TSDMike | June 20, 2009

I was checking web referral stats and I noticed a handful of hits from a Russian sports site, all linking to my rant about Bettman and the Stanley Cup Finals. I checked it out – It was a blog post of some sort with the title “Obituary for the 2008-2009 Red Wings”.

Here’s the website translated to English courtesy of Google Translator.

I guess this would explain all of the “Kiev Mail Order Brides” spam comments that I’ve had to delete over the course of the last couple of weeks.

Category: NHL | 1 Comment »
Tags: conspiracy, detroit red wings, gary bettman, hockey, NHL, pittsburgh penguins, stanley cup finals

TSDMike | June 14, 2009

A lot has been made of the fans’ reaction to the second period hit by Johan Franzen that knocked Sidney Crosby out of the game. I’ve read in comments and blog posts by various writers displaying the ubiquitous opinion that Detroit fans showed no class by cheering the injury to Pittsburgh’s franchise player when it occurred.

But, this is severely out of context, and the criticism is unwarranted.

Category: NFL, NHL, Other/General Commentary | 10 Comments »
Tags: collision, contact sports, detroit red wings, fans in detroit, game 7, hit, injury, joe louis arena, johan franzen, NHL, pittsburgh penguins, sidney crosby, stanley cup finals, violent game

TSDMike | June 13, 2009

Of course, I don’t actually mean that.

Before I go on, I want to say congratulations to the Pittsburgh Penguins and your fans. You fought hard and didn’t quit when you were down 2-0 in the series and again after a 5-0 loss in game five. It’s not your fault that you won.

There’s really no reason to sugarcoat this, so I am simply going to just say it: This series was rigged in favor of the Pen’s. Not to take anything away from them. They played hard, fought hard and persevered. But they shouldn’t have won this series.

Category: NHL | 22 Comments »
Tags: detroit red wings, gary bettman, pittsburgh penguins, stanley cup finals

TSDMike | June 3, 2009

Twenty-one seconds.

Twenty-one seconds in the second period of game three of the Stanley Cup Finals kept this series from being a boring sweep by the heavily favored Red Wings. Twenty-one seconds prevented the Finals from being over in six days.

The whole playoff season this year has been a disaster for Gary Bettman and the NHL. In a league fighting for popularity and for relevance in the sports world, this has done nothing to bolster their position. Out of the 14 completed series, only the second round matchup of Pittsburgh and Washington had any excitement to it. The Penguins went on to storm through an overachieving Carolina team to reach the finals for the second straight year.

Detroit swept through their opening round against Columbus, then went seven games against an underrated Anaheim team – but that series should have been done in five games. Had Jonas Hiller not made 7,000 saves in game two’s triple overtime marathon, the Wings would have steamrolled the Ducks easily.

Category: NHL | 2 Comments »
Tags: blackhawks, evgeni malkin, gary bettman, nbc, NHL, pittsburgh penguins, Playoffs, red wings, sidney crosby, stanley cup finals