SB Nation User Blog: PPP

Vesa’s done a great job recently, and before Vesa, Jonas was making some big saves. And it’s huge. Y...

PPP — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 08:03:23 -0000

Vesa’s done a great job recently, and before Vesa, Jonas was making some big saves. And it’s huge. You start to trust your goaltender, other things fall into place.

Emphasis mine, Ron Wilson's, Brian Burke's, and anyone's who has ever played in front of a shaky goalie.

It all begins in net and builds from there.

Dany Heatley Speedwagon, noted troll and ocassional blogger at Scarlett Ice, forwarded me his entry...

PPP — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 20:13:56 -0000

Dany Heatley Speedwagon, noted troll and ocassional blogger at Scarlett Ice, forwarded me his entry into Puck Daddy's Christmas Float Contest.

As if we needed any more reason to hate the s*nators. Well, I guess Phil Kessel is pulling the bandwagon and Toskala did get caught under some wheels and Brian Burke does get pulled around town like a potentate...whatever. Screw the s*nators.

I fully expect some of the photoshop wizards around these parts to create something miles better than this hastily thrown together pile of dung.

"They never quit. Those guys always skate hard, they forecheck hard. They might not be the most...

PPP — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 03:08:05 -0000

"They never quit. Those guys always skate hard, they forecheck hard. They might not be the most talented team, but they never give up."

The Washington Capitals' Alexander Ovechkin pays the Leafs a commonly heard compliment. The team is halfway to where it needs to be. Next up: becoming more talented.

If the 1988-89 season had a highlight for the Maple Leafs, it was probably a six game winning...

PPP — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 21:51:10 -0000

If the 1988-89 season had a highlight for the Maple Leafs, it was probably a six game winning streak on the road. (Oilers fans can probably see where I’m going with this). I’m pulling together some data on winning streaks on the road and, by and large, if you hit five games, you’re talking about a very good hockey team, a 95 point club or so, in the days when that meant something.

MC79 takes a look at what you can tell from a team's ability to put together a string together some road wins. You'll never guess where he's going with this and I'm not sure you'll ever be able to forget the conclusion so be forewarned.

Toronto Maple Leafs v. Boston Bruins: Translation Problems

PPP — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 23:06:59 -0000

Fighting in Punjabi doesn't sound any tougher

What you are experiencing while viewing that video (make sure to listen) is what the Maple Leafs encountered last Saturday. They knew what was going on and what was supposed to happen but nothing made any sense. Their forwards' efforts weren't rewarded, their goalies didn't make any saves, and their defence turned back the clock to October.

Tonight they get a quick chance to redeem themselves and avenge one of the few blights over their past 10 games. Phil BOOOOOOOO Kessel's got that first BOOOOOOOOO game out of the BOOOOOOOOOO way so he'll BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOo know what to expect and hopefully BOOOOOOOOOOO he'll react much better than he did on the weekend.

Wrap's tending to familial duties but the same rules apply: Keep it relevant and as insightful as possible. Newcomers, this is a good chance to say hello. Don't be shy. Also, remember your SPG picks.

Ian White is Moustachulent, Blake Wheeler Should Be Suspended, and Hockey Night in Canada Hates Us

PPP — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 04:28:39 -0000

Glove tap to Belligerent Burkie for finding the incident in question

This has nothing to with this post other than I love posting Ian White kicking ass
The Man, The Myth, The Moustache

17. Bill McCreary apologized to Ian White for missing Blake Wheeler’s push from behind that sent White hard into boards. White said after the game, "I was lucky." Obviously, you’d love McCreary to see it and call it live, but good on him for manning up.

- Elliotte Friedman, 30 Thoughts

How long r we going to treat refs like they're above the law, above being questioned by the media? It's an outdated concept that needs 2 die

- Jason Whitlock, Twitter

Those two tweets, the latter re-tweeted by yours truly, were enough to sitr me from my blogging slumber. As usual, my muse Godd Till, was on gchat immediately to kick-start the creative process:

Till: AH YES, BECAUSE THE STANDARD OF OFFICIATING WOULD CERTAINLY BE IMPROVED BY SUSTAINED, INTELLIGENT CRITICISM BY THE HOWARD BERGERS OF THE WORLD

PPP: Not from the dumbasses of the world but the refs should have to answer for why they screwed up like with that White hit.

Till: UH HUH. 'REPLAYS SHOW THAT I WAS BLOCKED OUT ON THE PLAY' Remember that? Can't wait for more of that standard of ass-covering. This should be great.

Obviously, the fact that Bill McCreary missed the hit is mind-blowing. I won't beat around the bush, Ian White is bang on: he is very lucky. If he had been hit a half a stride or so sooner he could have woken up Sunday with a halo and paralysed from the waist or neck down. Blake Wheeler laid an absolutely filthy hit and the fact that he isn't suspended and that there was no call on the ice highlights the massive trouble the league faces in trying to cut dirty play out of the game.

The more upsetting part was that Blake Wheeler didn't stand up to Colton Orr when it came time to pay the piper. Normally, non-fighters obviously don't have to fight enforcers but 'The Code' is supposed to keep players from making those kinds of hits because they'll have to fight the Colton Orrs of the world. Instead, we saw Wheeler pull his best Claude Lemieux impression while the Bruins were rewarded with a powerplay. Of course, I don't want Orr to pull a Carcillo but is it to much to ask that Blake Wheeler man up? And if he won't, would it kill the league to dish out some punishment? I guess so.

There was obviously a lot of ugly things in a broadcast that features the Leafs losing 7-2 in Phil Kessel's first trip back to Boston but one we could both agree on was that Mike Milbury's presence was the straw that broke the camel's back. How bad was it? Godd Till actually wrote a post about how it made him realise Pierre McGuire's genius. Put aside the fact that the very idea of having him present his opinions on anything related to the NHL is laughable.

Till: And what the fuck was with having Mike Milbury in the booth? That POS defended Wheeler on that play.

PPP: WASN'T THAT PAINFUL?

Till: Fuck, Hughson and Simpson are bad enough but that addition was so fucking bad.

PPP: Yeah, it was disgusting.

Till: Hmm, let's put a grating loudmouth Bruins homer in the booth.

PPP: Yeah, this is genius. Ok, next we're going to put a West Coaster with an inferiority complex about Toronto.

Till: Check!

PPP: And some twit that didn't want to play in Toronto because he was a pussy.

Till: GREATTTTT IDEA!

PPP: This is going to be awesome
/scribbles HNiC script

Till: THE TORONTO MAPLE LEAFS ARE PROUD TO SELECT, FROM SASKATOON OF THE WHL, D WENDEL CLARK! FUCK YOU SIMPSON!

PPP: THEN FUCKING BENEDICT CHERRY WEARS A FUCKING BROOONS TIE!

Thanks to a quirk in the schedule the Maple Leafs are back in Boston on Thursday night for a rematch. This is probably a great thing for Phil Kessel in terms of facing a pressure-packed environment. It also lets the Leafs work on the things that killed them on Saturday night: their lack of attention to detail, their lack of offensive desire, and their lack of passion. The one advantage they have is that the Bruins won't be getting shellacked by the Habs Wednesday night because anyone that watched Friday's 100th anniversary game knew what was going to happen:

The Bruins are going to be flying tomorrow night. Freaking bums
- Some Guy On Twitter

God, I hate it when randoms on Twitter are right.

Maple Leafs 5 v. Thrashers 2: TODAY IS THE GREATEST DAYYYY

PPP — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 02:33:05 -0000

More photos » by CHRIS YOUNG - AP

Sorry Antro. You can't have Poni! He's mine!

Browse more photos »

Chemmy would like you to listen to this song to understand the post title. Unfortunately, Smashing Pumpkins doesn't like having their music embedded.

The Toronto Maple Leafs bounced back from a pantsing in Boston on Saturday to beat the Atlanta Thrashers 5-2. They were paced by two goals by Alexei Ponikarovsky, a strong performance by Matt Stajan, and competent, nay, outstanding at times, goaltending by Vesa Toskala. Re-read that if you have to in order to believe it but there it is.

The Toronto Maple Leafs knew that they had to do something special. First, they knew that Puck Daddy was going to be in the building being afraid of King Clancy after a day spent visiting all of the city's sights. He also did his best Don Cherry impression: YER PATHETIC!! Could have used Jeff Marek standing beside him terrified and perplexed. Secondly, they likely (despite all protests to the contrary) read this abortion of an article by Mark Zwolinski featuring his best Working Class Howard impression:

Even though they are fully aware of it, the Leafs received another reminder yesterday of how fortunate they are to play in a city where no matter how poorly they perform, there's always a love-in waiting for them when they return home.

And that was the first sentence/paragraph/whatever journalists write since they stopped writing in proper English! Now, I know ad hominem attacks aren't the way to make your point but...come on, is Zwolinski an idiot? The love-in? Is this by the fans that spent so much time booing the team that JFJ actually got fired, that McCabe got run out of town, that Tucker and Raycroft were bought out, that reporters have commented on what a poisoned atmosphere the ACC has become? Really? Where are Amy Pohler and Seth Myers when I need them!

And because I can't let a mention of 'idiot' and Working Class Howard go without a proper mention here were the two records that the teams sported before tonight: Leafs at home: 2-7-3 Thrashers on the road: 9-2-1. What would those figures have told you before the game? That the Thrashers were likely to win the game. Well, that's not what Mensa Berger had in mind. His view was that 'something's got to give'. Sure Howie. Yeah, yeah, yeah, he could have been saying that the Leafs aren't this bad and the Thrashers aren't that good but knowing WCH who thinks that that was his point?

The first period was a whole lot of frustrating as the Leafs directed 30 pucks in the direction of the Thrashers' net only to see 20 get blocked or miss the net completely. Most notably, on a long 5-on-3 the Leafs managed to look completely toothless. Luckily for them, Toskala kept out all nine of Atlanta's shots. Every time I write that I have to check the scoresheet to make sure it's real.

The second period can best be described with a short anecdote. Godd Till, of Zambonic Youth fame, and I frequently chat about soccer, our old high school, whose hometown is worse (Cobourg came out strong but was trumped by Peterborough's NSFW late effort), and simulate British football commentary when we rip on right-wing extremists on Twitter. For the unitiated, that means writing hilarious overwrought and ridiculous things but our all-time favourite word is the only one that could describe the second period: Rampant. The Toronto Maple Leafs, for one of the few times this year, were well and truly rampant. One might have referred to 'champagne hockey' and 'the gulf in class' being tangible. Leading the stampede was Alexei Ponikarovsky although he had plenty of help from Matt Stajan (on pace for 26 goals), Lee Stempniak (on pace for 21 goals), and Mikhail Grabovski (on pace for 17 murdered pineapples).

That left the ACC crowd in ecstasy (sorry, still in Brit commenter-mode) as the home side ran up a 5-0 lead. Of course, that led to the mention by everyone that Vesa Toskala could pick up a shutout. People were angry, irate, and...crazy. Jinxes are superstitions. We can't control it. If people want to flout accepted societal norms and mention shutouts all willy nilly well...that kind of thinking is what gave us the current sexually equal generation of women so who's to say it's wrong? In the end, people just had to remember that a. the Leafs get ridiculously pleased with a good two period effort and b. Vesa Toskala was in net.

So for those keeping track at home, while the mittenstringers have been calling for Ron Wilson's head and people have been saying things like "The Leafs would have to win 6 out of every 10 games AND get an OT loss in there 6 times to make the playoffs!" the Maple Leafs have been picking up 6 wins and an OT/SO loss in their last 9 (6-2-1). Hmmm. Look at that. The Maple Leafs are not entirely out of the playoff picture. Weird. Because Damien Cox told us to abandon all hope and all we've been getting is an endless litany of Taylor Hall jokes. Sure, things look better if you take Ron Wilson's advice and read the standings upside down (PRESIDENT'S TROPHY!!1) but there's a lot of time to make them look, if not good, then at least acceptable.

Lots of great videos from last night's game here

Who raps better? Alex Ovechkin or Sidney Crosby? Find out in this video from the future.

PPP — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 00:25:41 -0000

Who raps better? Alex Ovechkin or Sidney Crosby? Find out in this video from the future.

The Barilkosphere's greatest videographer Bloge Salming, has lent his talents to Capitals and...

PPP — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 00:24:07 -0000

The Barilkosphere's greatest videographer Bloge Salming, has lent his talents to Capitals and Penguins fans. Enjoy!

Truculence Tracker: Phil Kessel v. Kris Russell

PPP — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 05:05:38 -0000

This is something new for this season that'll hopefully track all of the Leafs' fights this season. Thanks to Hockey-Fights this time for the video although it sure seems like their website name is kind of familiar. I can't quite put my finger on it...

This wasn't much of a fight. Anyone with eyes can see that. Hell, even Phil the Thrill knows that:

"All right, it was more of a wrestling match," said Kessel, who, after the room had cleared, asked a reporter, "I won the fight, though, right? I got the W?"

Yes Phil, you got the W. I'd say jerseying the other guy and landing the only punch in the fight deserves the judges' decision. I'd add a poll but that's making my browser crash so let's just vote in the comments. The better part was what it represented. As Burke noted during the intermission, opposition teams aren't face-washing the Leafs as much and they definitely are not teeing up on them as much as last year. Part of that is having a killer like Colton Orr roaming the ice but the other part is that the team isn't taking it anymore. Hell, Tomas Kaberle got into a scrum last night and would not stop!

Kessel, when asked about the fight, said that it was just a matter of being fed up with Kris Russel's non-stop cross-checking. Of course, it came out more like "Well, ya know he was cross-checking me purty hard donchaknow so I made 'im stahp".