Daily Archives: April 4, 2010

Blah – Blah – Blah Redux

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I think this player should be talking to his ownership and coaching staff about their rebuild plan to compete for a Stanley Cup NOT to our fan base and players about ours.

And then I think this player should stand up and communicate to his team’s fan base about their plan to compete for a Cup and how they will qualify for the playoffs year after year. And then back it up. It is a simple formula: Outline a plan – communicate it - back it up.

As I have noted, the best way to compete for a Cup is to qualify for the playoffs which Columbus has done exactly how many times to date?

Why are we even giving this guy airtime?

Let us move on.

This is What I Believe

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Until we win a Stanley Cup, we won’t earn true respect from pundits; from on ice officials; from mainstream and Canadian media; from the NHL; and from certain fans.

As I have said many times, ”I get the joke.” And I agree.

We can do tit for tat stat analysis. Dan does a great job here and it won’t matter until we join other great teams in saying we are Stanley Cup champions. As a character once said in a great film “THIS is the business that we have chosen. It isn’t personal. It is only business.” Thank you Dan for trying to shed light on our season to date.

We know what we have built: A generationally great and highly competitive team built around a young core with upside; stocked with great and popular players; capable of winning a Stanley Cup; one that makes the playoffs every year; one that sells out its games; one that may win the President’s Trophy this season. We are meeting our commitments to our fan base. It is all nice and all part of the plan. It has been a special season to date. We are making positive strides.

But we know – we know - until we win a Stanley Cup, it is all talk and all stat analysis. We welcome the pressure. It will be coming at us by the boat load. What is fun and exciting is to see if we are up for this great challenge which we compete for with 15 other great and talented teams.

One more week of talk. One more week of regular season games. Enough already. :-)

And R.J. - enjoy the long offseason.

“It Wasn’t Text Book”

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“Again, the win was anything but text book.”

Ok. I now know that the text book of style on winning resides somewhere at the Washington Post.

I am hopeful one day it will be shared with us; we can review the text; and share the scripture with everyone in our organization. We certainly want to be good students and that all starts with understanding the right text books. We don’t want to win text book though, we just want to win. Whatever it takes. That is our text book. :-)

As to another player commenting on our style of play, it is ironic. The players over there didn’t like their D style of play and system and their long term successful coach was fired and their team is being dismantled yet they don’t like our style of play either or our coaching .We beat them last night and we have best record in the NHL.

Our players don’t talk about other teams.

There are times to talk publicly and times to just play out the string. Last night was one of those times to get ready to play some golf and be with family. One shouldn’t write checks that your mouth can’t cash.

Had to vent a bit. That feels better. :-)

Check a Few More Off the List

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We now have the most wins in our franchise’s history and the most points.

We now have the most road wins as well in our history.

I think Mike Green is certainly a Norris Trophy candidate and a strong serious one at that!

We now have 301 goals. That was another goal we set for ourselves in the preseason. There is a big differential between us and the next team in terms of goals scored. About 50 goals.

We are up 17 points with 4 games left to play in the Eastern Conference although we don’t know who we will play in the 8th spot as we have clinched the first spot. By the way, we do know we have NOT won the Eastern Conference Championship - just the right to play all games at home – while we play teams in the East in the playoffs because we have the best record in the East. I have to giggle when fans think we are dumb. We may be stupid though. I get the joke. :-)

We are up 8 points with 4 games left to play in the President’s Trophy race to secure home ice all the way through the Stanley Cup finals should we be so fortunate.

Our last ten games, we are 6-3-1. We aren’t sliding, falling, losing, lazy or whatever other terms some want to use. We are doing what is necessary to win; to gain points; to remain healthy; or to heal up. So far, so good.

Four games left to play. One more week, 3 games at home and 1 game on the road and a back to back session where we play the Penguins in Pittsburgh on Tuesday night after playing Boston on Monday night.

Let us get this week over in one piece with the best record in NHL - celebrate for a nanosecond – catch our breath - and then head into the playoffs. Thank you for all of your support so far. This is fan appreciation week. We care about you all. Go Caps!