patches - see the Red Wings' brutal February last year). I can't possibly be the only one who noticed this shift, right?