PowerPlayGoal.com – Hockey From A Different Angle

Super Mario Galaxy 2’s release on the Nintendo Wii is not too far away, and as a long time Mario fan I can’t help but feel all hyped up and type up this article for PowerPlayGoal.com.

“Wait, what?” you might be thinking, “What the hell does Mario have to do with hockey?”

Where do I begin… first of all, there was a certain someone who used to play for the Pittsburgh Penguins who was given the nickname of ‘Super Mario.’ Secondly, Nintendo’s mascot was reportedly seen at the Hockey Hall Of Fame in Toronto, after the announcement of 2K Sports’ NHL 2K9 being made for Wii, and he has also played a bit of puck with Sonic in a certain Winter Olympics themed videogame. All of the above has led me to believe that this portly plumber is in fact, a hockey fan. But the real question for me is: what is his favourite NHL team?

Let’s start with the most obvious choice: the aforementioned Pittsburgh Penguins. Mario Lemieux, who as I mentioned in the above paragraph, was given the nickname ‘Super Mario’ during his career. Of course, Nintendo’s Mario has encountered a fair amount of Penguins during his adventures, most of which have been friendly, so perhaps he is a Pens fan. He’s recently been seen sporting a Penguin suit in New Super Mario Bros. Wii, perhaps in honour of his favourite player.

Or maybe he’s not a Pens fan, because he’s fed up with hearing about Sidney Crosby everywhere. Although he does share quite a bit in common with the Montreal Canadiens: both are red and blue, and both of them are among the oldest, most recognisable and most successful franchises in their respective industries.

But then maybe he’s not a Habs fan either, because he’s not familiar with the French language. He’s supposedly of Italian-American descent and from New York – or more specifically Brooklyn – so he’s probably either a Rangers or Islanders fan. The former shares his colour scheme, but the latter may remind him of the many adventures he’s had. New York City is also home to the Nintendo World Store…

But it’s time for our next suspect: the Dallas Stars. Now that’s an object that’s been in the Mario series for a long time: it’s granted him invincibility over the years, so the Stars must be his favourite team! But then again, there’s been a few times where he’s been given the difficult task of collecting 120 of them, so maybe not. Or maybe the green reminds him too much of his younger brother for his liking.

Now let’s take a look at Western Canada. You’d think he might be a Vancouver Canucks fan since that’s where he first played hockey, but as with the Stars, maybe the colour scheme reminds him too much of his brother. Perhaps he is instead a Calgary Flames fan: after all, his main projectile of choice over the years has been granted to him by the power of a Fire Flower.

Or maybe he’s a Detroit Red Wings fan? Considering they’re his favourite colour, their away jersey colour scheme is very much like Fire Mario, and there is a Wing on the logo that reminds him of the various flight based power-ups he’s used in many of his games. Not to mention that Detroit is the Motor City and Mario does enjoy a lot of go-karting in his spare time.

Finally, there seems to be a very subtle hint that he is in fact an Anaheim Ducks fan. Of course, he’s had various flight-based power-ups as I’ve mentioned before, but in Mario Kart Wii, one of his vehicles is named the Wild Wing, sharing its name with that of the Ducks mascot. There is actually some things he shares in common with the Ducks: cartoon series made to sell merchandise, and horrible movies which both would rather never speak of again.

I’m Wildwing64, and this is What The Puck at PowerPlayGoal.com.

So your favourite team is playing a key game against one of those teams that the NHL media has been raving about – be it because they happen to be one of the better teams in the league with a chance to win the Cup, or because a certain superstar player is the face of that franchise – and you know that this game is important because of either of the aforementioned reasons, or something more important to you as a fan of your team. You know this game must be won; your favourite team must have those two points.  No, they will win this game because your team actually happens to be better.  They are statistically a superior team to the rivals, higher up in the standings, and have scored far more goals than them during this season…

But then, wham! Out of nowhere, the team you are rooting for has somehow been scored on three times in only the first period. To make matters worse, they start racking up penalties later on in the game, allowing Mr. Superstar to score a hat trick, thus putting the icing on the cake for his team, and his ever-inflating ego. But how could this happen? Your team was supposed to be better than this; you were superior in every way! Something just doesn’t seem right…

And that’s just an example situation which could simply be bias from that fan’s point of view. But this doesn’t necessarily mean that they are wrong. Of course, the fans of that other team will see things the exact opposite way, saying that their team deserved to win, they played with more heart, they played fair, etc, etc…

Only The Simpsons can provide an answer…

But yeah, sometimes you can’t help but feel these certain suspicions after a game has taken place. And neither can I. There’s just something about some of the results I’ve seen in recent years that do seem very convenient for the team that has won, almost as if someone has been paid a sweet amount of money behind the scenes to make the convenient losses happen. I won’t go into too much detail, but I’ll just point out three recent examples which I personally feel are quite notable for their apparent (and possible) riggings:

Example A: The 2007-08 NHL Premiere in London, between the Los Angeles Kings and the Anaheim Ducks. In the first game on the Saturday, the Kings were designated the home team, and beat their SoCal rivals in a fairly lopsided 4-1 win. But then on the Sunday, the Ducks were made the home team instead, even having their own goal horn replace that of the Kings, and guess what: they won 4-1, the exact same score of the previous game, but this time in their favour instead. Yes, even as a Ducks fan I can quite comfortably say that at least one of these games, if not both, was probably rigged to keep the fans entertained.

Example B: The 2008-09 Stanley Cup Final. In the previous year, the Detroit Red Wings went all the way and beat the NHL’s apparent favourites, Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins, in their own city in game 6, winning the Stanley Cup. Strangely enough, a year later, these exact same teams played each other again in the Final, but this time with the Pens winning game 7 at Detroit, thus seeing the NHL’s favourite player winning the Stanley Cup for the first time.

Example C: The entire 2009-10 Phoenix Coyotes season. Throughout the franchise’s tenure in Arizona, the team has been seen by some as irrelevant, bleeding money for years while maintaining a “national footprint” that the NHL, or rather Gary Bettman, apparently wants. The team has been mediocre at best for most of their time in the Southwest, and in 2009 filed for bankruptcy, thus making their future in Arizona uncertain. But then, after a lot of things involving legal stuff and Jim Balsille that I can’t be bothered to go into, the NHL bought the team, dead set on keeping them in Phoenix for at least another year. And suddenly, in time for the 2009-10 season after not making many, if any apparent changes, the Coyotes were much better than they had ever been, and would go on to earn their best regular season record in franchise history. They then made it as far as game seven in the first round of the playoffs against the Red Wings… it’s highly possible that the Coyotes’ conveniently miraculous turnaround year was an attempt to draw more fans in (come on, they are owned by the league!), but this apparent plan failed, as the Coyotes finished with the league’s worst overall attendance, and continued to bleed money.

Now I’m not saying that these events were actually rigged, but it’s just speculation on my behalf. I have nothing to prove that these games could have been manipulated in any way… in fact, it’s very hard to determine if and how a hockey game could even be rigged in the first place. With it being such a fast paced sport, there’s no way that the players would be going by a script that has been given to them by the league. And even if the players on one team were being offered money to lose, there’s not even the slightest chance that they’d want to.  The only thing left to blame now is the on-ice officials: maybe they’re being paid to give unfair calls during games to one team, thus giving the other team a better chance of winning? Of course, one could also argue that the officials are being paid to do their jobs, nothing more or nothing less.

But how would an unbiased article such as this be complete without suggesting proof of the opposite point of view: that hockey is just unpredictable and thus just cannot really be rigged?

Let’s take a look at the 2010 playoffs: although Phoenix did make it to game seven, they lost to Detroit in a very one-sided 6-1 game. Then over in the East, we had the Philadelphia Flyers, down 3-0 in their second round series against the Boston Bruins. History wasn’t exactly on their side, but the Flyers basically said “F**k history” and won four straight games, being only the third team in NHL history to achieve such a feat. And how could I forget to mention the Montreal Canadiens, and their surprising upset against the NHL best Washington Capitals, as well as their victory over the NHL’s favourite team, Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins, in the second round? Surely if the latter series was rigged, the NHL wouldn’t have allowed their beloved poster boy to lose such an embarrassing defeat.

So what is my overall conclusion based on this speculation? Well, it’s hard to say whether or not it’s true. It must be difficult to actually rig a game as, like I said earlier, hockey is such a fast-paced game that the players couldn’t possibly be following a set “script” of any kind. If anything, the only possible way that a game could be rigged is if the officials were being paid to officiate in favour of a certain team. Whether or not this actually happens is something we’ll probably never know, but sometimes we just can’t help but wonder.

I’m Wildwing64, and this has been a One Timer at PowerPlayGoal.com

Welcome to The Definitive Fan – The online guide from PowerPlayGoal.com to the types of fans who you’re likely to meet (or not meet) at a game.
Some of these fans clearly have a true passion for the game, others, well, they are just there for something to do.

Fan Type #15 – The Critical Blogger

Bio:

A computer desk, littered with Mars Bar wrappers, the remains of a kitkat, a plate with chicken bones on it, and a coffee cup with a single drip of coffee stained down the side of it.
A windows computer sitting, on the desk buzzing. An internet browser with several pages loaded and solitaire sitting in the background, hidden beneath the browser; forgotten like much of the disk.
This is the home to the blogger, “journalist” of the internet, spreading their views on anything and everything; be it Locally Produced Food to The evils of apple computers.
However, this blogger likes to complain about hockey.
Doesn’t matter whether its Gary Bettman creating a new franchise in Winnipeg or the Montreal Canadians winning the Stanley cup, they are online ranting about it within 15 minutes of it being announced.
Their list of “loyal” followers, often from similar themed blogs post comments on how much they agree with what’s written; whilst those from the outside who dare to say they don’t agree are quietly ushered away to a room out the back and beaten with a hockey stick.

Characteristics:
Years ago, the typical nerd description would suffice; but with the “web 2.0″ evolution being upon us now; its a lot harder to say what sort of person is a hardcore critical blogger.
I would like to imagine personally, someone aged 30-45, bald or balding and they like to wear a white vest; with stains.
Potential smoker.

Favourite Team:
So long as it isn’t an “evil” sunbelt team

Other:
They often like to fill their spare time by causing trouble on forums; starting pathetic facebook groups or going to games where they sit and moan all the time.

=== Disclaimer ===

In addition to this post; I would like to state that this only applies to Critical Bloggers; those who do nothing but moan – and this doesn’t apply to all hockey blogs; some of which we are quite big fans of here on PowerPlayGoal.com